School & the Zoo!

What a busy day!  We worked hard in school in the morning, then went to the zoo in the afternoon.  I don't know about the kids, but I'm ready for bed!!

Adeline's journal entry this morning was a picture of her family... and Tinkerbell.  Tinkerbell got the most time and attention.  I asked her what we were doing in the picture and she said, "Cartwheels."  Of course, why didn't I see that!

As requested, Braxton got his marker board activity.  Tracing a line is still above his ability level, but he enjoyed the activity, nevertheless.

He was more successful at lacing.

Adeline chose to play with blocks while Braxton worked at the desk.  Then she wanted me to take her picture.

Adeline played the cupcake file folder game during math.  She did really well!

And Sadie used her time to tear apart the art center.  She looks pretty proud of herself, huh?

 We talked about triangles in math, then made triangle hats.  They look a bit like dunce caps, but the kids don't know that!  They had a great time decorating them with glitter glue.

On the fourth day of reading The Kissing Hand, we discussed nocturnal animals and then completed a worksheet about the things we do in the day and at night.

And then the zoo!!  The kids had a lot of fun in the butterfly house.  The butterflies seemed extra friendly today.

One more day and we will have the first week down!!  Tomorrow we have 3 friends joining us for school.  Wish me luck!

Day 3

Today didn't feel quite as exciting as yesterday.  Maybe it was simply that the activities weren't as "fun" as yesterday or maybe it was that my level of enthusiasm matched my level of energy, which I'm pretty sure was/is in the negative range.  It wasn't a bad day, just more of a ho-hum day.

I decorated our bulletin board last night with our kissing hands.  

Braxton worked on a file folder game and did really well!  I made it a couple years ago for Adeline.  This one is nice for colors, shapes, matching and counting to 2.

More practice at the marker board.  Braxton told me that he wants a marker board activity tomorrow.

Farmer Brown lost his sheep!  Adeline helped count them and put them in their fence.

Another day of reading The Kissing Hand.  Afterward, we traced our hands, then estimated how many "kisses" would fit on the drawings.  Adeline thought 2 kisses would fit on her hand.  Of course, Braxton said the same thing.  Turns out, Braxton fit 16 and Adeline got 18.  They were both allowed to eat 3.  :)

Tuesday

Another day down!  Even though I was happy with yesterday, today went a LOT smoother.  Sadie was content more often than not, I made a few adjustments after re-examining yesterday and I think everyone was more relaxed in general.  I don't know - it was just a good day!  We had some fun activities today.  

In science, we experimented with mixing colors.  You can't go wrong with finger paint!  

 Sadie thought this was GREAT!

After the experiment, Adeline decided that her favorite color to make is purple and that she really likes purple butterflies.  However, she couldn't find her purple crayon, so she chose to draw a blue butterfly in her journal.  The purple crayon was located at the end of the project, so the butterfly got a couple purple dots.  For now, I'm doing most of the writing for her, but she did write "Adeline" and "purple" by herself.

Braxton had fun with Unifix cubes during his one-on-one time.  We worked on counting to ten and stacking the cubes - a nice fine motor skill activity!  We did a little bit of pattern copying, too.

Adeline practiced writing letters and drawing shapes with sidewalk chalk.

Then we decided to play alphabet hopscotch!  I got in trouble because my "big feet" were erasing the lines.  So I sat in the shade and watched instead.  :)

Hopscotch... or Twister... whatever!

"Hopscotch" is actually the name of our curriculum's mascot.  Last night he was busy making bunny trails on our marker board for Adeline to trace.  Sadie thought it was hilarious to watch him bounce across the board.

"Look, Mom!  Choking hazards!"

Adeline had a turn with the Unifix cubes, too.  She made stacks of cubes from 1-10.  The biggest challenge here is keeping your baby sister from knocking over the towers!

We read The Kissing Hand again today, then made handprints with heart shaped "kisses" on them.  I placed a small heart cookie cutter in the wet paint and let the kids pour glitter into it.  I think they turned out cute!  Sadie wasn't a huge fan of getting her hand stamped.  Can you tell?  :)

We were done again today right at lunch time.  8:30 to 11:45ish seems to be our schedule.  We are all looking forward to tomorrow!

And we're off!

We did it!  Day one was a success!  I am utterly exhausted, but pleased with the day.  So here's how it went.  After a yummy egg, toast and smoothie breakfast, school began at 8:30.  Here's the crew:

 I don't know how to get them to give me natural smiles.  This is what happens every time a camera is pointed their way.

Sadie enjoyed lounging in the doorway during lessons.  Check out her cute toenails!  Daddy painted them last night.

During Braxton's one-on-one time, he stamped the letter Aa.  It's suppose to be a do-a-dot sheet, but the one place that sells do-a-dot markers was out of them when I was there.  This worked just as well.  The sheet came from the Confessions of a Homeschooler blog.

About halfway through the morning, we headed outside to burn off some energy.  We made a "grocery store obstacle course" because earlier in the morning we read about a new family moving to town and the community helping them out by bringing over groceries.

The kids weaved in and out of the canned goods on the scooters Daddy made.  We (yes, even me!) went on our backsides, tummies, and knees.  Then we took turns pushing each other.  Super fun!

Back to business.  Adeline reviewed the alphabet by naming the letters.  I'm glad she remembered so much from Pre-K!

Math this week is a review of basic shapes.  Today it was circle.  This week will be pretty easy for Adeline, but I'd rather start off too easy than too hard.  I'm pretty sure she's giving her brother the "preschoolers are soooo immature" look.

"Mom!  Take my picture!  CHEESE!!"

They were actually really excited about this activity.  Can you tell?  :)  Even though it might seem odd since the kids don't leave me during the day, I wanted to start the year with the book "The Kissing Hand."  Love it, such a sweet story.  We have activities based on that book all week.  Today we made heart shaped sugar cookies (like the heart kiss on the raccoon's hand).  Yes, we did it in the basement living room because Miss Sadie was asleep.  :)

We finished the day with a puzzle - one that I bought on a garage sale and consequently is missing a piece.

Well, there are the highlights!  We made it through our entire schedule just in time for lunch - which was followed up by sampling the tasty cookies!

Now this mama needs to get some sleep!  Tomorrow promises to be just as busy!

Ready, Set, Go!

I'm ready!  I'm ready?  I think I'm ready.  As ready as possible, anyway.  With the exception of a couple non-critical things on my "To Do" list, I'm all set to begin the 2011-2012 school year.  Wow!  On one hand, I feel super prepared and excited for the coming year.  On the other, I'm totally overwhelmed!  I'm at the point where we need to jump in feet first (or cannonball, haha Jessica!) and figure out how this will all come together.  Because it will come together, one way or another. So I thought I'd start the year with a tour of our classroom.

I'm really excited about our new art supplies!  I got some good deals through Discount School Supply.

We will be using Five in a Row for part of our curriculum.  Each week includes a geography lesson.  I hate to admit that I'll probably be learning as much as the kids when it comes to world geography!

We had to take down our Teaching Tree from last year in order to make room for the maps, so this year we will put the daily weather picture above our marker board.

Yay for a pocket chart!  I was so excited to get this.  Right now we have our daily schedule in it with Dottie the Ladybug serving as a marker.

Did I mention that our classroom is also a spare bedroom?  :)

This poor plant!  He's been a bit neglected over the summer - I forget about him when we aren't in the room everyday!  It will be the kids' job to water Mr. Plant.  Maybe he will fare better that way!  Adeline wants to add a fish to our room, too.

Kathi, if you're reading this, see we still don't have closet doors!  Some things never change.

We're using the K5 curriculum from Bob Jones University.  It's the same publisher we used last year for preschool.  A friend of mine is teaching music for me.  She will teach Adeline a pre-piano course with the glockenspiel.  Braxton is getting my revised version of Letter of the Week.  Thanks to Confessions of a Homeschooler for some great ideas and free materials!  Love that site!    

So there you have it!  See you Monday!

2 weeks left...

of summer!  And then we officially begin Kindergarten with Adeline and Year 1 Preschool with Braxton!! I can't believe how quickly the summer flew by!  We spent the days doing whatever sounded like fun - which meant lots of time at the park, zoo, and pool.  Definitely lots of time at the pool these past couple of weeks.  It has been hot!  But now the weather is starting to act more like pre-fall and we are again thinking of making a trip to the zoo.

So here's where I'm at.  Wow, do I appreciate first year teachers!  I can't begin to add up all the time I have spent planning and prepping the coming year.  And our K material is mostly planned out for me!  I've added and tweaked it to fit our needs and interests, and then threw in some weekly themes to cover topics I want to cover and to have material that's flexible enough to be used with a 3 year old and 5 year old (and in some instances, a 1 year old, too!).  I have the whole year sketched out and the first 4 weeks planned in detail.  I hope to get another 4-8 weeks in detail before the year begins.  We'll see what happens!

Our daily schedule looks like this:

Calendar Time & AWANA Review

Bible Truths & Memory Work

Beginnings: Part 1 (Adeline's Language Arts/Science/Social Studies)

Adeline Break/Braxton one-on-one time

Beginnings: Part 2

Snack

P.E. or something like it :)

Beginnings: Part 3

Math

Theme Activities

Lunch

D.E.A.R. (Drop Everything And Read)

Quiet Time for Braxton and Sadie/"Big Kid" activity with Adeline - We will be doing a VeggieTales curriculum, music practice (more about that in a later post!), Spanish intro, board games and AWANA homework on different days of the week

Quiet Time for Adeline

I have no idea how long this will take and I imagine each day will be slightly different.  I'm allotting half a day or about 3-4 hours.  Sadie plays really well by herself in the morning, so I'm counting on her being content to play around us and with Braxton.  That will probably be one of my bigger challenges.  Braxton doesn't have a "curriculum" per-say, but will participate throughout the morning.  He will join Adeline for Calendar Time, Bible Truths, P.E., Theme Activities, and D.E.A.R.  His one-on-one time will be spent working on his AWANA homework and getting an introduction to letters, numbers, colors and shapes.  Both kids are super excited to start!  I am, too!

So let the countdown begin!  I'll be back in a couple weeks to tell you how it's going.

And no more promises of pictures.  It just doesn't ever seem to happen.  Sorry!