2nd February, 2010
Catching up- There was an old lady who swallowed some snow and the Letter Gg
I feel a bit disorganized. We’ve been doing the alphabet in Itty Bitty Order, which starts with the easiest letter to write and progresses. We were supposed to have done O, Q, and G during the month of January. We only did one unit last month, There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow. We squeezed in a few activities for the letter Gg.
Alphabet
G is for glitter
Literature
I don’t suggest this book for use in a curriculum. I didn’t like it for a couple of reasons. The use of the word *puke*, and the fact that I had to explain to Ada what a pipe was. We’re very anti smoking around in our home, and well, I just wouldn’t have used it. II bought the book off of Amazon, and didn’t read it before we started the lesson. That was a lesson learned. In library school we we had several discussions on how to deal with parents who challenge books in school, and the balance of the freedom of speech, etc… so I do, on some level, feel like a traitor to my trade, but in the end, one of the perks of homeschooling is being able to appropriately shelter your children.
Crafts
Coffee filter snowflakes
I had every intention of doing an entire curtain filled with snowflakes, but the cutting turned out to be too hard for Tater, and the hodge podgeing was a nightmare. So, we stuck with just 4.
Since Tater was already in her painting shirt… she wanted to paint.
Last but not least, my fashionista.
Posted at 6:23 pm | Comment (1)
31st January, 2010
Missing and definitely in action
I have been AFK… for good reason. I’d like to introduce our newest addition… Spud…
Tater and Cheezer have been watching lots of educational TV. Spud was born on the 11th, I spent the entire week in the hospital. My parents stayed the next week with me, and this past week, I was all alone with all three of my children for the first time. When I brought Tater home, I distinctly remember crying to a friend that the only goal I had that week was to mop the kitchen, and didn’t get that done. She laughed until 2 months later- she had her first child and understood completely. I am super woman in comparison that that first time mom. Super woman sporting kryptonite. My mama left the house spotless, and it has been upkeep at this point. I’m still tired, but ready to come out of hiding and get some stuff done!
Posted at 9:34 pm | Comments (5)
5th December, 2009
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie and the Letter Mm
We had a really rough start to the week. The trip home from Alabama really took it out of us- well- me. However, looking back on our pictures, we really did get a lot done.
We are proud to be Official Itty Bitty Bookworms. You can follow us, and the other official bookworms, at the IBB blog. Each of us uses it differently. We use it as he foundation of our program. Each month when I get the kit, I choose which three books we’d like to cover that month. Each month has four. Three of the four weeks introduces a letter of the alphabet, ending the month with a review. Since we only plan for three weeks, we omit the review week.. I use the alphabet activities provided in the kit- a clip art page we use for our letter chart, and also a letter itty bitty book. It’s how we always start our week. The kit provides a template for each letter, but I prefer to use the templates available at DLTK. It takes a little digging to get to them, but they include both the upper and lowercase letters.
Additionally, I use the following blogs in order to supplement our activities:
Confessions of a Homeschooler- this mama has some awesome activities on her blog. I am heartbroken when we’re covering a letter she hasn’t done yet. She has GREAT printables. You’ll want to have a laminator, so you might resist the urge to check her out until you do.
Homeschool Creations- Jolanthe also provides a great deal of inspiration. Scroll all the way down to the bottom to “alphabet time” to see each letter’s respective activities.
Refined Metals Academy- is another site that I find myself surfing to get idea for letter activities.
This is not by any means the end of our inspiration, just the sites I seem to visit weekly. I have been more than pleased with our IBB curriculum. We were set to do a unit on a title called Mmm, Cookies this week. However, after reading the book, I decided not to use it. The activities in the kit were wonderful, so I decided to substitute one of our favorites- If You Give a Mouse a Cookie . We’d been invited to a Kid’s Cookie Party this week, and what else says Christmas like cookies!
As I said, I’d planned on taking it easy this week, but we really did get a lot done- naturally. We’re going to continue our study of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie next week, and may even get motivated enough to do a lapbook from Homeschool Share. I’ve already printed, cut, and laminated these wonderful activities from Suite 101.com. It was the first time I had used the site. It’s loaded with advertisements and difficult to navigate due to the fact, but the activities are cute.
The first thing we did this week was to start and finish the craft for our Kid’s Craft Exchange at There’s No Place Like Home Homeschooling Board. We took it all the way to Alabama and back without completing it. I was very proud of how they turned out, and the girls really do most of the work. Our gift was a modified version of this ABC fishing game from First Palette.
I was disappointed to miss our monthly MOPS meeting Tuesday morning. To get our Christmas activities started on time, we did a Santa Beard Calendar and a Christmas Garland.
On Wednesday Daddy took Tater to co-op while I went to an OB appointment. There’s no missing co-op.
Thursday we missed another MOPS activitity but did make our Kids Cookie Party at my girlfriend’s house. Mainly, I sat and let my kids run a muck.
Friday- we managed to get down to “school”. These wonderful M&M activities came from Confessions of a Homeschooler (I didn’t even use half of them).
Language Arts
Pre-writing skills:
Letter Mm alphabet sort:
Letter Mm Chart:
I let Tater do this completely independently this week. She did a great job and was quite proud.
Math – Tater has been getting much better her letter recognition. Once we get 6, 9, and 10 out of the way she’ll know 1-10. She can count, she understands one to one correspondence, just the visual recognition isn’t there quite yet. We introduced the number zero. I remember struggling with the idea in the first grade, so she’s already smarter than her mama!
This activity was a HUGE hit. Who doesn’t love eating M&M’s in school!
Literature
We read for 30 minutes before bed every night, however, something about reading during “school” is so calming. We stuck to the series for our school books. I picked up two more at Kohl’s this afternoon that we’ll include next week.
Life School- I can’t believe I’ve never thought to get Daddy to take a picture, but one a month they trudge out to Home Depot or Lowes for one of their Kids How-To clinics. Home Depot hosts a Kids Workshop on the first Saturday of every month. It is designed for children aged 5-12, but Tater has no problem completing the project. Home Depot seems to have less- commercial, more useful projects than Lowes. I was kind of surprised when I saw the pictures that they used no goggles, but I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they were out. For completing the project, each child gets a pin and a certificate of completion. Both stores offer a kid’s sized apron to keep and take home.
Lowes has their Build and Grow Clinics more often- so far every Saturday this week. You sign up on line in order to participate. Each child gets an apron, a patch to commemorate that activity, and a pair of safety goggles. Again, Tater has no problem participating in the activities. She loves to go “build” with Daddy. Mama enjoys the Saturday morning break.
To see what other preschoolers did this week, please visit Preschool Corner
Posted at 10:34 pm | Comments (4)
25th October, 2009
No school this week
We had our friends- the twinadoes over all day Monday and didn’t get any school done. Tuesday and Wednesday were MOPS and co-op respectively. Thursday morning is just a blur. I remember grocery shopping and napping instead of going to swimming lessons before going to our small group meeting. Friday was spent vegging out after the busy week. Next week we’re going to try to squeeze in the letters D and P.
Posted at 11:29 pm | Comment (1)
25th July, 2009
Mommy- we do school!
We’ve received all of our materials. Tater was very excited to see the boxes sitting at our front door. “What do we got? More books!”. When Daddy got home she’d tell him of all the new books she had received that day. I am impressed with the simplicity of Explode the Code. After reading the first couple of pages, I learned that there was some optional supplemental material I had not ordered. Suddenly I’m not saving so much money in doing this at home. (I’ve asked for a laminator for my birthday). There is a very cute alphabet wall chart that you can order to use with the program that I’m very tempted to buy. It’s on sale at CBD this month. Tater isn’t ready for a phonics program, but I anticipate probably next summer she will be.
Tater is very excited to start “school”. I’ve settled on Sept 14- well, because that’s the day Christian Liberty Preschool in Illinois starts their program- and they are the designers of the program I am using. I want the Christmas lessons to correspond with Christmastime. I could start earlier and put in week long breaks, but I need time to get prepared.
Prepared for what? My house is in a constant state of upkeep. I want things to be clean and organized. I want a beautiful school room with shelves, a desk, a pocket wall calendar to do daily orientation, an American flag, my laminator. I’ll steal one of Daddy’s many computers and load it up with educational software. Maybe next year- or by time she starts kindergarten. This year, I’ve decided to do it in our dining room. I just want to be orgnized about it. I’m going to get a rolling cart and plop a desk apprentice on top of it. I made it through 3 years of grad school on my dining room table. I taped outlines of papers to the wall, littered the floor with index cards, and dared anyone to cross the threshhold when I was in writing mode. I’m sure one or two years of at home preschool will be just fine there also. It’ll give me time to scour craigslist for good deals on classroom furniture, and to nag daddy into painting the schoolroom.
I’ve also recently read The Well Trained Mind. I checked it out from the library and I loved it so much that I’m going to be getting my own copy. Heather (Camian Academy in my links) was the first person to mention it. It’s a great resource, and puts into words what I haven’t been able to articulate about my desire to homeschool. It’s more than controlling the influences my children have at an early age, but it’s also being there to recognize their strengths and weaknesses, to be sure that they aren’t being dumbed down in order to keep up with the rest of the class, or passed over when they haven’t fully learned a concept- but the class is ready to move on. Children don’t learn the same way, and it’s ridiculous to teach them all the same way. If you’re thinking about homeschooling, or homeschooling, I’d suggest you read it. In each section it gives suggestions on resources to use. I was happy to see that Explode the Code was on there. I’ve quickly learned to be cautions when reading the Well Trained Mind Forums. One can quickly start to second guess their curriculum choices, opting for the next best thing. The book suggests switching when it’s obvious a program isn’t working, but once you find something that works with your child- to stick to it. There will always be something new out, and I can already sense that I could easily be one of those parents posting with curriculum regrets.
Posted at 2:18 pm | Comments (2)
