Showing posts with label preschool. Show all posts
Showing posts with label preschool. Show all posts

Monday, July 16, 2012

Day 1 of School!!

Our Latin lesson for the day:
to one of you: Salve!
to all of you:  Salvete!
"Hello"

It was a lovely day of school!  I over slept.  And the boys woke up so they purposely let me sleep in...how quick they learn. :-)

 None the less...we got started and had a successful day.  Ben started his third grade studies, Nate first grade and Eli is following along with the boys Science, History, Christian Studies, and Latin...but for him we will still do Montessori activities along with follow the Highlands Latin Schools 2 day a week Jr. Kindergarten.  In a short while we will begin learning the memory work for Classical Conversations and attending the Friday school.
Here is a picture of Nate starting his History notebook for Story of the World Vol.One....I am sooooo excited about a history that has hands on projects all along.  This is going to be a fun year.  I feel a little guilty about getting to learn along and enjoy the experiences with the boys.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Montessori #3!!

Sorting!!

This one is a winner!!  Right now these divided trays are everywhere!!  I picked this one up a the Dollar General for $1.  
Again this idea was from the workshop with Debbie Fox from The Bottom Shelf.  If you ever get a chance to attend one of her workshops do...her knowledge is so workable. { She even shared the basics of dinner swap clubs!}  There is info on her site on how to book her as a workshop speaker.
 Word of caution...I picked up beads from the Dollar Tree...I plan to use them in another lesson also...but pick 
items that is safe for your childs age.  Other sorting objects could be...dried beans, buttons, colored marshmellos...just look around...see what is available!  Enjoy!!

Monday, May 14, 2012

Montessori #2!!

Hammering!!
Eli loves this!!
This kit I purchased from Debbie Fox ~~the Bottom Shelf~~
It has ten wooden golf tees
a lobster wooden mallet
non drying clay
and a plastic bowl.


yes he did hammer his fingers a few times...but he did catch on and played quietly hammering, hammering, hammering!!

Tips from Debbie:
~~these lessons are only available to him during lesson time
~~ he must put the lesson kit back neatly on the shelf
~~lessons are rotated to keep them fun and fresh
~~assign each of the older schooling children a 30 minute time to spend "working" with the preschooler.  {I used that idea the day after the workshop and all three boys enjoyed "Eli time".}

Saturday, May 12, 2012

Homeschool Montessori #1 (or how to get a 30-45 minute break!!)

Our homeschooling year has closed.  But at the end I came across a HUGE secret for success that somewhere along the way everyone had forgotten to share with me :-(  Montessori--Tot Boxes what ever you want to call it...hands on skills play.  

Our homeschool co-op FAITH sponsored a speaker to do a workshop on what to do with that preschooler while you are schooling your other children.  Of course work with them too...but sometimes they have got to get constructively busy.

So Debbie Fox from The Bottom Shelf came and shared with us how to make these montessori lessons, use them, organize our time, our life,and she offered some kits that she had already made!  I will be sharing those also.  But for now I am sharing one that I made!--her idea :-) Thanks Debbie!!

Pouring and Funneling

Kit:
tray walmart $1.98
funnels dollar tree $1
measuring spoons and cups dollar tree $1
small bowls my kitchen
rice



Eli played with this at least an hour..totally mesmerized.  He only gets to play with the kits during lesson time.

Thursday, January 19, 2012

100 DAYS of School!!!


When Ben was in Kindergarten he went to a public school and on the 100th day they had a celebration.  I made Ben a special shirt to wear to school that day.  Nate fell in love with the shirt!  He called it the "party shirt" and wore it proudly every time he could find it in the closet.  So with Nates' 100 day of Kindergarten nearing I made him a a special shirt!  {{and one for each of the other two boys :-)}}





Wednesday, August 31, 2011

22nd Day of School!!

I am so behind on posting about life, school, ect.....but here is a go!

So far we have had three field trips!

The first one was to the Louisville Zoo!  Funny but the boys favorite things about the zoo are the playground and the african culture exhibit!!


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The next week we went to the Kentucky State Fair...their favorite exhibit was the 4H bug collections and the fossil digging from Mammoth Cave!
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I was totally taken by the winning 4H cake!!
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This Monday we went to the Air and Space Museum at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton Ohio.
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I will have to find more pictures of that later :-)

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Preschool File Folder Games





We have all purchased those $1 workbooks at the Dollar Tree.  I just saved some games and pages.  I laminated the numbers and letters to file folders.  With envelopes or pockets also.  Then I slit the pocket and envelopes open to hold the game pieces--which I also laminated.  For the letters the child matches the lower case to the uppercase.  And then I cut out various pictures for them to match the beginnig sound of the picture to the letter.  Easy, fun and inexpensive!




The DIY Show Off

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Feild trip





Our annual trip to the pumpkin patch was the perfect feild trip to go along with our Autumn Treasures lapbook study that we are doing.  Also in science we are studying the five senses...and what more of a perfect place to use all of the senses than a farm!

Saturday, September 11, 2010

First Day --of Homeschool Co-op

so Thursday was our first day of Enrichment classes with one of our homeschool groups.  Ben and Nate were both excited to get new backpacks and attend classes and hopefully make new friends.
Eli got to go too...he just used Nates backpack from last year.  All he had to take was a pull-up, wipes and a snack.

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Homeschool Product Review: Learning Pallette


I am in love with the Learning Palette from Learning Wrap Ups!  This game can be expanded by adding new card packets.  It is so much more than "busy" work...The student even check and corrects his project as part of the whole process.  I purchased one base and card kits for each of the boys.  Even my four year old can learn with it and check himself while I work with my six year old.  I purchased my first set from a store but then found that I could save $$$$$ by purchasing the card kits directly from  Learning Wrap ups.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

DAY 38!

37 lessons and one field trip so far!  And here is basically our schedule that we try to maintain:
Wipe off board that I got at the dollar spot in Target!!

My pocket chart (also from Targets dollar spot) and the cards made from blank sentence strips from the Dollar Tree.  Here you see an exercise to determine when to use which "k" ending sound.
Crayola wipe off chart for spelling practice.
For computer center time.  Great FREE early elementary language arts study.
Nates Alpabet cards---from the Dollar Tree!!
Totally awesome BINGO games...first grade level from Targets Dollar Spot.
Nate working on his coloring.
Great find at KSS this week....there are so many projects that we can do with this in our Science Center.  Also...if you have more than on student...buy an extra magnetic wand.
The boys try different items to make a magnetic maze on cookie sheets.
Ben reading...leisurely.


Keeping schooling fun.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Measure of Success

Nate is loving not going to preschool this year.  In fact now when he is misbehaving we will ask him if he wants to be good or we can call the school and send him back....he immediately begs to learn at home.

He could do his little workbooks with lots of direction but was not enjoying them ---just enduring them.  I decided that even though this is Preschool we both needed more structure and direction.  So I found the World Book scope and sequence for every grade on line.  The list looks easy enough to complete.

I felt that Nate would also be more apt to do his lessons the more successful that he felt.  So I ordered a{pre}preschool set of books from Christian Light Publications.
These books are very,very basic in skills and concepts.  So far Nate is enjoying them.  The only thing that we are having a problem with using these books is that they are based on an Anabaptist lifestyle....seems in my eyes{outsider looking in}  to be between Amish and Mennonite.  So in an activity where it would have objects that the student had to match to the activity Nate is not always familiar with these.  {sewing machine, needle,etc}  and in one exercise he has to distinguish male and female clothing--I do always wear skirts but I{nor anyone else he knows} wears a dress with a cape.  Otherwise the books are a great spring board to early education.  I understand that these books were written for the Anabaptist people and I am thankful that they are sharing their work with us.

In addition to this stage of Preschool we are doing rote counting, tactile letter studies and traditional children's literature.  During the study of literature we are practicing:
  • speech
  • comprehension
  • sequencing
For literature we are doing nursery rhymes and traditional fairy tales.

After the Basic Skills series I plan to move on to the ABC Readiness Series by CLP and probably stay with that curriculum until Nate's first grade then move him to ABEKA.