Chore Chart

One of the things that I think Angel Girl is ready for is a Chore Chart. Angel Girl loves to help around the house. This will be a way to keep track and also introduce her slowly. I will be introducing 1 chore a month and focus on helping her learn how to do it correctly. The most important thing to me is doing it regularly and together with set expectations for how it will be done. January we will be working on picking up her toys every day. We already do the clean up game but this will be more specific. I do not plan on rewarding her with anything but stickers on the chart.

Jan. Lang. Theme CAP Looking L to R

January's Language Theme is Concepts about Print, Looking left to right. This is introducing children to print and our conventions of print. Until a child is asked to read they can look at the world in any way or order. Then we introduce this concept of reading that includes looking at print from left to right. Many children pick up the conventions of reading just by being read to and some very simple quick activities. This month we will be focusing on introducing looking. This does NOT mean that I expect Angel Girl to understand this concept and I am sure that these activities will be repeated many different times and combined with lots of story reading in our home. The activities shared this month are great ways to introduce looking at print although many of them do not even ask the child to look at words but rather to get use to organized looking.

January Learning Themes

Language: Concepts About Print looking l to r
Writing: Pencil lines

Math: Counting to 5
Shape: Square

Science: Body Parts

Social Studies: Family

Art: Color: White
Process: Glueing

Music: Clapping to the Rythm

Physical: Throwing

Emotional: Please and Thank You

Chore Chart (a new addition): clean up toys

Tick Tock Game

So Sweet Boy loves to play the Tick Tock game. I have him face me and gently rock him back and forth singing this little song:
Tick tock, tick tock, I'm a little cuckoo clock. Tick tock, tick tock. Now it's striking one 'o clock.
We do this until mama is tired or we get to 12.

Hand print Turkey's

Yes I know it is well past Thanksgiving but I want to remember this activity for next year Basically I put paint on both of Angel Girl's hands (which she loved) and then printed them on the paper. After they dried I had her color "feathers". She preferred just coloring but when daddy came home she told him all about how she painted with her hands and was very very proud of her picture.

singing video

So some of the songs that we enjoy are:
Popcorn Popping
Jesus Wants Me For a Sunbeam
Pop Goes the Weasel
Old MacDonald
ABC's
Twinkle Twinkle
Head Shoulders Knees and Toes
Baa Baa Black Sheep

What are some other great Pre-school songs?

Word Families Idea

Found this website here and loved this word families idea. Thought you would too.

Hands on Homeschool

So I found this handsonhomeschool.com and am interested in thoughts....I looks like a good basic program that can be added/changed as needed. What do you think? Remember I work part time so this way I don't have to start from scratch which takes time I don't always have.

Writing Practice

I want Angel Girl to understand how to appropriately use pencils, pens, crayons and markers. Kumon has great workbooks that focus on these basic skills. The one we are working through right now is the tracing book. Angel Girl will grudgingly do the page as long as I let her "color" the rest of the page when she is done. I do try to remind her how to correctly hold the pencil and she seems to do a good job. We do not do this every day, or even every week, just whenever we have a few minutes and Angel Girl wants to.

Ball Activity

Today we decided to focus on rolling a ball. I got out two balls and one cardboard box to start with. Then we took turns trying to roll the ball into the box (this would work with an empty formula can as well). They had fun rolling the ball. Then I let them each have their own box and ball and let them loose to experiment.

They only played with it for like 1 minute after I walked away but hey, at least they had fun.