Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Christmas Day 1

I am trying to do a Christmas and an activity. 

Today we read Mooseltoe.

Then we made our Christmas cards using stickers, crayons, markers, and construction paper.  Basically I let Angel Girl do what ever she wanted for each card.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

What We Read This Last Couple Weeks

Old Hat New Hat by Stan and Jan Berenstain - letter H
Inch by Inch by Leo Lionni - letter I

Yummy by Lucy Cousins - yes this book again lol we read The 3 Billy Goats Gruff and did activities like acting it out, and making goat puppets.

Halloween books just for fun
Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson
Spooky Hour by Tony Mitton
Who Said Boo? by Nancy White Carlstrom
Fright Night Flight by Laura Krauss Melmed
Zoom Broom by Margie Palatinin
The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams - personal fav!!! Read it to a group of Angel Girls friends and had them do the motions.  Totally fun.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

What We Read This Week and The Week Before

Yellow Ball by Molly Bang - doing more activities from Before Five in a Row

You Touch With Your Fingers by Melvin and Gilda Berger
Touch! Touch! by Riki Levinson
Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb by Al Perkins - we used these books to learn about the sense of touch.  We talked a lot about touching and then touched a lot different types of textures and tried to describe them.

Tumble Bumble by Felicia Bond - With this book we named the animal on each page, then I had Angel Girl finish the rhyme when it was an animal. 

Anno's Counting Book by Anno - LOVE this book it has so much potential for math activities.  For this reading we just counted the houses on each page and some of the other fun things.  Angel Girl started to show a bit of an understanding of 1 to 1 matching, not consistent but she was starting.  I would have her hop on my finger to practice 1 to 1 and then she would do it independently on the same page.

Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown - lead in to the letter G activities
The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss - lead in to letter F activities

For fun we have a stack of Halloween books that Angel Girl will pick a book from to read.  Here are the ones we have read so far.
Boo by Robert Munsch
Clifford's First Halloween by Norman Bridwell
The Hallo-wiener by Dav Pilkey
One Spooky Night by Laura Leuck
The Best Halloween Hunt Ever by John Speirs
Skeleton Hiccups by Margery Cuyler

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Math Fun

So I got a copy of Miquion Math which I think is AWESOME.  Angel Girl is not quite ready to do any of the activities but I am starting to do some things to someday prepare her for it.  So this week we did Free Play with Cuisanaire Rods.
Basically she was given the rods to do what ever she wanted to.
So she made a house.  It was fun to watch how carefully she added rods.
When she was done I suggested making a train and modeled how to do it.
She created a train and had people riding it (the upright rods).
The goal of Free Play is to let her experience the rods and make casual observations.  Some of the things she did today was name the colors of the rods..."Mama I need the orange one" and compare orientation, in her train some are laying down and others are standing up. 
The goal is to do things with the C-rods every week and observe what she is noticing.

What We Read This Week

The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper - to teach letter E

Yummy by Lucy Cousins - this is one of my new favorite books!
The Three Little Pigs by Margot Zemach - We read it and then did activities such as making a house of foam. We then huffed and puffed and tried to blow our house down.

1,2,3 to the Zoo by Eric Carle - We are making a number book so we read this book and then entered the number 1 to our book.  We counted out 1 bear and 1 sticker.

Yellow Ball by Molly Bang - to use with Before Five In A Row

Thursday, September 23, 2010

What We Read This Week

Its been a slow reading week....or maybe just a busy life week...so here is what we have read.
Go, Dog, Go by P.D. Eastman -Used to intro letter d


Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See by Bill Martin - we are doing some of the activities from Homeschool Shares
Baby Bear, Baby Bear What Do You See by Bill Martin

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

What We Read This Week

C is for Clown by Stan and Jan Berenstain - used this to intro letter C
Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina

Alphabet Adventure by Audrey Wood - after we read it we found objects that started with the letters in the alphabet just like Charley's alphabet did

The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle
- while reading we made the sounds of the animals in the book and followed the spider's web around.
Miss Spider's Sunny Patch Kids by David Kirk (extra credit book has transracial adoption in it)
We did Spider stuff like making a web with glue on paper (when it dries you can feel the glue is raised up). Walking a spider web and pretending to be a spider.

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Fun Things We Have Done

We read...a lot!
Counted 1 counting bear.
Sang a Goldilocks song.
Practiced writing with our Kumon books.
Colored on large and small pieces of paper.
Made circle shapes with our bodies.
Learned how to put our dirty clothes in the hamper and make our bed.
Practiced putting the silverware away correctly.
We beaded pipe cleaners.

Sunday, September 5, 2010

What We Read This Week

The Berenstain's B Book - which was used to introduce the letter b. We traced sandpaper letters, added it to our letter book, colored a b and found it with magnetic letters.

Tickle Monster by Josi Bissett
- read and tickled as we went. Its a fun book with body parts...the only problem is it uses cutsie names for body parts
Look, Baby! Listen, Baby! Do, Baby! by True Kelley - great book that shows different babies their body parts, sounds and things they do with their bodies. It was perfect for our learning about body parts.

Red Truck by Kersten Hamilton
- Fun book that features a red truck.
Black Dog Red House by Lizi Boyd - Fun book about colors. Used the cover to match items around the house that are red.

Monday, August 30, 2010

Weekly Book List

So my biggest focus for Angel Girl has been reading. Lots and lots of stories being read. Here are the books we have read this week:
Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear by Nancy White Carlstrom
Goldilocks and the Three Bears by James Marshall
Yummy by Lucy Cousins
Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Jan Brett
The Apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall
Along with many board books.

For Goldilocks and the Three Bears we made a puppet that we used to tell the story. By the end of the week Angel Girl was asking to "read" the story and would tell me what was happening on each page. This is a valuable early literacy skill that I love see emerging. She is starting to understand story structure and remember what she heard.

For Sweet Boy we were reading:
The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
We read about 10 pages at every nap and bedtime and repeated the book for a week.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

It's a New Year!

Ok so a new school year for many school aged children. So I took this opportunity to start a new year with my Angel Girl (also this is my first full time mama time so we are developing our rhythm). So this week we are:

Learning Humpty Dumpty
Refreshing our known letter knowledge (working on A this week).
Reading Goldilocks and the Three Bears (and many of its renditions)
Retelling the story with puppets (and just "reading" the story).

We have also pulled out some of our Kumon books to practice tracing and coloring (just for fun).
Looked for and made circles.
Counting out 1 object.

I look forward to teaching her how to make her bed every morning and add this to her chore chart.

How have you learned this week for the new year?

Sunday, August 1, 2010

3 Yr Old Learning Goals

Goals for my Angel Girl in her 3 yr old year.

Colors
Shapes
Nursery Rhymes
Lots of read alouds
Beginning retelling and sequencing
Letter Names
Lots of playing outside
Counting to 20 (she already goes to 13)
Identify numbers to 5
Lots of sensory activities
Lots of crafts
Lots of cooking
Lots of pretending

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Nursery Rhyme Stuff

Great Nursery Rhyme stuff especially sequencing cards. Check it out here.

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Book Recomendations

These are some of the books I have been reading, enjoying and using for mommy schooling it.

The Well Trained Mind
- a homeschooling classical approach to education

Math Experiences for Young Learners - pk-k math activities

Before Five in a Row
- using literature to play and teach young children, also has a section of ideas for things to do with 2 - 4 year olds

The Complete Daily Curriculum For Early Childhood
- has great theme studies and ideas for activities based on multiple intelligences and learning styles

Story S-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-r-s for Infant, Toddlers, and Twos
- activities to do with little ones based on books that you read to them.

Books that I am spying:
Slow and Steady Get Me Ready
Words Their Way

Monday, July 19, 2010

Ready at Five

Ready at Five has some fun activity cards that are relatively easy to do and mostly use things around the house already. They cover language, physical, math, science, social studies, and art.

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Awesome Lapbook Site!

This an awesome sight for literature based lapbooks. It fits really well with the Before Five in A Row curriculum I have for Angel Girl but it also has great stuff for non B4FIAR.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Best Time of Year!

School supply sales are on! My plans are mostly to update my art supplies with crayons, markers, colored pencils, glue sticks, and watercolor paints. But I love just browsing through the world of new school supplies, it makes me want to get ready for a new year of teaching my babies!

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Ways We Learned This Week

or having too much fun with family to do formal mommy school.

The best part of mommy schooling is that there are no rules, no hard fast times, or lessons that have to be done. Rather it is about exposing through lessons that are like play, at least for the little. Angel Girl spent almost everyday outside experimenting with sand and water. She learned that water and sand makes mud...that adding water to a full bucket of sand makes the water come out (I think that would be a lesson in volume :))

We studied gravity and physics when she experimented with dumping sand out from the highest height she could reach or when she tossed the sand out and had it land in Sweet Boy's hair.

We learned about cause and effect. That when you push a cousin and take their toy they usually push you back and take the toy back.

We learned about music when she got her new "flute" to play all day long! And practicing the lyrics to "Defying Gravity" in the car.

We did some practical life activities of cleaning the windows with bubble solution, washing Barbie's hair, and thoroughly cleaning her trike with the pool water.

We did some biology at the zoo, and the aquarium. Paleontology at the Dinosaur Musuem and just had fun riding the "Dinosaur" train (pretty much any train we could find).

In the mean time we have started reading Charlottes' Web right before nap time with Angel Girl...and she depends on hearing it to fall asleep easily. Sweet Boy has been listening to the Little House.

Mommy has gotten some new fun books for teaching through nursery rhymes, extending stories with the baby, and some great new math games.

We have also been working on upping Angel Girl's sensory input through foam, moon sand, playdough, and water. It seems to be working she really seems to do better with a high sensory diet.

The best part of learning is the part that happens when we are living life and having fun!

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Circle Time Day 5

Memory Work: Had Angel Girl sing the first 2 vs of Twinkle Twinkle. We will need to continue to practice this song at other times but I am impressed with how quickly she has picked it up.
Story: Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear
Activity: From Before Five In A Row
Letter Work: Starfall!

Monday, June 28, 2010

Circle Time Day 4

Memory Work: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star vs. 1 and 2
Story: Goldilocks and the Three Bears
Activity: Make paper bag puppets and retell the story.
Letter Work: Trace the letter in a salt tray.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Circle Time Day 3

Memory Work: Continued with Twinkle Twinkle Little Star vs 1 and 2 with the pictures.
Story: Yellow (a board book I got in a set about colors)
Activity: Yellow Hunt, finding items around the house that were yellow.
Letter Work: Coloring sheet.

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Circle Time Day 2

Memory Work: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star I made little puppets of parts of the song for Angel Girl to hold as she sang. I also introduced the 2nd verse using the puppets. HERE is a copy of all the verses of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
Story: Goldilocks and The Three Bears by Jan Brett
Activity: We retold the story using finger puppets. I mostly did the retell and had her hold up the different parts.
Letter Work: We did letter A in her letter book (which she was able to do immediately she loves that it is her name).

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Circle Time Day 1

Yesterday was my first day of doing circle time with my Angel Girl. This is what we did.

Memory Work: Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (this is a known song but I would like to do more with this this week...did you know there was more than 1 verse.)
Story: The Apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall (this book is for introducing the letter A)
Letter Work: Using sandpaper letter introduced (ok so A is known but this will be how I introduce the other letters) letter A and had her attempt tracing...she does not have to be able to trace it correctly merely adding a tactile component to the learning of letters.
Religious: Sing I Am a Child of God

Monday, June 21, 2010

Week of June 21st - 25th

There are some changes in our life so for this summer I am planning on doing activities for Sweet Boy based on the week. Then for Angel Girl I plan to just focus on developing a "circle time" which I will post about daily (I hope). So for this week:

Sweet Boy
Story: The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle
Game: Peek-a-boo (yes the game where you cover your eyes and say peek-a-boo, I like to do it with blankets)
Nursery Rhyme: There was a Crooked Man

Angel Girl
Letter Aa
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
Goldilocks and the 3 Bears
Color Yellow

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Monthly Topic: Schedule/Planning

In 7 day I will be free...from having to go to work outside of the home. This has caused me to consider how to schedule mommy school with 2 children. So the following is my tentative schedule for the next year. Angel Girl will be 3 and Sweet Boy will be 1.

7:00 breakfast (yes we are early risers)
(from after breakfast until circle time is chores and free play time)
8:00 Sweet Boy first nap
8:30 Angel Girl Circle Time: Memory Activity based on common preschool songs, nursery rhymes or simple scriptures
Story: Monday's Book about Letter of the Week
Tuesday's Book about Theme
Wednesday's Book about color of the month, shape of the month, math, and ABC
Thursday's Book about Theme
Friday's Book from Before Five in a Row
Activity: Based on the book read
Letter Work: quick activity about the letter of the week
Religious Instruction: (yes I am religious but I will not be sharing the particulars of this aspect except to say we are doing it daily) This is from a religious text based on Angel Girl's Sunday School classes.
9:00 Independent Activity for Angel Girl This will be a chance for her to do independently something she may have done before or engage in independent art or play
9:30 Snack time
10:00 Outing Doing something outside the house.
12:00 Lunch
12:30 Sweet Boy second nap
Angel Girl read aloud from a chapter book
1:00 Quiet Time for ALL'
2:30 Sweet Boy mommy school time based on Letter of the Week Brightly Beaming Baby and Toddler
3:00 Snack Time
3:30 Angel Girl Center #1
4:00 Angel Girl Center #2 These centers are based on things that I would like her to do with help such as art projects, theme activities, math activities, Kumon books ect
4:30 Free Play Time

So this is our experiment to see if such a schedule will work for us. What kind of a schedule do you have when you are home all day with your little ones?

Monday, May 31, 2010

Week of May 31 - June 4

Angel Girl (toddler)
Monday
Read "Spring is Here" (theme, pre-reading)
Have Angel Girl glue green leaves onto a brown tree (theme, art)
Tuesday
Read a yellow book. Sort out yellow items from a bag of toys. (color)
Sing "Spring is Here" (theme, music)
Wednesday
Kumon tracing book (pre-writing)
Talk about Spring, baby animals, flowers, bugs, trees (theme)
Thursday
Glue alumninum foil over star outline to make a shiny star (shape)
Use tissue paper to make a tulip (theme, art)
Friday
Matching game using bird outline, variation 1 with dots, variation 2 with shapes, variation 3 with colors, variation 4 with letters (theme, math, color, pre-reading, shapes)
Shaving Cream Art (J4F)

Sweet Boy (baby)
Book: Good night moon (read before naps and bed)
Game: Different Textures - touch and feel different textures of material
Nursery Rhyme: Baa, Baa, Black Sheep

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

May Week 3

Angel Girl (Toddler)
(So I kinda skipped week 2...daddy was away on a business trip and it was enough just to be together).

Monday
Thumprint Ants (activity from week 1 left over) (theme, art)
Letter A trace and letter book (theme, prereading)

Tuesday
Isty Bitsy Spider (music, movement)
Sort out blue items from a basket (color)

Wednesday
Sing the Ants Go Marching with different movements like jumping, skipping, hopping (theme, movement)
Talk about ants. Write down one of the sentences that Angel Girl says, add this to a nature journal. (theme, prewriting, science)

Thursday
Counting raisins for ants on a log up to 5 (theme, math)
Use body to make different types of circles (shape, movement)

Friday
Moving like and ant to music (theme, movement, music)
Make magnetic maze for "ant" to get to a cookie. (theme, just 4 fun)

Sweet Boy (Baby)
Reading I Love You Forever by Robert Musch
Playing Pop Goes the Weasel.
Hearing I Had a Little Nut.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

I found this great lapbook based on the book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. It helps children with shapes, letters, numbers and colors. Very fun, and perfect for my Letter of the Week program!
Totally Tots link
The Activity Mom Link

Activity Mom blog

The Activity Mom is a great blog that has a lot of great ideas for Alphabet learning.

Excersize A-Z

We did this today as a PE activity and the boys LOVED it. Found on The Home Teacher

Monday, May 17, 2010

Letter A

Letter Recognition - A

All week we will be singing the alphabet song, and reading alphabet books, watching alphabet movies and going on a continuous Letter A Hunt

Monday:
Sing Alphabet song
Alphabet Song on You Tube
Introduce Letter A using Starfall.com (we also talked about how the letter A was red, and had the boys find the other red letters).
A Letter Hunt in Baby Girls room (her name plaque has an A in it, her room has all the books etc). I used a letter A to help them make a match (they LOVE making matches!).

Tuesday:
Letter A Scrapbook Page: Ant thumbprints, both lower and upper case Aa (I am using the terma mommy and baby Aa, because it is easier. I realize I am setting myself up to having to work on fixing this, but for now I think it will be fine.)

Ants on a Log Snack (celery, with peanut butter and raisins), and making them. (I have to make 70 of them for church for that evening, so I figured why not kill two birds with one stone!)

Wednesday:
Story Time
Letter A coloring pages for scrapbook (ant, airplane, astronaut, apple etc)
Apple Shack up snack found on totally tots

Thursday:
Ant Size Sort
Ant Upper and Lower Case Sorting
Sing "The Ants Go Marching" using ant cutouts to count the ants and actting out the scenes.

Friday:
Sing 'Alice the Camel' and show on fingers how many humps
Playdoh alphabet cookie cutter play
Eat Alphabet Soup

Friday, May 14, 2010

Babies, Toddlers, Preschooler Oh My

So I am getting to the point where I am thinking about how to mommy school with more than 1 age group. Sweet Boy will be 1 in less than a month and I think I would like to start planning a special Sweet Boy mommy time. This will be specific time with my little boy that I hope to do specific mommy/toddler time. Mostly games and little guy specific things. So I have been looking at adapting some of the activities from Letter of the Week. I plan to use the book list for reading before nap and bedtime and then picking a nursery rhyme or game to play for Baby time. I was also thinking that many of the things that I would do with Sweet Boy would be good for Angel Girl to review and play to so I may do reviews of the previous days fun when both kids are around. How do you balance mommy schooling with more than 1 age group?

Thursday, May 13, 2010

May Theme

Better late than never right....so for this month lets focus on
INSECTS!!!!
This was always a theme for May in my elementary teaching years so lets share ideas about teaching insects.

Check out this link to Confessions of a Homeschooler. It is an entire Ant themed lesson plan for the letter A. Lots of fun printables!

May Week 1

Monday
Read book about ants (I read The Life and Times of an Ant, but there are many many good fiction and nonfiction books). (reading, theme)
Sing song about Ant/insect parts. Here are some cute ones. (music, theme)

Tuesday
We went to a local museum that has a collection of leaf cutter ants and just observed and talked about it. If you don't have a local museum like this you can always just go outside and find an ant hill and sit and watch it for a while. (science, theme)
Read a blue book, then hand over some different types of blue paper and tissue squares and let Angel Girl cut and glue them on a paper to make a blue collage. (color of the month, art, reading)

Wednesday
Crawl like an ant around the room, so extentensions of this are to have a piece of food (real or play) that they can pick up and move like an ant. (movement, theme)
Kumon tracing book. (pre-writing)

Thursday
Thumbprint Ants. (theme, art)
Read a circle book. Tape a circle on the floor and do different movements around it like running, tip toeing, marching, jumping, hopping. (shape of the month, movement, reading)

Friday
Counting to 5 on finger. (math)
Mothers Day - we read a book about moms (What Mom's Can't Do), and then she got to color a card for me. (Just 4 Fun, holiday)

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Month of May

I have decided to start doing themed units so this month we are working on:
Ants!
Many of my activities are ant based.

We are also working on:
Color: Blue
Shape: Circle
Letter: A
Nursery Rhyme/Song: Itsy Bitsy Spider
Math: Counting to 5

Monday, April 26, 2010

Weekly Plan: Colors

Tuesday: Color Sorting, Primary Colors song with two color color hunt, bean bag toss
Wednesday: Colorful family book, color hunt with two colors, story time
Thursday: Color matching file folder game (HomeGrown Hearts), Brown Bear Book, color hunt
Friday: Play date, bean bag game, color matching, colorful family book, color hunt and sort with all three colors (pile of all three colors of items around the house, and sort into correct colors)

Monday, April 19, 2010

weekly plan

My printer is on its last leg, it makes a TERRIBLE noise when printing, so I haven't been able to print out the things I would like for my mommy school. Plus, this week is RIDICULOUSLY busy...prepping for a wedding, every night a new responsiblity - just crazy. So, we are just going to have fun this week, and if I find time in our busy schedules to do some sit down activities with the kids I will post.
No weekly plan this week.

Monday, April 12, 2010

Weekly Plan: Colors and Counting

Everyday we will focus on counting anything and everything, as well as identifying the colors all around us to introduce the topics of colors and counting. Both boys are excited about counting and colors. They have been trying to count many things over the last week this is why we are beginning a study of counting. We will begin by learning the primary colors and counting to 5.

Prior knowledge for Thing 1: Can count to 5, starting with 2. Doesn't verbally identify colors, or respond when asked to find a certain color.

Prior knowledge for Thing 2: Can count to 3. Can identify the color blue.

Monday:
- Colors Movie (Baby Einstein: World of Colors)
- Read Counting Book (Spot Can Count by Eric Hill)
- Shapes Game

Tuesday:
- Read 'Brown Bear' (my homemade version, which has shapes and colors to identify)
- Color Sorting Found at Home Grown Hearts
- Barney Counting Movie "It's Time for Counting"

Wednesday:
- Gymnastics 9:30 - 11:30
- Basic Color Book (found in the dollar section at Target)

Thursday:
- Library Story Time (10:30 am)
- Basic Color Book
- Counting Caterpillar (similar to this one except the one we have comes apart at the segments, found at the local library for check out)

Friday:
- Counting Book "City 1,2,3" by Zoran Milich
- Color Matching File Folder Game
- Building color matching towers with Lego's

Next week we will learn about the primary colors, red, yellow, and blue. And go on color hunts.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Square Lacing

I used an old diaper box (we have way too many of these hanging around) and cut off one of the top flaps. Cut that in half, then used a hole punch to punch circle holes all around the perimeter of the square. Then I took some yarn taped one end to the cardboard and with the other end I wrapped tape around it. The boys loved lacing their square cards and was amazingly the longest activity of the day!!

Shape game

I put three shapes on the floor using colored duct tape - blue square, yellow circle, and purple triangle. Right away Thing 1 ran to the kitchen, where we just finished playing with our shape cookie cutters, ran out, and put all the cutter shapes in the right shape :) At least I know he can match the shapes!
I had the boy sit on special spots (couch pillows) next to me. Then I said "Run and touch the purple...."(and waited to see if maybe they knew the color, only Thing 2 knew the color blue because that is the color he has been assigned since birth). Then I picked up a shape outline and said the shape name. "Touch the purple.....triangle". The boys would jump up and run to the triangle and touch the shape. They played this for about two rounds of each shape. Then I just said the shape without any helping pictures or colors. This was a bit harder but they got through a round.
I think it was a successful way to get them to better identify one shape out of the three.
Shape exercise:
After they were tired of playing (which was sadly only about 4 rounds total). We each stood in a square and did different things like spin, touch toes, jump, donkey kicks (hands down and kick legs up) etc. They thought this was fun, but then kept fighting over who got to stand on what shape so we moved on to another activity.
Shape tracing with cars:
I got out some toy cars of the boys and let them race them around the shapes. This only lasted a minute or so until they were up and finding something else to play with (sadly, when one boy decides he is done both stop playing...).
I think it was a very fun, successful time playing with shapes :)

playdough cookie cutter shapes


Using this tutorial on wiki I made some shape cookie cutters. Originally the plan was to make sugar cookies using shapes cutters but I didn't know who we were going to make cookies for and next week we have to make a lot for Little Princess' birthday. So, we improvised with playdough. Thing 1 and 2 had fun with this but it didn't last as long as I had hoped.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Tuesday: Squares

We started this activity by reading about squares in one of our shape books. Then we had an exemplar and sang a square song
This is a square, this is a square.
How can you tell? How can you tell?
It has four sides, All the same size.
It’s a square, It’s a square.
(found HERE).
Then we went on a square hunt using the exemplar.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Weekly Plan

Monday
Ee name sound
Clapping to music

Tuesday
Squares
Practice hopping (this is her new trick so we might as well practice)

Wednesday
Throwing 10 “snowballs”
Ee letter book

Thursday
Animal sounds
Make pink playdough

Friday
Bus driver
Ride the bus

Monday, April 5, 2010

Week with Shapes/Setting up Potty Training

Monday:
- Read Shapes Book
- File Folder Games
- Ant Shape Matching (found through Confessions of a Homeschooler)
- Shape Matching (found through Home Grown Hearts)

Tuesday:
- Shape Viewers shape search (found through Home Grown Hearts)
- Highway Cars driving cars around the shapes (found through Making Learning Fun)

Wednesday:
- Play dough shapes (possibly using highways as our template)
- Potty Movie ("GO POTTY GO!")

Thursday:
- Library Story Time

Friday:
- Shape Cookies (using cookie cutters to make different shape sugar cookies)
- Potty Movie ("I can go Potty")

EDIT: We didn't do any activities on Wednesday because we had friends over for the day so I was in charge of 6 kids, instead of just my 3. It was quite the adventure. Here is my revised plan for the end of the week.
Wed: Play Date
Fri: Library Story Time (read shapes books at the library)

circles

Last week we did a few things with circles. First we read a book about circles that showed us circles in every day things. Then we used our circle shape viewer (found at Home Grown Hearts) and went on a circle hunt around the house. The boys LOVE having this shape viewer to look through and to check and make sure it is actually a circle. Then we colored and cut three circles from paper and made them into a circle snowman! The boys weren't too excited about coloring the circles, but love cutting since we don't do it very often.




(I helped them with the circle eyes, and buttons down the snowman. Thing 2 was adamant that I be the one to decorate his snowman. Not sure if he is not wanting to do it, or doesn't think he does a good job...)

Sunday, April 4, 2010

More Changes

So I want to start a monthly topic share. This will be outside of what I "normally" do but rather an opportunity to explore an idea more in depth and hopefully get lots of ideas to use in our mommy schooling endeavors. This topic can be used as a jumping off point for activities this month or just a way to gather a lot of ideas on the topic to use through out the year. Comments are a great place to add your ideas.

This month's topic SQUARE!

What are some ideas to learn about squares?


Here are some of our posts already written about squares.

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Mommy Schooling Success!

I have been introducing the letters (check here for how I have been doing it). I have NO expectation of her "knowing" the letters but rather just introducing them for the first time. One letter we have focused on more than other is A because it is in her name, basically we just write her name and point out the A at the beginning. So today dh traced it in some dew on the car and Angel Girl said A!!!! Then he wrote it on a piece of paper for me to see and she KNEW it! This is huge. Letter knowledge is important but not really until a child is in Kindergarten does it become a necessary piece of knowledge. But I do think that introducing a child's first name and the letters in their name is important just because a name is knowledge a child own's and can be used in reading and writing as a valuable starting place, (many children start writing stories with just the letters in their name). So to have Angel Girl identify A the first letter in her name is Awesome! Now if she can learn how to write her name before Kindergarten then it will be a major mommy school success.

Monday, March 29, 2010

Easter Activities

I am focusing on Easter Activities this week so that the kids get more familiar with it.

FHE tonight will be the Easter Story from the Behold Your Little Ones Nursery Manual (Lesson 29)
Throughout the week we will be doing some of these activites:


We will also be reading books about Easter.
For our Easter Egg Hunt the kids were assigned a color. Thing 1 had green, Thing 2 had Blue, Little Princess had Yellow. The boys (thing 1 and thing 2) were given a paper egg of their assigned color. Thing 2 really enjoyed putting his paper egg next to the eggs he found to see if they matched. He was even more excited when they did match and he could put the egg in his basket. I think this really helped the kids be able to know which color was theirs and work on matching. It helped their egg searching be successful.

Got any ideas for teaching the meaning of Easter, traditions, or activities for your children?

Home Grown Hearts

ABSOLUTELY AMAZING HOMESCHOOL BLOG!!!! SOOOOO AWESOME!! I CAN NOT EXPRESS HOW PERFECT THIS BLOG IS FOR ME!!!! AHHHHHH
check it out
Home Grown Hearts

Friday, March 26, 2010

Easter Crafts

DLTK's Site is a favorite resource for fun crafty activities to do with my kids. They have a ton of great ideas. This weekend we are having an early Easter Celebration with the grandparents and some of the cousins (wish you were here....). I decided to find some fun easterish activities to do with the boys to get them introduced to the idea of Easter Bunnies and egg hunting. I found templates on the DLTK site for an Easter Egg Mosaic and a bunny hat. So, I got out the craft supplies and we made some Easter crafts!!
We first did the Easter Hats. I printed out the ears template and let the boys color them. Then they helped me cut them out and I let the one waiting continue to color their ears. They did a much better job with coloring when they were cut. Then I taped two halves of a piece of white card stock together and let them color that. Then I taped the ears onto the hat, and taped the hat around their head. They love their bunny ears.
Next we did the Easter Egg Mosaics. First I cut the egg template out. Then, I pre cut strips of colored card stock for the boys to cut from. We took turns choosing a color and then cutting 'squares' out of it (reinforcing yesterday's learning). Of course not all were squares but this is only their third time using scissors. I helped them and said open, close, open, close.
(forgive the clothes, hair and makeup less face...., oh and the mostly naked children....)
Thing 1 opened his mouth along with the scissors each time I said open :)
Thing 2 got a very concentrated look on his face.
I let him try to open and close the scissors by himself and was a little afraid of loosing some fingers....thus the look of fear on my face. No worries, no one was harmed while using the scissors ;)
After cutting their 'squares' out I covered the egg with glue stick. Then they could just stick their 'squares' on. It was nice to have one gluing while the other cut, keeping them both happy and occupied. After they were all finished I put three strips of clear packing tape over their egg to keep the pieces on.
Here are the proud boys with their completed projects!!
(Thing 1 was a little concerned that his 'squares' kept falling off, but some packing tape solved the problem and now I don't have to worry about their little sister finding a bunch of 'squares' to put in her mouth....)
I think this was a very fun, successful project. I will be reading them some stories about Easter, and Christ and talking more about the Easter Bunny this next week.

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Squares

Today we learned about squares. I checked out a video from the library that taught shapes (along with colors, and some numbers but my focus was for the shapes). I also checked out a book on each of the shapes- triangle, square, circle. We have previously talked about shapes and they know a heart and star, and Thing 2 can sometimes identify triangles, squares and circles. During an hour and a half drive we watched the shapes video twice. The boys seemed to enjoy it (although for an adult it can get a little annoying ;). After we got home we read the square book -'Squares: seeing squares all around us' by Sarah L. Schuette. The boys enjoyed finding the squares in the book and I think it helped them to be able to find the squares in everyday objects. After the story we got out our special finder glasses (found in the dollar bins at Michaels) and we went on a square hunt! We went to every different room in the house to find squares.



I was really impressed by some of the things they found. Thing 1 found the squares on our tile floor, Thing 2 found the squares on the washer and dryer. It was a lot of fun. After our square hunt I printed out a square picture found on this website. I also tried to get them to trace an outline of a square but we aren't there yet. I plan to continue to help the boys identify squares all around. I am not sure if I will introduce circles tomorrow, or if we will just continue with learning about squares until we hit mastery.

Monday, March 22, 2010

The Home Teacher

Found this blog thehometeacher.blogspot.com and am in love with it!!!!

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Week of March 22nd - 26th

• Monday
Dd name sound
Mary Had a Little Lamb

• Tuesday
Glitter Stars
Obstacle course

• Wednesday
Counting Groups of 10
Letter Book

• Thursday
Scratch and Sniff Art
Star stamps

• Friday
Going on a trip game
Field Trip to local fire/police station

Friday, March 19, 2010

Thursday: Sniff Test

So I got this idea from Chasing Cheerios...basically I get really smelling things and put them on cotton balls and into jars...then we do sniff testing to decide what we like and also did a matching game where we match the smell to the original.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Week of March 15th - 19th

• Monday
Cc name sound
Mary Had a Little Lamb

• Tuesday
Tissue Paper Star
Walk a Balance Beam (playground)

• Wednesday
Stringing 10 beads
Letter C book

• Thursday
Sniff Test
Star Hunt

• Friday
Community places
Lemon bars

Saturday, March 13, 2010

Wednesday: 10 Little Fingers

1 Little, 2 Little, 3 Little Fingers
4 Little, 5 Little, 6 Little Fingers
7 Little, 8 Little, 9 Little Fingers
10 Little Fingers on Your Hands

You can substitute with pretty much anything such as hearts for Valentine's Day or different animals.

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

March 8th - March 12th

Yes I know this is late :)
• Monday
Bb name sound
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

• Tuesday
Green hunt
Curvy tape line

• Wednesday
10 Little Fingers (thinking about switching this with last weeks lesson when I do this with Sweet Boy)
Letter B book

• Thursday
Make lemonade (sweet and sour smells)
Green Painting

• Friday
Places we go
Bake bread

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Thursday: Playdough

I made some scented playdough for Angel Girl on Thursday. Here is the recipe or you could try this recipe made with kool aid. Angel Girl enjoyed being able to smell the playdough and then we played with it cutting out different shapes with cookie cutters including the star shape. As long as it is in a air tight container it can last for a couple of weeks which Angel Girl enjoys (and at writing she has already chosen to play with it again from her choice shelf).

Sunday, March 7, 2010

Wednesday: Letter Book

The letter book is a creation of an ABC book. The important part is to use picture of things that Angel Girl knows. This includes pictures of toys she plays with and other items from around her environment. The letter will be written in big letters on the left page and 1 picture on the right. Each week we will add a letter and a picture. Again this is not mastery. This is the creation of a resource that Angel Girl can use through out our Mommy Schooling years.

Wednesday: 10 stars

Angel Girl LOVES stickers and putting them on paper. So I had her put 10 star stickers on a piece of paper and we counted them. She is able to verbally count to 10 so I am trying to introduce the concept of 1 to 1 in counting. So we practiced touching and counting to 10. She was not very strong at touching 1 at a time or even touching all of them but she was counting to 10 and she was watching me touch and say.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Tuesday: Intro star

So it turns out star is one shape that Angel Girl knows well. So we just colored a star and glued it onto some construction paper. The original idea was to count the points and find it in our shape book (a board book I found cheap).

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Monday: Intro A letter and sound

Picking the first letter to introduce was easy. A because that is the first letter in Angel Girl's name. To introduce the letter I cute it out of sandpaper and glued it to an index card. I plan to use these index cards over the next couple of years. Remember this is an introduction there is no expectation of mastery or even really acknowledgement. This is merely to start the process of recognition. So I helped her trace the letter and said the letter name. I also linked it to her name. This is going to be the process for all of the letter introductions.
1) Letter will be cut out of sandpaper and mounted on an index card.
2) Help trace the letter and say letter name.
3) Link to a known word or object (object is always better they can see and touch it)
Remember at 2-3 years of age there is no expectation of mastery. This is merely and introduction.

Saturday, February 27, 2010

March 1st - 5th

Monday
o Intro Aa name sound
o Twinkle Twinkle

• Tuesday
o Intro star
o Walk a tape line

• Wednesday
o counting 10 stars
o Letter Book A

• Thursday
o Make scented playdough
o Star cutouts with the playdough

• Friday
o Community places
o Library trip

It's March (well almost)

So I was thinking about what I wanted to do for March.
Here is a list of general topics for the month.
Language: Introduce letters
This will be a very simple introduction. There will be no expectation of knowledge or even remembering. This is merely to start familiarizing her. I am not sure if I just want to go through the alphabet (which is not the most effective method when used with young readers) but the method I use with young readers is starting with letter they know and she does not know any letters. Many programs on line use the traditional abc order for introduction. So I will have to decide soon. I know we will start with A because that is what her name starts with. We will also be making an ABC book that we can use through the years to help her learn her letters. That is all we will be doing so I am thinking a letter a week for now, we will see how it goes.
Math: Counting to 10
Angel Girl is able to count to 5 and has surprised us a few times with her ability to almost count to 10. So we will be doing activities that work on counting to 10.
Color: Green
Its March which means St. Patrick's Day so I think we will learn about the color green.
Shape: Star
Just cause....I have a lot of star shaped foamies so its next.
Music: Singing Nursery Rhymes
Learning and singing nursery rhymes. Nursery rhymes are very important part of phonemic awareness (rhyming) and also the knowledge is important for understanding some stories read (ie each peach pear plum). I think we will do Twinkle Twinkly and Mary Had a Little Lamb.
Physical: Balance
Angel Girl is attending gymnastics and loves to walk the balance beam but she does it primarily sideways so I think we will work on walking one foot in front of the other on balance beams (or tape lines in our house).
Science: Sense Smell
Its next.
Social Studies: Community
Learning about places we frequent in the community.
Social: Making friends
Angel Girl thinks that she can just walk up to kids but that can scare them (she is a giant 2 year old). So we will be working on how to be more friendly.

No Mommy School

We did not have Mommy School last week...Sweet Boy was in the hospital for a few days and was still sick through out the week. We took advantage of no planned mommy school and spent hours coloring, and sticking stickers on paper. We played and talked and just spent time together. Although it was not planned there was learning.

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

February 22nd - 27th

• Monday
o Block patterns
o Maraca Music

• Tuesday
o Shape sort
o Sing Along/Dance Party

• Wednesday
o 5 little monkeys
o matching game

• Thursday
o Jell-o
o Matching circles

• Friday
o Where does it go?
o Field Trip

Friday, February 19, 2010

Thursday: Circle Fun

When I was planning the week I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do for circles yet. Mostly because I didn't know where we would be in mommy school by then because of all the other things I planned for the week. Well come Thursday I needed an idea and considered going online (my favorite place to get ideas) but Angel Girl had an idea all her own (thus why I love homeschooling I can take her lead). She wanted to run in circles. So we ran in a circle, and walked, tiptoed, hopped, skipped, jumped, elephant walked all in a circle. She loved it and I loved it!

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Thursday: Taste Testing

For this activity I gave Angel Girl a whole bunch of different things that can be spread on crackers. This was to help her with spreading with a knife that she is very fond of doing. So she had honey, tuna, non-dairy butter spread, jelly, and peanut butter and a stack of crackers. It was fun to watch her try the different toppings on the cracker. The first time she had tried the honey a few months ago she said yuck and today she loved it. It was also fun to tell her the different names of the toppings. She keep repeating them as she spread/or ate straight the toppings.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Wednesday: Cooking Circles

The idea of this activity is to make something that is circular. My first thought was sugar cookies but Angel Girl is dairy allergic so butter and milk are not options for us in anything. Then I realized we could make dairy free biscuits as long as I use the dairy free vegan butter we have. So I found this recipe. We made it together and used a cup to cut out the circles. Angel Girl loved rolling out the dough and then cutting out the circles. Then we ate them for lunch which made it more fun I think.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Monday: Matching

For this I just grabbed different sock since Angel Girl loves to help "fold" sock during laundry time. I put them in a pile and had her match them. She had a great time and loved to say daddy sock, mommy sock, baby sock. Easy and quick and something she can now "help" with during laundry.

Monday, February 15, 2010

February Break 15th - 20th

• Monday
o Matching (socks)
o Copying rhythms

• Tuesday
o Tracing Circles
o Ring Around the Rosy

• Wednesday
o Cooking Circles
o Matching (pairs)

• Thursday
o Taste/Textures
o Circle Fun (ie not really sure what I am going to do yet :))

• Friday
o Taking Care of our things
o Field Trip

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Friday: Valentine's Art

For Valentine's Day Angel Girl did this. For us it was hard to get her little hands to make such perfect hearts so I just drew a heart around the prints. Either way it turned out super cute...and daddy loved his card.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Thursday: Taste Likes and Dislikes

So for this day I got a variety of different fruits and veggies. Some I knew Angel Girl likes and some that she had never tried before including Kolrabi (I am sure I spelled that wrong :)). I had Angel Girl try the new food and I had a piece too. Mostly she just licked it and said yuck to all the new stuff BUT I did find out she likes mangos! I think I may do this more often because eventually maybe she will take a bit and not just lick it, considering she use to not even try it and just say yuck.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Wednesday: Counting to 5 with balls

We continue to work on counting to 5. Today we did it with 5 balls. We rolled them, threw them, kicked them and bounced them. We counted as we did it. We put 5 in a large bucket all together and took them out. We put one each in 5 containers and counted. The most important thing was repeating the order 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Monday/Wednesday: Beading Sequence

Going along with sequencing I am doing some math patterns. Originally on Monday I was going to do an AB pattern (only 2 colors) but I realized that this was a completely new activity to Angel Girl. So for Monday I pulled out her beads and let her string any way she wanted to. This was to help her get the idea of stringing. Then I put it on her like a necklace. Then on Wednesday I started with a very simple AB patter. Pink/Purple/Pink/Purple. This is not a concept I expect her to master or even really understand fully just begin to see. So I helped her with picking out the next bead. She really likes having the necklace to where. It also helps with her fine motor skills to string beads onto a piece of string.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Feb. 8th - Feb. 12th

• Monday
o Pasta AB pattern
o Tap a rhythm

• Tuesday
o Circle Hunt
o Dance Party

• Wednesday
o Counting to 5 with balls
o Bead Pattern

• Thursday
o Muffin Tin Like Dislike
o Red

• Friday
o I Spy Household
o Valentine’s Day Art (Hearts)

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Friday: House Tour

This was an idea I got from a reading conference I recently went to. The teacher (who was trained in montessori education) used a traveling set of words that they used to actively label things around their school. I thought this would be a fun idea to use around the house. I figured it would aid in vocabulary development along with the beginning of text recognition. So I typed up a list of things in our home and cut them out. Then I handed one to Angel Girl and had her put it on the item. It was super cute to watch her try to figure out how to get the word to stick to things like the playpen or fridge. We only did about 7 to 10 of the words but they are going on her "learning" shelf and I plan to pull them out when we have a few minutes.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Thursday: Taste Test

So this idea is based on the many bloggers that do Muffin Tin Monday. Basically there are a variety of food placed in a muffin tin for the child to try. It is a fun way to try different food. This is what we will be doing every Thursday for Taste. I plan to introduce some new foods along with some of Angel Girl's favorites.

Friday, February 5, 2010

Tuesday: Jumping Stones

For Tuesday I just put out some washclothes like hopscotch (if it was warmer I would have gone outside and done it with hopscotch). Then we walked on each square, jumped with 2 feet on each square, jumped on one foot on each washcloth then tried jumping on just 1 foot to each square. It was a great way to get some energy out in the middle of winter :) You could use cut out feet or anything really that would show where the child was to put their feet.

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Monday/Wednesday: Sequencing

Monday and Wednesday we started learning about sequencing. I started with first and last. Then on Wednesday we did first, middle, and last. I used the cards from this activity. They seemed to be the most realistic. Angel Girl did not completely understand but I figure this is a great activity to put on her activity shelf to practice throughout the month.
Learning sequence is important both in story comprehension and also in word learning. Children need to learn how to look from the 1st letter through to the last and so the concept of first middle and last is very important.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Feb 1st - 5th

Monday
o Sequence First and Last
o Itsy Bitsy Spider

Tuesday
o Intro Orange
o Jumping Stones

Wednesday
o 5 circles
o Sequencing 3 parts

Thursday
o Taste Test Orange food
o Tracing Circles

Friday
o House Tour
o Valentine Art

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

February Focuses

Language Arts:
Pre-reading: we are working on first and last
Pre-writing: we will still be using the Kumon tracing book to practice

Math
Counting to 5 (we are getting good to 3)
Circles (considered hearts but need to learn the basics first)

Music
Clapping rythyms
Itsy Bitsy Spider

Art
Red (Valentine's Day!!!!)
Painting

Physical/Emotional
Jumping
Getting Dressed (something she is really starting to get interested in)

Social Studies
Around the house

Science
Taste

Sunday, January 31, 2010

Wednesday: Bottom and Tops imprints

Play doh is a glorious toy. So we used it to make imprints of the top and bottom of different play doh toys.

Angel Girl seemed to have a hard time with making the imprints...she could point to the top or bottom but rotating the toy to imprint it was difficult. But she went on to play with the play doh for another hour making different things.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

Jan 25 - 28th

* keep in mind this was the original idea list but this week has had some major events in it that made mommy school hard to get to everyday so some of these may not be explained (not done) or will show up another week

• Monday
o Tracing Lines
o Clapping rhythms

• Tuesday
o Square Snacks
o Throwing balloons

• Wednesday
o Sets of 5 counting
o Bottom and Tops imprints

• Thursday
o Fingerpaint
o Making squares

• Friday
o People in My Neighborhood
o Picnic Lunch

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Thursday: White Art

On Thursday we continued to learn about the color white. For this day I had a black piece of paper and white stamp pad. I had paint brushes, stamps, Q-tips and the square sponges. I let Angel Girl go at the paper making a work of art with the color white. She did really well! The painting now hangs on our fridge in the place of honor.

PS. I know I am almost a week late in this post but that is the great thing about mommy school...when life gets crazy busy we can adjust our learning and activities.

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Wednesday: Counting to 5

Wednesday we worked on counting to 5 on objects. In particular these really cool nesting bowls that we got Sweet Boy for Christmas. They can stack on top of each other and within each other. They also have numbers written on them. I modeled putting out the nesting bowls and counting to 5. Then I showed her how to stack them counting to 5. Angel Girl then took over the task. She really enjoyed it and by the end of the lesson she was able to count to five while she placed them.

Friday, January 22, 2010

Tuesday: Squares

Tuesday we sponge painted. In particular we used square shaped sponges. I had a large square sponge and a few smaller square sponges. I held up the big one and reintroduced her to the word square. Then asked to make squares on the paper. She seemed to enjoy it a lot.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

January 18th – 22nd

Monday
o Tracing lines Kumon
o Pat a cake

Tuesday
o Sponge paint squares
o Ring toss

Wednesday
o Counting to 5 with nesting bowls
o CAP: 1st and last with different familiar objects

Thursday
o Handprint counting to 5
o White Art

Friday
o Family Who am I? game
o Handprint paintings

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Thursday: Body Parts

On Thursday we continued learning about our body parts. I read the book From Head to Toes by Eric Carle and we did the different actions that the animals did. Then we sang Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes. I did a little bit of where is your neck, wrist, ankle but she wasn't entirely sure what they were.

Friday, January 15, 2010

Tuesday: Intro White

For Tuesday I tried to introduce the color white. I had a white crayon and had Angel Girl repeat the word white. Then we went through her toys to find toys that were white. I took pictures of the items that we found so that I can make a color book for her using her toys. Most of them I had to point out to her but she did find 1 item. I figure I will continue to point out white objects to her.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Monday: Tracing

Sorry a little behind this week, we've had a very busy week this week so not all my planned mommy school lessons are occuring...but that is what makes it great...I can just do the activity at another time.

So Monday we did tracing using our Kumon book, about 1 page at a time. Kumon is a company that creates workbooks for pretty much everything. They also have tutoring and such. For me I was interested in the basic skill books. The tracing book is for ages 2-4 and it is basically a book of lines for Angel Girl to trace. Angel Girl loves to draw and color and does it often but this give a very specific task of being able to control the pencil/crayon enough to stay within the lines.

PS. I also have the cutting, coloring and mazes book (they were on sale at Costco). I think the coloring one will be fun to use when Angel Girl is more familiar with her colors.

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

January 11th – 18th

Monday
Kumon Tracing lines
Clapping music

Tuesday
Intro Color White
Throwing beanbags

Wednesday
Counting to 5
Kumon Tracing lines

Thursday
Body Part Identification
Review squares, white, and counting to 5

Friday
Identifying family
Play at the park (depends on if the weather improves like predicted)

Sunday, January 10, 2010

Friday: Family

Angel Girl got really interested in Who was Who when we went back to Daddy's home for Christmas. So that prompted me making family part of our study this month. For Friday I just pulled out some of our albums and pictures and going through them with Angel Girl. I made sure to include pictures of Grandma and Opa so that she would be able to remember who she had just spent time with. I had a little album that I wasn't using so I put in some of the loose pictures for her to look at anytime. It will be her book. The best part is that as we take more current pictures I can change them up.

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Thursday: Body Parts

Note: no Wednesday post because the activity was just counting in different situations

Thursday was learning about our bodies. I had Angel Girl lay down on some wrapping paper and traced her. Then she identified body parts and I added it to her outline. I think I will do more with the outline this month but I am still trying to figure out what.
We sang Head, Shoulders Knees and Toes to finish off.
Angel is fairly versed in basic body parts so I think the rest if this month we will work on more advanced body parts (thighs, shins, chin, finger tips, ankle ect)

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Tuesday: Squares

Today I introduced squares to Angel Girl. First I showed her a large square that I had cut out. I told her about 4 sides and 4 corners. Then I sang her this song:
This Is a Square - sung to "Frere Jacques"
This is a square, this is a square.
How can you tell? How can you tell?
It has four sides,
All the same size.
It's a square, it's a square.
(she didn't really get the song but I figure we can revisit it often enough)
Then we did a square picture. I got some foam squares that I let her glue on and make a picture with. I used the word square as much as I could so she could hear the word while she was manipulating the shape. She loved this activity and is really proud of the picture that she made.

P.S. This was part of the art process gluing I am introducing this month. We used a glue stick and I showed her how to hold it and to put the glue on the foam square. She got putting the glue on but I had to help her a lot with flipping it over to put on the paper.

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Manners - Please and Thank You

Angel Girl is good at saying please and thank you. Sidenote: Angel Girl says Thank you in sign language most of the time, and slowly it has evolved to blowing a kiss which I am not ready to give up yet.

I googled some ideas though for helping her remember to say please and thank you. Here are my favorites: (from this site)

o Sung to: "If You're Happy and You Know It"
• When my grandpa gives me something,
• I say "thank you".
• When my grandma gives me something,
• I say "thank you".
• I can see it makes them happy
• When I say it so politely
• Yes, good manners mean to always
• say "thank you"!

o Sung to: "I'm a Little Teapot"
• I have super manners. Yes, I do.
• I can say "Please," and "Thank You," too.
• When I play with friends, I like to share.
• That's the way I show I care!

o Sung to: "Frere Jacques"
• Please and Thank You
• Please and Thank You
• Sounds so nice
• Sounds so nice
• Manners are important
• Manners are important
• Be Polite
• Be Polite

I may incorporate these songs into our day to help her remember these words, especially since she loves to sing.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Monday Jan. 4th CAP

So Monday's activity is CAP looking L to R. For the reasoning check out this post. The actually activity we will be doing on Monday is merely tracing lines. I bought the Kumon Tracing book that I plan to work on with Angel Girl to help her get use to tracing. This will also help her develop the idea of looking. I will also be using my finger to trace the words in at least one of the books that we read each day. I figure repeating these two activities in a variety of ways over many weeks, months, and years will do the best for helping my daughter learn about looking l to r. A bonus activity (something we will do if there is down time and she is bored one day) is a line of toys that she just quickly points to from left to right. This would be a quick activity that can be done that focuses on left to right processing.

Friday, January 1, 2010

New Year

Its new year which means resolutions. This year I want to be more consistent with mommy school for Angel Girl. So every month I plan to post my monthly themes to work on in Language, writing, counting, geometry, science, social studies, art color, art process, music, physical, emotional, and chore chart. So this year Mommy School will start on Monday. This week we will:
Monday:
CAP looking l to r
Cleaning up

Tuesday:
introducing squares
throwing

Wednesday:
counting to 5
CAP

Thursday:
body parts
More squares

Friday:
Family