Jugs and Bears

Julia's confinement has been great! Don't worry, she enjoys it too because she gets snacks. It is making main lesson time go SO much smoother.

This week has been grey, cloudy and rainy. We were still able to take our morning walks all week and enjoy our Halloween songs and verses. We added jump roping this week to Grant's circle time. He REALLY likes that. The tongue twister I introduced on Monday was, "Jolly juggling jesters jauntily juggled jingling jacks." It took him awhile to get it, and then we let it rest for the day.

In our story, Katie had to go collect water for the family in jugs and her father taught her about the letter J, and told her The Water of Life. I told the Grant the same story and we talked about the letter J, practiced writing it and practiced the new form drawing for the week. Next, we started our drawing from the story.

"J is for Jug" Chalkboard Drawing

Grant's jump rope the he finger-knitted

I made a run to a local "paint your own pottery" place and picked up a "pottery to go kit". I got a jug for Grant to paint and a pumpkin plate for Johanna to paint. Knowing that Grant would also want a pumpkin plate, I got one for him, too. They really had fun painting these on Tuesday. It is hard for them to imagine the change the colors will make after they are fired. When we painted them, the colors were very dull, pastel, and rough. But the magic happens when they bake and glass that is in the paint melts, and voila, bright shiny colors! Grant also told me the story of The Water of Life. We wrote the letter J and the summary in his book, and finished our drawings. By today he had mastered the new tongue twister.

Mom's The Water of Life Drawing

Grant's The Water of Life Drawing

On Wednesday, we learned about the letter B and I told Grant the story of The Willow-Wren and the Bear. Grant practiced drawing the letter B on his chalkboard. For this, I draw three line on the board. A blue line for air, a green line for grass, and an orange line for dirt. Then I draw the different letters and explain to him how some stand tall way up into the air, some stay and play in the grass, and some dip down into the dirt. For some reason, he is always excited when one of them dips down into the dirt! After he practiced it, he wrote it in his lesson book. I also introduced a new tongue twister today, "A big black bug bit a big black bear, but where is the big black bear that the big black bug bit?"

In the afternoon I made some bread dough, and Johanna helped me make bread for dinner. We had some men at the house doing some work, and Grant was much more interested in "helping them" then making bread with the girls!

"B is for Bear" chalkboard drawing

On Thursday, we wrote the summary of The Willow-Wren and the Bear in his book and he drew the form drawing in his book. Earlier in the week he struggled a little with this one, but after a little practice, walking it on the driveway, drawing it in the air with his hand and arm, etc, he was drawing it with ease.

For handwork this week, Grant finger-knitted a strap for a felt treasure bag I made for a Birthday gift. Next week we will start on a Halloween sewing project. Grant picked out this project and is very excited to get started!