Saturday, September 17, 2011
Lono and More Math Review
We made it through our first week of school, and are getting settled back into the rhythm of it all. This week continued to be review for Grant, and I moved on to reading this book to Johanna:
This is a fun little book, that I also used with Grant in Kindergarten, about an island named Lono and how she goes from a bare rocky island to a lush green paradise.
We started every morning this week with a walk, blessing, circle time, foreign language lesson (singing a song and learning simple phrases in French)penny whistle lesson and math review. Some days Grant and I reviewed math with bean bag tosses, sang the times table's songs, and some days he worked out some problems on his own. Grant will also have a new form drawing every day this week. Starting next week, he will only have one form drawing to practice every week.
On Monday, which will also be "clay day" for Grant, he did his best to model a pyramid with the fingertips in front of him. This was quite a challenge for him, so I will probably let him do it like this again next week before having him try and do it behind his back.
I also read him a short story about Times and Minus the math gnomes to help him review greater than,less than, and =. He also worked out some problems.
We started every morning this week with a walk, blessing, circle time, foreign language lesson (singing a song and learning simple phrases in French)penny whistle lesson and math review. Some days Grant and I reviewed math with bean bag tosses, sang the times table's songs, and some days he worked out some problems on his own. Grant will also have a new form drawing every day this week. Starting next week, he will only have one form drawing to practice every week.
On Monday, which will also be "clay day" for Grant, he did his best to model a pyramid with the fingertips in front of him. This was quite a challenge for him, so I will probably let him do it like this again next week before having him try and do it behind his back.
I also read him a short story about Times and Minus the math gnomes to help him review greater than,less than, and =. He also worked out some problems.
I read the first two pages of the Lono book to Johanna and then we modeled an island out of clay.
On Tuesday, Grant will be working on a ball twirling exercise, eventually progressing to twirling a ball in each hand going in opposite directions while spinning a third ball under his foot (in the same direction as that hand is going) while saying a memorized verse. This will definitely take him a few weeks to get the hang of!
Grant worked out some math problems, and then we reviewed money. We talked about what each coin was worth, and how many of each make up a dollar. After that, I handed him some bills and coins and asked him to tell me how much money he had total. Then I handed over the money drawer to him and "bought" some items from the school room and he had to give change back to me.
I read Johanna the next two pages of Lono where she gets friends in the form of lichen babies and mossy maids. We also meet the little palm man, Coco Boato, from a nearby island who is intent on getting to Lono in his little boat after hearing from the wind messengers that she is lonely and bare.
To go along with the story, Johanna and I planted seeds for an indoor herb garden.
On Wednesday, I read Johanna the next two pages in the Lono story, and we drew a picture of Lono and Coco Boato who is now a tall and mighty palm tree.
Johanna's Picture
Grant continued his review of money as we set up a "Truxton Market" in the school room. Johanna was a baker selling tasty treats, and Julia was selling fruits and vegetables. Grant and I wrote down the prices of the various items, then Grant bought items from the girls and figured out how much money he needed to pay each one.
On Thursday, we set up the market again, and this time Johanna bought items from Grant and he had to figure out how much she owed, and how much change he had to give back. I also made sure Johanna bought multiple items of the same thing, so Grant got a chance to use multiplication, as well as addition and subtraction. He also drew a picture in his lesson book:
On Friday, We did a comprehensive math review, and I gave Grant a little "test" to give me an idea of where he is with his math skills. He did really well, and got all the answers right.
These were the form drawings Grant worked on this week:
Next week Grant and I will begin new material with our first language arts block using stories from the Old Testament.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
A Trip to the Apple Orchard
The morning was full of kids, mazes, sliding, jumping, goat feeding, tractor riding, apple picking, apple eating and apple slushies.
Monday, September 12, 2011
The First Week of School
We started our 2011 school year after Labor Day. The first two weeks for Grant will be review. I will also be doing some "first year Kindergarten" activities with Johanna this year.
On Tuesday, we started off with our walk around the lake. It was a beautiful morning and a great way to kick off the first day of school.
After the walk, we made our way into the school room where we said a blessing and then I did a short circle time of seasonal songs and verses with the girls. I will see how they do, and if they stick with me and stay interested, I will add more songs, verses and finger plays. After circle time, we moved into a French lesson. I switched to French this year from Spanish (which we tried when Grant was in first grade) because I actually took 3 years of French in high school, so I am familiar with most of the words and their pronunciation. Trying to learn Spanish while teaching it to my kids did NOT work well.
Afterward, I told Johanna the harvest story of The Giant Turnip using these fun nesting dolls.
Once I was done telling her the story, Grant and I did our penny whistle lesson. I upgraded our penny whistles for this year, I we really like them. The first couple of weeks with the penny whistle will also be a review. After that, I will begin teaching Grant how to read music.
After the penny whistle lesson, I introduced the form drawing for the day. Grant and I practiced drawing it in the air, and then we used our fingers and wrote it on each other's backs. He practiced it on his chalkboard before drawing it in his form drawing lesson book.
Next, we began a review of time. We reviewed the year, the months and seasons. How many days in a year? How many days in a month, in a week? We reviewed the days of the week, and how many hours in a day. We talked about the history of clocks and reviewed how to read an analogue clock. We talked about the hands of the clock being like three brothers who are all very different. We also set up some sticks outside to watch how the shadows moved in relation to the sun as people did a LOOOONG time ago.
Grant also copied this verse:
While he was copying his verse, I sat down with Johanna, and we drew a picture from The Giant Turnip story. Johanna saw me using the block crayons, and even though she didn't have to, she wanted to use them because I was. This was the first time she has used the block crayons to make a drawing.
On Tuesday, we started off with our walk around the lake. It was a beautiful morning and a great way to kick off the first day of school.
After the walk, we made our way into the school room where we said a blessing and then I did a short circle time of seasonal songs and verses with the girls. I will see how they do, and if they stick with me and stay interested, I will add more songs, verses and finger plays. After circle time, we moved into a French lesson. I switched to French this year from Spanish (which we tried when Grant was in first grade) because I actually took 3 years of French in high school, so I am familiar with most of the words and their pronunciation. Trying to learn Spanish while teaching it to my kids did NOT work well.
Afterward, I told Johanna the harvest story of The Giant Turnip using these fun nesting dolls.
Once I was done telling her the story, Grant and I did our penny whistle lesson. I upgraded our penny whistles for this year, I we really like them. The first couple of weeks with the penny whistle will also be a review. After that, I will begin teaching Grant how to read music.
After the penny whistle lesson, I introduced the form drawing for the day. Grant and I practiced drawing it in the air, and then we used our fingers and wrote it on each other's backs. He practiced it on his chalkboard before drawing it in his form drawing lesson book.
Next, we began a review of time. We reviewed the year, the months and seasons. How many days in a year? How many days in a month, in a week? We reviewed the days of the week, and how many hours in a day. We talked about the history of clocks and reviewed how to read an analogue clock. We talked about the hands of the clock being like three brothers who are all very different. We also set up some sticks outside to watch how the shadows moved in relation to the sun as people did a LOOOONG time ago.
Grant also copied this verse:
While he was copying his verse, I sat down with Johanna, and we drew a picture from The Giant Turnip story. Johanna saw me using the block crayons, and even though she didn't have to, she wanted to use them because I was. This was the first time she has used the block crayons to make a drawing.
Mom's Picture
Johanna's Picture
Julia wanted to join in on the picture drawing, too.
Once Grant was done copying the verse, he drew a picture of a favorite memory from the previous year. I let him use stick crayons for this drawing. We will work our way back into using the block crayons after these first two weeks of review.
He drew a picture of himself swimming in our pond
(That's a huge catfish nibbling on his foot):
On Wednesday, we once again started with our morning walk. On our walks we will be stopping to feed and water our chickens. The kids like holding and feeding the little gals. I figure it's a good thing to get them used to this routine as they will be taking it over once they get a little older....
Julia can snatch up these little chickies like nobody's business. She's fast!
Julia can snatch up these little chickies like nobody's business. She's fast!
Julia with Lucky
(Yes, there is a story behind this name, and it involves being chased by a German Shepard and a Black Lab and living to tell about it..trust me, she's lucky!)
(Yes, there is a story behind this name, and it involves being chased by a German Shepard and a Black Lab and living to tell about it..trust me, she's lucky!)
Grant with Mabel
Johanna with Cutie Pie
Once we got into the school room, we had circle time, French lesson and penny whistle lesson. Grant and I also reviewed all of the "times table songs" we learned last year.
After that, I told Johanna (and Grant and Julia, too) another harvest story about a family of hedgehogs from the Fall 2008 edition of Living Crafts magazine with the felted pumpkin and hedgehog family I made a few years ago.
After the story was over, Grant and I reviewed the times tables again by making this chart to hang up in the school room. Grant really enjoyed filling it out once he discovered the patterns of skip counting in both the rows and the columns.
Once he was done filling in the chart, we began making a corn husk doll. I wanted to make a harvest craft with Johanna, but she ran off to play with Julia, so Grant and I started making one. We didn't quite get it finished, and Johanna is requesting a girl doll with a skirt. We'll see if we get to that one...
On Thursday, we started out again with circle time and penny whistle lesson. Grant and I also reviewed the times tables some more.
I told Johanna a story called, "The Little Red House with No Doors", which is about a little red house with no windows and no doors, and five rooms and a star inside. The little red house turns out to be an apple. During the story, I cut open an apple so we could see the star inside and then the kids ate it for snack.
Grant practiced a new form drawing, and then we reviewed the four processes using a story about a woodcutter and his woodshed. He wanted to keep track of how many sticks he had available to sell, so he put bundles of 10 sticks in the left side of his shed (the ten's place) and put loose sticks in the right side of his shed (the one's place. We worked through many story problems using all the processes. Grant drew a wood shed in his lesson book, and he used toothpicks as "sticks" to help him solve the problems.
I also had Grant read this book to the girls:
Grant also practiced a new from drawing and copied it into his book.
On Thursday, we started out again with circle time and penny whistle lesson. Grant and I also reviewed the times tables some more.
I told Johanna a story called, "The Little Red House with No Doors", which is about a little red house with no windows and no doors, and five rooms and a star inside. The little red house turns out to be an apple. During the story, I cut open an apple so we could see the star inside and then the kids ate it for snack.
Grant practiced a new form drawing, and then we reviewed the four processes using a story about a woodcutter and his woodshed. He wanted to keep track of how many sticks he had available to sell, so he put bundles of 10 sticks in the left side of his shed (the ten's place) and put loose sticks in the right side of his shed (the one's place. We worked through many story problems using all the processes. Grant drew a wood shed in his lesson book, and he used toothpicks as "sticks" to help him solve the problems.
I also had Grant read this book to the girls:
On Friday, we took a field trip with the Warren County Home School Group to the apple orchard. Later in the afternoon, I read this book to Johanna:
Afterward, Johanna and I were going to make an apple crisp, but the other two "Webb-kins" wanted to help, too. It was a tasty way to finish off our first week of school.
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