Homeschooling

I have been homeschooling my kids “officially” since January. I’ve been doing a sort of “eclectic” format, piecing it all together myself. I don’t like that method, now that I’ve been doing it for awhile. I would rather have a set curriculum to pull from daily.

Since January, we’ve moved from preschool material to kindergarten material. Both kids know their shapes, colors, letters and letter sounds, can count to 20 (actually much higher with a little help), can do simple addition, and can write all their numbers and letters. We’ve moved on to phonics and beginning reading. I started out using “How to Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons” but for some reason, Gabriel just wasn’t getting it – so I’ve stepped back and I’m just doing a really phonics-heavy program now. We go over A Beka-style phonics ladders and charts (think sk in skate, thr in three, etc.). I’m a bit frustrated with how long it seems to be taking and the fact that sight words never seem to stick. I know I’m always expecting a bit too much. I am very ambitious, though and it’s just in my nature to push them to be the best they can be … and then some.

One favorite activity recently has been playing with alphabet magnets. Gabriel has been spelling up a storm .. although, he needs help on things that aren’t obvious, like words with a silent “e.”

I am going to school this summer to start working towards my nursing program … but then I’ll be out in August, not to return until the program officially starts up in fall of 2010. So, I have to decide what to do school-wise with the kids this next year. I *definitely* don’t want them going to public. Mikaela’s not even old enough. I had Gabriel at the public school last year and I didn’t like it for many reasons. I am considering getting a full-time job and finding a private school for the kids to go to. That decision is mostly because we consistently don’t have enough to make ends meet. My freelance work just doesn’t pay the bills. And as much as I believe in homeschooling … I don’t know if it’s for us or not. Maybe if I had a set curriculum to work from, things would go more smoothly. Either way, it’s a big decision to make and I’d appreciate your prayers.

Long time no write

Wow, has it really been two weeks? What a slacker I’ve turned into!

Homeschooling is going pretty well. We’re about a third of the way through How to Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. Mikaela is picking it up more quickly than Gabriel is. Each day we also read a book together, trace letters, trace numbers, have a Bible lesson and a science lesson. Crafts and cutting practice get thrown in the mix almost daily as well. We spend about an hour to two hours, depending on the day and their attentiveness. Sometimes Gabriel is totally spaced out, which obviously slows us down.

This week at our homeschool is animal week. We’re covering the following concepts:

• Animals live in different habitats, in different places in the world
• Animals come in a wide range of sizes
• Animals’ coverings protect them from temperature and predators
• Animals need food, shelter and water
• Animals move in different ways
• Animals can be classified
• Some animals lay eggs, some animals have babies
• Animals eat different food
• Some animals build homes
• Some animals hibernate, birds migrate
• Some animals are nocturnal
• Some animals provide products we use

… we’re covering those topics by reading an array of books, watching animal DVDs we rented from the library, doing animal experiments and activities from my Macmillan Early Science Activities kit, and hopefully we’ll be able to go to the zoo this week as well.

I love this stuff.

Aside from homeschooling, I am trying to get a degree plan written up by a couple of our local community colleges. Hopefully once I get the finalized degree plan it will help me to make my decision about which nursing school to attend. This decision is making me nuts, and I’m ready to have a solid plan in place. I am a goal-oriented person and I hate when things are up in the air like this. I’ll keep you posted.

Fun with Themes

I have been getting into the spirit of the literature-based theme unit curriculum I’m about to start using for our homeschool. Today, we read If You Give a Moose a Muffin and then pulled two activities out of the book – making muffins and putting on a puppet show.

The muffin part was pretty standard, but we let the kids help us stir it up and pour it in the muffin pan. The puppet show was a lot of fun. We turned a table on its side and Jay made a cardboard arch to tape to the top of it. Voila – instant theater. I pulled out old socks, adhesive wiggly eyes, my needle and thread (trust me, I’m not nearly as creative as I’m making this sound) and fuzzy craft pom-poms. About 30 minutes, one bloody finger and a couple of muffled semi-swear-words later, I had four sock puppets – one for each member of the family.

We decided to act out a story from another book – The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Jay read and I worked the puppet. It was pretty easy and involved lots of cookie-monsterish gobbling. Of course the kids thought it was funny. It was a good family night.

Ultimate Alphabet Theme Unit Resource

I’ve compiled a list of early childhood alphabet theme unit materials, from games to books to coloring pages and more. Whether you’re a homeschooler, a parent who wants to give your kids a head-start, or a teacher, you’re bound to find lots of great resources here. I went through many pages online weeding out the good from the bad (in my humble opinion!). Another note: some things fall within more than one category, so if you don’t see what you’re looking for, keep scrolling and maybe you’ll see it. (For example, reproducible/class activity books are under “Teacher Resources” and not “Books”)

Alphabet theme

Free Alphabet Resources

Free Class, Group or Individual Games

Alphabet Battle (alpha ordering)

Free Activities/Crafts

Alphabet activity ideas

DLTK’s alphabet games and crafts

Free Online games

Learn upper and lower case letters, letter sounds, and words starting with letter

Match first letter to picture of item

ABCD Watermelon – Pick which letter comes next

Clifford’s Letter Round Up – Match letters, hear letter sound

Assortment of alphabet ordering games

Connect the dots – alphabet (letter order)

Drag the vowel to complete the word (fill in missing letter)

Teach Me ABCs

Click and drag to match letters in the jungle

Writing letters/handwriting (Free)

Cartoon spider writes upper and lower case letters

Letter tracing printouts

Online Free Printable Worksheets

Match upper and lower case letters

Upper & lower-case letter coloring pages

Circle words that start with each letter

Alphabet printable books

Other Alphabet Resources

Homeschool, week 2

Well, so far, things are going pretty well. I’m especially surprised at Mikaela’s newfound ability to sit still and pay attention. It’s Gabriel I’m having more trouble out of. He rarely wants to have school time, although he warms up to it once we’re doing it and often doesn’t want to stop. One big thing he’s struggling with is his handwriting, which is not surprising given his motor delay and lack of age-appropriate motor skills (in other words, his hand muscles are too weak to hold the pencil right). I am REALLY hoping this improves with practice/age. We can really get hung up on a page of letters to trace.

Our daily sessions are taking about 2 hours, but that includes a 10 or 15-minute recess break where they play in our backyard. Plus, we’re doing fun things like playing math-related games. This was my lesson plan for today:

Lesson Plan
Day 7 – Monday Aug. 4, 2008

Recite weekly memory verse: “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” – Psalm 139:14

Identify month and day of the week on calendar: Monday, August 4.

Look outside and talk about weather. Select appropriate thing on the weather wheel.

Recite pledge of allegiance and Texas pledge.

Add a link to construction paper chain.

English
Go over the letter G – the letter shape, letter sound, and trace a page of upper & lower-case letters.

Read “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” aloud. Ask them questions about the story when finished:
- What was the story about?
- What was your favorite part of this story? et al

Math
Build a lego (or blocks) tower and have them build one to match. (Make sure they get the concept of “alike” or the “same”).

Do Number 6 tracing worksheet. Count several items that have “six.”

Do Cutting and ‘big and small’ Worksheets.

Science
Gather plants and describe them. Talk about similarities and differences.

English
Vocabulary words: Xylophone, flute, harp, maracas, tambourine (1000 words p. 72)

Social studies
Read page out of “Children Just Like Me” – identify where child is from on the globe.

Look at family tree. Talk about our family. Talk about different families. “Families and their Needs” pages 4-7, 10-11

Homeschool Preschool Day 1

Today was my very first day of really homeschooling in earnest. [If you're just tuning in, I am homeschooling my 3 1/2-year-old girl and almost-five-year old boy. He starts preschool at the local public school in a month, but I'm not sure I'm leaving him in long-term.]

I think it went pretty well. It lasted about two hours, with a 10-minute “recess” break in between. I took a long time researching the state educational standards (what kids need to learn when), consulting teaching and homeschooling books, and gathering workbooks and supplies. So instead of a set curriculum, we’re just kind of doing a hodgepodge based on my research. I mean, it’s not rocket science … obviously, they need to be learning their letters and numbers at this age, but there’s a lot more I wanted to cover as well.

If you’re curious, here was my lesson plan for today:

Recite weekly memory verse: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16

Identify month and day of the week on calendar: Monday, July 28.

Look outside and talk about weather. Select appropriate weather conditions on the weather wheel.

Recite pledge of allegiance and Texas pledge.

Start a construction paper chain. (Have a pre-cut strip of construction paper, crayons, and tape handy.). Tell them that each day, you will add one more ring to the chain. Let them help you decorate it.

English
Go over the letter A – the letter shape, letter sound, and trace a page of upper & lower-case letters. Drill them with letter flashcards to make sure they know uppercase A and lowercase a. Talk about words that start with the letter A. Let them take turns writing A’s on the dry-erase board.

Read “The Snowy Day” aloud. Ask them questions about the story when finished:

• Was this story about summer or winter?
• What did the boy do in the book?
• What was your favorite part?
• Do you think snow is cold or hot?
• What do you wear when it snows outside?

Math
Sorting game: give them each baskets or bags filled with multiples of several different things. (I used buttons, cotton balls and jingle bells. Odd combination, but it’s what I had handy.) Put bowls around room and have them run around sorting items out by kind.

Do Number zero tracing worksheet. Talk to them about concept of “none” and “zero.”

Do Cutting Worksheet (scissor skills)

Science
Discuss your Five Senses. Read “My Five Senses.”

English
Vocabulary words: Smell, Touch, Taste, Sight, Hearing.

Social studies
Read page out of “Children Just Like Me” – identify where child is from on the globe.

Talk about each child as an individual and get them to recognize individual differences and characteristics (use mirror). Fill out page 43 from All About Me (height, weight, hand and foot measurements). Have them decorate “God made me special” picture frames.

Mailing your first letter

So, I’ve been looking for opportunities to teach my kids everywhere I can. Today I decided to teach Gabriel about writing and receiving mail, and the USPS. First I showed him this video about how the USPS works. Then, we collected envelope, stamp, paper and pen and I told him we were going to write and mail a letter to Grandmother and Granddaddy. He was excited. (“This is gon’ be awesome!” he said at one point.) I asked him leading questions about his day and asked him what he wanted me to write to them. With some prodding, he talked and I wrote. Tomorrow we’re going to take the letter to the post office. I hope by the time my parents send a letter in reply he hasn’t forgotten about the whole thing (we live several states apart).

I’ve been looking around for other resources to expound on and/or reinforce the mail theme and this is what I’ve found:

Online

• Publication (PDF) from the USPS about their history, including a section about how a letter travels.
• The National Postal Museum has some great resources for educators, including games and coloring pages. This site also has a good but long video on the history of moving the mail. There’s a wealth of information on this site, so dig around a little.

Books

• A Day With a Mail Carrier
• Where Does the Mail Go?
• The Post Office Book: Mail and How It Moves
• Dear Mr. Blueberry
• Dear Annie
• The Jolly Postman
• Bunny Mail: A Max & Ruby Lift-the-Flap Book
• How it Happens at the Post Office

VHS/DVD

• All About the Post Office
• Hard Hat Harry’s Real Life Post Office Adventure for Kids

Week 1, down

Well, I’m happy to say I have one full week of leaf-turning under my belt, and I’m happy to say that things are going pretty well so far. The major changes that I’ve made so far are sticking to a better schedule, getting the kids in a night-time routine again, keeping on top of the housework (mostly) and last but certainly not least – homeschooling the kids.

I’ve decided to start the homeschooling out really slowly – we only spend 30 minutes to 1 hour each weekday, the length of time depending on whether they’re getting sick of whatever we’re doing. I’ve decided to spend 1 week on each letter of the alphabet, and this week we’re on “B.” We’ve been naming words that start with “B,” coloring pictures of “B” words, tracing capital and lowercase Bs and singing songs about the letter, as well. They both know that B says “buh” and that B starts balloon, bird, bed, boy, ball, baby and bear…. but the letter tracing’s not going too well. It’s no big deal… they’re still so young. I’ll probably try to re-focus on handwriting in another year, when he’s 5 and she’s 3 1/2. I’m just mainly concerned with letter recognition and phonemic awareness (knowing what sounds the letters make), so we can get them on the road to reading. I was reading at the age of 4, but since Gabriel’s somewhat behind developmentally, it will probably be a while yet before he’s reading. I’ll be thrilled if he’s reading by 6.

Anyway, we are talking about some basic mathematic concepts, colors, shapes, opposites and some other things … but my main focus right now is the alphabet.