No pictures this week. Bad mommy! Addison worked on contractions and fractions (we are all about rhyming our topics of learning - ha!) this week. Because she is constantly reading, she keeps finding either contractions or words that could have been contractions and pointing them out:) We are going to do a couple of fun recipes this coming week to do some practical life reinforcement of fractions. Hopefully I can manage to get some pictures of that! She has been asking me to teach her to sew for a long time so I need to make plans for some simple projects for her.
Jaron is working on writing. We also got to visit a friend's classroom during Addison's piano lesson and he got to play with her "feed the dog" fine motor activity. He loves using tweezers and tongs:) He has loved his cutting projects this week and especially a "Cars" reading book we bought at Half Price Books. That comes in handy for motivation in doing other activities. You may call it bribing. I call it motivation:) He also loves his Team Umizumi math activity book. I plan for 1 activity and he always wants to do more!
We read some books about stars and planets this week, but didn't get to our planet project. We will try to do that this week and get some pictures. We read plenty of Mother Goose rhymes and finished our book about William Tell. Both kids loved that book. Jaron really liked the archery.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Another week in Review and Jaron's 4 year old well-check
On Monday mornings, Jaron has gymnastics. Here is he is running back from "ringing the bell" for doing something well. I think this was for his back roll.
Jaron is quite proud that he can write his name so we have been practicing in different ways. A great way to build hand strength is to have them write "on the wall" or upside down (on paper taped to the bottom of a table). This was with new washable Crayola dry erase markers (woohoo), but we usually try to stick with the dry erase crayons on the board as that gives him the resistance needed to build that hand strength. The markers just don't do that so it looks shaky, but he loves them so we "play" with those too:)
I have a small embroidery business that helps to pay the bills so I can stay home. I do lots of applique like the shirts below, but can put names on lots of things and even business logos on polos, dress shirts, etc. Here are a couple of project from the week:) Hudson is one of my former preschool students and Houston is his little brother:)
Jaron is working on identifying and putting numbers in order through 20 right now. Here he is hard at work!
Addison has been working on contractions and fractions mostly this week, but here she is with a couple of geoboard creations she was particularly proud of.
Jaron woke up from nap time to join the fun. He added some to sissy's creation. Please excuse our nap hair!
On Fridays, we go to our Homeschool co-op. This is Addison shortly after returning. It's a long day full of activity, but we love it:) And yes, she is asleep!
And finally, Jaron had his 4 year old well-check since he will be turning 4 on the 26th. He was 33 pounds (25%) and 38 inches tall (20%). He is on the small side for his age, but doing great. What can I say. His mama is 5'1" (almost) and his daddy is 6'1". The kiddos have half a chance at being a normal height. Ha!
Monday, September 10, 2012
Week in Review
Well, Week 2 went so much better schedule-wise. AND I took some pictures! Here is just a little of what we did this past week!
Jaron doing a reading lesson from 100 Easy Lessons. He is getting a little bored with this right now so I think we will change things up next week. We will probably do some Hooked On Phonics (Kinder level).
Doing some fine motor pre-writing activities..
And some cutting.
A frequent sight in our house: Addison reading to Jaron. When she has free time, reading is probably the most chosen activity. Love that!
Addison showing Jaron her new Math computer game. This has been much requested this week!
Choice time for Addison included making shapes/pictures with velcro sticks.
Both kids had a blast playing in shaving cream. A little free play and some writing practice for Jaron and a spelling test for Addison.
We had our first day at a local Homeschool Co-op. Parents come together and teach different classes while kids get to do some fun enrichment classes and be around other homeschool kiddos. Both kids had an absolute blast even though they were pretty wiped out by the time we got home (so was mommy). I get to help out with a few classes, but my official job is to watch kids when the day is over so the cleaning team can restore the church to "Sunday ready." I'm hoping to be able to be able to teach classes soon since that is my love:) Here is the only picture I got of the kids at co-op. They are singing "God Bless America" at the opening assembly. I hope this will be the start to many years in co-op!
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Our first "official" week!
Disclaimer - Long post ahead!
I am so glad that we did some school this summer since our first "official" week was anything but normal. For people who know me, they know I am pretty organized. I am very much a list-maker and have my list with me at all times. So starting out this week, I had workboxes full, checklists prepared, our homeschool area prepped as well as our lesson plans and supplies ready. What really happened was a different story! When you see what happened this week, I hope you will forgive my lack of pictures on this post! So here was our week:
Monday - Jaron has gymnastic in the morning. This is weekly and not a big deal. Addison does school while he has class. It changes up our schedule some, but not a problem! When we got home, Jaron did some school and we did school together. After a short break and lunch, our friend Lily came over for her piano lesson. We do a group lesson (kids are ages 3, 4 and 5) with Lily and my kids. We do piano as well as some general music and I try to make it fun by playing games. When she left, it was rest time for Jaron and Addison finished up her school. Successful first day!
Tuesday - Mommy had to go to the doctor and I brought the kids with me. I love my doctor, but we often have to wait a while to see her since she ends up delivering babies, doing emergency surgery, etc. We were prepared with some hands-on, but portable activities, books and snacks. Jaron and Addison both played with Unifix cubes. Jaron sorted them by color and then we worked on creating patterns with them. This is old news for Addison, but fairly new to Jaron. He soaked it up with no problem and starting creating his own patterns. We talked about stars and planets and did some cutting activities and Addison did some of her reading. Not sure what I'm going to do with that girl. There are 2 big readers for the Language Arts curriculum we are using. I had the first one with me. After she read 4 stories (and could answer all of the comprehension questions), I flipped to the back to play "stump the Addison." She loves this game. I picked out words I thought would be hard for her, but she got every one! Anyway, by the time we got home, it was time for a quick lunch and early rest time. Addison finished school while Jaron napped, and then we ran to dance class.
Wednesday - We have had a big hole in our kitchen ceiling due to a water leak for a couple of weeks. We finally got the information we needed from insurance and were able to get an awesome team to get started on Wednesday. There was much drywall dust and plastic hanging in our kitchen, but we really just had to avoid the house as much as we could that day. Because of the lay-out of our house, just going to the bathroom was going to present a problem. We went to Chick Fil A for breakfast and playtime, a movie and then visited our old preschool for a bit before Addison's piano lesson. The kitchen was not very usable that night so we ordered a pizza and had a picnic in the living room.
Thursday - more work on the kitchen and painting! I have wanted to paint my kitchen for a while, but didn't really think it would happen any time soon. I love it! We were able to stay home, we watched a friend's 2 little ones for a few hours and did lots of school in the living room. No kitchen that night either so with a coupon and a gift card, we ate at Macaroni Grill for $6 and that included tip!
Friday - the guys finished up the painting and we played "catch-up" with school. I schedule for a 4-day school week since we have co-op on Fridays (starts next week), but today we caught up with most all but Addison's math (which we finished on Saturday). The kitchen is done and Mommy had lots of clean-up and moving back into the kitchen. I love my new kitchen! I'll post pics next week.
We didn't get to a couple of fun enrichment activities this week, but we did the bulk of what I had planned. I'm hoping this coming week will be a bit more "normal" so we can see how our daily schedule will work out. If you got to the end of this post, I am impressed! Next week should include some pictures and hopefully, a more accurate view of what we usually do at home!
I am so glad that we did some school this summer since our first "official" week was anything but normal. For people who know me, they know I am pretty organized. I am very much a list-maker and have my list with me at all times. So starting out this week, I had workboxes full, checklists prepared, our homeschool area prepped as well as our lesson plans and supplies ready. What really happened was a different story! When you see what happened this week, I hope you will forgive my lack of pictures on this post! So here was our week:
Monday - Jaron has gymnastic in the morning. This is weekly and not a big deal. Addison does school while he has class. It changes up our schedule some, but not a problem! When we got home, Jaron did some school and we did school together. After a short break and lunch, our friend Lily came over for her piano lesson. We do a group lesson (kids are ages 3, 4 and 5) with Lily and my kids. We do piano as well as some general music and I try to make it fun by playing games. When she left, it was rest time for Jaron and Addison finished up her school. Successful first day!
Tuesday - Mommy had to go to the doctor and I brought the kids with me. I love my doctor, but we often have to wait a while to see her since she ends up delivering babies, doing emergency surgery, etc. We were prepared with some hands-on, but portable activities, books and snacks. Jaron and Addison both played with Unifix cubes. Jaron sorted them by color and then we worked on creating patterns with them. This is old news for Addison, but fairly new to Jaron. He soaked it up with no problem and starting creating his own patterns. We talked about stars and planets and did some cutting activities and Addison did some of her reading. Not sure what I'm going to do with that girl. There are 2 big readers for the Language Arts curriculum we are using. I had the first one with me. After she read 4 stories (and could answer all of the comprehension questions), I flipped to the back to play "stump the Addison." She loves this game. I picked out words I thought would be hard for her, but she got every one! Anyway, by the time we got home, it was time for a quick lunch and early rest time. Addison finished school while Jaron napped, and then we ran to dance class.
Wednesday - We have had a big hole in our kitchen ceiling due to a water leak for a couple of weeks. We finally got the information we needed from insurance and were able to get an awesome team to get started on Wednesday. There was much drywall dust and plastic hanging in our kitchen, but we really just had to avoid the house as much as we could that day. Because of the lay-out of our house, just going to the bathroom was going to present a problem. We went to Chick Fil A for breakfast and playtime, a movie and then visited our old preschool for a bit before Addison's piano lesson. The kitchen was not very usable that night so we ordered a pizza and had a picnic in the living room.
Thursday - more work on the kitchen and painting! I have wanted to paint my kitchen for a while, but didn't really think it would happen any time soon. I love it! We were able to stay home, we watched a friend's 2 little ones for a few hours and did lots of school in the living room. No kitchen that night either so with a coupon and a gift card, we ate at Macaroni Grill for $6 and that included tip!
Friday - the guys finished up the painting and we played "catch-up" with school. I schedule for a 4-day school week since we have co-op on Fridays (starts next week), but today we caught up with most all but Addison's math (which we finished on Saturday). The kitchen is done and Mommy had lots of clean-up and moving back into the kitchen. I love my new kitchen! I'll post pics next week.
We didn't get to a couple of fun enrichment activities this week, but we did the bulk of what I had planned. I'm hoping this coming week will be a bit more "normal" so we can see how our daily schedule will work out. If you got to the end of this post, I am impressed! Next week should include some pictures and hopefully, a more accurate view of what we usually do at home!
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