Back to School Fun: Spring 2012

We jumped right back into school as soon as the new year passed and we were all ready to get back into a normal swing of things!  We did some extra fun learning activities to get going.  Dot painting gave us the chance to work on patterns and following instruction.  I gave them a specific pattern to follow and after doing that, then they were allowed to exercise their creativity with the rest of their peacock.

I had planned a game of 10's Go Fish to refresh some math skills that might have been forgotten.  When I started shuffling the cards, I realized that my kids have never seen plain playing cards before!  So we played a simpler version to get used to the cards and and how to handle them.  I wish I had Grandma's card holders!  Guess I'll have to make my own.  This turned out to be a good counting review for Elizabeth anyway.

Another math game using dice & adding for David & Elizabeth to work on together.  I challenged David to a speed round later, which turned out quite exciting!  I was ahead by a long shot, then my dice would not cooperate and he pulled ahead for the win!

I love mixing learning with Christmas!  Found a great deal on the Crayola Activity Center that I'd been eyeing for a while anyway, with a coupon and a store sale the day after Thanksgiving!  Elizabeth loves it and is getting in some good handwriting review!

David's favorite subject is World History.  He is happy to be back in the world books.  Here he is marking the reign of Alexander the Great as we read about him.  It was a fun first week back to school and a good start to the Spring 2012 semester.  This week, perhaps we'll wear clothing for school instead of PJ's!

Kindergarten Show and Tell

Today we hosted a small gathering that we called, "David's Kindergarten Show & Tell." I had the idea at the beginning of the school year, remembering the PTO Open House that we had when I was in elementary school. I don't know if it was more important to David or to me... probably me! I've done a lot of work this year!!!

I used the bar area to display David's
notebooks and some other work.

Language Arts/Reading, Handwriting, Science

Math & some holiday stuff
(note on the Mayflower, it's being bombed
and there's a blue shark in the water)

Folder from Dinosaurs A to Z class at our homeschool co-op
(which I also taught),
Clothespin Stegosaurus and paper Laura the Giganotosaurus

Artwork displayed on the back windows

Other little booklets he made throughout the year

Blue Crab in clay

Family looking at his work

I really intended to take more pictures, but I always forget when I'm hosting something. After family looked at the displays, David loudly sang 2 of his Bible verse songs that he's learned this year. He declined to read the book that he had selected. Then we moved out to the front porch where he presented his science demonstrations.

Displacement of air

and a volcanic eruption.

(sorry, we were out of red dye)

David was also in charge of serving refreshments and even planned his own menu: mayo & cheese finger sandwiches, Fritos and blue corn chips. The dip was my idea.

Elizabeth was not to be left out!

We had her notebook of coloring pages on display
and her Fun with Numbers book.

Ladybugs in clay

OK - on the top one, I made the head, shaped the body and rolled out the black spots. She assembled & made the legs. She did the bottom one completely on her own.

Elizabeth also took her turn in the limelight by singing 2 different versions of the ABC song very adorably. And she thoroughly soaked in the applause. : )

Tiny Talk Tuesday

We're using Starfall.com for language arts. I highly recommend their program for learning to read. David has really been enjoying it. Elizabeth also enjoys their ABC pages... now if she could just figure out how to use the mouse!

Here is David singing last week's verse, 1 Thessalonians 5:19. Song from Sing the Word: From A to Z, part of our Kindergarten home school curriculum from Sonlight.

A few days ago, I was whistling the catchy cantina song from Star Wars. David didn't want me to sing "his song" and came up with his own version. I have to admit, I was impressed with his ability to write lyrics on the fly!


We had another death in the family this week, this time my husband's grandpa. I explained to David & Elizabeth that PaPa loved Jesus, so his soul had gone to heaven. Elizabeth replied, "With Grandma?" Yes, my love.

She has a notebook of coloring pages and a wipe-off book that's for practicing handwriting. She calls it "my school work." She's so cute working in her books. Sometimes she traces the letters, sometimes she draws smiley faces, sometimes she just scribbles.

Rebekah says: Da-did! and she is in the process of cutting tooth #3 this week!

Homeschooling Through Christmas

Elizabeth, now 2 11/12, has been wanting to have school right along beside us since Thanksgiving. Above you'll see her Christmas tree drawing. Very colorful. I've been giving her a wipe-off ABC handwriting book & she's been coloring in it for 30 minutes or more. She very carefully traces the letters, then scribbles over the entire page. Need to get a picture of that...

Little did I know that by taking the week off for Thanksgiving, David would seem to forget everything he's learned in kindergarten! It was crazy. By Friday, he's finally doing things on his own again.

We've been taking advantage of the Christmas Countdown activities to get some good number practice in. (Also a Brachiosarus on the board.) The chain goes all the way to the floor right now.

That was a couple of days ago.


For the past few years, David has memorized and recited part of the Christmas story at our family Christmas gathering. We're working on it again this year and he's also writing it out this year. We're adding a phrase every day.

I think in light of our Thanksgiving experience, we may keep doing school right through Christmas! I don't want to have to keep taking an extra week just to repeat everything!

...for Thursday School

I am thankful forThursday school.

With a home schooled kindergartner this year, also came a home school co-op group. We joined a group in a neighboring town and David has been attending a class at Thursday school every week. It's good because it gives David interaction with other kids and he sees that other kids are taught at home, too. It's also been good for me because while he's in class, I get to hang out with the other moms. I also get Mom's Night Out! (when Dad's not working) We have both made some new friends this semester. This photo was his Fascinating Facts class this week.

David is thankful for...

Every day I've been asking David for one thing he's thankful for. This is his list so far.

I am thankful for all the time I've been able to spend with him this year.

Below are a few of the projects he's worked on lately.

While I read about the Mayflower, David colored one, complete with gray storm clouds, exploding cannons, and even a blue shark in the water.

We also made a booklet about the first Thanksgiving and have done a few pumpkin activities this fall.

His small pumpkin had 403 seeds inside!!! I thought we never were going to be done counting! (and it became a counting-by-10's exercise)

The work above is amazing to me because he has never liked to color before and only recently started doing it. Now he's drawing pictures of robots & sharks.

Shoe Box Week: Day 5

Today we're going overseas:

Oops... my internet was down this morning. I did not intend to post the 2nd video that was on this post previously. It was a little TMI for my kids.

Shoe Box Week: Day 3

Today we will talk about how to prepare our shoe boxes.

In case you're wondering... I found all the videos Sunday night and scheduled them to appear on the blog each day. This way, I can just come to the blog to show the kids the video each day. I'll try to add some more pictures of the kids soon... today is Rebekah's 6-month birthday!!!

Tiny Talk Tuesday and Shoe Box: Day 2

David: Mom, I think you are the goodest mom there ever was... (just then the phone rang) because you answer the phone.

At Thursday school, I called David to wait by the door of his classroom. A little girl, who was just a bit taller than David came up to me & said, "Is David your son?" I confirmed and then she said, "He's cute." Seriously, I almost passed out. I told her thank you.

I've been racking my brain trying to remember Elizabeth's song. She combined Pop Goes the Weasel with something else & it was really funny. She's a ham!


Today's shoe box video is a little more fun!

And since Larry is traveling, we're going to follow him:

Shoe Box Week: Day 1

This week we are taking a break from our wonderful Sonlight Curriculum to work on a couple of special projects. Today I will introduce David and Elizabeth to Operation Christmas Child. We're not in Canada, but I thought this was the best video to start with this week.

6 Weeks of Learning

Wow! I can't believe it's been 6 weeks since our first day of Kindergarten already! We're now in Week 7! We read every day from the assigned books, which includes a Bible story, history, poetry, fiction selections, and science.

David loves books and always seems to be adding more to the curriculum.

We also have readers and worksheets for Language Arts, handwriting and math. He's really good at math, too. We started on K book 2 and he's doing fine.

He attends Fascinating Facts at Thursday School with other homeschoolers in our co-op.

He and Elizabeth learn a new Bible verse each week.

Sometime science comes to life....

and other times we bring life to science.

David's handwriting has greatly improved and he uses his left hand almost exclusively. He still switches over to the right occasionally, but he says it's easier to use his left. He even wrote his own name on his paper this week at church. That was a first!

For this 6-week review, I'd say Kindergarten is going pretty well! We are enjoying the curriculum (which is Sonlight K with Singapore Math and A Reason for Handwriting)... and yes, I am already collecting books for first grade!

BFF Visit: Part One

Grandma wanted to see our guests, but I don't know if there will be time now. So I thought I'd share some of the pics we have so far while they've gone to the wedding.

Brigid is a happy girl!

Friday was a school day, so we went on with school.

Sarina is practicing her number 5.

Lavery shows Elizabeth how to write ABC's.

Lavery also enjoyed our water gun fight outside.

David wandered off before the picture was taken.
We were going on a leaf collection adventure for science.
Don't we look cute in our boots? : )

Back inside, we made leaf rubbings while I read to them
about the structure & purpose of leaves.

In the evening, we sent them out to burn off some energy.

Elizabeth & Lavery are 9 months apart.
David & Sarina are 2 months apart. (David is older)

And Rebekah & Brigid are 5 weeks apart!
Chillin' in the Bumbos.