Homeschool Day 37 - Monday, October 27, 2008

Scouts-at-Home (Social Studies): Careers. Veterinarian. We read several library books about the work that vets do. Shayla was bothered by one of the books that mentioned that animals can pass some diseases to people. UGH! I guess I’ll have to be more careful about what I teach! She definitely enjoyed playing the part. She used an old green shirt as a scrub and a toy doctor kit. We had a real stethoscope from earlier days. She practiced her vet skills on her stuffed animals, then her twin pups. She said she would not like to be a vet because the sounds of the cows and big animals!

Activity (fine motor skills): Shayla traced around her left hand with her right hand. She did a good job. She wrote her name on her thumb outline, her age on her pointer finger, her telephone number on her middle finger, and her birthdate on her ring finger.
*Note: She is becoming more confident in making her numbers without as many dots or dashes. She made an 8 independently today (for the first time)! Woo-hoo!

Math: Patterns. Shayla and I read I See Patterns. She completed pg 176 making a name pattern. We had fun with this page. First she wrote her first name, middle name, and last name – one letter in each square. Then she colored all the s’s yellow, all the h’s black, etc. We played another game in the Zoorama packet. She chose lions and I chose giraffes. We spun the spinner and put an animal sticker under each number that was spun. Shayla won this game fair and square! We then used the spinner to count out foam shape pieces. Shayla did this with ease, so we cut the lesson short.

Phonics/Reading: I introduced -ad sound. Shayla is now reading -at, -am, and -ad words. In addition to sight words: the, end, on, and. She is really enjoying the Bob books. Several times I found her trying to sound out words that she sees throughout the house. YAY! I'm really pleased that her reading is progressing!

Field Trip (Music): We attended Morgan's marching band concert finale last night. The kids did a wonderful job. Shayla's behavior was ok. No ear plugging and she actually sat on the bench beside me, instead of on top of me!

Again, we completed alot of worksheets. I know our school day may not seem like a long one, but many things take her so painstakingly long to complete! I keep telling myself that it's better to take time to actually learn it, then to push her through it to stay on track (like public school).