Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Homeschool Highlights Week of Jan. 25, 2009 - January 31, 2009



Days 88 - 93

I just realized we're past the halfway point for first grade! Where did it go!?!

Bible: Letter K. K is for King David.
Memory Verse: Be kind to one another. Ephesians 4:32

I didn't find much on the sites I usually use. So I googled and found these Bible printables at Train Up Children. I did use the coloring page for David annointed king.

The first thing we did as a family was watch Veggie Tales: King George and the Ducky. An all-time favorite, because Shayla is obsessed with rubber duckies, oh and baths!
Reading: We read about the kindness that King David showed to Mepibosheth. We also discussed the customs of the time. (social studies, history)
Social studies/character: We discussed ways we can be kind to one another.
We learned Psalm 23 - one of the psalms David wrote to God. We will be memorizing this as part of earning Badge 1 at the Hide The Word in Your Heart Club.

K is for Kangaroo. Here are many lesson ideas for Kind Kangaroos. We made a cardboard kangaroo. The activity requires an empty tissue box, but we didn't have, so, we sorted through the recycling and found a food box. I tore it down the seam and reversed it so that the inside was out. We taped it together that way. Shayla painted it brown and I drew a head, ears, legs, and arms out of 1 piece of brown construction paper. (art) While the paint was drying we went through a magazine and cut out things that begin with k. I drew a few things, too, because we didn't find much. LOL! She put the things we cut out into the kangaroos pouch. (phonics, language)

We pretended to be kangaroos. Shayla put a backpack on backwards, so that the "pouch" was in the front, then I put a babydoll in the pouch, just like a mama kangaroo carries her joey. Then we bounced around the house. (movement)

As you can see, she thought it was great fun to be a mother kangaroo!


K is for King. We made a king's crown using a cookie box we got out of recycling. Again, I opened it at the seam. And drew and cut out a crude crown. I wrote her memory verse on it and she decorated it with markers and stickers. Then I stapled it together. She really enjoyed this simple, frugal activity.
She looks like she's making executive decisions in her king crown!

Music & Movement: We sang and danced to Jim Gill's Knuckles, Knees song. For those not familiar, it's similar to Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.

K is for Kitten. I made up math problems for simple addition and subtraction problems with "kittens" I drew on the white board. Funny, I think she gets math when there is a purpose, like a story! Then she had fun drawing kittens on the white board and making up problems for us to solve together. (math) And she actually drew kittens, instead of scribbles or lines. (art) She made up funny stories about what the kittens were doing in her math problems. (language). We did the asl sign for kitten (I was unable to find kitten, so we did the asl sign for cat.) We read Shy Little Kitten's Secret Place. (reading, shyness)

We recently found a new show on the Christian Television Network. It's called the Star Family. It has quickly become Shayla's favorite. (I think because the lady in it reminds her of one of my friends.) They have what's called The Hide it in your Heart Club. You can join and earn badges for learning Bible verses. We did the cross craft they did this week. (art)



Literature-Based Unit Study: Harold and the Purple Crayon.


Of course we had a purple day! We dressed in purple clothes. Searched the house and discussed other things that are purple. Last year for kindergarten, we created a purple collage (during color studies)by cutting purple objects out of magazines.


You can find all kinds of ideas for this book at homeschool share.

Writing: She completed this coloring page. Then she used her imagination and drew what she thought would happen next.
I folded a paper into little squares. I made dotted words for the following: moon, apple tree, dragon, ocean, sailboat, picnic, pie, moose, hill, porcupine, mountain, bedroom, window, balloon, house, building police, and bed. She traced these and drew a picture with her purple crayon, (of course). (writing, art, vocabulary-language)

Reading: We read The Crayola Counting Book. This is a favorite. She enjoys counting the crayons and discussing the colors. Then we went to the crayola website and played games and printed off a color page (fine motor & computer skills).

We did these activities from the literature based activity book we used:

Art/Writing: Shayla made a paper box of crayons. She colored the crayons the appropriate colors and cut out and glued it together.


Colored Crayon Overlay. She colored crayon shapes, cut them out and glued them randomly on a piece of black construction paper, making a collage.
Remember the Colors Game: I put 12 crayons on the table. We counted the crayons (math). We named all the colors of the crayons. Then I covered them and she covered her eyes, I took one away each time. She had to guess the missing crayon.


Again I am amazed by her memory and attention to detail. She guessed the correct missing crayon correctly 7 out of 11 tries.

Watercolor Mood Painting: we had a lot of fun with this! I turned on various music channels on our dish network. We talked about how the different music styles made us feel. Some were mellow and some were upbeat. She painted how she felt with watercolors at her easel. She tended to paint warm colors with "happy" music (red, yellow, orange). She tended to paint cool colors with the mellow music (blue, green, purple, and black.) (art, language, music, movement)
Snack time: Purple grapes!
Character quality/Home Therapy Through Play: Trying new things, shyness, and self-esteem
I decided to tackle some of Shayla's social issues this year for her New Year's resolutions. We are diligently working at this. I have been reading and discussing several books with Shayla on a daily basis.
Here's what we're using for self-esteem. I learned some interesting things from my daughter during our discussions. One thing is that she feels bad that her snack is different from everyone else's whenever we go somewhere. I tried to explain to her that she has food allergies and that she has to eat that way to feel better. She accepts this because she remembers how badly she used to feel. She was covered from head-to-toe in an allergic rash, she suffered terribly with this from before birth til we eliminated all allergic foods at 5 years old. Her self-esteem was further hurt when she was broke out in a rash and kids would come up to me and ask what was wrong with her and if they could catch it. Yes, this happened more times than I care to remember. Although her skin has since completely healed, her heart and self-esteem haven't. I've been taking extra time in pointing out things that she can do, things that she's good at, and extra hugs and kisses, of course!

I will also be doing these free lessons from Heritage Builders about Inferiority.

For shyness, we're using these resources (obtained from our library): The Shy Little Girl by Phyllis Krasilovsky. Shayla really relates to the main character of the story, Anne. In the end, Anne makes friends with a new girl, Claudia and neither girls are no longer shy.

The Very Shy Turtle by Phylliss Adams. This book is about Sandy the shy turtle. It discusses all the feelings/characteristics that she is (lonely, shy, sitting by herself, watching other turtles playing and having fun together, feeling like she wants to crawl away when others ask her to join in, hiding inside her shell). All of these are great conversation starters. I think she had an easier time opening up and talking because it was not threatening to her. After all, it was about a turtle, not a little girl!

In the book, Sandy solved her shyness issue by watching the other turtles and how they interacted with friends. Shayla related to this because she is a "people watcher." We acted out what Sandy did and made up different scenarios.

And I saved my favorite for last. We've been discussing trying new things. Shayla is not really the adventurous type. In fact, she really doesn't like to try much of anything "new." She has been that way since birth! So, I bought a book called When Lizzy Was Afraid of Trying New Things by Inger Maier.

Lizzy is a shy little lamb. She has a twin and an older brother. Lizzy was shy, she wouldn't try in the games that the other lambs played. She had been that way since birth. She always had excuses why she couldn't do things. She didn't think she could do them as well and she worried that she may cry and others would laugh at her.

Maah and Paah came up with a fun, new game for Lizzy. Everytime she tried something new, it didn't even have to be done perfectly, just trying, she got to add a rock to her pile. In the end, she accumulated a pile of rocks and Maah and Paah had a surprise for her!
So, we are trying this, only we are substituting hershey kisses in an empty peanut butter jar as a visual reminder. I also write in a little notebook all of her new accomplishments. This serves as a visual reminder and we frequently recount what each kiss was for. This is also helping her self-esteem.
In the past week since we've started this, I'm happy to announce that Shayla has earned 10 kisses!

Here are her accomplishments:
  1. She whispered in her dad's ear in a store!


  2. She slid down the hill on the sled by herself!


  3. She sat with kids at the Girl Scout meeting!


  4. She painted her own craft at the Girl Scout meeting!


  5. She started making friends with a little girl at the Girl Scout meeting. The little girl helped her and talked to her. Shayla did not talk back, but she showed interest in facial expressions and willingness!


  6. She did jumping jacks at the Girl Scout meeting!


  7. She participated in the closing circle song at the Girl Scout meeting. This is big because it requires that she hold hands with two girls!


  8. She told us that she needed her toenail clipped! I won't go into details, but it's big for her!


  9. She tried eating a chicken quesadilla for the first time (and liked it!)


  10. She tried eating meatballs for the first time (and liked them!)
When she fills her jar, she is going to get a treat. She gets to pick it this time. She has chosen trampoline time with Mom.

Social Studies: Careers & All about me. Back to the curriculum. Fortunately, I found that we weren't as behind as I had thought. We did an in depth study of careers for scouts-at-home. We read library books and dressed up and acted out different careers. I felt this was adequate in lieu of the curriculum ideas. Besides, like she is really going to interview someone. I did pick out two curriculum ideas. She completed pg. 378. I Want to Be. . . When she grows up she wants to be a teacher. Why? She wants to teach little children like Miss Betsy (her former preschool teacher). I also had her draw a picture of herself, the very best picture she can draw. At the top, I wrote "I am the best that I can be!" I had her write out her personal information (name, phone number and address). We definately need to work on this some more. At this point she would not be able to verbally tell anyone this information (if necessary). She needs to at least be able to write it (but we've made great strides in speaking this week, too - I'll share that later).

Next week, we'll be studying mapping - week 10.


Science: Animal Habitats. We have studied this more in depth when Shayla attended "Outdoor School" at the local state park. We did read The Magic School Bus Hops Home: A Book About Animal Habitats. We also watched a Barney episode called Barney's Home Sweet Homes. We played this animal habitat game at science with me.

Math: Addition. We're still working on simple addition problems. The funny thing with math is she can solve the problems in her head, but when I try to show her the groups and how we count onto from the first group to the second group, she gets lost. So, we're just practicing more and slowing down the curriculum, again. She did complete some worksheets. Again, it takes her longer because she just can't remember how to form numbers (even though we practice a lot). She doesn't seem to have this problem with letters anymore.

A game we've been doing for math that she enjoys is: Take two dice and cover the six side with a dot sticker. That is for 0. Then we roll the dice and make addition problems out of them. We write the number sentence on the white board for each turn. It seems like the funnest homeschool games are the cheapest!
Reading/Spelling: We played Boggle Jr. I think this game is a wonderful resource for preschool - early elementary grades. It teaches spelling/reading 3 and 4 letter words. We are working on reading four letter words right now. I had to slow down the 1st grade abeka because she wasn't quite getting it. She was having a hard time understanding the long vowel sound rule. When there are two vowels in a word. The first says it's sound and the second one is silent.

She is capable of reading 3 letter words "in reading class time." Other times, when she picks up a book, she looks at it and makes her own story up about it! She doesn't even try to look at the words or sound them out.

Does anyone else have this problem? What was the remedy?

For more ideas that work from folks who know first hand go to 5 Minutes for Special Needs.




We also did journaling and creative writing this week.



6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Neat ideas!

Anonymous said...

Do you write all this stuff down here as the week goes by? I noticed the date says the 27th. That's probably easier than remembering what we did. I get to the end of the week and think...we did something. lol

We use homeschool share a lot too. Very good ideas there.

Calina said...

JM,

I suffer from mommy-brain. Which means I can't remember anything! Since my daughter needs frequent breaks because of her attention span, after we complete a subject, I try to log in what we complete. Some days I'm better at this than others.

Recently, I switched to just posting weekly because of busyness, but I may go back to daily.

Thanks for visiting!

Anonymous said...

Very impressive. LOVE the kangaroo!

annies home said...

several great ideas thanks for sharing my daughter will begin homeschooling her child soon so will pass this along to her
thanks

Anonymous said...

What an impressive week! I love that you are able to focus on self-esteem and inferiority. We are working with my son on some of these issues and talking about strengths and weaknesses and how each person is different in this way.

Thanks for participating in Try This Tuesday!! (Trish @ 5MFSN)