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.

Homeschool Week Highlights - Sun. Jan 18 - Fri, Jan 23, 2009

Homeschool Days 82 - 87

Scouts-at-Home: Colors and Shapes. The badge book recommended that you make play dough. However, we have done this numerous times. Instead we got out the modeling clay and just had fun making things. We also watched a video called Good Housekeeping Colors and Shapes.

A Rainbow of Colors. I explained what primary colors are (red, yellow & blue) We used tempera paints starting with these colors to do color mixing. She mixed red+blue = purple, blue + yellow = green, yellow+red= orange, then she mixed them all together for brown. Then Shayla colored in a rainbow that I drew for her. This is something we did in the past, but she still enjoys any form of art, so we did it again. (science, art)

Mexican yarn art. For our last project for this badge we made a rainbow shaped Mexican yarn art. You begin by drawing a design on cardboard. Cover the drawing with glue, then add different colors of yarn in all sorts of ways. We really had a lot of fun doing this. By making a rainbow, Shayla was able to make alot of the picture herself (after being shown what to do).

Reading: We read lots of books aloud. We are still working on her shyness (selective mutism) issue. We read The Shy Little Girl and The Shy Little Turtle. I have been reading these to her daily. She enjoys reading them and acting them out. We talked about how I was shy as a little girl and how I used to feel (character, social studies). I also ordered her several books about shyness and fears to add to our own library. She also eagerly read these books with her dad. But she added that she's still not going to talk.

We have been reading an assortment of reading materials. In addition to our own books, we have been reading library books, magazines, and comics from the newspaper.

Bible: Letter J

J is for Jonah.

We watched the story of Jonah on the Read N See DVD Bible. Then we sang You Are a Gracious and Compassionate God. We then read and acted out the story of Jonah from another Bible storybook. We sang Who Did Swallow Jonah? and It's a Whale of a Tale, (the Lighthouse CD)and Jonah and the Whale(music). Here's a whole slew of Jonah activities. We did a color page for her Bible book. We also watched the Veggie Tales Jonah movie. And we had a lot of fun playing a game called What's in the Big Fish? In this game, we took turns choosing cards. We described the picture to the other player and they guessed what the picture was on the card. We had a lot of fun with this and spent much more time on it than I thought we would. (language, communication)

Here's the What's in the Big Fish Game.

J is for jungle. We colored a jungle scene on paper with crayons. Then we painted over the crayon with green paint diluted with water. We did something similar for scouts called a crayon resist. After the paint dried, we added foam jungle animal stickers for fun. (art)

J is for jar. We read Luke 8:16. I lit a jar candle and demonstrated that the flame needs oxygen to stay lit. Shayla put the lid on the jar candle and the flame went out. The verse explains that we, as Christians are supposed to be like the candle with oxygen, shining in the world - not like the candles that are covered up, they lose their flame.

*To incorporate more handwriting, which Shayla definately needs. I had her trace and write Jj and our theme words for Bible (jungle and jar, Jesus, Jordan, and jobs). (handwriting)

J is for journal. We had fun with our journal entry today. We used Ed Emberley's Fingerprint Drawing book to make a scene of some of the bugs we learned about in science last week. (art, sensory, science)If you have not used any of his books, you are missing out. He teaches you to make many things using your thumb and fingerprint and adding small touches. I cannot draw at all, but I have been able to make some really cute things with my daughter.

J is for Jesus being baptized in the Jordan River. First we found the Jordan River on a map (geography). Then we talked about the dimensions of the Jordan River. It is about 5 feet deep in many places, so we measured out 5' of yarn. Shayla went around the house comparing objects with her yarn. We talked about taller, smaller, wider, etc. (math, size comparison)

J is for jobs. We talked about jobs that begin with letter j. We came up with journalist and judge. We didn't go any further because we did an in depth study of careers for scouts-at-home.

Math: Addition. She completed 2 wkbk pages of basic addition. They used eggs and dinosaurs as counters. I also demonstrated on the whiteboard. I think she has a fairly good concept of addition, she can answer correctly, orally. But she can't write the answers. We constantly are reviewing how to form the numbers. She can do most letters independently, but not numbers, so I have to make dotted ones for her to trace. It takes us so painstakingly long to complete. UGH! I don't know if I should just allow her to answer orally and move on, or if we need to do like we're doing. Eventually she'll have to learn to form her numbers!

Homeschool Days 80 & 81 - Weds, Jan. 14 & Thurs Jan 15, 2009

Social Studies: Shayla watched an episode on Barney about "Differences" this morning. She came and got me and made sure I watched it with her. We talked about how not everyone can be good at everything. And I explained to her that everyone wants to hear her thoughts and ideas, just like the show's character.

Computer: Shayla loves the preschool shows on PBS kids. So we went to the website and played some online games and things. We used to do this reguarly, but haven't done it in awhile. She really enjoys designing dollhouses at Caillou.

Reading: We spent over an hour sitting together and reading books.

Day 81

Bible: Letter I. We spent time reviewing memory verse with sign and watched Isaac stories on DVD. Then we reviewed songs. (music & movement, memory)

I is for insects. We sorted the insects out of Shayla's plastic animals. Shayla looked at the insects with the magnifying glass. We talked about characteristics of insects (6 legs and 3 body parts) - using plastic bugs as models. I explained why a spider is not an insect. Shayla got "Instant Insects" for Christmas. Those sponge shapes that are encapsulated. You put them in water. We did these for a fun project and named the different types of bugs (we also counted and talked about which color group had more or less). (math, comparison, science)

I is for inside. To teach i sound I called out a word. If it began with Ii, Shayla said "outside." If it began with another letter, but had an i sound in the word, Shayla said, "inside." Oh, and bouncing on the ball, while we do this makes it more fun, too. LOL!

I is for instruments. Shayla loves any excuse to get out the instruments. We had fun playing the various instruments and we made a new tissue box harp or guitar. This was her favorite today. We talked about why the sounds of the "strings" were different (the different thickness and size of rubber bands) We discussed how people have always enjoyed music and there were instruments in the Bible times. We read aloud Psalm 150. We counted how many instruments it named. (math & music)

I is for icicles. We have plenty of those all around our house. We talked about how when the snow melts, it forms the icicles. (science)

Science: We breezed through the weeks' plans because it was about insects and spiders. We have studied these more in depth in the past. For spiders, we looked at a plastic spider and counted the legs. We read a book called Spiders, Spiders, Everywhere. In the book it counts backwards from 10. At the end you count all the spiders. (math). We did Raffi's Eensy Weensy Spider and There's a Spider on the Floor songs. (music & movement)

Homeschool Day 78 & 79 Monday & Tues, January 12 & 13, 2009

Reading: We started again with read aloud time. We read a book called I Want Your Moo: A Story for Children About Self-Esteem by Marcella Bakur Weiner. It was a funny story about a turkey that didn't like the way she sounded. She asked all the other barnyard animals to share their voices with her. In the end, she discovered that her voice was just right for her. I think we will read this book several more times to see if it helps to build up Shayla's confidence.

I'm excited to see there are many others in this particular series. Especially Cat's Got Your Tongue: A Story for Children Afraid to Speak.

Another book we started working on is Pets, Animals & Creatures of the Beginning Sign Language Series. Shayla enjoys learning new signs. If I were better at it, this might be a way to get her to come out of her shell, but I'm slow learning sign. (foreign language)

Game Play: We played an opposite cards matching game. (language)

Reading: (multi-lessons)We haven't done a literature based unit study in awhile, so I randomly picked out The Tale of Peter Rabbit. It would probably best be done in the spring, but we still

found plenty to do. First, we read the story. We talked about the illustrations. Then I got a few ideas from homeschool share. Shayla reminded me that we have some Peter Rabbit cardboard stacking blocks (from her younger years). We got these out and she had fun stacking them. We did size comparisons and counted them (math). We read the story on the sides of the blocks and practiced identifying abc's on the sides.

Next, we went to Peter Rabbit website. We played some fun games. I really liked Peter's Net Maze. It asked multiple choice questions about the story. Shayla answered them all correctly. (reading comprehension). We also printed off a color page to do.

Shayla watched an episode of Barney today that was titled "Rabbits." (multi subjects)Shayla learned more about real rabbits here. (science)

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Bible: Letter I. We started by watching Abraham Obeys from the Read N See DVD Bible. We sang Whereever you Lead. Then we learned God Will Build a Nation song from The Singing Bible. We also sang Rock My Soul. (music) We reviewed verse Psalm 141:2 - using language and sign. (memory, foreign language)

I is for infinity. This was a fun math activity. I gave Shayla an empty peanut butter jar and a bag of m&m's. I asked her to count out 10 and see if it fills the jar. It didn't even cover the bottom. I asked her how many she thought it would take to fill the jar. She thought 100. So we counted and added m&m's till the jar was full. BTW, it was much more than 100. 453 (or a whole bag to be exact.) We had fun counting and adding together. This activity goes with God telling Abraham his decendants would be like the stars. (math)

Literature: Peter Rabbit. We sang bunny songs and fingerplays. (music & movement, math) Here are some fun bunny activities. We learned all about rabbits at Hopper Home. Shayla decided she would like to have a bunny. Oh boy! Another pet! LOL! (science) We discussed what rabbits eat. We just happened to get our garden seeds in the mail the other day, so we checked off the order. We decided if Shayla does get rabbits, we will need fence around the garden! Then Shayla used some old grocery ads to cut out what rabbits like to eat. She picked out spinach, lettuce, cabbage, and carrots.

We had counter strips with seed packets, trowels, watering cans, etc on them. We used these to do simple addition and subtraction problems. (math)

Shayla made a paper Peter Rabbit. This was a really cute thing. It retells the story using pictures you color, cut and glue and put in the rabbits tummy. (fine motor, reading comprehension, memory, language). She also did a bunny dot-to-dot (1-20)and traced the word "bunny" and made a Peter Rabbit paper bag puppet.

We learned the asl sign for rabbit. (foreign language)

I wanted to do the bunny hop for music & movement, but I didn't have the cd, after all. There was no way I was braving the snow to go to the library today. Some other song ideas are: Rabbit Ain't Got and Peter Cottontail.

Snacktime: carrots, celery, radishes and cabbage (of course).

We ended the day by playing Reader Rabbit First Grade computer program.

Homeschool Day 77 - Sunday, January 11, 2009

Scouts-at-Home: Colors and Shapes. (We haven't found the time to do Scouts-at-Home for awhile, so I thought it was time to get back to it.) The first project we did for this was to make sponge paintings. We did not make our own sponge stampers because I have 3 bags of sponge stamps for just such occasions! Lol! She really enjoyed making many pages of stamps.

We also made a mobile. We used cookie cutters as shapes. Shayla traced around the cookie cutters on foam, then cut them out. We decorated the shapes with buttons, sequins, and glitter glue. Then I punched holes in them and we tied them onto the hanger (made out of straws tied together).

Reading: We read a pile of library books aloud. Most of them were dealing with feelings and issues. I asked lots of questions to make sure she had an understanding of what was being taught.

Homeschool Days 74 & 75 - Jan. 7 - 8, 2009

Homeschool Day 74 - Wednesday, January 7, 2009



Although it was a snow day for Morgan, Shayla had a full day of homeschool. Dad took over as Shayla's teacher today just because they've been missing each other, with him being back to work. (I wasn't even sick - I used the time to get caught up on some cleaning and other things that needed done!) I just gave them some review stuff and workbook pages. Nothing really noteworthy today.



Homeschool Day 75 - Thursday, January 8, 2009



Scouts-at-Home: Colors and Shapes. (We haven't found the time to do Scouts-at-Home for awhile, so I thought it was time to get back to it.) The first project we did for this was to make sponge paintings. We did not make our own sponge stampers because I have 3 bags of sponge stamps for just such occasions! Lol! She really enjoyed making many pages of stamps.



We spent a lot of time reading books aloud for fun.

Homeschool Day 76 - Friday, January 9, 2009

What a busy day! We did our weekly grocery shopping/cvs run in the morning because of the weather forecast. I tried to get Shayla to come out of her shell this week. At the grocery store, she started clinging on myself and my husband, it was impossible to get things done!

We got home, got unloaded, quickly munched. Back out the door to Girl Scouts meeting. Again, I seen regression in Shayla's behavior. Not only did she cling onto me during the meeting, but she also would not eat her snack, instead gesturing that she expected me to feed her. NO WAY!!! I know exactly where that came from! The other day when we were reading Shrinking Violet, it said something about Violet being so shy that she did not like to eat around people because she might eat to loudly. Eating a snack has never been a problem before! This is a smart little cookie I'm dealing with! Later she asked why I wouldn't feed her. I told her I won't!
She had a great time at scouts, though because it was the annual white elephant gift exchange. She got a stuffed horse and a Disney princess purse.

Lastly, we braved the snowstorm to go see Morgan's boyfriend, Miles in the Aladdin Jr. play. It was an awesome show. These kids were so talented! Again, I don't have photos to share because it's against copyright laws. Our whole family enjoyed attending this and thankfully the weather wasn't so bad when we left.

Homeschool Day 73 - Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Reading: We read Are You My Mother by PD Eastman. The baby bird hatches from it's egg to discover it's mother is missing. I enjoy really making this book come alive by having Shayla make the animal sounds as the bird asks "Are you my Mother?" Then we talked about animals and the names given to baby animals (cat-kitten, etc) (science). We also played a Memory game matching mothers and babies. BTW, I won that one, but we enjoyed counting who had more and less matches (math, comparison). I asked if you were the baby bird what would you have done? She came up with several ideas, look for mother bird, but tweet loudly or stay in the nest and wait for mother bird. (language) She also completed a wkbk page writing living/non-living items in the correct columns. The words were vocabulary words from the story.

Phonics/Reading: She did Abeka lesson 12. She has gotten out of practice with her reading and phonics and started to become frustruated, so I let her take a break from the lesson by solving these wooden word puzzles. It did the trick. She was able to complete her lesson after the puzzles.

Language: We reviewed nouns. She understands this pretty well for a 1st grader. I introduced adjectives to her. I wrote phrases on the white board and she circled the adjective. Then we did a workbook page about sneakers. She liked this page because it started off with The Stinky Sneaker. . .

Spelling: She's working with short e sound words. She did a workbook page, then she was supposed to take her spelling pretest. Instead of writing the words, she sat on her therapy ball and bounced while she spelled the words.

*Note: Add part-time OT to my job description. LOL! Maybe I can add it to my resume. Where did I graduate from? Uh, the University of Real Life!

Phys Ed: I promised her some much needed outside time, (in between the snow and freezing rain we got today)but the swingset and trampoline are covered with snow (and it was downright cold). I hate making promises to my children that I can't keep, so she happily bounced on the little trampoline in the house!

Social skills: Communications. I had planned on only addressing Shayla's shyness and anxiety issues, but I came across several books at the library that I thought would be fun to use. Polite as a Princess was definately fun for us! Shayla dressed up as a princess and we had a tea party. During the tea party, I read the book to her. We talked about manners and different social scenarios. I explained to her that it is rude to not speak when someone speaks to you. I don't think she had ever thought of it this way.

To drive home the lesson, the Barbie we used yesterday as Shy Violet encouraged Shayla to talk and how easy it was.

. . . And since we were on the Princess theme, Shayla and I sat down and watched part of her Cinderella video. Well, technically, I guess she watched. I fell asleep, but since she wanted to turn off the lights, so it was like the movie theater, I don't think she noticed! LOL!

Homeschool Day 72 - Monday, January 5, 2008

Bible: We are on letter I this week. I is for Isaac. We started by watching the story of Abraham and Sarah conceiving Isaac on the Read N See DVD Bible. (reading) Then we did the song Father Abraham (music, movement, memorization, body awareness)What a way to start back to school. I'm already out of breath! Then I taught her new memory verse.

May my prayers be pleasing to you like incense. Psalm 141:2

Science: We discussed what incense is. I compared it to a candle or a pot of potpourri.

I is for ice. Yesterday we watched Stars on Ice on tv. She loves figure ice skating, too. Since we are having a beautiful and warm day here in NC Ohio, this didn't work as well as I had hoped, but they are calling for freezing rain tomorrow. We talked about ice. (science) We went outside to find the twigs needed for the project. (Another great way to start the day!) Shayla drew a snowman shape by tracing different sizes of lids. We talked about size comparison. (math, fine motor). Then she colored the cirlces in with a mixture of white glue/white paint. She sprinkled silver glitter on. Then we added a felt hat and scarf from scraps. She glued the twigs on for arms. (art)

Journal: Draw your favorite gift you received for Christmas. As most children, she was so excited about this that she couldn't limit it to just one item.

Activity: We read The Four Seasons. I divided her paper into 4 boxes. In each box she wrote a word that has something to do with winter. She chose snow, hats, snow angels and snowflakes. She wrote the word in each box then she had to draw a picture of each object.

Math: Addition. We used foam shapes as counters to review addition facts. She completed wkbk pg 184. We used counters and made story problems out of them. *Note: I was discouraged to see that she has forgotten how to draw most of her numbers over break. UGH! I also feel like the curriculum doesn't focus enough on memorization of facts. I think that is necessary to build on. I modeled facts(using a drawings of 2 chocolate chip cookies). 0+0 through 0+5=5. She quickly caught on when I began using the chocolate chip cookie models. LOL!

We then practiced our counting by 10's by counting the Box Tops for Education that we've been saving for a local public school. We counted up to $14.50. That's alot 10 cents at a time!

Phys Ed: I'm going to try to get back to doing this everyday. Today we were blessed by reasonable temperatures, so we went outside on the trampoline and swingset. I knew that jumping on the trampoline was therapeutic for her, but I actually read in three different places last week that the reason bouncing on a trampoline is good for special needs kids is because it helps to drain the lymph nodes of built up toxins. Interesting, huh?

Life Skills: Communications. We read Shrinking Violet by Cari Best. I liked the way this book was written from a shy person's perspective. I asked Shayla if she felt like just shrinking away when people talk to her. Obviously this was hard for her because she just shook her head. Shayla could also relate to the book because Violet itches and scratches when she becomes uncomfortable, much like Shayla. She also decides she is allergic to attention. Which sounds exactly like something Shayla would come up with. It also caught Shayla's attention when Violet said she didn't like to be watched, she never made waves in the pool or swallowing sounds at snack time. She liked to do the watching. This is sooo much Shayla! She notices all the little details. Long story short, Violet saves the day at the school play, gains the respect of peers, and overcomes her shyness.

We reinacted the story using Shayla's Barbies. Funny enough, Shayla was playing Violet and she couldn't remember to be quiet until the end of the story. LOL! After the show, Violet the Barbie asked Shayla some questions. Do you like being shy? Would you like to come out of your shell like I did? It doesn't hurt, I promise, I did it, it's easy! Violet, the Barbie, then asked Shayla if she could take baby steps. Maybe this week she could whisper to her mom when they were out somewhere. Shayla didn't think she could. Violet said that Shayla could take her everywhere and she would help her whisper her words.

Does anyone have any other suggestions for overcoming shyness, social or general anxiety? I'm ready to try almost anything at this point!