Tuesday, September 27, 2011

"180" Movie

If this doesn't make you think, NOTHING WILL!!!


Warning!! Pictures of the Holocaust!

Monday, September 19, 2011

Space, Planets, & Astronauts

One of my favorite things to learn about when I was little was outer space! I grew up southeast of Houston, TX & NASA was just amazing to me! I remember getting to watch the 1st teacher go to space, but unfortunately I ended up seeing the Challenger explode & not quite understanding why it disappeared. Looking at pictures & videos of the universe completely solidifies my belief in the one true God! Just with His word He spoke it all into existence is completely awe inspiring!

Many of the items we used this week came from Homeschool Creations, 1+1+1=1, Making Learning Fun, Spell Outloud, & of course our awesome resource center! Please check out these amazing sites to find all of these amazing printables!

Our Bible Verse was Psalm 148:3 "Praise Him sun & moon. Praise Him all you shining stars."





We went over the days of creation that God created light, earth, & all of the universe. I was pleasantly surprised by how much Brady remembered! Here are the books we read together this week.
I HIGHLY recommend 8 Spinning Planets! Both of the boys read this one multiple times! Rylan can even look at this book & tell me which planets are which, which are hot, which are cold, etc.

For Brady's handwriting practice we used printables from the many sites I listed earlier & he wrote space-themed words & his Bible verse. Rylan also used the printables to practice tracing different kinds of lines.


Making Learning Fun has magnet pages for their space theme. I chose A is for Astronaut & 1st had Rylan cover the dots with the magnetic pom poms I made, then he & Brady both used Do-A-Dot Markers to cover them. I use this as a pre-writing skill for Rylan & Brady just thinks it's fun!


Brady practiced his beginning sounds by saying the name of the picture on the card then circling the correct letter. He practiced ordering things 1st-8th by lining up the planets each day. This helped him remember their order as well!




All of his vocabulary words this week were space words of course. He practiced by matching the word to its correct picture 1st, then he had to tell me what that picture was & answer some other questions about it.

He also had to sort pictures by whether they were planets or not & he practiced counting by 2s by using a printable from Making Learning Fun.


Rylan enjoyed playing with the cut-outs of the planets & making them orbit :) We briefly talked about constellations & had I really cool activity we got from the resource center. They had cards with various constellations printed on each one that you could shine a flashlight behind & see the constellation on the wall. I think we may continue to play with this so when we go camping we can try to find some.



We checked out moon shoes from the resource center so the boys could pretend they were astronauts walking on the moon. I must admit there were MANY accidents on them, but they LOVED them nonetheless!






Rylan worked on a space puzzle & playing with a magnetic playset to work on his motor skills. Many of the magnetic pieces were small, but he did great moving them around & creating a picture. It was also a good way to teach him the names of the pictures too. Example: moon buggy, satellite, space station, comet, asteroid, etc.






He also practiced his colors, counting down from 10 to make his rockets blast off, & matching pictures to their shadows.






The boys played with stick puppets I printed from Spell Outloud & acted out a cute poem we found on there! You MUST check it out! I also made 2 sensory bins. One had moon sand, 2 small astronauts, a flag, small earth & moon, rocks I found outside, mini glow in the dark stars, various sizes of Styrofoam balls to pretend they were planets, meteors, or asteroids. The other had moon dough with glow in the dark stars, comets, planets, Styrofoam balls, & rocks too. They played with them EVERYDAY for a LONG time! :)









At the end of the week I had the boys try freeze-dried ice cream just like the REAL astronauts ate in space. As you can see Rylan didn't like it at 1st, but then they both devoured it! We also watch videos of real space shuttles taking off, traveling in space, walking on the moon, & much more!






I am so glad these fabulous ladies share their AMAZING ideas & printables with the rest of us! It sure makes learning fun for me & my kiddos! My heart is so happy that my boys loved the space unit as much as I did!

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Transportation

Like most boys, mine LOVE things with wheels! I saw the Transportation Pack from Homeschool Creations last spring & knew it was something I had to do with my boys! The activities are so colorful & inviting that my 3 year old Rylan didn't want to stop "playing school!"

Reading, Writing, & Spelling

Here are the fun books we read this week to go with our transportation theme.


At the Resource Center I found a Wheels On The Bus book & felt bus complete with the people & items on the bus that go along with the song. I really wish I would have recorded Rylan singing while he played with it!


After reading some of the books, we began the week by going over our transportation words & pictures. Rylan matched the pictures together.


Here are the boys practicing their writing skills. Ry traced various kinds of lines by "flying" the airplane to the cloud & Brady practiced writing the upper & lower case letters that began his transportation words. He also practiced writing his sight words in salt, which he just thought was COOLEST thing! :)




Math/Shapes/Colors/Puzzles
I printed off the train below from Making Learning Fun. Brady practiced counting by 5s & 10s with it by lining the cars up in the correct order. He also used the train printable from Homeschool Creations to practice his ODD & EVEN numbers. Anything involving trains is sure to keep my boys focused!



Brady used transportation counters to help with his subtraction work & the boys both sorted them by vehicle & color & made patterns with them.


I found these AWESOME shapes from Making Learning Fun that looked like roads. I had Rylan drive his car on them to trace the shape while we went over the names.


He also matched the transportation pictures to their shadows & put together small 3 piece puzzles of them too.




Crafts, Games & MORE!

If you read my blog often you know I'm a sucker for a good craft! I let the boys use various kinds of plastic transportation toys & sponges to paint with & use transportation cookie cutters to play with their play-doh.



They also played their Cars game on their Clickstart Computer from Leap Frog. This was their reward for working hard during school!


Brady had his Geography Co-op this week & while he worked on coloring his continents & oceans we discussed the different ways we could travel to each one from where we live.


Brady is in 1st grade, but even though the packs say preschool, they have MANY activities that are applicable for him. Brady also carries on with his other 1st grade work, but I try to incorporate as much of the themes I'll be doing with Rylan into Brady's curriculum to spice it up & make it fun for him too :)

I hope you all have a blessed week!!!

Friday, September 9, 2011

Fruits of the Spirit & Nutrition


As the boys continued to study about their bodies they learned the importance of good nutrition. They learned about the Food Pyramid & the different types of food groups. They used pretend food to sort into their correct food groups



They played with small puzzles to find out how we get some of our foods. For example, cows make milk which we use to make ice cream; tomatoes come from a vine & we use them to make ketchup, etc.




I divided their pretend food into their food groups around the dining room table, gave them mini-shopping baskets & shopping lists with pictures of food to use to go shopping. They had to get all the foods on their lists then tell me which food group they belonged to.



They learned the importance of eating fruits & vegetables & how carrots are good for their eyes, blueberries are good for their memory, etc. Today I told Brady he needed to pay attention to his co-op teacher & remember what she teaches him so he can tell me about it when he gets home. He informed me we didn't have any blueberries to eat so he probably wouldn't be able to remember :)


The boys used fruit counters to practice sorting colors & sorting them by what kind of fruit they were & Brady used them to help with his math.


And of course we wrapped up our study on the fruit of the Spirit. We discussed each one & what they meant & how we can show them to others in how we act & behave.




We also did Fruit of the Spirit activities from Christian Preschool Printables. Definitely check them out! They have some fun & cute ideas for all things Jesus & the Bible!!

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Math Review

When we started school back up I spent a few weeks reviewing some math skills Brady learned in Kindergarten. He practiced counting to 100, counting by 2s, 5s & 10s. Below is a picture of him counting by 10s using a Chicka Chicka 123 tree we checked out from the Resource Center.


He did some workseets with pictures to review & used counters to help as well.

I gave him dominoes & he had to write out addition problems for each one. He really liked this!


He's remembered a lot which makes momma happy! We haved moved on to subtraction review while continuing with other math concepts as we go over other things in our studies such as graphing, odd & even numbers, etc. Below is a picture of Brady helping my stepmom in the store she & my daddy own. He had a blast helping the customers with their money! Couldn't ask for a better hands-on lesson than that one! :)


Have a blessed day!








Thursday, September 1, 2011

ToT SCHooL Review

We've schoolin' for two months now! I used this time to get Rylan used to "doing school" at a set time & to review him.


He began an "All About Me" theme with his big brother Brady. He did fun activities from a My Discovery Book by Learning Adventures & looked at pictures of other kids doing their favorite things. I asked Rylan what his favorite thing to do was & though he gave me a long list, one was to bake with Mommy. So that's what we did! :) But as you can tell from the picture he'd much rather lick the spoon!


Rylan learned that his food goes to his tummy when he eats it, reviewed his body parts parts & what they help him do. I printed off some activities from 2 Teaching Mommies Body Pack for him to do. He colored different shapes to paste a body together & made it his self-portrait.



He also used his counting skills to put together a puzzle of a little boy. Apparently he was working hard cause his tongue was sticking out! :)



We read the book& practiced buttoning & unbuttoning shirts & zipping & unzipping pants.




I found some dry-erase puzzle pieces that I wrote his name on & he practiced spelling it by putting it together. He still can't recognize his letters, but he's getting MUCH better!

Rylan found a fun puzzle at the Resource Center on shapes & practiced lacing shapes too.


He did his 1st sensory bin. I put various colors of buttons & beads in a large bowl full of beans, rice, & Cherios. He had to dig through the bowl & then sort the colors on their matching pieces of construction paper.




Rylan loved reading Chicka Chicka 123 & Chicka Chicka Boom Boom to review his numbers & letters. He did a counting numbers puzzle that was textured & he practiced tracing the numbers & matching up the puzzle pieces to the correct number.



Rylan adores this letter foam puzzle I bought from the Dollar Tree!!! This has been one my greatest finds!!


He also read many books on the alphabet, but his favorite was a glitter ABC book that he would read to his baby brother Keller.



Now that he has been well reviewed & is used to sitting still long enough to do school, we OFFICIALLY enter Preschool next week!!! I can't wait to blog about all the fun stuff we'll be doing!! I just posted the picture below, because Rylan said this was his favorite toy he's checked out from the Resource Center so far. He thought I should add it to "HIS" blog! lol