What's In The Box Wednesday

Well Brady has hit day 3 of 2nd grade & has realized how much more work it is. He hasn't changed his mind about starting up again so quickly, but he is pestering me to teach him Spanish :) 

He is still doing workboxes, but we are tinkering with our schedule since I have to devote more time to Rylan for preschool. So as of right now, Brady starts his boxes in the morning while I work one on one with Ry. Then after lunch while Keller naps & Ry has computer/play time, I work one on one with Brady. I'm still tinkering with our new schedule so time will only tell! 

Box 1: Write a sentence for each spelling word. (10 in all)

 

Box 2: Use the Do-A-Dot markers to count by 2s & 5s.

 

Box 3: Proper noun worksheet. (copier messed up :P)

 Box 4: Review sight words.

Box 5: SNACK

 Box 6: Copy weather vocabulary definitions into science folder.

 

Box 7: Reread HOP book The Best Grandma Ever.

Box 8: Trace Bible verse & color picture. (2 Teaching Mommies)

Box 9: Addition review.

Box 10: Play time on the iPod.

I'll let you  know how it goes next Wednesday! :)

Brady Counting in 2 Languages

This was Brady 3 years ago (2009)!!! Where has the time gone!!!!





Who needs Rosetta Stone when you got Dora & Ni Hao Kai-Lan??? :) hehehe



We had also studied the 5 senses that week too...Brady picks up things so easily...Im so glad he loves learning!

1st Week of Kindergarten

(August 2010) 

Well of course he has a GREAT teacher in his mommy ;) We've only been at it a week but I cant be more thankful that God has called our family to homeschooling! I love our new curriculum! It's completely Christ centered and challenges my lil braniac's mind all the while teaching him not just academics but also the Word of God! Here are some pics from our 1st week.

Letters Y & Q

(January 7, 2011)

Well we are the home stretch of Kindergarten and of course I have VERY mixed emotions! Happy to see how much Brady is learning, but a little bit sad because he's growing up so fast! Even though he's known all of his letters and their sounds for a long time I have decided to review him on them and use this as a way to get Rylan involved and to have some learning fun with Brady. We are doing this on top of our regular reading and math lessons and using the weekly letters to learn new words, play games, do science, and some social studies type projects. So check back every week to see what we've come up with :)

The boys glued Yarn to a Yellow Y. Rylan's is on the left & Brady's on the right. Brady & I also discussed words that start with Y & we talked about the one's he didn't know & looked for pictures of them in his 1st Dictionary. I purposely made lunch or dinner with something that began with a Y, but it took him a bit to guess Yellow corn :) Momma doesn't do Yams! And of course he had Yogurt at lunch one day. Brady was also extremely happy that Yoshi from Super Mario starts with a Y too and reminds me of this whenever he plays :)

Rylan coloring a letter Y from his book. you can also see textured Y we trace with our fingers & a ball of Yarn we used for our art & to play a game of toss with.

Brady using Cuisinare Rods to make Ys. This book also helps with colors & counting & many other fun activities.

Brady tossing Quarters onto the letter Q.

After practicing his printing we put the Quarters under the paper so he could rub the imprint of the Quarter.

The boys also painted Qs with Q-tips & happy for me, they didn't even make a mess!!

Their final products with our list of Q words.

After school was over today we went out to lunch and ate some Quesadillas! MMMMM MMMM MMMMM!!!!

Letters & Numbers

(January 18, 2011)

On the home school front we reviewed the letters N & L.

For the letter N our focus was Numbers. We went on a number hunt at Walmart and Brady wrote down all the Numbers he saw in his little Notebook. We worked on skip counting by 10s and 5s and worked on some early addition skills too. Our N food was Nachos (my favorite) and we talked about different ways we can be Nice to others and Not be Naughty.

The Letter L represented Letters. Brady is almost finished with his Kindergarten reading book! So we've used the last couple of weeks to review. Our verse was Luke 10:27 "Jesus answered, 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” Which also tied into our "Nice" lesson. His L food was a Lollipop, but thought it was "SO COOL" to eat ABC's & 123's because it had Letters and Numbers in it. :) The Little things that kids Like LoL...and speaking of LoL...we also talked about things that make us Laugh...my favorite was my kiddos, Brady's was Tom & Jerry.

For our craft I cut many Numbers and Letters out of newspaper and Brady had to sort them and glue the Numbers to the Letter N and the Letters on the L.



Pictures were taken on my phone so the quality isnt too great. This week we're taking off to the great state of Texas to visit my mom & sister! have a blessed week!!!

Letters O & T

(February 1, 2011)

Last week we reviewed the letter O & made some super cute Owls! Rylan joined in the fun this time!

They painted their O's added a triangle with 2 green circles for the eyes. This was also an opportunity to teach Rylan some colors & shapes, though he didn't care for it as much as he did the painting! I had to pry the paint brush out of his hand!

Our O food was an orange of course! Brady wasn't too keen on trying an Olive! We talked a lot about the Ocean & our vacation to the beach when saw a lot of different sea creatures up close! Too close for me! A baby shark swam 5 feet away from were we were! We also looked in books & talked about the different animals that live in the Ocean. After we made our Owls we learned a new word: NOCTURNAL because most Owls sleep in the day & hunt for food at night. Another new word was OAR. It was in his dictionary & he couldn't understand why they put a paddle under the O because paddle starts with P! He cracks me up sometimes with his simple logical sense of things.



Brady also reviewed the letter T & made a cute Tree in the shape of a T.

He colored the Trunk & branches, then used a sponge to paint green leaves on it & before the paint could dry, he added fake grass we bought a while back to add some Texture!

Brady came up with a Ton of T words! As you can see by his list some of his VERY favorite Things start with T. Trains Thomas & Toby made the list & Brady wasn't too happy I ran out of room to write Tow Mater from Disney's Cars :) Our story came from the Bible, we Talked about the Trees in the Garden of Eden & the 1st sin. Brady remembered most of it which makes me happy! We also Talked a lot about Trust & Telling the Truth. Our T food was his favorite vegetable, a Tomato! I had considered working on Telling Time for math, but I didn't want to interrupt our addition that we had already started.

As you can see he did VERY well on his on. I like to buy the $1 workbooks to assist with our Singapore book we typically use. Brady likes it too because as he says, "I get to work with my friends." Meaning his favorite characters. :)

He also uses his Cuisinaire Rods to help count the numbers & then add them all together. I'm amazed at how quick he caught on. I'm hoping he's good at math & likes it. I never did! One of my main goals in homeschooling is to make learning fun so here's to praying I can find fun ways to teach the stuff I don't like so much.

Letters C and M

(February 7, 2011)

First of all let me say a BIG thanks to ALL the AAHHH-MAZING mommy bloggers out there who dedicate so much time into sharing their ideas for the rest of us!!! Because of these ladies I'm able to do so many fun learning activities with my boys & they inspire me to create some things on my own!

We began last week reviewing the letter C. I took this time to introduce Brady to the CH sound as well because we are about to cover that in our reading lessons. We also talked about how the letter C can also make a "S" sound like in the words City, Celery, & Cereal. Brady thinks the letter C is a tricky Cat! (dont ask)

Last year I read "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" to the boys & ever since then it has been a BIG hit in our household! Both big boys can quote it word for word! So they were pretty ecstatic when we read it during "school" time & made Caterpillar C's!

Rylan was incredibly impressed by the little fuzzy Craft balls we used. So I came up with a "Tot School" activity that I'll post tomorrow! :)

We also made Chocolate Chip Cookies in the shape of the letter C. This was quite messy, but of course that made the boys love it even more! Rylan sang the Cookie Monster song, "C is for Cookie, it's good enough for me" the whole time :) I wish I would've gotten it on Camera, but my hands were covered in gooey dough!

While our Cookies were baking we read the book, "If You Give A Mouse A Cookie." I HIGHLY recommend all the "If You Give A..." books!!! We also took time to talk about their Cousins & named all of the ones whose names started with a C: Caleb, Connor, Cameron, Christian, & Cody; Brady was a little upset that his Cousin Kaelin's name started with a K & not a C.

We also discussed how Jesus is the Christ & though I know the deep meaning of Christ is above his lil head, I still enjoy planting the seed in him & sowing it, because one day he will understand & that is the ultimate goal!

Our other C activities included lots Counting with our addition, playing with Cards, eating lots of C foods: Cookies, Carrots, Chips, Celery, Chicken, Corn...bet you can guess which food was Brady's favorite!

The boys even had a lunch of Chicken, Chips, & Corn while they watched Cars. I was informed this day that I was "The Best Mom EVER!!!" :D

Brady couldn't have been more thrilled to begin the letter M when he saw we would be doing our Math lesson with M & M's!!! He sorted them by colors & counted them, did his addition with them, made patterns & shapes with them & we even brought the M &M's into our language lesson & traced our M's with M & M's.

I used to have a M & M Math book from when I taught 4th grade, but have seen it since then :( I will have to purchase it again because my students LOVED it!

We spent that afternoon reading "If You Take A Mouse To The Movies" & which led us to watching the Movie "A Mickey Mouse Christmas" while we ate some popcorn & M &M's with Chocolate Milk. (Notice the Mixing of C's & M's??? ;P) We also purposely Made a Mess so we could Clean it up. For dinner we had a special M Meal of Mini Meatloaf Muffins & Mashed potatoes. We also played ALL of their Musical instruments & made up silly songs together.

We focused our Bible story to Moses & the 10 Commandments & made our Mt. Sinai out of the letter M, added some clouds & of course Moses too!

We reviewed the Commandments & gave examples of each (with the exception of adultery) & I explained to my best ability what Mercy was & that even though we often make Mistakes, God shows us Mercy & He forgives us; which is why we should show Mercy to others.

Valentine's 2011

(February 14, 2011)

Last week began discussing Valentine's & how it's a holiday for us to remind others of how much we love them & more importantly that God loves them. We started the week off with the letter H for Heart. The boys used these little Hearts for EVERYTHING all week long! They made patterns with them & sorted them by color & size.

Brady used them to count while he did his addition.

They glued the Hearts to a letter H.

Decorated their Valentine bags with them.

And Brady used them to decorate the Valentines he made for all his friends.

As we talked about love we focused on the Verses Matthew 22:37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’³⁸ This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹ And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’" We discussed many ways we could show love to others & how we can show God how we can show God how much we love Him. I really enjoyed talking about God's love! In fact I NEVER get tired of about of the love of my Savior & Bridegroom...but that's a whole other blog not in homeschooling :)Our H foods were of course Hot dogs & Ham & cheese sandwiches.For the letter V we didn't have any foods except what I called our special Valentine meal of Heart shaped pancakes. We have some Venison, but I never got around to thawing it out to cook :)

For our V craft the boys made Vases.

I drew different kinds of flowers& let the boys color them. We cut them out & pasted them with stems to fill the Vases. I thought they turned out SUPER cute!

Today we concluded our Valentine lesson with a Valentine party with some of our favorite home school friends!

We went to Kidz Rock which has many inflatables for the kids to go crazy on.

And arcade games & outside playgrounds.

The kiddos played, us mommies got to chat, we talked about love & the lil ones exchanged Valentines.

We ate some yummy food & had a fabulous time! I am SO incredibly thankful that God has brought some sweet homeschooling mommies to me! It's nice to have some friends who understand what I am going through in this area of my life.

This week we are reviewing our letters up to this point so no big crafts. Hopefully this break will finally let me upload a blog on Tot School...Rylan's special stuff :)