Leaves, Scarecrows, & Pumpkins oh my!!!!!

I love fall! I mean it! I absolutely love it! I love the cooler weather, the leaves changing colors, putting out my cute scarecrows, pumpkins, & sunflowers in the front yard. Of course living in the South some days will still be hot & the leaves don't change as quickly as I like, but nonetheless, I LOVE FALL!! This blog post is a combination of what I had planned to do over three weeks, but we all kept getting sick with colds & coughs, then I got a stomach bug, then the baby got pneumonia :/ So we did what we could, when we could, & still had a lot of fun with all of it!

We started out reading these books about leaves. My favorite was Autumn's 1st Leaf! One of my favorite lines was near the end when one leaf says something to the effect of, "It doesn't matter what color we are, we are all the same." I was also only able to find one scarecrow book which leads me to believe we weren't the only ones having some Fall fun! :)

Rylan practiced sorting leaves from apples, shadow matching leaves, sorting the leaves by size, & tracing lines to "rake the leaves to the pile,"

One Saturday morning the big boys went outside to play, ran in quickly to grab some bags, then bolted back out the door. I knew something had to up. To my great surprise they were acorn hunting! They desperately wanted to feed a squirrel & were very sadden that one wouldn't just come up to them no matter how many acorns they had :) But I let them add the acorns to our fall sensory bin.

 He also LOVED playing in the sensory bin I made for him! Uncooked rice, beans, stale cheerios, twigs, leaves, fake berries from an old fall wreath, acorns the boys found, & a paper squirrel & owl as well :) Rylan enjoyed searching for all his acorns time & time again. I really wonder what's so amusing about this, but I am glad he likes it!

 I found a Count by 5s page at Making Learning Fun. Brady had to trace the #s & use the Do A Dot Markers to stamp the leaves to make a beautiful fall tree. This was one of his work box activities. 

 One of our art projects was tear pieces of fall colored construction paper to glue over the word FALL & then to glue some paper leaves around it. Brady did an excellent job, but I must admit Rylan got bored halfway through the letter A. So being the good momma I am I sat there & helped him, but when it came to gluing the leaves he no longer wanted my participation!

 They turned out SUPER cute!!

 Rylan did MUCH better when it came to the scarecrow craft. We got this from Making Learning Fun as well. We talked about the different shapes & colors as we went along. Rylan isn't very good at cutting yet so I cut out his pieces for him while he got to practice snipping away at the scrap paper & Brady cut his own.

 After the pieces were all cut out, the boys glued them to their papers per my instructions. I was pleasantly surprised at how well they did this. I asked them to name their scarecrows & they each thought they should be named after themselves & Scarecrow would be their last name LoL!!

 Rylan also used his magnetic pom poms to do a S is for Scarecrow page.

We finally began our pumpkin fun by heading out to the pumpkin patch with our homeschool group. You'll have to stay tuned to the next blog post about it :) It was hard finding books about pumpkins that weren't Halloweenish. So we only ended up with three. I hope to get the Pumpkin Patch Parable by next year! Here are our books with the boys' carved pumpkins. 

I found an AWESOME prayer book at Christian Preschool Printables that you can pray with your kids while you carve your pumpkins. I totally forgot about it when we actually carved them, but we did go back outside & I read the prayer to them as we went over our pumpkin with the face. We continued to go over that prayer for the rest of out pumpkin unit. I HIGHLY recommend you printing one out!!

I found these cute color pumpkins at 1+1+1=1. Brady had to trace his color words then color the pumpkin accordingly, while Rylan had to tell me what color the words were then he colored his pumpkin to match. They really enjoyed this activity. I have NEVER seen them take so much time to color. Rylan kept telling me pumpkins were his favorite :) 

Ryaln also practiced counting to 10 with these printables from COAH P is for Pumpkin. 

 I was GREATLY surprised at how well he traced his Ps!! As he did this we sang the Leap Frog jingle, "P says puh, P says puh. Every letter makes a sound. P says puh."

 I later caught Brady teaching Rylan the difference between a big P & a little p. He kept reviewing him til Rylan got them all right! I guess I found a lil teacher's assistant! :)

Many of the printables I used came from 2 Teaching Mommies Leaves Pack & Homeschool Creations Fall Fun Pack. The others are linked above. Be sure to check them all out!! We had a blast with them! We used a lot more than what I showed. I try to take pictures of everything we do, but let's face it, it isn't always possible! I do the best I can to record the fun we have so some day the boys can look back on their schoolin' adventures & I can look back & cry at how little they used to be ;P

I pray you all have a blessed week!!



Fun @ the State Fair

A couple of weeks ago we hit up our state fair & had a GREAT time! Click this link to my other blog & check out all the great pictures!!!

What's In The Box?

I finally began using our workboxes & I must say I LOVE them!! It has helped Brady work more independently so I can work with Rylan, tend to Keller, or clean. If he gets stuck on anything he can come & ask me, but for the most part he knows he has to try & figure it out on his own. The boxes are full of things he's familiar with so he knows how to do them already without further instruction. Before he begins them I go over each one briefly to make sure he knows what's expected of him.

Here is how our 1st run at workboxes went:

Box 1: Brady's new list of spelling words. He had to say the word then write it 3x.

Box 2: Read the book as he listens along to the tape. I have a tape player set up beside his desk so it's easy for him to use.

 

Box 3: Math sheet with counters (if needed).


Box 4: Roll A Graph (from Fall Fun Pack at Homeschool Creations).


Box 5: SNACK!!


Box 6: Practice sight words.


Box 7: Practice sound cards for blends.



Box 8: Read words on marked pages. These are words we've already gone over before.

 

Box 9: Count by 5s & use Do A Dot markers to decorate the fall tree.

Box 10: Cut out pictures & paste them under noun or verb.

  



CAMPING

For the last five years all the guys on my husband's side of the family have done a camping/jug fishing trip. When our boys & nephews each get old enough they get to go too. This summer was Rylan's 1st time to go & ever since then he has been asking to go camping again. When I saw that 2 Teaching Mommies & Homeschool Creations had Camping Theme printables I KNEW we HAD to do them!

Finding books for our camping theme was a bit hard. We were able to find 3 books & I found a few short stories from Teachers Pay Teachers that we were able to use too.
Here's Rylan chilling in Keller's bouncy seat reading his favorite book :)

One of the BEST things about camping is roasting marshmallows! Brady used mini ones for his roll-a-graph & as counters while doing his math worksheets. The boys also used them for a measuring activity I found on Teachers Pay Teachers; though Rylan ate more than he measured :)

Another fun food activity Rylan did was fishing for M&Ms! I printed it off of Making Learning Fun & he had to match the color of the M&Ms to the correct color fish. Of course he rushed through this so he could gobble them up!

We used the counting/number cards from the preschool packs with clothespins. I wrote #s 1-10 on clothespins & Rylan has to count how many items are on each card. Then I show him what the # looks like & he has to find the right clothespin & clip it to the card. He does get a bit frustrated sometimes when he cant open them well. I am hoping this will really help him with his scissor skills cause he's not liking that too much either...well when I make him hold the scissors the correct way :P

For writing practice Rylan did his usual Do-A-Dot page, this time a tent, & practiced writing the Letter F for FIRE! We even made a pretend camp fire that you can check out in the 1st picture up above. Rylan also practiced tracing lines "bringing the campers to their tent." I forgot to take a picture of it though! Brady used one of the printables to practice his Beginning Sounds & practiced his printing by writing & spelling many camp-themed words.

This week Brady also worked on putting words in ABC order & practicing compound words. We had really cute camp-themed printables for these activities, but apparently I deleted the pics! WHOOPS! Sorry! I got them from Teachers Pay Teachers so go over there & search "camping" to see all the cute stuff they have.

I found this cute shape matching game from Making Learning Fun. Rylan had to tell me the names of shapes he knew (some were pretty tough) then match the flame to the correct camp fire.

Brady also worked on reading his shape words. I found this at Homeschool Creations.He also practiced reading his number words 1-20 by matching the oar to the correct canoe. (from Teachers Pay Teachers)

Here's Rylan working on size sorting & shadow matching. He absolutely LOVES shadow matching because of watching Peter Pan chase his shadow. It makes me laugh at how things travel over for some kids & makes them likes things better...or worse sometime :)

Our original plan was to take the boys camping Friday night, but we all ended up getting pretty bad colds during the week & we didn't want to chance it. So I set up the boys tent in the school room & they slept in it EVERY SINGLE NIGHT during the week! (pictured at the beginning of post). Friday we were all feeling much better so we built our own campfire in the backyard & roasted hot dogs for dinner!

And lets face it, camping wouldn't be camping without SMORES!!!

Keller LOVED marshmallows & graham crackers! After he finished eating them he would smack his lips asking for more!

This week was more relaxed due to sickness, but I figured that's what camping should do anyway right? Relax you. The kids loved reading, playing, & sleeping in their tent inside & we have decided to keep it up in the playroom next to the book shelf & now the boys call it their Reading Tent :)

We definitely made some fun family memories with our backyard camp out dinner! Doing a theme each week really makes me think outside the box & helps us do such fun things we might not of done without a theme leading us that way.

I pray you all have a blessed week!

DINOSAURS!

When I was a little girl I LOVED dinosaurs! Probably more than I loved space! I wanted to be 3 things when I grew up; an actress, an astronaut, & a paleontologist! NO KIDDING!!! In fact to this day I still love watching things about dinosaurs!

Here are all the amazing books we read this week!
I try very hard to find books each week the boys can listen to on tape or CD. This week I lucked up with The Dinosaur Who Lived Next Door. One of their favorites this week was Dinosaurumpus! Very silly & very cute! Brady & I also began reading chapter books together & started with The Magic Treehouse Dinosaurs Before Dark. Brady can't wait to read another one! This just tickles my heart! I love that he loves to read & I pray it's always this way! We read about 2-3 chapters a day, depending what all we had going on. We took turns reading pages & I would help Brady with words he didn't know. I can't believe how much better he got at reading just after doing this book together! I can't wait to do more!

Our Bible verse was Genesis 1:25 & we talked a lot about how some people have different thoughts on how long ago dinosaurs lived & what happened to them. Of course we believe in Creation, not the Big Bang Theory so we read What Really Happened to the Dinosaurs & discussed what Creation Scientists believe. Brady doesn't seem to care whether they lived millions or thousands of years ago; he just thinks they're cool! But I know it's important to start teaching the truth young whether they understand all of it or not.

The boys also like the book Look Inside T-Rex & after we read it we did some fossil digging of our own! A long time ago I found a "fossilized dino egg" by Creatology at Michael's for a $1. It came with a chisel, a hammer, & a brush to help the boys uncover the dinosaur inside. This took a lot longer than I expected! But my lil paleontologists persevered!


I checked out a Dinosaur Theme Box by Lakeshore from the Resource Center. Inside they had lil plastic dinosaur skeletons. During nap/quiet time I went outside & hid them in the dirt. When the boys got up they got to to dig away to find them all! This was such a HUGE hit!!! And like Easter egg hunting goes, they wanted to do it over, & over, & over, & over! Can you tell we had a lot of fun this week!? :)

Our printables this week came from Confession's of a Homeschooler's Letter of the Week D is for Dinosaurs & 2 Teaching Mommies Dinosaur Pack.

Rylan had to match the dinosaur pieces to the correct color match. We also used dinosaur manipulatives to sort the dinos by color & species & made patterns with them.

Brady also used them to help him with his math as needed during the week & graphed them.

To practice his 1 to 1 number correlation, Rylan used the number cards from the Letter of Week (LOTW) pack & we said the # on the card, then counted the # of clothespins & attached them to the card which also helps him work on his fine motor skills. After we did all the #s, we would repeat it except he would count the clothespins as we took them off this time around.

Rylan also practiced lacing a dinosaur & using his magnetic pom poms to work on his fine motor skills too. His lil fingers sure are getting strong!

All these skills help Rylan with holding a pencil or crayon to practice writing. He began his writing practicing using his Do-A-Dot marker to write the letter D, then he traced the letter D with a dry erase crayon. He also practiced tracing lines by taking the dinosaur to the volcano (this came from 2 Teaching Mommies).

The boys spent a TON of time playing with dinosaurs this week! From the dino mat, to puppets, in the bathtub, outside, here, there, EVERYWHERE!! What can I say? We LOVE our dinosaurs!!

Keller decided to give the T-Rex a dose of his own medicine & showed him how it feels to be bitten :) He also had a lot fun playing with his baby T-rex book!

For our crafts I drew a scene according to Brady's description of what a dinosaurs home looks like. He said it had to have a volcano & grass & trees for the herbivores & omnivores to eat :) The boys then used dino stamps to create their pictures. They also used their dinosaur toys to make dinosaur tracks on paper to see the difference in each species' footprints.

We looked through all of our books & dino fact cards to learn about the various types of dinosaurs. I was pretty amazed at how many Brady already knew from just the past 2 years of liking dinosaurs. We don't watch Dinosaur Train a lot because they can go overboard with their own dino theories, but I will occasionally let them watch it & I'll ask questions about it & always redirect them to remember what we believe about the dinosaurs. Great teaching moments everywhere! The boys also watched The Land Before Time movie The Great Valley Adventure.

Our special theme lunches were dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets & dino shaped spaghetti Os & sandwiches in the shapes of Brady's favorite dinosaur; a Brachiosaurus! I also made him try salad because a Brachiosaurus would have liked them. To his surprise he like it! Though it was covered in ranch which I doubt the dinosaurs had LoL!!!

What would my kiddos do without a themed puzzle!?!? :) I think they did this one at least 5x a day! No kidding! Thank God for Michael's! We went there a few weeks ago & I racked up on wooden puzzles that were on sale for $1.50 or $2.50!!!

I hope you all enjoyed our DINO WEEK!!! Be blessed & have a great week!!