Friday, March 21, 2008

Egg-citement and Egg-speriments

In case you hadn't guessed, in celebration of the fun side of Easter, today is "Egg Day" in our house.

We began by learning the word "egg." Hannah practiced writing the word and drew a picture of Easter eggs, and Ben just colored a picture. We also talked about ovals, because eggs are shaped like ovals. Then, we did a series of "egg-speriments," using chicken eggs from the fridge.

First, the kids looked at the different sizes, held the eggs, rolled them to see how they wobbled. and tapped gently on their hard shells. Then, we talked about the things baby birds need as they grow and where those things are inside the egg. We cracked an egg open and examined the yolk and the air sac inside the shell. We also looked closely at the little pores in the egg shell. (Since the kids seemed rather distraught at the thought of wasting an egg, we all ate eggs for lunch, using the eggs we studied...)

When we finished, the kids made an adorable chicken craft using different shapes, including ovals. Ben made the yellow chick (found here), and Hannah made the hen (found here). All of this will lead into Easter egg dyeing tonight when Daddy comes home.

Additionally, and perhaps most importantly, I also plan on tying this lesson into the idea of new life (because of Jesus) at Easter. Once we finish coloring eggs this evening, we will make Easter Story Cookies. In these cookies, eggs symbolize new life. We have been reading and re-reading the Easter story for the past two weeks, and these cookies help show the story in a very visual way. I cannot wait to see their faces when the cookies are empty, just like Jesus tomb, tomorrow morning...

How refreshing for me, as well, to see Easter anew - through the innocent eyes of my children!

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Kindergarten, here we come!

We finally got our curriculum in the mail last week, and I am so excited. We got Sing, Spell, Read, and Write, Math-U-See, and A Reason for Handwriting. I also picked up a secondhand K-3 Science book at a great price, so we can use some of those activities too.

Hannah loves the lessons already. I pulled out one of the kindergarten level story books the day we received the reading curriculum, and she read through the whole first book without any help! I knew she could sound out words a bit, but I had no idea how much she already understood. She's also starting about 9 lessons into the math book as well.

Sweet, stubborn Hannah... She wants to tackle the whole curriculum at once! I have to watch her closely and limit the amount of time we spend on lessons, because she never wants to quit! Persistently forging ahead, she completes page after page, activity after activity, all while rubbing her eyes and yawning. But, if I suggest stopping for the day, she responds with screams and wails as if I am punishing her! Fortunately, the lessons involve songs and games too, so I can break up the workbook time, and I only attempt 1-2 hours of formal learning per day. She reminds me so much of myself at her age... I only hope I can teach her to relax and have fun instead of making school as all-consuming as I did. I almost feel like I have to de-motivate her so she won't push herself until she burns out. But, I'm also thrilled that she has such a love for learning!

So, at Hannah's request, Kindergarten, here we come!

Saturday, March 8, 2008

Emergency!

What should you do in an emergency? How do you call for help? And, what is an emergency anyway? Those are the questions we answered on Friday, partly in preparation for a field trip to the fire station later this month.


We started out by figuring out how to identify an emergency and learning when NOT to call 911. Then, we learned the numbers 911, and Hannah practiced writing the numbers on paper.

While she wrote, I gathered together two toy phones, our cordless phone, and our cell phone, and we used them to practice dialing the correct way on different phones. (Don't worry - we didn't call for real!) I showed them how to wait for the dial tone on a land line and how to dial first and then push the send button on a cell phone.

Then, we rehearsed what to say when the dispatcher answered the phone. They practiced speaking loudly and clearly, answering questions, giving their address, and staying on the phone until the operator tells them to hang up.

Hannah spent half of yesterday running around the living room pressing the numbers "9-1-1" again and again on the toy phone! Thankfully, she also understands that she can't do that on the real phone unless there is an actual emergency.

As a side note, if you are looking for an easy way to teach your kids their address, this worked very well for us. Obviously, I won't share our real address online, but this is what we did (sung to the tune of Jingle Bells):

"House number, and our street, city, and our state. That is what my address is. It's what I need to know!"

After discussing 911, we talked about what to do in a fire. I found a ton of great fire safety tips online, and the kids colored various pages about firemen, smoke detectors, and how to get out and stay out of the house during a fire. Now, they know to check their doorknob for heat and how to crawl low to the ground if the house is smoky.

But, their favorite safety lesson, by far, was learning to stop, drop, and roll. They practiced again and again, especially when I played "Stop, Drop, and Roll" - a song on a Veggie Tales CD that uses a bit of humor to teach kids what to do if their clothes catch fire. They rolled around the house for about 10 minutes straight!


I know this can be a bit of a heavy topic, but I think the kids had a lot of fun. And, I feel better knowing that they at least have a basic idea of what to do in a real emergency, though I hope they never have to put their skills into practice.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Workbook Day

Yesterday was mostly just a fun day for the kids. On Wednesday afternoons, a local high-school girl, who is studying childcare, will be completing part of her internship at our house. She will spend 2 hours a week here, playing with the kids, so I can get some work done! The kids loved having her here, because she spent the whole time building Lincoln Log houses with them. She interacted very well with them, encouraging them to describe what they were building and admiring their work. And, I did a few loads of laundry, washed dishes, completed a logo, and made four scream-free phone calls. I am amazed at how much I can accomplish in just two uninterrupted hours!

Today, we just had a workbook day. Hannah loves practicing letters and going through the pre-K workbooks I bought this year. I've noticed that her handwriting has improved dramatically from just a few weeks ago. We were going through a number book, and she really struggled to write the numbers. I pushed and pushed, because her preschool teacher said her fine motor skills were lagging behind her peers. I could see the frustration in her eyes, and she begged to quit.

Realizing that I had been pushing too hard, I scooped her up into my lap. "Hannah," I said, "You are such a smart girl. You know so many things! But, even when you are smart, you often have to work really hard and practice something again and again until you learn it." I also reminded her about Angelina Ballerina (the title character in the book we read that morning), who loved dancing but still had to practice very hard until she became a star ballerina, and I gave her a huge hug and told her how much I loved her.

We stopped writing that day, but now she begs to practice writing her letters and numbers nearly every day we do preschool. In fact, I usually have to make her stop after doing several pages, because I can see her getting tired, and I reward her hard work with a bunch of fun workbook pages that challenge her to think but don't require much fine motor work. Additionally, I see how much genuine praise encourages her, so I give her stars and celebrate when she takes her time and prints her letters nicely. Today, as she worked, she kept showing me which letters she thought merited stars - and she was usually correct!

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Did I say two weeks??

Hmmm... I just figured out that Easter is three weeks away, not two. I guess we'll be spreading that unit out over a few more days!

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Stormy March

Today we began a two week unit focused around spring and Easter. Somehow, I ended up with a copy of a wonderful, out of print children's book called "The Story of Easter for Children" by Beverly Rae Wiersum. It begins by describing spring and the coming of new life, and then it ties spring and all of the Easter symbols into a beautiful description of how Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus and his gift of new life. So, we are going to use the book as a starting point to discuss the coming of spring, Easter eggs and new life, and, most importantly, Jesus' death and resurrection. If we have time, we'll also look at some of the other Easter symbols.

Because of our rainy, stormy weather today, I decided to focus today's lessons around rain and the water cycle. I found some wonderful ideas at http://first-school.ws/activities/science/drippy.htm, including links to a story about "Drippy the raindrop" and several good coloring pages at Kidzone.

We started by reading the Easter story, and then talking about spring rains washing the snow away. Then, we looked at the story of Drippy and discussed the water cycle. Hannah learned the word "rain," and practiced writing it several times. She also drew a picture of rain on the paper.

To illustrate the concept of the water cycle, we used one of the suggested activities at First School, soaking cotton-ball clouds with water and watching them "rain" into a bowl. The kids loved doing it again and again!

Then, I continued the illustration using the wonderful Kidzone worksheets. I boiled water in a teapot to show the four stages: evaporation, condensation (on the lid), precipitation and collection (water dripping from the lid and falling back into the teapot). Then, the kids colored the corresponding worksheet pages. They seemed so excited, and even Ben understood at a two-year-old level. He kept telling me over and over that water is "old" because it keeps going up and down, instead of being newly created water.


Hannah was very proud of her finished work. Her fine motor skills (writing and coloring) are improving every day!

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Hot Chocolate!

Even though we don't push Santa in our house (Hannah and Ben understand that he's just a fun story like any other fairy tale), my kids became enamored with the movie The Polar Express this Christmas. They have an infatuation with trains already, and I think they view the film as an exciting train movie.

Anyway, this week we had a big snow storm that caused us to cancel our field trip to the fire station, and I could see how disappointed the kids felt. When Hannah mentioned wanting hot chocolate at breakfast (a rare treat for them), I suddenly felt inspired. While they ate, I found a free train pattern here and then printed and cut out the pieces. I also made each kid a golden yellow ticket like the one in the movie.

After breakfast, I gave the kids the train pieces and let them color and glue it together. Then, we wrote the numbers 1-4 on the cars. Once they finished, I handed them their tickets and put on the soundtrack from the movie. When the conductor yelled, "All Aboard," I checked their tickets and seated them at the table. I wrapped up the activity by serving them hot chocolate when the "Hot Chocolate" song played on the CD.

The kids loved it! They both slept with their train tickets in their beds last night and insisted that Daddy let them watch the movie while I was out last night. I don't think they even remembered that they missed their field trip...

Where homeschooling is just a small part of becoming life-long learners.