Week Six

It was a strange week of school here. I am so thankful that I have started this kindergarten process a year early because this is certainly a year of trial and error. I am continuously playing around with our schedule and content to see what works and what doesn't. I plan to use two years on Kindergarten with Caleb since he is only four right now anyway so it is fun to try different things and just enjoy the process. There were many parts of the curriculum we chose to not do this week because Caleb was not enjoying them, but I plan to add much of it back in this week for a fresh try.

Bible Story: Jacob and Esau Genesis 25:19-34 ad Genesis 27: 1-38

Bible Memory Verse: Luke 1:37 For nothing is impossible with God. They both know it!

Nursery Rhyme: Peas Porridge Hot

Songs: God Made All of Me, The Five Senses

Other Preschool Activities this week: We talked a lot about the five senses this week as well as circles and rectangles. Hannah did LOTS of puzzles this week. She loves puzzles right now.

Preschool Stories: Piglet Tells the Truth by Mary Manz Simms, My Five Senses by Margaret Miller, My Five Senses by Aliki, Rectangles by Jennifer Burke, Twin to Twin by Margaret O'Hair, Round is a Pancake by Joan Sullivan Baranski, A Circle is ROund by Donald Crews, Round, Round, and Round by Tana Hoban, and Circles by Mary Salzmann

In Kindergarten this week:

History: This week's history was focused on missionary stories. We only read one out of four. I am not sure we will continue with this book. I would love for him to learn about missionaries but this book is a bit advanced for him.

Read-Alouds: We began reading My Father's Dragon. Once again, a book I am not too fond of so far.

Math: counting by tens, adding, calendar, ordinal numbers- I also added in his math video this week, MathTacular. I let him watch one segment each day and he really enjoys it. It basically is just a fun way to introduce or review a skill with a short one to 4 minute video clip.

Handwriting/Spelling/Phonics: Caleb was very excited to read a few simples "at" words this week. He also worked on writing the letter "g" and colored a goat.

Science: We read about grasslands and oceans. We did a simple experiment with celery (see picture below). Caleb told me this week that his favorite parts of school are math and science. Oh my! Guess what my two least favorite subjects are...

We did more scissor practice. We had a great time at library story hour and this was the week for our September field trip to Reed Creek Park.

The kids have been asking for puppets. I found 6 great puppets at Dollar General for $1 each. They only know we have 2 right now (yes, I got to shop alone). It will be fun to pull out the other 4 at another time. Hannah LOVED the pig and took it everywhere with her this week. Caleb's puppet was a tiger.

Hannah worked on shapes, colors, animal sounds and sequencing with this Jump and Jam Jungle game.

She worked on numbers and matching with this Maisy's counting game.

This is a picture of Caleb and Hannah playing a counting game that was demonstrated on Caleb's math video this day. I flipped over a number card and they raced to see who could count out that many chips first. Then to challenge Caleb a bit I let Hannah flip cards while I raced with Caleb. He really did beat me a few times.

The theme for this month's preschool nature walk at Reed Creek Park was plants. Here Hannah was searching for flowers and seeds to put in her cup.

These plants were growing up through the boardwalk.

Playing a game. Identifying if the picture is a plant you would eat or not.

Caleb uses letter magnets to work on "at" words. I thought he would love this, but it was only fun for a few minutes. I think he just wasn't in the mood for school at all this week. He's been a bit off all the way around lately.

There is that tongue again! No resistance to coloring this week...WOW!

Stringing beads

Math work

We put celery in blue water to observe how the water travels up to the top of the leaves. Caleb still won't let me pour the water out. He wants to see if the celery will drink all the water. Over half of the water we started with is gone so far.