Katy and the Big Snow

Our adventure with Katy was very dry.  Here in Nevada we rarely have snow, only if we go tho Mount Charleston :)  But we did our study and it was fun!

The story is about Katy, a big red crawler tractor who saves the day when a huge snowstorm hits the city. With her big snow plow on, Katy responds to cries of “Help!” from the police chief, the doctor, the superintendent of the Water Department, the fire chief and others with “Follow me,” and plows the streets to their destinations.

Social Studies: Running a city, Responsibilities, Street Signs, Map Skills

We did all sorts of activities with the city officials, our responsibilities, street signs.

We do regular Map skills activities, but here we refreshed our knowledge of the cardinal directions:

 Language: Character, Vocabulary

 We spoke about Katy's character, what she did, her characteristics and finishes the Language session with the new vocabulary words.

 

Science: Weather

During science we learned about different weather patterns.

 ART
We draw our own geopolis :)

 And that concludes our Katy and the Big Snow FIAR study.

Resources and Inspirational sites:
Homeschoolshare
Delightfullearning
stART

Free Math Program

I love math, and know how important MATH is, no matter what.  Many people are afraid of Math because of bad experience, or luck of good teacher.  Well MATH is like any other language, you have to learn it and build up your knowledge step by step like you learn phonics, reading, writing.  Mathematics is not more difficult than any other subject.
So I found this extraordinary website where you practically have a whole Math program free: free teaching manual.  The idea is based on Hungarian teaching concept, Hungarians have one of the highest standards in Mathematics.  The program is called Mathematics Enhancement Programme and it is used in British Schools.  I love the whole approach to teaching Math, it is very important to tech playfully and enjoyably.
Primary stage or Reception year refers to Kindergarten year, and year 1 refers to Grade 1, etc...Mathematics Enhancement Program.  They even have Spanish version of this Math Program.  I hope you will enjoy it.

Week two review

Reading
I cannot emphasize enough how good the OPR teaching method is.  Currently we are at Lesson #54, digraph ng.  Also, we went over the Hooked on Phonics Kindergarten set and G did it instantly.  It was no brainer for him.  We wiil continue with the First Grader set and see where they are compared to OPR.

G also read several small stories, that makes him more and more comfortable reading.
With Explode the code we finished the first three lessons, words with a.

Spelling
We just started All About Spelling and it goes well so far.  More on it later.

Handwriting
We do regular lessons from Handwriting without tears, just finishes Capital B.

Math
In Singapore math K edition we finished chapter 13, will start chapter 14.

Vocabulary
In Worldy Wise 300 K we are at the middle of lesson 2. It is fun :)

Art
We started with Renoir study,  paintings, books on Renoir
Renoir and the Boy with the Long Hair
Pierre Auguste Renoir
Renoir: Art Activity Pack

Music
Piano lessons

Geography
We just got Scholastic Success with Maps and Places around Me.  We are ding both simultaneously because it is fun.

New Year, New Beginnings/ Kindergarten Curriculum for Spring 2012

Although G attends Montessori School PreK during the day, we always did extracurricular at home.  He is more advanced and I do not think that this interferes with what he does in school. 

Kindergarten Curriculum for Spring 2012

Reading (Phonics)

• Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading (OPG) – 5x/week; main coursebook. We are at Lesson 51 right now.  He sails through the lessons.
• Explode the Code  (ETC) – 3x/week; We do it concurrently with the OPG.  I thinks it is helpful, he recognizes the words and understands their spelling too.

Supplemental reading:  Lots of books, My first I can Read books, Bob Books, Progressive phonics, Usborne Phonics Readers, Beehive Reader...

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Handwriting

• HWT K – Letters and Numbers for Me:  3x/week; G's handwriting is behind compared to other subjects, he knows all his letters, but like a boy he spends more time with his toys than sitting and writing :) 

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Spelling

• We just started All Bout Spelling Level 1 3x/week.  

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Math

 We love Singapore Math Kindergarten  4x/week.We use both the activity book and the supplemental books.  They are both helpful and help in mastering the subject.  Repetition is the key.

Besides this we always play, count in everyday life.

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Vocabulary 

We use Wordly Wise 3000 K 3x/week.The lessons are very colorful on enjoyable, G loves it.

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History

We haven't started it yet, but soon will Story Of The World. 

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Science

• We use  Sonlight's Science A - 5that we

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Art

• We use Child size Masterpieces to study several artists, somewhat following Harmony Art Mom's curriculum.  We plan incorporate Meet The Masters soon.

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Logic

• Lollipop Logic : Critical Thinking Activities –and Building Thinking Skills 2x/week.

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Writing

We started The Complete Writer: Writing with Ease   that we incorporate with our readings.  We do not follow the exact books the book recommends.  We also do Writeshop Primary A occasionally.  For G this is very good introductory to start with.  At school they do some writing too.

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 Spanish

G is in a English/Spanish immersion program at the Montessori school.  He knows a lot of Spanish words, expressions.  We plan to do some Spanish K workbooks that will be fun.

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 Music

G is attending Suzuki piano classes one on one since last fall that we will continue.  We also listen to some classical music while on the road.

Gegraphy

We started some Geography Workbooks too  Maps, Charts, Graphs level A   and Scholasti Success Workbook along with A Child's introduction to The World book.

Great Giveaway

There is a great spelling giveaway at Homeschool Crew website.  Please head over to see it.

Letter F week

This week we started to learn abut a new letter F.  Started with Montessori activities, sandpaper letter F f, match object which start with F to pictures, sound book, letter F book, Get Ready for the Code letter F activities.

Some prctical activites we did: thonging, stringing beads, funneling water, funneling solids.

Art: draw a frog from I can draw Animals from Usborne. Cutting paper.

Gross motor activites: hiking to a waterfall in a close State Park.

Week of March 15-19 Activities

We followed quite well our last week’s schedule and did more or less all the activities I planned.


Language: we learned letter M, and followed some Montessori activities: sand paper letter M m, match object to pictures, learned new words with letter M, also did some Confessions of a Homeschooler letter of the week activities, learned some rhyming words, activity words with picture match. We also did from the Get Ready for the Code the letter M section.

Sensorial: did knobbed cylinder blocks 3, pink tower and one of the extension cards, geometric solids sphere and cube, also matched shapes.

Practical: our practical activities go quite well, spooning beans, thronging pom-poms, pouring lentils, pouring water, also pouring water through funnel, funneling solids, sorting by size and color.

Math: did some math counting, number matching, picture to number matching.

Animals: we learned about monkeys since we learned letter M last week, and matched mini monkeys and apes (Monkeys and Apes) to monkey pictures.

Art: we try to draw an animal each week for the “I can draw animals” book by Usborne.

Gross motor skills: play ground, monkey bar, visited and hiked a trail at a local state park.

After all it was quite a productive week.

Artistic Pursuits Giveaway

There is a fantastic giveaway going on at Raising Olives blog.  I checked out the preliminary pages of Artistic Pursuit which look great.  She has a wonderful family and great blog too :)

Great Tropical Traditions shredded coconut Giveaway

Michelle at  Delighting in Journey   has a great giveaway of   "Tropical Traditions shredded coconut".  Head over to read about it and enter for a chance to win!

New Beginnings

It is hard to believe that January and February is over.  March first we started our new curriculum with my son.  We just finished getting over the alphabet that we started last September.  From now on we follow a  sort of Montessori Language development, sensorial, math and culture curriculum.  However, there are many extra activities that we do and are nor Montessori. 
This week we started letter R, sandpaper letter R, tracing letter R in sandbox, all sorts of object matching activities, that begin with letter R.  We also used Confessions of a Homeschooler's Letter R activities.  Learned about the Rabbit as  social studies activities.  George enjoyed the Rabbit Lapbook that I prepared for him. 
He also got a Rainforest Toob animal set.  He loves animals. 
His Handwriting got better since we started tracing lines and letters and numbers since last September thank to the different fine motor skills activities.
As for reading:  we read a lot.  The new book introduced this week is: The Velveteen Rabbit, which he adored. 


Imagination is part of our everiday life.  Quite ofted George imagines things and talks about being in the middle of a jungle and sees animals walking or jumping around him :)

We aslo do a lot of math activites, by counting, sorting, matching numbers.
I hope my blogging skills will get better soon, so I would be able to attach pictures and more graphics.