Summer of Success-Week 1

June 10-14th

At the end of the year I always ask my kids their favorite things.I trace their hand and have them draw a self portrait.

We are starting our book logs.Each week we will do a special activity for reading. This week we are making a book worm.You start with his head and each time you read a book you add a circle to his body.They will also tally their minutes.We will make reading boxes for them to put books they want to read.Book logs can be put on back of box.

Book box broken down by age
5 and up can decorate,write his/her name on boxes
3-5 yrs can decorate with help.Try to get them to recognize the first letter of name
0-2 Have older kids pick book for the week.They could even read to baby

Here is a break down of week
Theme:Zoo
Scripture:Noah's ark
Nursery Rhyme:What little boys are made of
 Letter of the week W-water week where we will do various activities
Skills to work on daily-reading,writing,math

Monday: Dairy day and activities /make book box
Tuesday:library for books on baby Zoo animals
Wednesday:picnic
Thursday:free day after school and family contributions
Friday:Flag day&Fathers day craft
Sunday:Father's Day

Schedule
Wake up and do family contributions .They earn points and prizes.
9-10 1 hr of schooling-lesson,worksheets, reading,activities for theme or unit
11-12 outside /do things on bucket list
12-2 lunch and quiet time
2-3 snack &outside time
4-5 dinner prep,inside activities, dinner clean up
5-7free time and bedroom clean up
7-8 quiet time
8 in bed can read do things quietly until fall asleep
This is a very flexible schedule and I know there will be late nights :)

For the one hour of schooling is broken down by age as follows:
8 and up-daily tally of minutes read.add them to next days tally for math.fix misspelled sentences,word of the week found in dictionary. There will be words from reading too.After reading a book write character, plot,setting,climax and main ideas. Reading and picking an animal or whatever the interest.Prepare a report.This report will be broken down as data is collected and be done at child's pace.Weekly grocery list written and plan one meal.Counting practice and practice telling the time may also be done.An occasional spelling test might be given.Each subject will take 15 min.

5-7 year old will work on sight words,word families.Writing ideas and punctuation. They can write words for grocery list and identity what it starts with. Basic addition and subtraction will also be done.Counting by 2's and 5's and 10's.

2-4 letter,number,shape and color of the day.It is basically repetition at this point and lots of play.For the grocery list they can associate pictures with their corresponding words. They can also work on counting 1-10.

3 months-24 months
The more reading and singing the better! We earn nursery rhymes and play,explore.The older babies/toddlers may be able to count from 1-3.

Writing prompts for the week:
What I would like to do this summer is.....
My favorite milk treat is.......why...?
At my picnic we ate....or we saw...
I like picnics because. ....
What I love about my dad is

Hope you all have a happy and successful Summer!

Letter of the week V-6 ways for kids to make a video and Volcano

V is for Volcano.This week we did some volcano fun.
Our first experiment we took a tray, some baking soda,food coloring and vinegar.
I put the food coloring on the baking soda and the kids used droppers for some colorful fizzy fun.It is a variation on what was done here

The second time I did one color at a time so it wouldn't turn a dark color,but there would be more pretty color mixing.

Our next experiment I threw all good table manners out the window.You take milk,red food coloring and a straw.Then let the kids blow bubbles.

We listened to the volcano song.It is really cute.It has good vocabulary words for the older kids:

Volcanoes

Eruption

Lava

Magma 

Equilibrium

We also did V for Videos.The kids chose to do a 1.puppet show behind a white sheet.You could do anything though.A few more ideas would be to 2.have them teach something,3.do a cooking show,4.dance or 5.music video or 6.just be silly!

My kids like most have a hard time with controlling their tempers.They are like little volcanoes.When they get upset they over react at times and erupt with a display more terrifying than the volcano videos we watch.We talked about controlling ourselves and ways to calm down.

While I was folding laundry we pretended to be volcanoes and erupt!

Letter of the week U

We started our morning off with the pledge of allegiance. My 8 and 6 year old know it but not

my Tot.We talked about what it meant to be Under God.U for under.U for united. I opened an umbrella, which I know you are not supposed to do in the house,but I had the kids sit under it.We imagined it was God's love and it is always there!

U for umbrella
We practiced up,under,next to,behind and in front.The kids moved the flag to the  corresponding place.

We colored on paper under the table.

They ate snacks under the table too!

The baby got to be under the umbrella. We hung toys and a mirror for him to play with.At almost four months he loves to bat at things and kick.Mirrors are also something that fascinate babies.We are still doing tummy time songs and books.
Our Nursery Rhyme this week :
Rain Rain go away
Come again some other day
Little baby wants to play

We talked about underground animals like earthworm, badger, gophers and snakes. My Kinder asked what worms ate so we finished with that and lunch under the umbrella. Boy I am going to have a lot of bad luck!!!

We are doing letters U and V together.We have been fighting a bad cold so hopefully tomorrow will be the letter V with a video and some volcano fun! 3 more days and school is out! We will keep playing and learning with our Summer of Success.I should have the first weeks plan up Friday but it is a busy weekend so it might be Monday.

Review letters K-T

Faith is like a little seed.....                                      
We talked about faith and hope as we read Hebrews11:1.Afterwards we did the activity,or you could say it's a finger play,found here

This week is review week for us.We are going over K-T.We start this off by walking on letters with music.When the music stops they say what letter they are on and the sound.My 2 year old recognized a few!My Kindergartner practiced writing her letters.

We focused on letter K-M.As we read books they tried to find those letters.We read blue train,green train and Fire Truck by Peter Sis.These books were the favorite from our Transportation theme last week.We actually read for over an hour.

We noticed a lot of words ending in ck:

Here is what we foundTruck,clickety-clack,track,back, sack,stack,thick,and trick.

Letter T-Transporttion and Wright Bros Patent of the airplane

Today we celebrated the Wright Brothers patent of the airplane.So we went to Hill Air force Museum and had a blast! We even made and flew paper airplanes.Who can go the farthest?

The kids got to do a lot of hands-on activities.Here they are flying a plane with a joy stick .The plane was suspended in the air and fans were blowing on it.They could steer it.On the wing is the alleron Controls the roll.The flaps increase lift or the drag.

They had a block area to play in.Here the kids are building a runway for the airplane.

They even got to be pilots and sit in a cockpit.

Endangered Species day and the letter T

Scripture D&C 3:2
“For God doth not walk in crooked paths, neither doth he turn to the right hand nor to the left, neither doth he vary from that which he hath said, therefore his paths are straight, and his course is one eternal round.”

I found a talk by The straight and Narrow Way by Joseph B Wirthlin where he starts out with a story he says:
While traveling along a mountainous road one evening through a driving rainstorm punctuated with frequent claps of thunder and flashes of lightning, Sister Wirthlin and I could barely see the road, either in front of us or to the right and the left. I watched the white lines on that road more intently than ever before. Staying within the lines kept us from going onto the shoulder and into the deep canyon on one side and helped us avoid a head-on collision on the other. To wander over either line could have been very dangerous. Then I thought, “Would a right-thinking person deviate to the left or the right of a traffic lane if he knew the result would be fatal? If he valued his mortal life, certainly he would stay between these lines.”

That experience traveling on this mountain road is so like life. If we stay within the lines that God has marked, he will protect us, and we can arrive safely at our destination.

The kids and I talked about what Jesus meant.He is not talking about a real road but the path we choose in life. He will forgive our mistakes or our detours and he will make the way back to him straight .This he will do if we repent and ask no matter how crooked and wrong our choices.

Next I drew 2 paths,a straight one and a zig zag.I asked which would get them to their destination.Here are the kids trying to figure it out.They decided it was the straight path.Good choice!

We used the box the babies high chair came in. We made ramps and had so much fun.

We are talking about Transportation this week.
Letter:T
shape:circle
Number:4
What better way to study than to drive around and see the cars,buses,trucks,strollers and bikes.We talked about colors and where they were going.
Today is Endangered Species Day.We learned about tigers and the kids made a cage for the pretend train to take the tiger to the zoo.
We sang a train song

For baby
 Nursery Rhymes: This little piggy
Song:The wheels on the bus

The Sun Moon and Stars lesson plan

How amazing are the stars that make up the sky.We have been talking about the stars and planets.I poked some holes in paper to look like the constellations.I shone a flashlight through it.We learned about the myths behind big dipper and Orion
Next I had the kids make up their own constellation with a story.My daughter came up with Princess Penelope looking for her shoes she looked and looked but could never find them.She asked the Sun but he could not help.She asked the moon he lifted her up and asked the stars to help.She is still looking to this day.It is another chance for my Kindergartner to practice her writing.

I also want to share this cute Tale of the Sun and moon.We also talked about the Moon phases.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoWFJ690U6E&feature=youtube_gdata_player

The kids enjoyed this clip about Super Sun.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0x7DKgBl1Cc&feature=youtube_gdata_player
We did our nursery Rhyme and I named a part of the baby like his nose and had a star I made out of felt touch his nose.We continued naming different body parts.I recieved many coos and smiles.It is a good sensory activity and greet for language development.For my Second grader I made a list of Vocabulary words like orbit,gravity,phases,constellation.
We also did some fun finger plays and songs This is good for fine and gross motor development.

Letter of the week S-Solar system

S is for Solar system. It is made of 9 planets, galaxy and billions of stars.There is a cute song on You Tube about each planet.
The kids pretended to be planets orbiting around Sun.I played music and if I stopped it they would freeze.
They pretended they were stars.

We started our new Nursery Rhyme Star bright Star light.
How was it formed?What better way to know then to look to the scriptures about the creation.In Genesis chapter 1,it states that on the 4th day he created the moon and the stars. I had the kids draw pictures of each of the days.

I printed a coloring sheet from coloring castle.Then we cut the pictures out and played pin the planet by the sun,like pin the tail on the donkey.

Next we did sight words and making a sentence with them.I got the idea from a picture I saw for a pack on 1plus1plus1equals1.There are great preschool packs there for a variety of themes.

We mostly talked about Mercury,Venus,and Earth.Tomorrow we work with constellations,Sun,Moon,and Mars.We are going to have a very fun activity with the baby!

How are rocks formed?

How are rocks formed?We watched a video and then talked about how and the rock cycle.The kids thought the volcano part of it was pretty cool.
http://www.ducksters.com/science/rocks.php
https://www.youtube.com
Build rock formations sculptures and all you need are rocks.We went on a walk to collect rocks.I then hot glued the rocks however the kids wanted me to.We added beads for fun!The kids couldn't stop so we did this the rest of the day.

Hope you had fun with us this week!

We will rocket into the letter S for Space next week
10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 blast off!