Summer of Success- week 5

July8th-12th

How was every one's 4th of July? It's been a very busy weekend with celebrations and family in town!

Here is a break down of week ahead
Theme:Dinosaurs
Scripture:Deuteronomy 31:6
"Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee."
Nursery Rhyme:Teddy Bear,Teddy Bear
Number:5
Skills to work on daily-reading,writing,math

Monday: 5 Little Dinosaurs
Tuesday:play at the park
Wednesday:Teddy bear picnic
Thursday:Dinosaur train
Friday:prepare for next weeks lesson
Saturday:

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 was your favorite activity for the fourth of July?
Name 3 things you learned at patriot camp
If you could be a character in a book who would you be?why?
What do you want to know about your Grandparents? ......

Hope you all have a happy and successful Summer!

Sweet land of Liberty

Before my day gets any crazier I want to get my post up! This week has been all about the fourth of July and America.
Scripture:D&C 98:5
 And that law of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me.
We did the pledge of Allegiance today.The baby liked watching the flag.

We read the book Sweet Land of Liberty by Callista Gingrich. I decided to do some yoga with the story.It is about an elephant who wanted to know how America came to be.So Ellis the elephant goes to the library and starts reading books about the pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving.The kids put their feathers on and ate a pretend feast.

We represented the Boston tea party with the boat pose and then we pretended to throw tea overboard.

The kids pretended to sign the Declaration of Independence. They wrote their names in the air.It was a good time to ask my Preschooler, no longer a Toddler what his name started with.We wrote an R in the air.We also did the eagle pose.

George Washington fought with many men and woman for our country. We did warrior 1 and 2.The second warrior honored in this book was Abraham Lincoln.

Next we were pioneers with wagons.We made wheelbarrows by having one kid lie on his tummy while the other kid grabs their feet.Then they walk around the room on their hands.

The book talked about living our dreams.Several inventors were mentioned including the Wright Brothers. So we all flew around the room.

Next we pretended to be the Statue of Liberty.

They made great flags!

The kids learned about the race to the moon.So they rocketed to the moon, 3 ,2 ,1 blast off from child's pose.

I found this great fireworks breath to end with.The kids had fun with this one!

Craft:Firework shirts.What you need:
paint,shirts,and pipe cleaners you can see how to make the fireworks with the pipe cleaners here

3 months and up:I wanted to make the baby something so I cut red strips from felt and used the white stars I cut from yesterday. Last I cut a blue rectangle. I pit it all on white felt.I am no Betty Ross but I like our flag and my Preschooler really loved making things from the felt.He kept calling me over to see his creations.We also recited the Nursery Rhyme. We do this all week.Repetition is key!

Color:red and blue
Shape:rectangle
Number:13.Now that my Preschooler is more comfortable with his numbers 1-10.We tried to count to 13,because of the 13 colonies.

HAPPY FOURTH EVERYONE!!!

Why the fourth of July?

Independence is something we all want and look for and want.Even a 2 year old when they declare "i do it" knows he wants things his own way.

In the scriptures we read in Doctrine and Covenants 98:5
" And that law of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me."

We looked up what freedom means and talked about the 13 colonies and the declaration of Independence.

We watched The first July 4th to help the kids get an idea how it all started.

We talked about who wrote it?Thomas Jefferson
My daughter when she heard me say Thomas shouted Monson! Not the prophet today silly girl.I am glad she knows who he is though,and soooo cute.When she was younger she would say "spider man" instead of amen.

After that tangent hee hee I asked who the first president was.George Washington. Would you rather have a King or a President?This question brought up a very interesting conversation.We pretended to sign the declaration. Here the kids are with a copy of the declaration of Independence.

For the baby and the Tot we did the color white and star for a shape.I cut some stars out of white felt.It is good fine motor practice. We are still doing tummy time and books.The Nursery Rhyme is Fourth day of July by Jean Warren to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle little Star.

Today is special, do you know why?

It's the 4th day of July.

See the flags passing by.

See the fireworks in the sky.

It's a special celebration.

It's the birthday of our nation.

Jean Warren

Summer of Success- week 4

July1rst-5th

Well July is almost here!We had a rough time this week with my toddler's reaction to Amoxicilin.He is doing a lot better now! We are going to stomp away from dinosaur to learn more about how America came to be!We will be doing some fun crafts and get to see dessert animals at the library.

Here is a break down of week
Theme:America
Scripture:Doctrine and Covenants 98:5
" And that law of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me."
Nursery Rhyme:Fourth Day of July by Jean Warren
Number:4
Colors:red,white and blue
Shape:star and rectangles
Skills to work on daily-reading,writing,math

Monday: Declaration of Independence/ visit library
Tuesday:Liberty bell, firework activities,indoor picnic
Wednesday:Statue if liberty/library program
Thursday:4th of July BBQ
Friday:prepare for next weeks lesson
Saturday:

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:
If you could be a character in a book who would you be?why?
Which site important to the founding of America would you want ti see?why?
What do you want to know about your Grandparents? ......
What was your favorite activity this week?

Hope you all have a happy and successful Summer!

I'm bringing home a baby Dinosaur

Luke 6:31 "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
Today we are talking about Being kind.My Mom's rule growing up was never hurt anyone on the inside or the outside.
Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes is a great story on being kind.We are all different! Being different makes us special and unique.

My 8 year old was assigned setting,plot,characters and climax.Here is a great website to practice plots and setting
For my 6 year old we talked about title,author,beginning,middle and end.For my Tot we talked about his favorite part of the book.

We got these cute wooden animals from our Zoo trip.I grabbed some ham,apple and leaves ans asked the kids to put the animals by what they would eat.
Vocabulary:
Carnivorous
Herbivore
Omnivorous

The ham was too big of a temptation for our Prehistoric Pooch ,T-bone!

I'm bringing home my baby dinosaur 

Won't my mommy hide behind the door 

I'm bringing home my baby dinosaur 

Ooh eee it stepped on me!

For the baby we have been doing the Bumble bee song.There is a version @dltk There is an extra verse(above) which leads us into our next unit of study........Dinosaurs!

Believe in yourself and some monkeying around with some yoga

Our scripture: Mark 5:36 " Be not afraid,only believe"
This week I found this devotional by Gordon B Hinkly about this scripture.He quoted the following passage

1. Believe in yourself. Believe in your capacity to do great and good things. Believe that no mountain is too high that you cannot climb it. Believe that no storm is too great that you cannot weather it. You are not destined to be a scrub. You are a child of God, of infinite capacity.

Believe that you can do it, whatever it is that you set your heart on. Opportunities will unfold and open before you. The skies will clear when they have been dark with portent.

Commander William Robert Anderson, the man who took the submarine Nautilus under the North Pole, carried in his wallet a card which read: "I believe I am always divinely guided. I believe I will always take the right road. I believe God will always make a way where there is no way." (Quoted in Look , 20 April 1971, p. 48).

May the blessings of heaven rest upon you, my dear young friends, as you step into the future.

Letters Y and Z

Writing prompt -What can you do for someone in your family to make them feel good about and believe in themselves.

Y is for Yoga.
I took the book Animals don't so I won't by David G. Derrick, Jr. I used the animals in it as poses for our yoga.It is a cute book about a boy who doesn't want to do what his Mom asks.I don't know any kids who would pull that ha ha.(note the sarcasm)Yeah all kids want to be independent and do what they want.The author also educates the reader on the different animals.It is really clever and fun!

He turns into a beetle because he doesn't want to clean his room.Here the kids are doing dead bug pose.

He didn't want to eat his dinner so he turned into a penguin. Here the kids are waddling like penguins.

He turned into a leopard because he didn't want to take a bath.Relax in cat pose.

He didn't want to use soap for his bath so he turned into a hippo.

He didn't want to put pajamas on because he was a bear.Here is the ASL sign for bear.

He couldn't brush his teeth because he was a crocodile.

He didn't wash his face because he was a shark.

He went limp in his Mom's arm because he was a slug.Join the kids in forward fold.

He didn't want to get in his bed because he was a Monkey.Here are the kids monkeying around.

Good night my wild child.To end we rested in Shavasna or resting pose and I had them imagine that they were an animal.Where were they?What were they doing?eating?playing?sleeping?Was it warm or cold?What was around them?Trees?water?dirt? Then after a few minutes I told them to imagine they were going to sleep and that all was calm and peaceful and they should feel safe and happy.

Good night my Zoo!Z is for Zoo

Summer of Success week 3

June 24th-28th
I can't believe it is almost July! Last week was sooo busy.We got to go to the Zoo.This week we are finishing Zoo animals and moving onto Dinosaurs!

Here is a break down of week
Theme:Dinosaurs
Scripture:Mark 5:36"Be not afraid,only believe"
Nursery Rhyme:Baby Bumblebee
Number:3
Skills to work on daily-reading,writing,math

Monday: finish Zoo animals and letters y and z
Tuesday:Eric Carle the author's Birthday /activities for Brown Bear Brown Bear what do you see?
Wednesday:Dinosaurs
Thursday:free day after school and family contributions
Friday:Readathon
Saturday: hike

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 was your favorite activity at the Zoo?......
How can you be nice to someone in your family?
Tell me about your favorite book......
What do you want to know about your Grandparents? ......

Hope you all have a happy and successful Summer!

Happy International picnic day!

Writing prompt:What would you pack for your picnic and why?

Math:I drew a giraffe and had the kids roll 2 dice.Then add those numbers together.Then I had my Kindergartner draw that many circles in the giraffe.For my Tot he practiced drawing his circles on his own giraffe.You could also have the kids make spots out of play d'oh.For my 8 year old we had him roll the dice and add,but then he would do it again. So if he rolled a 2 and a 4 it would equal 6.Then he would take the 6 and the sum of his second roll and add them together. So you have 4+2=6 and 4+4=8.Now take the 6 and 8 and add them.You would get 14 then add 2 more numbers and add that sum to the 14 and so on.So the number should keep getting bigger.

We also did some research on the giraffe.The baby is called a calf.It eats leaves.It lives in Africa.It defends itself by a strong kick with it's front feet.The giraffe is the tallest land animal.

2 more days till the Zoo!Lately I feel like I am living in a Zoo!

Letters of the week X,Y and Z

X marks the spot where the treasure is.I don't mean Gold and Silver but spiritual. In the scripture Mathew 6:20 it talks about laying up for yourselves treasures in heaven. There is a story of a girl named Christina who lived in Denmark. She saved coins that her Father shared with her from taking their sheep to have their wool sheered off.She didn't know why she was saving them until she met missionaries and traveled to America. She had just enough to join the Saints going to Salt Lake City.

Nursery Rhyme: The Zoo
At does do we saw a bear,he had long dark fuzzy hair.We saw a lion cage he was in an awful rage.We saw the big long necked giraffe,and the silly monkeys made us laugh.But my favorite animal is the elephant- how about you?

We did a little puppet show with finger puppets and made the animal sounds. The kids had fun doing that for the baby.

Letter of the week:Letter X
The kids hid treasures. My oldest even cut out and made coins.He also named the rooms like the jungle of death and skull island.The maps were simple with lines showing where to go and and X where the treasure was.

For my 2nd grader:
I found some down loadable summer packets.I took some of the sentences and changed some.Then my 8 year old would fix the sentences, whether it needed to be a capital, misspelled word or punctuation.Then I wrote up a word problem where he had to figure out how much it cost for 2 adults to go to the Zoo.The decimal point through him off.Both of my oldest wrote about their favorite activity for the week.

For my Kindergartner:
We worked on counting by 2's.She wrote her X.We practiced b and d since she keeps getting them confused. We did some addition practice as well.

For my Tot he practiced drawing diagonal lines and we read books.

Speaking of books we are reading a lot our book worm is getting long.We put a tally mark on one's previously read so we can find out our favorite!

We are counting down to Friday when we go to the Zoo.

For bedtime we had the kids get into their pj's and we made cookies and had them with milk.If you give your kid's milk and cookies they ate going to want to read If you give a Mouse a Cookie.

2 by 2 and ice play too!

Noah gathered the animals 2 by 2 a male and female. The kids understood that they needed both Mom and Dad to have babies.We pretended to be like Noah and count by 2's.My Kinder struggles there.For my 2 year old we practiced 1-10.

We started off this morning writing our favorite zoo animals.My toddler drew his favorite while my 6 and 8 year old scribbled away.For my Kindergartner I looked for spelling and letter formation. She picked a cheetah and got all the sounds especially the ch blend! She wrote cHeetu.Her c was backwards so we practiced c and her lower case h.

For my 2nd grader I had him practice telling the time.He wrote what time it was when he was done with writing.Then what it would be in 15 minutes,and then an hour.

Next I had him pick a 3 digit number.
1.write it out
2.draw it with cubes
3.add 3
 4.add 35
5.subtract 5
6.subtract 17
7.what are next 3 even numbers
 8.what are the next 3 odd numbers.
I got this idea here

This week we are working on picking up after we play.Our rule is one thing out at a time.We are also gathering all the Lego's,Barbie stuff and Squinkies I have found everywhere from people getting small stuff down and not monitoring the kids,when I was recovering from my C-section.I sigh...

Here is our bookworm.We add a section of him each time read a book.

Do you do quiet time? Every kid here does.The. can read,write,draw.Play with certain toys quietly.My oldest loves to draw but then there is paper EVERYWHERE!

Good mess?Yes? No?

It has been really hot here, so 24 hours before I wanted to do the activity for water week, I filled a container with water and little things and froze it.The kids had a blast! They smashed it and tasted the ice.We tried to get the baby to touch the ice but he wouldn't do it.He will stick with his nursery rhymes and books, thank you.I'm not sure where this idea originated so if you know let me give credit where it is due.

Letter of the week W and Zoo much fun!

First we started out with the story of Noah's Ark.We talked about the flood and how he brought the animals on the arc 2 by 2.We also talked about how he had to build it himself instead of the Lord just making an arc of here in our lives we have tests and trials and things that are hard.He can't make it easy for us otherwise we wouldn't learn.

We also talked about the letter of the week W.What starts with W:
wow ,what, warthog ,wet ,water and wound. I had my Kinder practice writing the letter W and the sound.

For the baby we are doing the nursery rhyme,What are little boys made of?
 Frogs and snails and puppy dog tails that's what little boys are made of.We read the book Touch and feel on the farm and talked about animal's sounds and how a frog is bumpy and a dog is soft.Here are pictures from the book some other baby stuff I had.

Theme:Zoo

We watched the Zoo song

We read a book The Underpants Zoo.What animals are in the zoo? I had the kids right down animals from A to Z to see how many they could think of.I had my Kindergartner sound out the words and then I corrected her later.It's good way to practice writing her letters and for me to know what she needs to practice with.

She got bored with the activity, but my 8 year old love to find the animals especially when we got to the hard ones like q,x and y.For my toddler we had him draw the animals and talk about the letters they started with.

Getting back to nature:What is inside a dandelion?The kids asked
There is white milk inside that is smelly and tastes bitter.They made soup out of water and weeds and grass.

We watched a Time lapse of dandelion.The kids thought this was pretty cool.They were surprised that it could be used as medicine.

We also played some sponge tag.You get the sponge wet and toss!Followed by a light saber fight on the trampoline.Another use for pool noodles!