Our First Week of School 2012 *Picture Overload*

We have done some schooling off an on for the summer, mostly just play type stuff. This week we got down to business and started our new curriculum. We had a three day school week as Austin was out of school Monday and Tuesday and I am following the same Calendar as the public school.

Wednesday our theme was Who are You? We started the morning off with me wearing a funny hat. It was my I feel special hat. We talked about what makes us special and how everyone is special in their own way. Then I shared my hat and Dylan told me what makes him special. 

Thursdays morning theme was Hands-On. We looked at a hand print that I printed out and discussed the lines and finger prints on the hand. 

Fridays theme was Favorites. Dylan was allowed to bring his favorite stuffed animal to School for the day. We discussed how different people have different preferences.

He did a worksheet on things that he like, night or day, dog or cat, car or airplane. His favorites were night, dog, and airplane. 

After we discuss these theme we add the Calendar Number to the Calendar. We say what month it is. We sing our days of the week song. Add what today is, what tomorrow is, and what yesterday was. Then we do the weather and season.

We review what our key points of the week are. 

This week it is the Letter A, Number 1, Color Red, and Shape Circle. 

Then we move to the table to do our Circle Time Journal.

 Next is Discovery Time

Wednesday we painted by instruction. Thursday we made finger prints with ink pads and observed them. Friday we colored on black paper with chalk and smeared it with our fingers. 

Our next stop in the day is Geography. We are using Expedition Earth from COAH.We are doing it on a PreK level though. Keeping it very simple. 

We just introduced the globe and some coloring of the globe this week. The second pictures printable came from 1+1+1=1 Continent Kids.

Then we have Art. 

Wednesday- I am terrific hat! Thursday- Hand prints with paint. Friday-Bubble Name Decorating.

 Then it is Free Play (read books, educational toys, or sensory bin) and Lunch Time. 

After Lunch we head back to the classroom to do Alphabet time. 

Here is just a little of what we did for the Alphabet this week.

 Then we focus on our Number of the week.

Then onto Colors.

 Last part of our sit down work is Shapes.

 After all sit down work is done he is allowed to explore and play with educational toys until Austin gets home from school. 

Here are a few pictures from that part of the week.

Last but not least we had some Sensory Bin fun!

 This gives a pretty good idea of what our day is like. We start school at 9am and end at 3pm. We had a few moments on the first day where he didn't want to do what I had planned so we stepped away and came back to it after he calmed down. It seemed to help and he was ready to go from there. Thursday and Friday were great and he was ready to learn.

Linking up

Basic Learning Pack

My first Learning Pack is ready! I have been working very hard at this as I wanted something that covered a lot of the basics but didn't really have a theme. I wanted it to be something that we could use over and over again through out the school year. 

It has 50 pages plus ideas and tips for using it!

Included:

Alphabet match

Flash cards

Word cards

Numbers

Counting

Prewriting Practice

Sorting Colors

Shapes

Size Sorting

Sentence Practice

Addition

Subtraction

Missing Numbers

Count by 2's, 5's, and 10's

Plenty to use during the school year for Preschool, Pre-K, or Kindergarten! 

You can get it HERE 

It is on sale for $4.50 for 8/29-8/31 

(sale price shows on page of product)

 Returns to $6.00 September 1st! 

It will go great with my Alphabet and Number Tracing Pages!

Enjoy! 

How to Teach Series Part #5

Numbers

Teaching Numbers is mostly about repetition. We count everything in our house, how many steps we walk, how many goldfish we get as a snack, and how many cans of veggies we put away in the pantry. I love working it into our everyday life! Here are some other ways that I have found that my boys loved to do as they learn their numbers.

• Place a poster up that has the numbers plus that same number of objects like the one below.( I got it at Dollar Tree last August)

• Play Number Games like below:

1. Number Dash- Draw Numbers on the sidewalk with sidewalk chalk (if you have 2 kids put 2 sets of numbers) be sure they arent in order just place them all over. Call a number and have them jump, hop, skip, run to that number. This is also a great activity for listening to direction.
2. Number Mats- Place Numbers around the room and have them name the numbers as they stand on them. When we do this sometimes we also play music and when the music stops. They stop on a number and they have to yell it out! # 1- 10 number mats and #11-20 number mats
3. Hopscotch- Have them throw the rock or bean bag on the square and where it lands they have to name the number.

• Pom Pom Numbers- This is a great activity from 1+1+1=1. Its great for 1:1 correspondence.  If you don't have pom poms you could use stickers for this.

• When teaching how to write Numbers I have a great set of Tracing Sheets. They have the dots on them for easy counting that can be worked in with the tracing! # 1- 10 and # 11- 20 Printables.

• Another Activity we will be using this summer for cooling off but also some learning fun.  I will hide 20 objects in a bowl of water. Then the boys will have to use a hammer on the ice to bust out the objects. As the get the objects out we will count them.

If you have any other fun Number learning activities feel free to leave a link in the comments!

Number's 11 - 20 Tracing Papers

Can now be bought in a set with numbers 1-20 HERE

This set contains number 11-20 tracing papers only! 

If you are looking for Numbers 1-10 you can find them HERE

Enjoy!

Number Mats 11-20

I was asked if I had any printables that were for numbers 11- 20. So I had been meaning to get these done! Here is the 2nd set of my number mats that cover 11-20.

(click image to download)

This set only has 5 pages as I love to conserve paper in any way I can. So just print them and cut in half.

If you are looking for Numbers 1-10 Number Mats you can find them HERE

Enjoy!

Number Mats 1- 10

I have in the past downloaded Number Mats from other sites that were for specific themes. But as I get more and more into the homeschooling stuff I am to the point where I try to save as much ink as possible. So I try to make my printables reusable and for no certain themes. 

Austin is working on jumping so I figured I would incorporate the numbers in and also make it so my number mats were more for an every day theme. With these mats I will call out a number and he will have to jump to it. I will also say things like "crawl to the number 9", "walk slowly to number 2". Different things to keep him thinking and the game fun!

Here is a set of Number Mats 1-10 

(image will take you to download)
The set is only 5 pages as I was conserving paper as well! You just cut them in half on the line!

 Set 11-20 will be coming soon! 

These would also work great as a reference tool for hanging on the wall! 


Enjoy!!

Number's 1-10 Tracing Papers

Can now be bought in a set with numbers 1-20 HERE

This set contains numbers 1- 10.
I plan to laminate them so my boys can reuse them!

Set 11- 20 will be coming soon!

Enjoy!

Letter Xx Preschool

(Austin is 48 months)

Our key points for the week were, Letter Xx, # 7, sight words: you, little, Color pink, Shape Diamond, and we did our Add on of the Senses to our human body unit from the week before.

We started the week off by doing a Letter X Craft. We made an Xray out of the letter X.

He colored his RRSP Bible Verse coloring sheet.


He did his tracing RRSP Letter X worksheets.


He did a Letter X Do A Dot Sheet! He made sure to fill every space of white in the X with color! I thought that was interesting. It turned out kinda looking like a abstract painting!


We did a 1:1 correspondence activity by putting the pieces of the xylophone that matched the number. I got this activity here: http://confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com/2010/03/prek-letter-x.html

He did his first color by number activity! He did a great job! We tried this before last year and he got to frustrated so we stopped! Hes definitely maturing this year! http://confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com/2010/03/prek-letter-x.html


He colored his Five Senses Mini Book.


Dylan helped him with cutting and taping together his RRSP Bible Verse this week! He was having a bad day at this point and was not interested in being involved in cutting. He struggles with it so im not pushing just encouraging as he will let me and figure hell pick it up eventually.


He did his RRSP Shape Matching Activity.


At the end of the week we did some finger painting. We started out with just pink but he requested blue and found out that they make purple! Note to self: Do not turn my back for one second next time as he will then become a purple monster! I had to change Dylan and in the 2 seconds I was gone decided to paint his face, his arms and legs. I came back to a nice surprise. He said he wanted to be a purple monster.

He enjoyed our books for the week.

After school one day he wanted to play with our lacing beads when Dylan was done so I got them for him and he sat for 30 to 45 minutes just lacing them.


Last week I decided it was time to make a Helpers sheet as they constantly bicker over who does what and I was so tired of hearing it! So to solve the problem I made up a sheet that has our Letter Tree, Calendar, Weather Chart, And our Days of the year coloring sheet on it. So each week I will rotate names and then theres no arguing, hopefully.


Interested in the Raising Rock Stars Preschool Activities you can check them out HERE.
Also she has a great memberships only area that has Powerpoints that go along with the lessons that my boys LOVE! Check out the info on the Members Only HERE.

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