Real School

This post wouldn't let me publish a few days ago. Here it is now.

Our America Moment today was Grammy's idea: throw bean bags at the US map and try to hit states we've learned. Then there was a little bean bag throwing free-for-all and some random juggling practice.

For our lesson today, we did a math lesson. I made a chart of the numbers 1 to 100. I asked the girls if they could see any patterns and then backed up to see if they knew what a pattern was. Amy totally did. She said it was like square, diamond, square, diamond. (I don't know how she knew that.)

When I asked for patterns about the last columns (the multiples of 10), Amy noticed that the top row was the kid numbers, and the second row, in the tens column (the number 20) started the grown up numbers. I realized she meant the ages where you become a grown up.

Then I had Amy count by 10s, pointing to the numbers. She totally could. Noel could fairly well too, although she said one-dy for 10 and five-dy for 50. She mixed up a few but surprised me at how many she knew. Then they were ready to be done. Amy wanted to draw her own patterns, and Noel wanted to practice writing her upper-case E. Now they are asking me to come teach them things like it is real school. (What do they think this is?) Amy said, "Teach us stuff like we're at real school and you're the real teacher and you teach us real things." :)

OK, off I go to teach them REAL stuff.

Amy's activity was to write the names of the states we've learned on the white board, copying from the map. I decided to also practice drawing the outlines of the states. She switched to drawing the state and writing the name in it.

Noel's activity was pretend. We played school. She was the teacher and I the student. The first day she taught me practicing writing capital Es. The next day, we drew pictures of toys. Amy became my mom and would take me to the bus and back. One night she fell asleep at the sewing machine. The next day when I came home from school, she gave me the apron she made me. Then Noel came to our house. It was my birthday party. We had cake and blowing out candles.

We now have a closing class in our closing routine. For closing class we played a new game called Green Eggs and Ham. Amy got it from knocking from Grammy. I won. Then Amy. Then we hung in there til Noel was done.

For our closing routine book we read One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish.

Fun day of REAL school!

Bean Bags, Music Reading, Lots of Whiteboard Play

This morning Grammy and Amy and Noel spent time learning to read and write. It's hard to get them to stop so much fun learning to actually have school. :)

I'm not feeling too well today but am trying to have school anyway. It seems that not feeling too well is a bit of a theme right now.

For our America Moment today we threw bean bags at the map again and talked about the states we hit - just a little. That's a fun one.

My quick note about Introduce Class -
Introduce:
staff - write the word and draw
treble cleff - write the word and draw
lines of the treble cleff

After that, the girls kept out the whiteboards. Amy practiced drawing more states. Then Noel suggested they play school with her as teacher. They were very cute playing. Now they are still playing pretend and also just doing their own things on the whiteboard while I rest. I'll get up again for closing routine.

Amy spent some time listening to a power tale tape and reading along - she's obsessed with those - while Noel and I worked on shapes.

We read a chapter of Sideways Stories from Wayside School.

Noel closed school with her prayer.

Then Amy whined and complained about how boring school was and how she was supposed to be learning and all Grammy and I do is help them play. WHAT on earth was she talking about? I don't really know what she wanted because she was talking to me calmly.

But until then, I thought it was a fun day.

Grammy School!

Due to not feeling too well Tuesday and then taking it easy for a few days, my mom has taken over school for this week. Awesome!

Tuesday we had none.

Yesterday my mom and the girls just couldn't stop coming up with activities. We didn't even know how to fit them in to our school framework. (That's really a lovely problem.)

My mom taught them part of a song she made up - putting the preamble of the Constitution to music, taught them where a few of the states are, and hung up our US map. (I wanted to add America Moment to our opening routine this year. So far, that's going well.)

They read some books together, listened to power tales on my mom's new tape player, cut with scissors and swam in the backyard pool. Great school day!

First Week of School

Highlights of the first week of school  included play doh, art,  tea parties every day, and setting up our school for this year. We created this new chart to keep track of what we do each day and to do the date and weather each day. We also had Joy School at our house this week, so I've been pretty tried. One of the days of school we just went shopping for supplies as well. It's fun to have Grammy living with us. It feels like school time (aka fun activities) all the time.

Great Fun School Day

Mom Class today was turning Amy's pants into shorts. They had holes in the knees, and Amy has been asking for more shorts because it's spring.

Amy's activity was riding bikes. No surprise there. We had fun. I even rode mine because Eliza was asleep (and still is after like 5 1/2 hours. Whoa.)

Noel chose sprinkler play for her activity. Friends joined us, and Noel bossed them all around about who could do what when. It was fun. She insisted that I wear my swimming suit, not just play in the sprinkler in my clothes.

Intermixed there was some friend time and some lunch time. I'm glad we started early. We have friends coming over soon, and we wanted to be sure we'd be done in time. It was really a fun school day.

Back in the Saddle

No school last week. Matt and I had a retreat that we were preparing for and then attending.

Monday we did quick school before a birthday party so no opening or closing routine.

Yesterday I taught Joy School so we had no home school.

Today we were back in business. For Mom Class, we had a reading lesson that only got halfway through before kids were too wiggly.

Noel chose art kit. We drew pictures and painted.

Amy chose "pen and book". There's an electronic pen thing you can use to read these special books. You hover over words, and the pen reads them. Amy therefore also got a lesson in changing batteries. She did the whole thing herself, including unscrewing the plate thing that covers them. Awesome!

This is not related to school, but I just want to mention that Amy taught herself to ride a two wheeled bike yesterday. She just started pedaling instead of using her feet. It was awesome! She was so proud, and so were we. We did very little helping her in the last few weeks. She just built up her confidence. Now it's all she wants to do.

Successful School with Friends!

(For the sake of the daily record, Wednesday was the day we had no school this week. I was weeding for many hours. Yesterday we transplanted berry plants from our neighbors and play battledome for school. Lots of friend time too.)

Today we had Aubrey and Grace over so I could babysit. They joined us for school, and it was a huge success. They were enthusiastic and enjoyed themselves.

For Mom class, I practiced the lesson I'm going to teach when I sub in Sunbeams this Sunday. We talked about the Sabbath Day and acted out the creation and appropriate Sabbath activities. The girls were great and fun at this.

Grace chose Duck, Duck, Goose.

Aubrey chose Dead Man, Dead Man, Come Alive.

Noel chose snack time - fruit snacks.

Amy chose ride bikes which turned into ride bikes/ play with balls/ blow bubbles.

I read a story that only Grace and Noel were interested in.

Then Mike came and got his girls. So much fun.