Its week 2 and we have explored the seas with Christopher Columbus, learned about how Jesus got his name and learned the difference between common and proper nouns. We started science this week and learned how to complete our science cards with the 1. Question - What I Did 2. Experiment - What Happened 3. Conclusion - What I Learned. We know that air is extremely interesting and can do some amazing things! And we enjoyed reading first hand stories about what it was like to sail with Columbus to the new world.
As usual, our mornings started this week with group time. Brooklee likes to stand in front of the tv and pretend like she is one of the kids on stage leading the rest of the group. She gets this from church but its funny to watch as the other two usually join her at the front leaving no audience for her to lead. I mentioned in my last post that Sadie Quinn does the Pledge of Allegiance with us every morning, but she also enjoys doing the motions to the Lord's Prayer song, too. I've yet to capture what is sure to be a priceless video of her dancing!
One of the many benefits of homeschool - you can do your work in your desk, at the table, on the floor......pretty much any place you feel comfortable. When you get bored with one spot, move along to another.
As we worked on our Language Arts this week, we had the opportunity to incorporate our lessons in history into our common noun/proper noun practice. We used Christopher Columbus and the names of his ships to talk about proper nouns and the word "ship" to discuss the difference.
Last week Brooklee did copywork from the Spelling You See book but she wasn't required to work on spelling more extensively than just writing the entire paragraph. This week I picked out some specific words for her to work on. There are a few that are review that I want to be sure she remembers, but a few that are new and difficult because they aren't spelled the way they sound (ie country) or because we've learned the homophones for those words already.
This week's science project involved making a boat and exploring how wind and air play a role in moving the boat. Brooklee was able to complete the index card with our 3 questions - 1. Question - What I Did 2. Experiment - What Happened 3. Conclusion - What I Learned. I wrote it down for Kellan on his card and had them answer the three questions aloud. We even filmed them giving me a summary of our experiment but thanks to an iPhone that is currently holding too many photos and videos, the video wouldn't save to my phone. It was good practice though.
There were several books and videos we used in our studies this week. The kids were excited for the opportunity to include Magic School Bus (Goes on Air) in their science learning and we found a picture book that told us about Chrstopher Columbus's life as a child and what happened as he got older.
We did find one video that gave us a quick overview of Christopher Columbus's life, but you may want to watch it first before sharing it with your little one as it does show a little bit of the "darker" side of Christopher that most people don't talk about. We also found a video that looks like it was a project someone created to review what they learned about Columbus. It was interesting to me to learn that even when he did, Columbus never even realized he'd discovered America and not just another part of India as he'd hoped.
Many people recommended Pedro's Journal for us to read this week so we did reserve it from the library but never got around to reading it.
This year is the first time we will have an actual, designated classroom for our studies. In the past we haven't the space and because we made a last minute decision to move into a rental house (which is a long story for another day!) we didn't plan to have a classroom this year either. But we are excited to have a place to "do school" and make this all feel like we actually know what we are doing.
So step inside and see where we spend our mornings learning, reading, crafting and enjoying school together.
This is an overview of the room. We have an old activity table that we use for group work or crafts, a cheap TMNT table we use for school work and a Spiderman desk if anyone chooses to sit there for worksheets. The American flag is hanging on one side, but since I took the picture we have moved it and added the Christian flag to the wall on the right.
We used the My First Calendar last year and loved it so I added it to the classroom, as well as added white boards. Since Kellan is still working on learning to write his letters, I used velcro to stick the letter chart from Spelling You See on the wall that he can pull off and put bag as needed. We also have pencils, erasers, math blocks, calculators etc. at the end of the table and leave our wipe-clean lined paper boards out so they are accessible for copywork, handwriting, etc.
In this corner is the television that we use to watch our MathUSee videos and any other dvds as needed. The bookshelf is actually a set of drawers that have been broken over time from being in the kids' bedroom so I flipped it over and decided to make good use of it. On the side is a stick on chalk board and a basket for bookbags.
In the opposite corner is a large set of plastic drawers for miscellaneous supplies and the printer. Most of the space is my storage, but there are some crafts and various supplies that belong to the children but are kept "safe" in this area, too.
You can't have a classroom without the alphabet on the wall - am I right? I wanted to find something that goes along with our US History theme this year and that had cursive letters since Brooklee is learning cursive. I found a design on TeachersPayTeachers that I was really excited about, but once I purchased and downloaded it, I really wasn't pleased with some of the words that she used for each letter so I kept the background the same, found my own words and images and used a free font that I downloaded to update the words and letters. I LOVE the way these turned out and most all of the words are vocabulary words or people/places/events that we'll be learning about this year.
Here is the book corner with all of our reading level books on the top shelf and Sadie Quinn's books on the bottom shelf. I also put a basket on the bottom shelf with coloring books. The top of the shelf seems to change weekly. At first I had a box for the kids to turn in their worksheets every day. Then I had the hole puncher, pencil sharpener, etc. on top. I added the book display so we could have a visual of our weekly theme and the books we are reading. At the moment it is a little bit of all of those things, but primarily a display shelf for our artwork.
So there you have it. We love our little classroom and it is just perfect for us right now. Eventually I'd love to replace the activity table and TMNT table with a real table or a set of desks for the kids but for now we are just happy to have a classroom.
Its the first week of school and we are learning about Vikings this week. We spent the first few days figuring out our schedule, putting together our notebooks and navigating through the various curriculum for each subject. Each morning we begin with handwriting worksheets. Brooklee is learning cursive and Kellan is finally beginning to get the hang of manuscript. They both have a long ways to go.
Sadie Quinn joins us each morning to color, take supplies we are using or just roll around in the floor. I try to give her paper to use for her own masterpieces, but sometimes she just likes the thrill of making her sister and brother holler and chase her.
The kids look forward to group time each morning when we go to the living room and use the Roku to watch fun, educational videos on YouTube. We do our pledges, review the books of the Bible, and practice counting, letters, states, etc. during group time. Sadie Quinn even does the Pledge of Allegiance with us every morning. Here are some of our favorite videos:
We will add more videos to group time as the year progresses and will change out videos as needed. When we need a giggle break, the kids have some favorites to add:
We began Spanish this week by coloring our cover pages for our notebook and reviewing some things we learned in the past. We have incorporated Spanish songs and videos into our morning routines in the past, so while some of this is new to them, many of the greetings and vocabulary this week is a review.
We are using Teach Them Spanish, Grade 1 for our foreign language and are using several YouTube videos:
We all learned so much about the Vikings this week. I can honestly say that though I remember learning the name Leif Erikson and hearing about the Vikings, I did not recall that they were the first people to come to North America and really didn't even remember who they were. We had fun learning about their journeys, words that were passed down from them and their fierce boats. We even made our own! My little super hero loving boy loved learning that Thor and his family are based on the gods of the Vikings.
We used several books and videos to expand our learning of Vikings:
In following the MFW suggestions for the week, we also had some fun making an American flag dessert and learning more about our own names. We learned that Brooklee is a made up name meaning "peaceful stream or water" and "healer" so we decided her name means one who brings peace and healing. Kellan's name means "powerful" and "bright-headed" and Sadie Quinn means "Princess" and "Intelligent." We made practiced writing our names and made bracelets by matching letter beads to the letters in our names then stringing them on pieces of elastic. I bought these beads at Walmart for less than $3 and they worked perfectly for small wire or string. However, they were a little challenging to string on the elastic string that Walmart had for making bracelets.
And the finished product! It was an amazing first week of school and we had a blast learning about how our name is special to God, how the Vikings came to North America, how to greet someone in Spanish and where to find our city, state, country and continent on a map.
Its time to begin another year of homeschool fun at BKS Prep! This year we are using the My Father's World Adventures in U.S. History for Brooklee and Kellan. Brooklee is in 1st grade, though her coursework will all be on the 2nd grade level and Kellan is in K4 but we are using Kindergarten level work for him. I must mention that Sadie Quinn, my almost 2 year old, will be present during learning, so as much as I can, I'll be including her in some learning as well. Whether or not I am able to pre-plan those activities is yet to be determine.....
To supplement our Adventures in U.S. History curriculum, we'll also be using MathUSee Primer for Kellan and Beta for Brooklee. We began these at the end of last year and will pickup where we left off. For Spelling we are using SpellingYouSee Listen and Write for Kellan, which we also started last year and will pick up. We really enjoyed this curriculum for him as it reviews the letters and letter sounds, as well as teaches him to write and encourages him to sound out the letters to write words. We had to stop the curriculum last year b/c I never bought the teacher manual and we got to the point where I had to call out the word for him to write - but the words were only in the teacher's manual.
Brooklee should be finishing SpellingYouSee Wild Tales, which really was challenging for her last year, but since the Americana goes along so well wtih the Adventures curriculum, we'll be using it and skipping around on the lessons so the topics match up with what we are studying each week. I was a little giddy to see how well the lessons go with the MFW Adventures curriculum, just in a different sequence. I know Americana will be a huge challenge for her, so I'm not expecting her to be able to do it to the level required in the book, but instead will use it as copywork to practice letter formation, writing skills, and vocabulary while also gaining a better understanding of spelling, grammar and sentence structure. And I love that it will reinforce our topics for the week. I bought a workbook called Teach Them Spanish, Grade 1 for us to use as a foreign language study this year. I'm still undecided about our Language Arts studies as Language Lessons for Today came with the Adentures package I purchased but I'm also waiting on another book to see if I like it better called First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind, Level 1. Upon glancing at it online, I think I might start with the latter and move into Language Lessons for Today afterwards as Language Arts might be one of the areas where she actually is more on the level of 1st grade than in other areas. Language Lessons starts with common nouns then proper nouns, so while it will be good for Brooklee to review all of this, I think it might be on a level that Kellan can join in, too. I'd love to do a lot of hands on learning this year because I have seen how the kids understand and retain what they learn through fun more than worksheets. However, I saw a homeschool blogger recently share that they use the See - Hear - Say - Do method of learning as much as possible. I actually love this concept because I really believe each of us have our own preferred learning style(s) in which we learn best but at such a young age I am still struggling to identify what those styles are yet for my kids. And I'd really love it if they are able to figure those out on their own, too. There are several songs that we'll learn this year within the curriculum, like America the Beautiful and the Star Spangled Banner, but each month we will also be learning a hymn. I tried to match some of the more well known hymns (as well as a few that I just love personally) with the theme of what we are studying or what is going on during that time.
We are foregoing our journey around the world to instead journey back in time and learn some of the history behind one of our favorite holidays - Thanksgiving! Just when I feel like I know everything there is to know about this special holiday, there is so much more to learn about it! We used two full weeks to study about Thanksgiving, but you could easily pick and choose which activities and topics to use and condense it into one week or less.
We started off the two weeks by learning Psalm 100:
Shout with joy to the Lord all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness. Come before him with joyful hearts. Know that the Lord is good. We are his people the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with Thanksgiving and into his courts with praise. Give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good. His unfailing love endures forever and his faithfulness continues to all generations.
We made this Thanksgiving tree with a roll of kraft paper wrapping paper and different colors of cardstock that I had in my scrapbook box of scraps. This could have looked much better with a professional pattern or proper dimensions, but honestly I just cut it out freehand and think it turned out just fine for its purpose.
We practiced Psalm 100 with this great song on YouTube: Psalm 100 Song. I've seen that the kids learn better by singing the words and they like to make up motions to go with it.
We also made a Psalm 100 Memory Book. B loves to read it and then use it to sing the song we learned.
Our vocabulary words were the standard Thanksgiving terms one would imagine:
Native American - the Indians who lived in America when the Pilgrims arrived
Pilgrim - someone who takes a religious journey
Mayflower - the ship that the Pilgrims used to come to the New World
Wampanoag - the Indian tribe that lived in Massachusetts
Plymouth Rock - the place where the Pilgrims arrived
Squanto - the Indian friend of the Pilgrims
harvest - the time when crops are gathered
feast - a large meal usually with a lot of people
We used a lot of repetition during these two weeks to learn about Thanksgiving and its history. I created a First Thanksgiving Read-Aloud booklet last year for B to read with me and this year she was able to read most of it on here own.
I added a worksheet with questions for her to answer based on the story I wrote.
There are so many great books to read about Thanksgiving and we got an early start on reserving them at our library before they were all gone. We've also accumulated our own stash through the years. Here are some of the great ones we used:
Squanto and the First Thanksgiving
This book was a good one to learn more specifically about Squanto and the Native Americans during the time of the first Thanksgiving.
If You Were At the First Thanksgiving
So there are many things we learn about Thanksgiving that aren't exactly accurate. Or maybe assumptions that are far from the way things were back then. This book gives you an inside look on what it really might have been like at that first Thanksgiving. And just a hint: there was no pumpkin pie or cranberry sauce!
T is for Turkey: A True Thanksgiving Story
An alphabet full of Thanksgiving terminology for kids to learn! From Sarah Hale to today's traditions, this book is an overview for everything we've been learning and a good conversation piece for things we never knew about this great holiday.
Count your way to the first Thanksgiving as the Wampanoag and Pilgrim children help prepare for the big feast. Each page shows different ways that they would have prepared for the occasion back then and has interesting artwork that keeps little ones searching for a turkey here and a rabbit there.
Pete the Cat: The First Thanksgiving
My kids love Pete the Cat, so who could go wrong here? Not only did we have fun reading this book with the lift-the-flap pages, but it retells the story of Thanksgiving in a fun and easy to understand way for kids.
A twist on the traditional Indian counting song, this paperback book counts through the pilgrims, Wampanoag and Thanksgiving preparations. Read it or sing the whole song to the traditional tune.
Sister and Brother Bear put on a reenactment of the first Thanksgiving for the family and Sister gets a new pet turkey named Squanto. At the end there are discussion questions and activities that you can do with your kids to continue learning and exploring Thanksgiving.
A cute book about a group of kids who go to the farm on a field trip. Once they learn the fate of the farmer's turkeys, the kids' clothes somehow get more fluffy and the turkeys go missing.
This fun picture book is about 10 fat, goofy turkeys who fall off the gate one by one until the gate finally crashes. There isn't much here as far as education is concerned (except the counting) buts its fun and cute.
In our studies for each country we've tried to find an artist to study and a project to mimic his or her work. There isn't an artist for these two weeks but this book helped fill that gap with handprint art. The child in this book uses his or her handprint to make turkeys. When a frisky fox shows up for some turkey dinner, the child uses art to protect the turkeys, set them free and entice them back.
We used this book as a springboard to make our own turkey art with handprints.....
Why have I never learned of Sarah Hale before? When I read about her in T is for Turkey: A True Thanksgiving Story (see, I told you it was educational), I realized I had no idea who she was and what she did to "save" Thanksgiving. I decided to research her and grabbed this book from the library to learn more. Boy am I glad that I did! Sarah was extremely instrumental in creating the Thanksgiving holiday that we have today! This book is full of great information and is written in a manner that makes it easy to insert a lot of animation and expression to keep kids interesting as they are learning. It also introduces some new things to my kids: Presidents, war, women's rights, etc. At the end there is a "Feast of Facts" that includes some background information on Thanksgiving, Vintage America, The Civil War, and Sarah Hale.
From this book, I created a Sarah Hale Saves Thanksgiving one-sheeter for B to read herself and answer questions. We reviewed a few large and new words for her (i.e. national and President) and she easily completed this while I reviewed K's sight words for the week with him.
These easy reader book were a little above B's reading level so we read them together. Both books were great for practicing reading and continuing to learn about the first Thanksgiving.
Follow the Robertson family as they prepare for Thanksgiving in 1841. Though it is a fictitious book about a made up family, the book is based on the life, conditions and happenings from that time in history.
This traditional book is part of the FIAR (Five in a Row) books that I've seen on many homeschool blogs so we borrowed it from our library too. You can find so many activities to go along with this book from other bloggers and Pinterest boards. We didn't do a lot of these this year but will plan to do this when the kids are a little older as I didn't feel like they'd enjoy it now as much as they will in the future.
Here are some of the best sites I've seen with activities for Cranberry Thanksgiving in case you're interested:
Delightful Learning The BEST!! I always love following this woman's blogs and getting ideas from her, but seriously, this is one of her best in my opinion. So many ideas in this book and she does a great job of showing how she teachers her kids cold hard school work through everyday fun activities.
Jack and Annie learn how to do things the Pilgrim way as they travel back in time and prepare for the first Thanksgiving in this chapter book for middle school aged kids.
B is learning subtraction this week and reviewing simple addition so it was easy to make and find Thanksgiving themed math sheets for to to go along with our studies.
B loves drawing, so I found some fun activities for drawing Indians and Pilgrims. There are videos on YouTube that she used and worksheets that we downloaded.
B used the videos to draw her Indians and Pilgrims.
Here is her finished work. Not bad for a Kindergartner, right?
And speaking of videos, of course there is an abundance of Thanksgiving related videos on YouTube! We have included many of them in our BKS Prep Morning Warmup this week! Here are some that we included:
Fun Thanksgiving Songs
Fun Thanksgiving Stories and Books
Educational Thanksgiving Videos
There are even more videos, ideas and resources on my Pinterest page.
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