Friday, August 24, 2012

A New Home School Year

Voila--a finished board!!
First...we picked leaves for the border! Des was taking a nap while Tim was doing some work on his laptop, so Aislin and I took a small paper bag and a pair of scissors and walked out to the road. We collected 18 colorful leaves :) (And if you're wondering why they look kind of funny, it's because they're taped onto yellow, orange, black, and white construction paper with clear vinyl.)
Second...we painted pumpkins by mixing red and yellow paint. We printed pumpkins on card stock and squeezed paint onto the paper, then placed the paper in a plastic bag. The kids had fun squishing and spreading the paint around until it resembled orange. And the pumpkins look beautiful!
Now, I may have made the scarecrow with the disproportionately-shaped head and cut out the letters, but the kids made the awesome trees along the sides of the board:
After cutting out a rectangular piece of brown construction paper for the tree trunk, we squeezed red paint onto a small paper plate and yellow paint onto another. The kids then pressed one hand into one plate and stamped their hand-print onto blue paper. After going around in a circle, they repeated the process with their other hand and the other plate. And now they have two lovely trees with fall leaves :)

Inspiration taken from The Mailbox Magazine, Preschool Aug./Sept. 2012 edition, page 46. 

We had some paint leftover, so I let the kids do their own art projects until they'd had their fill. While Aislin was busy mixing colors to make her favorite one (why yes, it is pink), Des decided to continue making hand-prints. He certainly enjoyed it!


An update on our card-in-a-jar experiment: 
Today the kids chose FOUR cards. Yes, four, because the first two went by so quickly. The first two were songs ("My Hands" and "Nephi's Courage"), so once we finished singing, the kids just kind of stood around not sure of what to do. I asked, "Do you want to pick two more cards?" The answer was a simultaneous, "Okay!" So the third card was yet another song ("Do As I'm Doing") while the fourth read "Bible Storybook". This meant pulling out their bible board book (with the flaps covering some of the pictures). From it I read the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Umm...the story was barely a paragraph long, SO...I think I'll try to expand on it next time and maybe with some extra pictures and an actual bible by my side :) 
Thus was the end of our first week back in home preschool!

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Summer was fun...but now Fall's begun!

Where have we been all these months?! Well, we've been on summer break ;) And yes, even home preschools need one! It may not have been my intention to take one, but once it stopped raining and feeling cold...it was awfully difficult for my kids and I to stay focused on our preschool routine. So we took a break, went to the beach, played at the park, rode bikes, went to bed late and slept in :)


Ice cream at the beach? Yes, please :)

Best. Sensory. Medium. Ever. 

Picking flowers at the park

This was taken on Aislin's birthday...which is why she's fully dressed in princess apparel!


On the hunt for seashells :)

Journeying together

Alas, summer is ending and the kids are definitely itching for more to do. In fact, I'd say they miss the structure of a planned day just as much as the activities themselves! So we've begun our transition back into school mode--slowly but steadily. We've been working on redecorating our bulletin board this week, and should be done by tomorrow (pictures and post to come). We've also started a new idea for choosing our lesson plan each day. Instead of preparing our lessons myself and laying them on the kids each day, I've decided to try out a less stressful, participation-friendly and fun approach:

I labeled each card with song titles, story ideas (Fairy Tales, Nursery Rhymes, Dr. Seuss, etc.), scriptures stories, group time activities and the word "Art" (for which I'll soon have a list of art ideas that the kids can choose from, but for now those particular cards are sitting on my desk), and each day both my kids get to choose a card. Today for example, Des picked out a song card ("My Hands") and Aislin picked out a group time activity card ("Phonics Fun"). We spent a good chunk of time on these two things, and so far the kids haven't complained about their choices :)
A simple jar with simple cards

Now, I figured the same would have to be done for Aislin's skillbuilding lessons too...so I labeled her cards with things like, "Practice Writing Numbers," "Play with Number Puzzle," "Work in Alphabet Workbook," "Match Picture Cards with Alphabet Cards (Phonics Activity)," etc. We tried it yesterday for the first time, and she chose "Work in Alphabet Workbook." She finished an entire (phonics) activity, A-Z, in which she drew a line from a picture to its corresponding letter. It was a lot of work, but she did a great job! 

I'll keep you posted on our finished bulletin board, and our progress with this new card-in-a-jar idea!