The Big Green Pocketbook

This week's book came from the library. I decided to save some of the ones we own for when Ruby comes. Even though we will most likely take a little time off, it'll make it easier to use books we already own then requesting them to be sent to our library. When I went to pick up the book, they had one of the Jesse Bear books I requested since we had such fun reading from that series. The book they had for us was What a Scare, Jesse Bear and was perfect for our transition to fall! We read this book and Silas said it was his favorite Jesse Bear one and that he wished he could have that candy corn in the book. We then started our book for the week, The Big Green Pocketbook! 

This story was a cute one and after we read it, we discussed how the little girl found something fun to do or see everywhere her mom went even though they were just errands. We sometimes I have complaining on our multiple errand trips, so I was sure to point out that the little girl didn't grumble and complain even though she did get tired and fell asleep on the way home- have to take advantage of those little lessons! We decided to make a pocketbook like the girl in the story. I had Silas choose between felt and foam and he chose foam. I cut out the foam pocketbook and he practiced using a hole puncher and punched all the marks for the holes on the pocketbook.

Then we practiced sewing. We talked about how it was different than our lacing animals because we had two pieces to sew and not just one. We then had to decide between making it a purse like the book or just a pocket like a wallet. We decided a Peter Pan satchel was perfect so pocketbook meet Peter Pan it is.

We wanted to make the items to put in our pocketbook but I knew this would be more than a one day activity because we were reaching our max attention span. We started to make tickets and wanted to write BUS on them so first we practiced spelling bus. We ended up writing it together.

We also made some foam lollipops for our pocketbook but since we used paint we had to leave them to dry. We took a break for lunch, but Silas wanted to keep practicing using the hole punch. He loved using that tool haha.

The next day, we read our story again but this time put in our pocketbook/Peter Pan pouch the items we created the day before. 

Afterwards, we pretended to go all of the places that the little girl and her mommy did. When we went to the insurance office we wanted to type our name out like the little girl did on the type writer. We talked about the differences of type writers and computers and then we learned how to type our name in big letters and start a new line and use little letters too. We also learned how to use the back space key and we practiced typing for a while because it was so cool. (We did this again the next day and I was pretty impressed that he remembered where the backspace key was and how to use it all on his own.)

We also practiced writing our name and reviewed money with our pretend money, a matching worksheet, and our piggy bank worksheet. Quarters and nickels are especially tricky. 

On Thursday, we listened to an audio of the book and also related the lost pocketbook, to the Bible story of the lost coin. We read the story and watched a you tube version as well. We spoke about times we've lost things and how great we feel when they are found and how sad when they are not. We reviewed our coins again and played store.

Our last day of The Big Green Pocketbook was welcomed because, we weren't as excited about this story anymore. I know that's okay because we appreciated it enough and that's the point :) Today we worked on art and science. Silas is most excited about art and also likes experiments so I snuck in some coin review and handwriting first. My biggest aim is for him to learn how to write his letters this year but I am still trying to find a way to make it not a begrudging task. 

After that, we talked about primary and secondary colors and learned how to make green. We did some experiments on how to make blue and yellow make green. We tried with crayons first and that worked well. Then we tried markers and they didn't really turn green for us. The best part was our food coloring experiment. We did it algain and again.

We ended this day's activity with going on a GREEN scavenger hunt. We looked all around our house and backyard for green things and stuck them on a green piece of construction paper. I didn't plan it this way, but it was great we ended with talking about blue and green because those colors played a big role in our study the following week.

Caps for Sale

We have abandoned the school room for a bit because it is just too hot! We soak up the morning time in there with brother to do our free play but we need (the pregnant momma needs) cool air! Come on fall!

This morning we started Caps For Sale. 

To be honest, I was a little bummed that our Jesse Bear work was met with whines and I don't want to's so this week I planned a list of activities to try that I could shuffle around depending on our interests that day. I decided to start my weekly reflection today because we had such an encouraging morning! First, the book was a big hit. The only issue was the brown hats. Silas did not see them as brown but yellow and I kinda agree but we talked about shades of color. He didn't buy it haha. 

What do you think...yellow or brown?

We talked about the phrase "monkey see, monkey do" and Silas reminded me of the man with the yellow hat saying that on Curious George and also later about how the gorillas and monkeys were making the bad guy mad on Baby's Day Out. I loved that he found past experiences to relate to our discussion! We painted a tree and when it dries we will add monkeys to it. We also practiced drawing lines from monkeys to their caps.

The next thing I had planned on us working with our pegs and peg board. He said he really wished we could do number boards instead so we adjusted. We first worked on motor skills of dropping pegs into a pitcher. He's pretty good so we tried to do it all different ways- eyes closed, steps closer and back. We then picked out 3 number boards and made our number of pegs match the number on the board but using only one hole so that they are stacked high. He chose 1, 2, 3 and so I chose 4, 5, 6 so that it would be more challenging. He enjoyed the challenge and wanted to go all the way to 10 and then after we checked them, he wanted to put the boards in order from 1-10. 

I was so happy with his participation today and all of his own ideas. It gives me a good push in the right direction for this week and I'm hoping for more exciting days like today, but I know not every day will we feel so intrigued and that's okay too.

The next day, we started with our calendar and morning meeting. He's starting to catch on to the order of the days of the week and is sometimes answering the right answer on yesterday was, today is, and tomorrow will be, instead of guessing. He was still into the story, Caps For Sale. Today while we read, we had our big stack of caps next to us for a game. On his own, Silas decided to act out the story as went along, putting on and taking off the caps, and waving his hands and stomping his feet. Ezra came to join in the fun and stole a cap just like the monkeys. 

Ezra working on sand writing, well, sand play :)

We then finished our finger painting from the day before and also practiced making patterns with paper caps on a funny Silas. We played a cap stacking game and took turns stacking as many hats on our heads as we could. We found we had to be still and practice balance to get more hats on.

 On Wednesday, we had a lot of errands so we watched Reading Rainbows version of Caps For Sale and used our leapfrog to practice making big C and little c.

On Thursday, we decorated our house for fall and talked about seasons. We talked about how fall can also be called autumn and since Ruby will be born in the fall and it's one of our favorite seasons, her name will be Ruby Autumn. We listened to an audio of Caps For Sale and followed along in the book. I was surprised at how well he could tell when it was time to change the page. We then worked on scissor skills and cut out 12 caps to put in a pattern on our monkey's head. 

We also used a worksheet where we practiced reading a measuring tape and recording measurements of how tall different stacks of caps were. We then of course had to measure ourselves to see if we were much taller so we could ride bigger rides at Disney. This was a fun, fun week and we even read the story into the weekend. I'm loving how our school time connects throughout the other things we do during the week and weekend. It's really encouraging and makes me excited to plan the next few weeks to come! I think part of why I love doing school with Silas, is because it is our thing. He has so many things he gets to do with brother and daddy, that they are really good at like playing super heroes, sword fighting, sports, and even when I try- I know it’s not the same. School, however is all our time and ideas, and lately it’s been even when Ezra is napping so it’s even more just us time and it is pretty special. I think he knows it too. Also, we got some more BFIAR books in the mail from Grammy this weekend! Thanks Grammy!

Resources:

http://www.homeschoolcreations.net/2011/09/caps-for-sale-printables-before-five-in/

http://www.mfwbooks.com/products/4/Pre-K-for-4s-and-older-3s-/#Overview

What Will You Wear, Jesse Bear?

This week, we focused on Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear? and the rhyme scheme of the book was a big hit. Silas is definitely a music lover and the way he picks up on things orally makes me think this is may be his primary learning style when I once would have told you he was a kinesthetic...I'm still not sure though because depending on the activity, he really loves to show what he can do. All of that to say, this week's activities were not meet with the same enthusiasm as the previous week so I'm still learning what sparks his fire.

On Monday, we read Jesse Bear for the first time and talked about how he wore different clothes for different activities. We discussed what we would wear in different weather scenarios and colored our weather bear paper dolls. I colored a set too, so they could be laminated and used again and because he likes to work together. His bears turned into a fire fighter bear and he lost interest in coloring the rest. We worked on pairing our rhymes and I was surprised he didn't miss one and even came up with more rhymes of his own. We also used our rhyme cards and spelled out some of the words. He picked up on sand and hand used some of the same letters.

On Tuesday, we read our story again and talked about Jesse Bear's healthy lunch. Silas' activity was to cut and paste Jesse Bear's food on his plate. He really took his time and was proud of this activity. We also worked with our gears and magnatiles but had more of a play day since we were tired and trying to beat the heat.

 On Wednesday, we took school on the road and went to the library. We picked out books, played a few learning games on their iPad while Ezra worked on puzzles. When we got home we read two Jesse Bear books we got at the library- Don't Get Wet, Jesse Bear and How Do You Say it Today, Jesse Bear? and we liked these stories just as much.  Today we colored some pages on his lap book but he was resistant so we didn't do much. The iPad learning derailed him so he wanted to do more iPad learning. We settled on the leapfrog writing board.

On Thursday, we read our story and played with our completed weather bears. We also worked on the B part of our weather book. He colored his words and his B, pasted them in his book. We still had more pages to finish our lap book but he was not interested in creating our own book like I had hoped. We may shelve book making until he is older!

All in all, it was a great week but I found he wasn't too excited about the lap book because it had too much coloring. He loves being creative but gives up on coloring easily because he was told by a friend he scribble scrabbles and I think it hurt his feelings. I want to be sensitive to his feelings but I don't want him to give up so we talk about the many different art styles and sometimes artist are messy. I do however want him to learn how to color in the lines but I'm sure that will come at the right time. I'm going to incorporate other activities with less crayon work for us next week.