October 26, 2010: US- "God made us wonderful" (5 senses)

Today we learned the letter "U" for US, UNDER, UP, UMBRELLA, etc....and we colored and made our "U" books.



Then A- practiced and reviewed writing all the letters we've learned so far this year! I can't believe we are entering our 9th week of school already! Then mommy and S- worked on recognizing her letters. We are down to 7 that she still hasn't been able to get yet but I have a feeling she will get them down soon!



This week we are learning about our 5 senses. Today we learned about our hands and all about "touch." We learned that we have bones in our hands as well as muscles, and the muscles help us to move our hands.



Then we learned that we have 27 bones in each hand. We used our photo of the hand to help us count the bones.



Then we learned the names of our fingers, "index, middle, ring, little, and thumb"





We learned that "nerve endings" at the end of our fingers are what help us to feel things. So we then took a few things and put them in a pillow case and they got to feel them with their hands without looking and guess what was in the case. Then we put a thick sock on their hand and they tried it again and said "I can't feel anything!" This was great for explaining the importance of nerve endings and what they do, and that "God made us wonderful!"

We also learned our character quality for this week, "generous." Being generous is when we realize that everything we have is God's and we use it for his purpose, weather it's to bless someone else, or share a toy, or give up a toy for someone who might not have one. We will be trying to learn this quality all week!

October 19, 2010: TURTLE-"I don't quit; I persevere!"

We had a couple special guests today during school! We had baby S- who was so much fun! She was so sweet and we had such a great time with her today! She loved reading books with us and singing her ABC's, she would get so excited to sing the ABC's with us! She also LOVED to color!





We also had a little visit from our favorite old friend from Pre-school last year "TACO"!!!! Taco read us a story "The hare and the tortoise."




Then we made our own puppets! I think they all ended up being a "HARE" instead of a tortoise, but they turned out great! Later after the glue dries we will act out the story with our puppets.



We also counted 20 days of school today (minus the first 10 days we learned about creation). We added 1+1,1+2,1+3...all the way up to 1+10. Then we counted to 20 by 10's. It wasn't a lot of counting but they got it!




We also had our reading lesson today. Starting with this lesson A- has started to learn to read/sound out small words. We use what they call a blending ladder, similar to what we did yesterday but today, we used our textured letters and sounded them out one letter at a time then put them all together! She did Awesome! Today she read the words "sam, san, sat"



Then we did the cut and paste worksheet where she told me the word and pasted the girls name under the girl and the boys name under the boy. We had a great productive day!

October 18, 2010: TURTLE- "I don't quit; I persevere!"

So the great thing about homeschooling is the fact that when we have a lot to do one week we can have a few days of school and then finish the rest the next week! Last week was such a busy week for us, not to mention everyone was sick and not feeling well so we did 2 days of school last week and we're finishing up the rest of the lesson this week.

We started today with our devotion and prayer. I love this book it's a children's version of "My utmost for his highest" by Oswald Chambers. Today was a great one it was talking about "Love" which turns out to be our character quality for this week as well! We talked about how we need to Love what God loves, and hate what God hates. And we need to love unconditionally!



We learned about Love vs. Selfishness. We played a little game so they understood what Selfish meant. I would say "A or S-, GIVE ME THAT PURPLE CRAYON!!" and then I'd take it out of their hand and ask..."was that selfish or loving?" Then I'd say "A or S-, may I use your purple crayon?" and ask if that was selfish or loving?

Then I let the girls try to respond back to me in selfish ways and in loving ways. Poor S- had a hard time being selfish to mommy, haha.. Everytime I asked her if I could use her purple crayon she would say "SURE!" FINALLY she said..."SURE..I MEAN NO!" haha! It was fun!



Then we worked on our blending ladder with A-. Mommy would say the word "Sat" and ask her to look at the ladder and tell me what letter sound was in the MIDDLE of the word "SAT" once she figured that out she then was able to tell me the first and last letters. Then wrote them on her page.



Then we wrote our quote on a piece of paper and decorated it! We had a very good day of school!

October 12, 2010: TURTLE- "I don't quit; I persevere."

Today we added something a little new into the mix. "The number cup." We write numbers on a piece of paper and the girls tell me what number it is before they put it in the cup! We'll do more with this later.




Then we made a turtle today! WE took two paper plates and the girls painted the bottom of them green. While they did that I cut out the head, legs, and tail on green construction paper.



Then they both glued on eyes, and drew a mouth, nose, eye lashes, and even glasses!




Then we stapled them together with all their parts, and made our turtles. The girls were so excited!! They LOVED them!!




But of course no turtle is complete without names! I told my husband you can really tell a difference in their personalities by the names they gave their turtles "CHUCKY" (A) and "Princess Turtle" (S) lol

We also went over what God says about Persevering!

Philippians 3:13-14 "...But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

Hebrews 12:1 "...let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."

Galations 6:9 "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up"

October 11, 2010: TURTLE "I don't quit; I persevere."

Today we started with our calendar. This month we are working on patterns! Last week we colored each square, red then purple, then red....this week we finally realized that there was a "pattern" to what color mommy told them to color that day!




We also talked about the letter "T" and things that started with the letter T...like Table, Tiger, Toothbrush etc... And then we colored and put together our "T" books.




We then learned about "Turtles." We learned that there are two different types of turtles, the sea turtles, and the fresh water turtles. The sea turtles are usually bigger. But they both have shells that they use to protect themselves. Some turtles can live over 150 years!

Then we read our two books for this lesson that helps us with learning about persevering.

We also learned our "character quality" for this week. We will be working on "dependability" this week.

Join us tomorrow for our Turtle craft!! It's going to be tons of fun!

October 7, 2010- APPLE "If I stay in Jesus I will have much fruit."

Today for our Reading lesson we laid cards on the table of all the letters we've gone over already, and a few we havent. Then mommy said "A- point to the letter that starts the word...NOW, or SEPTEMBER, or TEN, etc... She had a great time and did an awesome job!!



Then we did our cut & paste worksheet, where we cut out the letters and A- had to paste them under the picture that starts with that letter! Again she did awesome and didn't even need any help!




Then we wrote our verse "If I stay in Jesus I will have much fruit" on a red sheet of paper and colored it. A- turned hers over and on the back wrote all by herself "I LOVE JESUS"





Then we did an awesome craft! We traced our hands out of brown construction paper, then glued it onto white construction paper and dipped our fingers into red paint and put apples all over our tree. The girls had a blast and they turned out really great too!



And of course no apple lesson is complete without learning about Johnny Appleseed!

October 5, 2010 - APPLE "If I stay in Jesus I will have much fruit"

Boy was someone excited to join us in school today! I got A's- handwriting worksheet prepared and put it in her seat, walked out of the kitchen and this is what I saw when I came back in! lol E's a mess! So We let her start off the day with counting our sticks first!






Then after all the boring school stuff, we talked about the fruits of the spirit, Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. We read Galations 5:22-23 and talked about how we can be all these things and that is how we can grow fruit in our spirit! Then we read John 15:4-5 "Remain in me and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. And then we got to the fun stuff...making Apple sauce! The girls loved it! It turned out really great!!

October 4, 2010- APPLE "If I stay in Jesus I will have much fruit."

We had such a great weekend it was so hard to start back for everyone this morning! We went to Carter Mountain to pick Apples this weekend it was a blast!! It was great timing because today we're learning about "Apples" and the letter "A"!

We added in another aspect to our school day last week and that is our Character Qualities. Last week we learned about "truthfulness" and this week since we had some hyper little girls this morning, we learned about "self-control." We also "practiced self-control" this morning. S- & A- both took turns jumping up and down and then when mommy said STOP, they would immediately STOP! We will be working on Self-control the rest of the week!




We did our letter "A" books today as well and learned A is for A-, Ants, Apple, Axe, etc...




Then mommy had cut out pictures of different fruits and veggies. We labeled two sheets of paper "Fruits" & "Vegetables", and we guessed which is a fruit and which is a veggie and then glued them to the right paper. We talked about how fruit grows on trees, bushes, and vines then mommy asked "did you know people can grow fruit too? Tomorrow I'll tell you about some fruit that can grow in you!" At that point A- got a worried look on her face and started looking up her sleeve, so I knew I needed to go ahead and explain that now!

So...We went to Galations 5:22-23 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and "self-control."" We talked about how WE can grow these fruits in our spirit and we are starting this week with "Self-Control!"

Can't wait till tomorrow!!