Record Keeping ~ With thanks to Scholé Sisters

Homeschooling - Week One

September 1 - 5

Kindergarten, plus a three year old

I am going to try out using this blog as a little record keeping for our homeschooling activities, with grateful thanks to Scholé Sisters.

Disclaimer #1: This looks so nice and fancy when all written down.  In reality we are spending less than 1-2 hours per day on "school".  Sometimes it stretches out, but that's because we take breaks to clean up, and I send the kids outside for recess!  Hahaha.  Or I have to spend a while holding the baby and paying particular attention to him.

Disclaimer #2:  I am using a simple Oak Meadow curriculum, with a bit of a Waldorf bent, plus a lot of work my mom and others did for homeschooling many years ago.  But I am not spending very much time actually planning (not counting the months I spend mulling over things in my head without doing any actual research).  I sketched out my day/month in the course of a short hour a few weeks ago, based on the curriculum, and I did know what story we would read and picture we would draw for G and 1 by the end of the day Sunday.  But I picked the poems/songs ad lib at the first circle time, and added to them ad lib as well.  I added the Bible reading every day unplanned, because Bluejay was so eager for MORE THINGS.  I'd planned to use it as an occasional supplement when we'd worn out our letter or number for the week.  I added the cookie making on Wednesday morning because I hadn't spent much time thinking about/researching crafts.  So I'm kind of winging it every day.  And that's working GREAT.

First Day of School.  Isn't he adorable?  This boy is just a joy.

Monday ~ 

Prayer* 
Circle Time - 

• Poetry memorization: Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater & Cockadoodledoo (from Mother Goose)
• Music: This Old Man

Kindergartener:

• The letter G.  Read the story of the Golden Goose (Brothers Grimm).  Draw the goose picture in his school book.  Practice writing capital G.

I started each drawing first, Bluejay watched me and then began his own drawing, imitating my crayon strokes, etc.

• Write name and year and decorate first page of school book.
• Read from the Children's Bible Reader (Genesis) and craft - make a G shaped goose with beeswax.

Circle Time (everyone) - repeat from morning

Prayer and Song*

Tuesday ~

Prayer and Circle Time as on Monday (added One Misty Moisty Morning)

Read from Children's Bible Reader (Genesis repeat plus new chapter) and make beeswax geese again (everyone).

Kindergartener:

• Talk about the number One.  How One can encompass many things.  Focus on one Sun.  Draw the sun and write the number 1 in his school book.

• Practice writing capital G's and finding G words in workbook.

3 Year Old: Work on writing her name. Work on being respectful to others.

I have minor regrets about sending my oldest to preschool, but it was largely a play-based preschool and only minor introduction to letters and numbers, which I do not think will counteract our homeschooling plans.

Circle Time (everyone) and closing song and prayer as on Monday.

Free painting time, 3 colors per person.

Wednesday ~

Prayer and Circle Time as on Monday (added plus other poems, they pretty much have the first two down.)  Added Mary Had a Little Lamb song, all verses.

Read from Bible (Genesis repeat plus new chapter).

Nature walk.  Talk about the time of year, still summer, fall approaching.

Do puzzles (Kindergartener needs more complex puzzles, but loves to do the ones he knows too.)

Talk about the year.  Beginning of the Liturgical Year on September 1st, and first feast of the birth of the Theotokos.  Bluejay told me in detail, with no prompting, about the last feast of the year, the Dormition of the Theotokos.  Talked about Autumn coming up, then Winter.

Three-year-old: painting.

One-year-old: learn to say "poop".  (Oh my goodness, it's the cutest thing ever.  He worked really hard on that word.)

At baby's nap time: Make cookies.  Help add ingredients, stir and try to put "evenly sized" (hahaha) scoops of dough on the pan.

Prayer as on Monday.

Thursday ~

Prayer and Circle Time as on Monday.

Read about apple orchard/growing apples.

Draw a picture of an apple tree using block crayons.

Practice writing 1 and G/g.

Closing prayer and song.

And that's it.  We are not doing school on Fridays as I have to work that day.  They'll be doing activities with Aaron all day, and at this age, we can easily fit in our curriculum in 4 days. Plus our whole life is pretty much homeschool.  

As a side note, I was beyond happy with our first week.  Bluejay is so engaged, especially in the combined story/drawing lessons.  My mom came over on Wednesday, and he pulled out his book, showed her the picture of the golden goose, and told her about the three brothers cutting down the trees, and sharing or not-sharing their "beer and snacks" with the little old man.  We only read that once.  It made my feel fuzzy all over.

*For our prayers we used the standard Orthodox Christian prayers, Oh Heavenly King (prayer to the Holy Spirit) for our opening prayer (both children know this one fairly well) and the prayer for the end of lessons (We Thank Thee Our Creator) to close.  I added the song Joy of All Who Sorrow at our closing prayer, because I love it.  I think it will be a little while before they learn this one.