Our Read Aloud, The Hundred Dresses

Our read aloud for the past 2 weeks has been The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes. This is a great book that has allowed for some great discussion between Zoe and I. Although I think some of it might have been a little over Zoe’s head, I’m sure that the general message was able to get through, I am also sure that it is one of those kind of stories that will stick with us for a while. The Hundred Dresses, is about a poor immigrant girl and her way of coping with her poverty and the constant teasing she receives for wearing the same blue dress to school everyday, One of her ways of coping is to tell a story to the little girls about how she has 100 dresses in her closet. We find out by the end of the story that she is not exactly lying. The little girls in the story are not necessarily seen as being terrible, they are just immature and materialistic. The story ends sadly with the little girl moving away because of the treatment from the children in her class. This leaves the girls with feelings of remorse and they attempt to make it right with Wanda, but they find out that they are a little too late.
As you can imagine there are so many great discussions that can come from this book. I have decided that when Zoe is just a little older I will put together a mother, daughter book club and this is one of those books we will revisit again.

Moving

I am in the process of moving this blog over to a blogspot blog. I might actually post on both blogs just because I’m crazy like that and I really do love a lot of things about WordPress, but I love how blogspot allows me to be more creative, and I can easily add more page elements. So we’ll see. If I decide it’s not working out I’ll probably come back here. But if you have saved me to any of your blogs or favorites make sure you save the new one too. I had to change it from schooling at home to schooling from home, so don’t miss that little article.

 http://schoolingfromhome.blogspot.com

Although I haven’t posted anything in a little while, we have in fact been working. Part of the reason I haven’t posted is I have just been overwhelmed lately. I don’t know how other homeschool moms handle their regular school days but I really struggle with fitting school into our life. Of course school work is a priority for us but some things just can’t be put aside and if you throw in house- work and other home responsibilities I wonder how anybody gets anything accomplished. Basically I just haven’t found a happy medium yet. I want school to be fun, but I don’t have a lot of time to prepare for all the great activities I would love to do with my children. I’m attempting to start a Thanksgiving unit but I am not going to stress over it being perfect, hopefully telling myself this will relieve any guilt I feel when I haven’t accomplished all I would have liked at the end of the month.

Apples, Apples, Apples

I have been trying to throw in this  Apple Unit since we started school, but somehow I haven’t been able to make it work. This week I decided to just do it. We had actually started the story of Johnny Appleseed, which is a part of curriculum, so it really worked out. Then I had a creative block, seriously I just couldn’t think of any real fun things to do for apples, so I looked at some great sites and a friend let me use some great resources and today we had a blast.

 

 We made these Johnny Appleseed  puppets after reading another book about him.

 We made apple prints with apples. This didn’t turn out like I had hoped but they had fun anyway.

 We did a sink or float activity starting with just an apple and carrot. This quickly expanded to other fruits and vegetables. They loved this. I will have to do this at another time with other things. We talked about what makes them sink or float.

  We made homemade applesauce.

  Very Yummy.      Very Very Yummy    

Science without even trying

Who knew that today’s science lesson would scamper its way through our hallway. As I was picking up random toys throughout the house I noticed a little gecko in our hallway. As I tried catching him I accidentally cut off his tail. I finally did get him and tried to free him into the front yard so that he could go about his way but not before the children caught sight of him and had to have a look. Turns out I must have injured him worse than I thought, or maybe the little guy or girl was just trying to recover from the shock of loosing his tail, because when I put him in the yard he just sat there. Zoe was so afraid that the ants were going to come eat it that she begged me to “rescue” it again. (she has this fear of ants after seeing them basically eat a whole very large dragonfly, that was still moving) So I agreed, to keep it in a bowl- Just until daddy got home- Then of course they wanted to feed it and figure out what the best way to take care of it was, so we spent some time researching geckos on the web. Turns out the little stinker probably detached its own tail as a defense mechanism, while trying to divert my attention. I personally don’t think he is going to survive but at least all the children had a great time with him. If he dies, that will be a whole other lesson.

 

 The gecko is at 6:00, it’s the best picture I could get with the glass reflection. 

You can see all the plant stuff the kids put into the bowl so he could eat, that was before they learned that geckos eat insects. When Zoe learned that she went on a hunt around the house for dead flies. She was actually very sad when she couldn’t find any. I was actually looking forward to watching her problem solve how to get the dead fly into the bowl- knowing she wouldn’t touch one.

Simply Homeschooling

For the past year I have read many books on homeschooling, How to, as well as just getting down to the heart of Why’s. I recently borrowed the book Simply Homeschooling from a friend ( I will eventually get it back to you Kimberly) There are so many great ideas and thoughts to take in all the way throughout the book, but so far one of the most profound thoughts for me has been the idea of just staying home. It has given me cause to reflect on why we chose this path and what is best for our family. I am by nature a homebody but these past few years, especially as our children get older, things seem to keep getting busier, and I find myself constantly on the go.  So I’m rethinking my schedule and working on ways to keep us home more often, I can already think of all the great homemaking skills we can work on with the extra time and of course all the extra snuggling while reading.

Curtain Call

Kindergarten is suppose to be fun. And I really want to have fun with my children this year while we are doing school. I don’t want to get caught up in the lessons without focusing on why learning is fun. In an effort to have a little more fun with the Godilocks and the 3 bears story we decided to do  a stick  puppet show. I had no idea what a success this would be. They have all loved putting on a show for us and now that I have heard their rendition of the story at least 6-7 times each, I’m officially tired of the three bears story.  But it was great for memory recall, sequential skills and of course public speaking- not to mention thier new found love of acting. Had I known it was going to be such a hit, I would have spent time letting them create a mini set for the whole thing.

 

Art Class

I didn’t join a homeschool group this year mostly because I didn’t get around to it in time, and then it just worked out that several of us kind of started our own. A friend purchased this Art curriculum at the homeschool bookfair last spring, and even though it is meant for an older student we decided to try it out anyway. Last Tuesday was our first official class. It went great. They worked on lines and creating drawings using them. Zoe had big fun. It is a video based curriculum so we are there just to hand out supplies and assist.

   

 The picture of the finished project did not turn out well but we plan on having an art show at the end of the year to show off all of the students great work.

Productive

I really did have great intentions of posting more often than once a week. But I have decided to let myself off the hook, and say- I’ll post as often as life lets me.

We had a great week this week. Very productive. We even had the chance to visit the Zoo, and join our playgroup for a few hours at the bounce house. I had many opportunities to remember why we chose homeschooling for our family. I have always loved teaching, there is just something wonderful about seeing someone have a light bulb moment and finally “get” something they have struggled with. When it’s your own child, and you are the one responsible for making that moment happen- nothing compares. I have loved watching Zoe think through things and grasp different subjects, but I especially love all the great literature we have snuggled up together on the couch to read. 

In this picture, I had asked Zoe to sort  some buttons. I had no idea how she would classify them, she started by sorting colors, then sizes. But then she decided to go by texture. She ended up with about 10 different groups. I can’t wait to do it again and tell her she can only put them in 4 groups.

Here are a few other pictures from the week.

Working on Dictionary Skills

Creating patterns

 Figuring out the Pattern

Whew!

Completed. Survived. Relaxed.

The first week is O-V-E-R, after what I have deemed “melt down Monday” the rest of the week went off without a hitch.  We began reading the Boxcar children -which I had never read, and I ‘m lovin it, we learned about the water cycle, and clouds- did art projects with each. Discussed 4 different letters and sounds. And of course did all the core stuff. Overall it was a good week. I’m going to plan a little more for next week and I think it will go a little smoother. I can’t wait!