Preschool Week in Review

Last week we started our new school year and Hunter started preschool.

On our first day of school, we went to our homeschool co-op.  Hunter was all ready with his book bag and lunchbox.

All ready- and very excited to go!
Since he won’t be 3 until December he is actually still in the nursery at co-op, but we are going to do preschool at home because he is very ready.

Harper went to co-op with us too- she wasn’t sure what to think.

The next day we had our first day of school at home.
We only had two days of school for our first week- here are some of things Hunter did during his first week of preschool:

I asked Hunter the questions on this All About Me Robot and then he drew a picture of himself and colored the paper.

I also asked Hunter to draw a self-portrait- so this is his drawing of himself.

I put Hunter’s name on his desk and then covered it with contact paper.  Every day he uses a dry erase marker to practice writing his name.

This is what it looked like when Hunter wrote his name on the first day of school.  I thought it would be fun to take a picture of how it looked on his first attempt so that I can compare it to what it looks like as the year goes on.

The rest of the time spent at preschool this week was just exploring some of the manipulatives that Hunter will be using throughout the year.

This is part of the math program that Hunter is going to use this year and he really loved playing with all of the pieces.

Hunter checked out the letters and the sounds that they make.

Working on a puzzle.  It seems like all of Hunter’s puzzles are too easy for him, so I need to start finding some harder puzzles for him to do.

Hunter needed some help snapping these together and they were not his favorite toy of the week.    I hope once he figures out that he can do it that he will like them more.  I have always loved these 🙂

The math farm set is a definite favorite- Hunter asks to use this every day.

One day while I was working on something with Hailey, Hunter decided that Harper needed some company in her bouncy seat 🙂

Check out what the other tots and preschoolers have been up to over the last week at 1+1+1=1 and Homeschool Creations.

Third Grade- Week in Review

Last week we started third grade.  Which is really hard to believe, because I’m pretty sure it was just last month that we started second grade.  But apparently it’s been a whole year.  Anyway…

On Wednesday we had our first day of homeschool co-0p.  So here is Hailey all ready to go to co-op.  She was so excited to back and see all of her friends from last year.

Posing in her new outfit.

Then, on Thursday we had our first day of school at home.  Hailey, Hunter, and Harper were all excited for the day to start!

Since it was the first week of school and we only had 2 days of school I don’t have a lot to share, but here are a few of the things that we did:

Our calendar board is much simpler this year and so far that is working very well for us.  Hailey is doing everything on the board except the weather, which Hunter is doing.  Last year there was just way too much on our calendar board and it took forever to do everything.

As part of the beginning of our day, Hailey is also doing a page from Critical and Creative Thinking each day.  So far she is enjoying the activities.

On the first day of school Hailey filled out a Back to School survey about a variety of things she likes to do.  She did one on the first day of school last year too, and I hope to remember to do it every year since it will be fun to look back at them in the years to come.

Hailey also drew a self-portrait, which is another thing we do every year.

Another back to school activity we did was this All About-Me Robot.

We are using Grapevine for Bible this year and so far Hailey and I both really like it.  The simple drawings (that even I can do) make it much easier to remember the information being taught.

For math we are using Teaching Textbooks and Hailey loves it!  What a change from last year.  She cheers when it’s time to do math and that was certainly never the case before.  I hope her enthusiasm continues.

We’re using Science in the Beginning and Hailey really liked that too.  We are doing it every other day, so we only had science once.  We did a fun experiment and read a short lesson.  Then Hailey did an entry in her science notebook.

So far, so good.  Let’s hope that continues.

Preschool Curriculum

Hunter loves to do school- and when Hailey is doing her schoolwork, he is looking for something to do too.  So, I am preparing to start preschool this fall with Hunter.  I need to be organized and have things planned out as much as possible since this will be a very busy fall for us!  Here are the plans I have so far for Hunter for preschool:

I am going to use Little Hands to Heaven with Hunter which includes A Child’s First Bible, Big Thoughts for Little People, and some music.  Each unit focuses on a new letter.  Since Hunter is still young I am planing to stretch LHTH out for 2 years.  We will do a new unit every other week.  The off weeks we will focus on the same letter we learned the week before using LHTH.  Those weeks we will use Alpha Tales, Montessori Letter Work and Number Work, Farmland Math as well as some printables from Confessions of a Homeschooler.

In addition we have lots of manipulatives that Hunter will enjoy using.  This is just a small portion of what I have for him to use.  I will rotate these every week to keep him interested.

This is the plan for now… of course that can and probably will change.  We’ll have a newborn in the house and I’m sure my plans will need to be relaxed and flexible.  Of course, these plans will also depend on Hunter’s interest.  If he isn’t ready for something or isn’t enjoying something I will put it away until he’s older.  But for now, this is the plan.

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She’s Here!!

Harper Elise arrived on August 19th at 1:27 pm.

She weighed 8 lbs 9 oz and was 20 1/4 inches long.

Hailey and Hunter were so excited to meet her!

Harper in her going home outfit.

Everyone all ready for bed on Harper’s first night home.

We are so happy she is finally here!!