Second Day of Kindergarten

We started the day early, we were out in the garden by 730, and the girls helped me "harvest" some seeds from our Allium plants.  We discussed the importance of keeping the seeds, and where we will plant them next year. 

 The girls got a little worn out, so they brought out the play tent, blankets, and pillows.  Look at how many seed pods we collected!

 We collected some pansies and did a little reading in our Handbook of Nature Study, and learned about little pansy faces and the little man that lives inside. 

 Color by sight word and color by word family sheets (Ready2Read)

 Our Chicka Chicka Boom Boom trees are all decorated up!

 Word Family -ip and -ig word sort (Ready2Read)

 Homemade sight word - word search.

 Occupying herself while Selena and I have one-on-one time together.

 Math fun, correspondence and comparing

Caterpillar sight word body parts (Ready2Read)

 This was an impromptu little project... After dinner, Greg goes, "Think we can turn that white dahlia blue?"  So we decided to do a scientific method project. 
Problem Statement:  I wonder if we can make a blue dahlia.
Procedure:  Make blue water for the dahlia to drink.
Hypothesis:  It will turn blue and it will take 20 hours to change (this estimate started at 10 seconds, then 20 seconds, and then we had to have a discussion on time).
Observations:  We made a table, Selena thought that we needed to monitor the size of the bloom (probably left over from measuring the seed growth this spring).  We are also going to be monitoring the colors, the day and time we make our observations, and the water level in the vase (to see if the dahlia is really drinking the blue water). 
I can't wait till tomorrow to see what the status of our "blue dahlia" is!

 To finish the day, we went for a walk.  The girls pushed their strollers and ran on ahead.  We definitely needed the exercise!

First Day of Kindergarten

Today was our FIRST DAY OF KINDERGARTEN!

We had a great day, without a whole lot of planning, and it seemed just like any other day...  

We started the day with  Ready2Read from The Moffatt Girls, we are continuing on from what we started already this summer, so we are in Unit 2 and introduced -ip words today.

I didn't take pictures, but Selena and I did a great intro Scientific Method during free play time.  We had a small cap (similar to a toothpaste tube lid) and a plastic tea set teacup.  Selena wanted to fill the big cup with scoops from the cap.  She thought that 10 caps would fill the cup.  Then we tried 20 caps, still not enough.  57 wasn't enough either.  We were surprised to find that it took exactly 100 small caps to fill the teacup.  We were able to observe surface tension in action.  Then she made an amazing (I'm biased) point, it would take 100 people putting one cap each in the cup!  That is some pretty impressive thinking for the first day of school!

Next we started our Language Arts unit of Billy Goats Gruff.  We have been eagerly anticipating this story set.

  Themed Billy Goats Gruff playdoh mats from Lesson Pathways activity (I printed them in black and had the girls color them before slipping them into page protectors)

 ABC practice with Abby

Totally cute ABC craft for Chicka Chicka Boom Boom from The Crafting Chicks, we will add the letters tomorrow.

Finding something quiet to do while big sister finishes up school work :).
During lunch, the girls were asking about pickles, what are they, why do they taste like that, how do they make them... So, we are going to make some pickles!  We'll probably wait a little while (at least till I get to the store and get the supplies!)

Lesson Plans for 2011-2012

Kindergarten (5 years) and Pre-Kindergarten (3 years)  The Pre-K will be along for the ride. We will do more focused ABC studies for her, but she will do what she can of what the K is doing and play games or do some Preschool Packs from Homeschool Creations.
11 subject areas required;  Health, History, Language Arts, Math, Music Appreciation, Occupational Education, Reading, Science, Social Studies, Spelling, and Writing. (I'm adding in Art, Life Skills, and Fitness)
My interpretation of these for our studies and what my plans for covering each of these are as follows:
{This list is not complete, I'm sure I will add resources as I see other ideas from other families}
Health and Fitness ~ I'm making this up as we go along.  Covering the food groups, healthy eating habits, exercise habits, and engaging in physical activity
History and Social Studies ~ Lesson Pathways 36 Week Guided Pathway We will add in resources, including World Book Clever Kids Study Skills
Language Arts ~ Lesson Pathways 36 Week Guided Pathway  We will pick and choose from this and add in our own, including from:  Teaching with Favorite Clifford Books, Learning Through Literature, First Grade Language, World Book Clever Kids Language Skills, Stories for Beginners
Math ~ Lesson Pathways 36 Week Guided Pathway in addition to 1-100 Activity Book, Mathematics with Unifix Cubes, Unifix Sudoku, Hands on Pattern Blocks, Patternables
Music Appreciation and Art ~  Miscellaneous/my own
Occupational Education and Life Skills ~ Miscellaneous/my own
Reading, Spelling, and Writing ~ The Moffatt Girls Ready 2 Read Program, Sight Word Fun, I Can Read! I Can Write!
Science ~ Lesson Pathways 36 Week Guided Pathway, Easy Science Experiments, Holt Science

 Our new bookshelf in the kitchen (I don't have a before picture, but this location always had a stack of miscellaneous papers, or boxes, or books)

 Daily "What we did" list.  I made this method up today, since it was the first day and I hadn't planned ahead... I'm going to try it out for a while instead of the "What we are going to do" list.  

 I typed up the state guidelines and assigned them numbers, and then typed up a spreadsheet with each of the numbers with columns for dates of introduction, practice, practice, review, and mastery.  I think this will keep me in line with meeting my state's guidelines.
I'm looking forward to our first "official" year of homeschooling!

Symmetry Painting

Saw this idea on a blog I read last week {Heart of the Matter Online} and we just HAD to try it!
We invited Grandma Judy over and we whipped out the paint.

Swim Lessons, Week 2

We really enjoyed our second week of swim lessons, the girls sure learned a lot.  We could see improvement each day.  Selena passed Level II and Abby did not.  We had no expectations as to the testing, but were so proud of Selena getting comfortable in the water.

These sisters LOVE each other!

 Pretty little swimmer

 Cutie patootie

 Action shot!

Wheeee!!!!