Homeschooling December 2013 Part 5

Gym/Ballet Co-op

I gave my girls a laminated poster printed on both sides. On one side, there is an image on the five positions and on the other, I put two pictures. One says "Keep Calm and Point Your Toes" and the other has a ballerina in her toes and a little girl wearing a tutu admiring her.

Homeschooling November 2013 Part 4

Something to think about...

Montessori Sensorial: The Pink Tower

Montessori Sensorial: The Pink Tower

The Pink Tower consists of 10 blocks, starting with the smallest (1cmx1cmx1cm) to the biggest (10cmx10cmx10cm). There are many activities or extensions with this manipulative. We did them all today.

Presentation: Show all pieces and teach how to carry them. Discuss size differences between cubes (blocks).

Put all blocks in order on the floor (see picture above).

Montessori Sensorial: Brown Stair and Extensions

Montessori Sensorial: Brown Stair

The Brown Stair has 10 prisms. 

Length and Width of the biggest prism are 10x10cm. 

The length and width of the smallest prism is 1x1cm.

Presentation: Show child the 10 prisms in the right order.

Show child how to hold/carry them (with both hands and slowly, carefully).

Extension 1: Put Brown Stair together, ask child to close his/her eyes and remove one of the prisms. Push all prisms together to not show the gap that the prism was taken out of.  Show it to the child and have him/her say where it belongs.

Extension 2: Same as Extension 1, but this time, put the prism behind you so the child will rely solely on the rest of the stair, not on the prism removed.

Homeschooling June 2013 Part 1

Spanish: Los Números 1-5

Materials: toilet paper rolls, construction paper, double-sided tape,
black marker, pipe cleaners, cardboard, hot glue gun.

Use the cardboard as a base. 

Cover the rolls with construction paper. 

Write the digits and number words in Spanish.

Hot glue rolls together and then to the base.

Fold pipe cleaner 2/3s of the way.

Make flowers with the numbers.

Use leaves that are color-coded to show where they belong.

Number one vase has one flower, the number two vase has two flowers, etc.

End product. The child can play the game of taking the flowers out and matching them up again and again.

Homeschooling Baby Girl (She is 16 months old now)

I do a little bit of everything with her, from Mathematics to the Alphabet to Animal Names.

Basic Shapes

Basic Shapes and Real-life Objects

Sight words.

Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee

She a quick study. Points at the correct letters sometimes.

Numbers 1-10. Today, we practiced 6-10

Four colors and matching words

Montessori Sensorial: Brown Stair

The Brown Stair has 10 prisms. 

Length and Width of the biggest prism are 10x10cm. 

The length and width of the smallest prism is 1x1cm.

Presentation: Show child the 10 prisms in the right order.

Show child how to hold/carry them (with both hands and slowly, carefully).

Extension 1: Put Brown Stair together, ask child to close his/her eyes and remove one of the prisms. Push all prisms together to not show the gap that the prism was taken out of.  Show it to the child and have him/her say where it belongs.

Extension 2: Same as Extension 1, but this time, put the prism behind you so the child will rely solely on the rest of the stair, not on the prism removed.

Extension 3: Place prisms out of order and place them back in order.

Extension 4: Place prisms far apart in a big area on the floor and then put the Brown Stair back in the right order.

Extension 5: Place the Brown Stair in the right order horizontally and then match it up with the Pink Tower next to it.

Extension 6: Place Brown Stair and Pink Tower side by side (like Extension 3), but vertically.

Extension 7 (Part 1): Alternate the Brown Stair prisms and the Pink Tower blocks on each level.

Extension 7 (Part 1)

Extension 7 (Part 2): Slowly remove all of the Pink Tower blocks, starting at the top.

Extension 7 (Part 2)

Extension 8: It's called the "Shadow." Build the Pink Tower vertically and then the Brown Stair  flat on the floor, tip to tip, making a long shadow effect.

Montessori Practical Life: How to Pack a Lunch

We talked about what is easy to eat at a picnic and we gathered all food items together.
Sandwich, chocolate almond milk, cheddar cheese, gouda cheese, yellow bell pappers, strawberries, placemat, lunchbox.

Then we had a lovely picnic at the park.

Homeschooling Baby Girl

Basic Shapes with name cards

She now points correctly most of the time.

Number cards and matching digits 1-3

Body parts poster

We sing the Twinkle, Twinkle lyrics together.

We also went over other colors, not just the basic ones.

Alphabet cards

Sight words

Homeschooling May 2013 Part 5

Montessori Language Arts: Metal Insets

These guys here are not only used to teach about geometric shapes,
but they are actually used to trace for Language Arts (fine motor skills).

                         

                                 

                                              

Free Play

Yes, free play is very important. As brother and sister, they both need to learn to get along with each other and share toys.  Right now, A is still in the exploration alone/parallel play stage and C is in the "mine, everything you touch is mine and I will take it away from you" stage. Sigh. Like I said, this "free play" time is actually a lesson in social interactions and proper social behavior.  Needless to say, it's a work in progress. :)

Spanish: Los Números (The Numbers)

Learn the numbers from 0-10 with a song.
"Uno, Dos, Tres, Cuatro, Cinco, Seis, Siete
Uno, Dos, Tres, Cuatro, Cinco, Seis, Siete
Ocho, Nueve y Diez
Ocho, Nueve y Diez
Uno, Dos, Tres, Cuatro, Cinco, Seis, Siete"

Stand in front of numbers called.
Stand in front of the number that says how old you are.

Activity: Put the correct number of stickers as the numbers in Spanish.
This time, we just did 1-3.

Art: James Pollock Technique on flat canvas

I absolutely LOVE this! Great choice of colors and good technique.

Desk Work

                                           

Montessori Culture (Geography): The Globe

I presented him with several formas of the globe and talked about it.  We found all the continents (and a few select countries) in each of them.

                                  

Montessori Sensorial: Pink Tower

The Pink Tower consists of 10 blocks, starting with the smallest (1cmx1cmx1cm) to the biggest (10cmx10cmx10cm). There are many activities or extensions with this manipulative. We did them all today.

Presentation: Show all pieces and teach how to carry them. Discuss size differences between cubes (blocks).

Put all blocks in order on the floor (see picture above).

Extension 1: Build the tower (biggest to smallest)
with all blocks centered. See picture above.

Extension 2: Build the tower (biggest to smallest), but aligned  on the left.
The smallest block must fit in the space to the right.

Extension 2 (finished) 

Extension 3: Build the tower (centered) and ask child to close his/her eyes.  Remove a block and place it in front of the tower. Ask child to find where the block goes in the tower and let him/her make an educated guess. If the child isn't correct, ask them to explain their reasoning out loud so you can hear when they're thinking. Give correct answer and discuss why (place the block in the right place to show that it really belonged there).
Extension 4: Same as Extension 3, but this time, hide the block that was removed behind you. This time, the child will have to find which block is missing by just looking at the tower. K did ok, but not too well without seeing the block. In Extension 3, it helped a lot to see the block that was taken out of the tower to see if it fell under the "big, medium or small" category. But without the block, he was just guessing. He's not even 3.5 years old, so I am sure there will be plenty of time to practice this important skill.

Montessori Science: Parts of the Plant

& The Plant Book (homemade by me)

These are the nomenclature cards for the parts of the plant (plant, root, stem, branches, leaves).  I have a couple of small plants that we picked outside that show all parts of the plant. These are perfect and easy (and free) visual aids. Also, going outside and finding the parts of a plant on several different plants is great.

This book was made by me. I simply found pictures of different things online and enlarged them to half a page. Then I stapled it and called it a book. Haha. I still have the file somewhere. If you want it, I can email it to you.  All you need is a good color printer.  There are more pages. I only photographed a few.

Play Time

                                 

Montessori Sensorial: Beading

I'm sure this activity is pretty self-explanatory, but I will still say something. This is a great activity for fine motor skills, creativity, patterning, counting, etc. These beads are wooden, painted in different colors and they have different shapes and sizes. They are great for small hands. I bought the Melissa & Doug brand for about $10. They come with extra long and thick shoelaces, which work great.

** An obvious and repetitive word of caution: DO NOT leave child(ren) unattended
with the shoelaces. The beads are way too big to pose a chocking hazard, but the shoelaces are trouble waiting to happen, so please, please, PLEASE don't
leave child(ren) alone with these... ever.