This is going to be a short post because there is honestly not much to say.
This Concept Week was pretty easy. The point of it was to do some fun Yule/Christmas/winter activities and to learn how other countries celebrate their December (sometimes January) holiday. It was neat to learn about other versions of Christmas (in the Netherlands it's called Sinterklaas after Santa), what they believe in those countries and how they celebrate. For instance, in some countries Jesus or the Wise Men leave the presents, in others elves or Santa do. Then other countries have their own mythical person - like Russia where Grandfather Frost & the Snow Maiden leave the gifts and sometimes have to fight Baba Yaga as she tries to steal them! As far as bad kids go they don't all get coal - in some countries (like Germany) they get sticks! Some countries the holiday will last for one day, in others it will last for weeks. Some countries the holiday is religious, others secular, others a combination.
After we read all about these countries we compared them to how we celebrate. We talked about how every culture has their own traditions and beliefs and how different families within the same culture will even believe or practice different things.
For our book we read The Berenstain Bears Meet Santa Bear by Stan & Jan Berenstain (of course it was a Berenstain Bears book!) and for our activity we wrote our letters to Santa.
In the end we picked up some new traditions that my kids want to try out this year. One they really want to do is a Russian tradition where they make 12 dishes for Christmas Eve dinner to represent the 12 Apostles. I told them that we will have to figure out something similar for us to do.
If you are interested in the country worksheets they came from education.com (of course!). Just look up First Grade Christmas worksheets and you'll find them no problem. Hopefully it will give you some idea to add to your own tradition. After Yule I'll post about all the new traditions we tried out this year and how they worked out.
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Two Week Review: October 25 - November 7
Sorry this post is so late. My grandmother came & visited while this post was going on. I like it when she visits, I know my kids get excited when great-grandma comes, but for some reason everything goes sideways when she is here. Some how, no matter how much I try, every plan I make seems to fly right out the window. I don't know what it is, we just cannot stay on schedule when she is here. We'll even get ahead of schedule before she comes and by the time she leaves we are either barely staying on schedule or have fallen ridiculously far behind. I just do not understand.
Enough about that (for now).
Remember how last post I mentioned that Scooby-Doo can not only count to 11 but also point to the correct numbers while doing it? And remember how I said I wasn't sure if that was just a coincidence or if he really recognized his numbers? Well, I have my answer, he actually recognizes his numbers!
First, my aunt mailed a foam clock to my kids to help Optimus Prime and Bumblebee learn to tell time. Scooby-Doo saw it, stole it, and walked around the house for two days straight pointing to all of the correct numbers and reading them off. Then, we went to the book store, hit up the kids section, and were wandering through the aisles when he saw the spine of a random chapter book that had a tiny #2 on it (because it was book 2 in a series). He pointed to the book and started saying "Two! Two! Two!" over and over again until I walked over to see what he was talking about. Once he saw that I was paying attention he said "Two!" one last time, gave me a big grin, and ran off in another direction.
I'm almost sad we're doing letters instead of numbers.
With Optimus Prime & Bumblebee nothing new is going on. Like I said up above, there was chaos but other than that nothing new. Despite the chaos we finished up their 1st quarter schedule in record time! They wanted it over badly, especially when I told them next quarter the work load was lighter. I'm not going to bother you with the details... okay, I threw out the old schedule with all my notes scribbled on it before I thought to copy them onto this post.
We started 2nd quarter the first week of November. It was our Concept Week as well, so we only had Math, English, Spelling & Logic.
They loved Logic (of course). For once they loved Spelling! They were glad to just do some nice, easy colors sheets. They are also seriously rejoicing the lack of Spelling quizzes (still).
Math we have FINALLY moved onto some easier stuff. We're done with adding and subtracting up to 18. They weren't ready for that yet. We are now onto greater than/less than, rulers, above/below, number patterns, etc. Their book is almost finished, middle of next week we'll be starting a new one. English is the same as always. Right now it's focusing on sentence structure - capital letters, periods, question marks, exclamation points, etc.
Our Concept Week was Winter Holidays/Christmas. I'll try to get that post up in the next few days. They loved it, so I'm glad we did it. No one-on-one time, I'll save that for a regular schoolwork week.
That's pretty much all I can think of right now. New update in two weeks.
Enough about that (for now).
Remember how last post I mentioned that Scooby-Doo can not only count to 11 but also point to the correct numbers while doing it? And remember how I said I wasn't sure if that was just a coincidence or if he really recognized his numbers? Well, I have my answer, he actually recognizes his numbers!
First, my aunt mailed a foam clock to my kids to help Optimus Prime and Bumblebee learn to tell time. Scooby-Doo saw it, stole it, and walked around the house for two days straight pointing to all of the correct numbers and reading them off. Then, we went to the book store, hit up the kids section, and were wandering through the aisles when he saw the spine of a random chapter book that had a tiny #2 on it (because it was book 2 in a series). He pointed to the book and started saying "Two! Two! Two!" over and over again until I walked over to see what he was talking about. Once he saw that I was paying attention he said "Two!" one last time, gave me a big grin, and ran off in another direction.
I'm almost sad we're doing letters instead of numbers.
With Optimus Prime & Bumblebee nothing new is going on. Like I said up above, there was chaos but other than that nothing new. Despite the chaos we finished up their 1st quarter schedule in record time! They wanted it over badly, especially when I told them next quarter the work load was lighter. I'm not going to bother you with the details... okay, I threw out the old schedule with all my notes scribbled on it before I thought to copy them onto this post.
We started 2nd quarter the first week of November. It was our Concept Week as well, so we only had Math, English, Spelling & Logic.
They loved Logic (of course). For once they loved Spelling! They were glad to just do some nice, easy colors sheets. They are also seriously rejoicing the lack of Spelling quizzes (still).
Math we have FINALLY moved onto some easier stuff. We're done with adding and subtracting up to 18. They weren't ready for that yet. We are now onto greater than/less than, rulers, above/below, number patterns, etc. Their book is almost finished, middle of next week we'll be starting a new one. English is the same as always. Right now it's focusing on sentence structure - capital letters, periods, question marks, exclamation points, etc.
Our Concept Week was Winter Holidays/Christmas. I'll try to get that post up in the next few days. They loved it, so I'm glad we did it. No one-on-one time, I'll save that for a regular schoolwork week.
That's pretty much all I can think of right now. New update in two weeks.
Thursday, November 7, 2013
Concept Week #6: Ancient Egypt
Prepare yourself for lots of pictures!
We were supposed to do Outer Space, but Optimus Prime begged, begged, begged, and BEGGED to do Ancient Egypt instead. We have (well, had now) a neat kit to make your own pyramids and he's been itching to do it for months. So, I took pity on him and we did Ancient Egypt.
The kit (pictured above, titled "Amazing Pyramids Art & History Kit" said aged 10 & up, but honestly so long as you are willing to mix the plaster there is no reason for it to be that age range) my mom got for me and my husband YEARS ago, long before our boys were born, on clearance at some store and for some reason we never got around to doing it. It lived in two previous states with us, collecting dust, so I was more than happy to bust it out and make some pyramids. That solved the project part of our unit, and for worksheets I went to education.com (would I go anywhere else?) and printed some up about the Ancient Egyptian gods, the pyramids, the lighthouses, the mummies, the Pharaohs... I think you see where this is going. I was left worrying about the book, but luck was with me, there was a book inside of the kit that had the instructions in it as well as some short stories (seven, to be exact) about how they believed the pyramids were built told from the point of views of the Pharaohs, the chief builders, the priests, and the princes. So we had a story book in the end.
There was a neat set up with a map and a bunch of plastic pyramids to set up on the map to see where everything was and what size things were in relation to each other. The plaster was for three of the pyramids, but there was so much extra that we made quite a few more with the plastic pyramids for the map. After everything dried we painted the plaster pyramids and the plastic ones and set them all up on the map.
Scooby-Doo even got in on this project and happily helped paint some of the pyramids.
It was definitely a very fun project.
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We were supposed to do Outer Space, but Optimus Prime begged, begged, begged, and BEGGED to do Ancient Egypt instead. We have (well, had now) a neat kit to make your own pyramids and he's been itching to do it for months. So, I took pity on him and we did Ancient Egypt.
The kit (pictured above, titled "Amazing Pyramids Art & History Kit" said aged 10 & up, but honestly so long as you are willing to mix the plaster there is no reason for it to be that age range) my mom got for me and my husband YEARS ago, long before our boys were born, on clearance at some store and for some reason we never got around to doing it. It lived in two previous states with us, collecting dust, so I was more than happy to bust it out and make some pyramids. That solved the project part of our unit, and for worksheets I went to education.com (would I go anywhere else?) and printed some up about the Ancient Egyptian gods, the pyramids, the lighthouses, the mummies, the Pharaohs... I think you see where this is going. I was left worrying about the book, but luck was with me, there was a book inside of the kit that had the instructions in it as well as some short stories (seven, to be exact) about how they believed the pyramids were built told from the point of views of the Pharaohs, the chief builders, the priests, and the princes. So we had a story book in the end.
There was a neat set up with a map and a bunch of plastic pyramids to set up on the map to see where everything was and what size things were in relation to each other. The plaster was for three of the pyramids, but there was so much extra that we made quite a few more with the plastic pyramids for the map. After everything dried we painted the plaster pyramids and the plastic ones and set them all up on the map.
Scooby-Doo even got in on this project and happily helped paint some of the pyramids.
It was definitely a very fun project.
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