Days 4-7 of Creation

Week 2 of 36

Here is the lesson plan we are loosely following. I feel practically lazy this year going by a pre-made curriculum and someone else having great daily plans. All I have to do is buy books, gather a few things and implement :-)

Weekly Learning Poster

Bible felt with the days of creation

Books of the Week on theme, number and animals going back to creation

Munchkin REALLY enjoys retelling the story through the props.

Counting through shopping

finger tracing with our number rhyme

Playing match with the days of the week

Memory Creation Game

Munchkin has this down :-)

We talk frequently about Creation addressing the mine word. I tell our little guy if He created it, it's his. Once we get down to the root material of any object, it's God :-)

In the beginning, Days 1-3 Creation

Week 1 of 36

I've been looking forward to blogging weekly again about our learning adventures. It feels so much more official this year buying a pre-made curriculum. This year starts writing and reading too. I really enjoy having much more of the work completed for me. This first week was a great introduction for all us to get back in the flow. We did school twice a week which is what our church's MDO program does, so I feel that's realistic and staying on track for Munchkin who will be 3 years old in 9 short weeks.... *gulp*  Last year he was asking for school, so if that's the case, I have activities, pages and other ideas as needed.  We read, play, sing and are learning every day, so it's so much more natural and organic now to see the opportunity to have fun and learn when curiosity hits. 

Learning Poster for the week

Our books for the week

I feel that we were able to fully utilize the material to Munchkin's attention span, interest and learning style.     I really like the lesson plans these ladies are utilizing with this curriculum.   Every 4th to 5th week is a review week so we can try additional activity suggestions - there are many on the ABCJLM forum, website, blog and fb group pages. Plus, we'll use some of our favorite manipulatives, printables and books from last year as well that will grow well with our learning.

Pointing out one of many of God's creations and naming colors

Visual for our memory verse

Munchkin can say his memory verse including book and chapter

  

Mommy's been using some teachable moments connected with God's creation. Everything belongs to God since He's the ones who created it. I think it's the cornerstone for stewardship and finances down the road, plus it addresses the pesky 'mine' word in the present. 

Matching game with the first 3 days of creation

Singing our creation song and matching numbers to His creation

Flashlight games in the dark while we talked about God making light where there was none.

Daily calendar activity from starfall.com

Our book of the week from YouTube

Number zero video

5 Little Ducks craft. We counted, named colors and talked about the bible stories that correlated with the theme of the book like the lost coin and prodigal son while doing this. 

ABCJLM memory verse visual

Our first day of school :-)

What's the the Bible, volume #1

Charlie Church Mouse Creation activities

Number of the week while doing our rhyme

Drawing and talking about our family

Matching up colors on the ice cream cone

Education cubes. We rolled the dice and named the number and what God created on that day.

Letter review on our own

 God continues to provide on the journey to learn at home with encouragement, support from other homeschoolers, groups and co-ops. His financial provision for materials we knew we could do with out, but would enhance our learning has been faith growing and a confirmation of our path. This Bible Felt set was one of those things. It's a wonderful example of how trusting in God always reaps a reward whether it's reminding us that He is in control and either pointing us towards are other resources to utilize or treating us to something we were dreaming of :-)

Bible Felt set :-D

Daddy and Munchkin talking about creation while I was starting dinner tonight

Doodlebug is there along the way every day. Even though he's not quite 15 months, we all have fun together reading, praying, loving and being a family. We had a great summer with tons of play dates, playgroups, firsts and fun but I'm glad to be back doing this. I love who we are as a family and what God has placed on our hearts to do. This works for us on so many levels.  It's my calling, my hobby and my passion to homeschool my precious sons. I'm a nerd about school supplies, books, manipulatives, free downloads and articles. I wouldn't trade getting to see my favorite faces all day for anything :-D

First Day of School 2012

First day of 3 year old preschool school went great today :-)

 Munchkin woke up in his big boy bed for the first time this morning to a fun day of learning.

Debut of the big boy bed

 We started week 1 in our curriculum this morning. Today we introduced the first 3 days of creation while reading related books, singing songs, doing a rhyme, activities and memorizing scripture. Academically, we talked about calendar time such as the days of the week song. We also covered the number zero as we did our book of the week as well as watched a couple of videos. We tied our book of the week in with the prodigal son and the parable of the lost sheep. We finished up with coloring and a matching creation game. 

Doodlebug sure was a good sport today :-)

I'll post highlights of our learning at the end of each week. I just couldn't let the first day go by with out it's own entry :-)

2012-2013 Curriculum

I really enjoy seeing other homeschoolers curriculum choices, so I thought I'd share ours. Last year was our first year and we spent piecing together Montessori materials and activities through various sources.  Our main goal was to build a faith based children's library while introducing Munchkin to basic letters, numbers, colors and shapes introducing the Bible through stories, songs, memory verses and character training. With God's help and direction, we were able to do those things. We are now ready to move forward with a new year :-D

2012-2013 Curriculum

This year, I went with a curriculum called ABC Jesus Loves Me for Munchkin's 3 year old preschool year. I ordered the spiral bound curriculum book.  They also offer a corresponding workbook and coloring pages that we haven't decided if we'll purchase or just download from the site offered for free as we go. The curriculum is free for individual homeschoolers and all downloadable from their main site. Christian preschools can use when they buy a license. ABCJLM also has a facebook page, discussion forum and blog called "Our Out-of-Sync Life" as support, inspiration, sharing, questions and collaboration.

I also purchased a 544 page Comprehensive Curriculum of Basic Skills workbook as well.

Some very generous preschool teachers shared their books with me for planning: 

Homeschooling resources to refer to through out the year:

Our main bible resources for the year:

The goals from the ABCJLM website are:

• know several Bible stories, Memory Verses, Nursery Rhymes, Finger plays, and Songs which they can recall when prompted

• know the names of all of the uppercase and lowercase letters
• know the phonetic sound of all of the letters
• be able to correctly trace all uppercase and lowercase letters with their finger
• know by name and be able to correctly trace the numbers 1-15 with their finger
• be able to identify various colors and shapes
• be able to demonstrate spatial concepts, sorting, and AB and ABA patterns
• be able to say the letters of their first name as well as write them
• be introduced to many books
• increase in fine and gross motor skills

How we'll apply those to our little guy:

We are using a combination of The Beginner's Bible, The Jesus Storybook Bible and Hands On Bible activities this year going through the bible.

Character training will come from this book:

Munchkin knows all the upper case letters, we'll do some special emphasis on the few confusing lower case letters for him such as b and d, p and q, etc.

He knows all of his phonic sounds but writing is new for him. We did some pre-writing tracing last year. We will start with this dry erase board, continuing with the salt box, sandpaper letters as well as worksheets reinforced with phone aps and websites.

Dry erase tracing

We introduced concepts, sorting and patterns this last year, but we'll work on taking that to the next level.

Pre primer sight words and teaching basic CVC words will begin. Watching him learn to write his name will be very exciting. We also bought "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" which has been recommended by many preschool mommies.

We are going to focus as well on one-to-one correspondence. Munchkin recognizes 0 to 10 and knows how to count from 1 to 15, so we are ready to take that to the next level.

Along the year, we'll add a chore chart and some introduction to money. 

For a chore chart, we are looking at Accountable Kids 






For finances, I'm still trying to decide between Dave Ramsey's program for kids and Crown Financial Peace ministries children's program.

  

Also, I have seen some wonderful preschool science experiments that I can't wait to do with Munchkin :-)

First day of school for us is Monday!