Saturday, February 22, 2014

Kindergarten curriculum

Kindergarten for Monkey 2013-2014 

This is what we have been using this year. We do not use everything on this list daily. Reading, writing, and math is all that I require to consider it a school day. Anything else is bonus! Science does get done most of the time, though, because it's her favorite. 

Language arts:
Phonics: Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading
Handwriting: Handwriting Without Tears level K
Reading: Readers from the library and The Magic Treehouse books. 

Read alouds:
Sonlight p4/5 as a booklist
Illustrated classics for girls (Usborne)
A Little Princess (abridged)
Brave Emily (AG)
Heidi (abridged)
Little Women (abridged)
Little House in the Big Woods
*I will add to this list as we finish new books*

Math:
Singapore primary mathematics standards edition 1a & 1b
Singapore math challenging word problems 1
Miquon Orange & Red

Science:
For science this year I didn't use any one curriculum. I pulled together several resources to focus on the subjects of her choice.  We started with astronomy and recently moved to dinosaurs.


Astronomy -  DK first space encyclopedia, Evan Moore space units, homeschoolshare lapbook materials, and various activities and printables found around the internet.

Dinosaurs - DK first dinosaur encyclopedia, Evan Moore dino worksheets, Zoobooks timeline and books, Dover dinosaur coloring book, Walking with Dinosaurs BBC shows, and various printables found around the internet

Geography:
Evan Moore Beginning Geography
States & Capitals songs
GEOpuzzles

Electives:
ASL - Signing Time
Spanish - Little Pim
Critical thinking - ZooLogic, IQtwist, Mind Benders

Extra curriculars:
Dance
Piano
Soccer

We have a lot of manipulatives, games, and other hands-on stuff that we pull out often. She also has access to plenty of art supplies!



Monday, February 17, 2014

Catch-up time!

Oh my I have neglected this blog! This post will be a quick catch up of what we've been up to.

In June of 2012 Monkey turned 4. For her party theme she chose.....monkeys!






In July of 2012 we welcomed our second little girl into our family, Bear. She's great fun but she is a handful!


Monkey absolutely adores her little sister. And Bear loves her big sis.  
  

For Monkey's pre-k year we kept it light. We did singapore earlybird math, handwriting without tears pre-k, and hooked on phonics. We read some good books and did some fun science 'experiments'. Since we were in a smaller space she had only one bookcase for her shelf work, but I just rotated often. Many of her activities were the same just with more expected out of them.

In June of 2013, Monkey turned 5. This time she chose Dinosaurs!




In July of 2013 Bear turned 1. She had a little party at the park with a cute bear theme, but I can't find any pics of it right now. I'll edit if I find them. 

In August we gave our school area a complete makeover:
And monkey started Kindergarten!
I will make a separate post to go into what we're doing for Kindergarten.

In September of 2013 I had my shoulder fully replaced, fun stuff. Then four days later Bear broke her wrist climbing out of her crib. So we were twiners in our slings. But you only get a pic of her. ;-)

So there you have it, a year and a half in one post! Next up will be details on Monkey's Kindergarten year!