September 3-7, 2012

This was our first official week of homeschooling, and we had a very fun time! As I talked about in my Not Back To School post, Rainbow Girl and I did Kindergarden last year and are doing First Grade this year. Sugar Bear is only two, but in an effort to include him in "school", we are calling him a preschooler.

Day 1 in our school room, holding their morning candles.

Watching the candles before saying our morning verse.
"Upon the Earth, I stand upright.
I reach my arms up to the light.
My feet Earth bound remain.
Hands and feet together again.
The sky above, the Earth below,
And here in the center am I"

Practicing the letter "A"

Practicing lowercase "b"

We talked about all the fun things we had done over the summer. She drew a picture in her notebook. I wrote the words on the board and she came and rewrote the words.

Rainbow watercolor painting.

Short a and long a sounds

Tuesday was the Not Back To School Homeschooler's picnic

At the Not Back To School Homeschooler's picnic

At the Not Back To School Homeschooler's picnic

After Axel went down for a nap, we went down to the school room and drew pictures from the story we read the night before, The Magic Spindle.

She then requested to write her numbers.

Math gnomes! Add, subtract, multiply and divide.

Axel was stung by a bee on Sunday. Since then, Skylar has wanted to know everything she can about bees. This afternoon we watched youtube videos about bees.

Sugar Bear helping me make lunch while eating all the hummus.

Drawing pictures from the story we had just read, The Bear's Child. 

Big B and little b.

"Mommy, I am going to be the teacher and teach you your shapes. Can you draw me an octagon so that I can turn it into a stop sign?"

Rainbow Girl asked to buy a big bunch of brocoli at the store, and then asked to cut it on her  own.

She did an amazing job, and ate a lot of it!

Thursday was my first day delivering produce in our area through a local coop. We had a great time doing it, until the sky opened up and we had to drive through terrible rain and some flooded streets. We finally made it home and played in the rain since we were already drenched.

Puddle time!

Checking out our produce.

After a bath and putting Sugar Bear down for a nap, Rainbow Girl and I went downstairs and did our morning verse.

Mommy checking her plans.

The letter C.  I helped her spell the words that she came up with.

I opened our box of Unifix Cubes and started playing with them. The following are all creations and ideas directly from Rainbow Girl.

Counting Unifix Cubes

Stacking Unifix Cubes

Making stairs

Rainbow Girl

Playing "The Sleeping Beauty Game"

Eating Bananas and looking at the fog.

Donut party with our awesome homeschooling friends. 

Trying to turn on the see saw with my keys.

Teamwork.

This week I had some realizations. My plan was to follow the Oak Meadow curriculum, and that was what we were going to do. The kids do not like every aspect of that so far, and really, what is the point of homeschooling if one can not adapt to the children's needs. The plan from here on out is to follow the kids' lead, more or less an unschooling approach, with inspiration from the curriculum. Rainbow Girl really likes the ritual of doing the verse, candle and exercises every time we "start school" and she also likes having some "school" time. 

Next week, Rainbow Girl will have her first Spanish and Art classes with a group of other homeschoolers. We should also hear soon when Girl Scouts starts. We plan to start knitting while on our beach trip, and will begin playing the recorder when we return. 

I hope you enjoyed seeing some of our first week and continue to follow us on our journey. :)

Water/Light Table

I had wanted an inside water table for my kids for a long time, so we decided to build one! Luckily, my fantastic dad helped out yet again and built and painted the frame for our table. The bins I purchased from Target. It is very useful to have lids for the table, and conveniently, bins come with lids!

Playing with waterbeads with friends.

Frozen Snack!

Our Discovery Bottles!

So I had gotten my wish of a water table, but now what I had to have was a light table! Whew are those expensive! I looked into making one. I thought about using frosted plexiglass for the tops, but decided that would be too expensive. I bought another set of the same bins I used in the water table and went about frosting the lids.

My lids and my frosting spray paint! I recommend lightly sanding the plastic first before painting so that the paint adheres to the surface better. My first attempt, I did not sand and the paint peeled.

Valspar Frosting Spray Paint

Now for the lights. I opted for LEDs, but these in particular flicker eeeeever so slightly. Enough to bug me, but the kids don't mind one bit.

I thought about painting the inside of my bins to channel the light upward instead of letting it flow out of the clear bin, but decided to go with foil to not only channel the light but hopefully amplify and reflect it 

My foil lined bin, glued to the bin with Elmer's glue. 

Lights evenly spread, taped down to prevent slipping around, with both ends coming out the top of the back.

TaDa!

I slid the light bins right into the water table bins, connected the two boxes' light strands and we were ready to go! 

Our new favorite thing is playing with the water table with the light bins underneath!