Our Learning Space

I thought I'd do a post about what our learning space looks like, since I love looking at other people's space. :)

Our living room is long and narrow so we've always had the couch moved up a bit from the window.  When the littles came along, it became a great place to put their toys.  Our DVD storage case became a toy storage, thanks to three canvas boxes from JCPenney and reused baby puff, diaper wipes, nut and cottage cheese containers (I'm still trying to figure out a way to make the cottage cheese containers prettier--spray paint wasn't great and paper would get tore off within seconds of hitting the shelf).  They are especially great for storing all of the wonderful math manipulatives we receive every month from Mother Goose Time.  I would dearly love cutesy, matching organizational bins and containers but right now I'd rather save the money so we can build our home (complete with an actual school room!) sooner rather than later.

We keep a selection of books and our newly acquired BOB books (thank you, Costco) on the top shelf along with a few other toys.

This little play area is a great place for me to sit with the girls and interact as they play in the kitchen or with the dolls.  A lot of language learning goes on here as I name the toy foods and comment on what they are doing at the moment.  We also do lots of imagining, which is so essential for children.  The kitchen, drawer unit and table/chair set are all from the glorious world of IKEA.

We do our "structured" preschool time in the living room and kitchen, for the most part.  I am really happy with our new circle time display.  I ordered a 36" x 48" science board, laminated everything and put it all together in an evening while watching "NCIS" on Netflix.  I used hot glue to attach the clothespins, Velcro dots for the months, calendar, day of the week and weather icons and removable glue dots for the clouds and other items.  We've used it a couple times already and it's holding up to Littlest quite well.

The back of my board is printed with manufacturer information and not pretty so I decided to use my wall for a few of the items that wouldn't fit on the front, such as the new world map and the beehive.  I also laminated an extra copy of the weather icons for Littlest to play with now that she's pretty gotten over putting the sticky tack in her mouth.  I keep the calendar numbers and current lesson materials in the glass compartment of my entertainment center so they're close at hand.

For art and science, we move to the kitchen (I bring in the second IKEA table when we have friends over).   I keep those supplies in our understairs closet, which would take more hours than I currently have free to make photo-worthy.



That's it.  It's not super Pinterest-y but it works for us.

Fun with Bunyan

We had so much fun with our Paul Bunyan tall tales this week.  I love that Littlest is able to participate in these activities; she thinks she's just as big as everyone else and it's pretty easy to help her take part.

We started by reading about Paul Bunyan's birth.  The girls all worked to build a "raft" in the living room and pretended to sleep on it (and then proceeded to roll off into the "water" and have to swim back to the raft--it was great fun).  First, they all wanted their rafts but after experimenting, we found that when we worked together we could make one that was even bigger (and thus, more fun).

We did return to individual rafts to practice our upper and lower case letter identification.  Rather than make a bed for the letter as outlined, they decided it would be more fun to be in bed, too.  I assigned each girl a letter and used the upper and lower case alpha cards from last month's kit.  I shuffled the cards and held one up so the correct Alpha Mommy could claim her baby letter and put it to bed.  Littlest didn't really understand but she liked being given cards to play with like the big girls.

The story pieces are always a huge hit with everyone.  I've been collecting them all week in a big bag and keeping them easily accessible so both girls can play with them anytime they want.  I really need to make a bigger flannel board though.  This one is 12x12; I used one side of a Shutterfly box and hot glued inexpensive felt to it.  It works great but I think I'd like it to be about twice as long.  I'm just waiting for the right box to come from Amazon...

I loved the measuring activity!  Miss M still refers to it when she watches LeapFrog Shapeville Park at lunch and they get to the measuring portion.  We kept it up and both girls walk up and measure themselves periodically (or stuffed animals).  I cut little leaves out of the leftover paper to mark the height of the various objects they chose rather than use the nice big ones in the template.  I'm keeping those to use to mark their height changes over the next few months.

Our second class this week was centered around Babe the Blue Ox.  I did the activities pretty much as outlined except for the art activity.  Instead of paint and paper, we used food coloring in water and paper towels.  The kids got to watch the colors bleed into each other on the paper towels to form green and I had a lot less potential mess to clean up.  It was really fun.  I think I might try a tie dye project using this technique sometime soon (thanks Mom, for the inspiration).

Two other exciting preschool events occurred this week--my September box came with my new circle time display (I'll blog about it specifically next week) and Miss M attended her first open house.  I have her enrolled in a playgroup at the local preschool one day a week to help her broaden her social skill use and she's very excited.  I think it will be a good way to supplement the wonderful curriculum we get to use at home.  She already impressed her teacher when she walked into the room and immediately declared "It's a crescent moon!"while pointing to the stuffed moon hanging over the story area.  Thank you, Mother Goose Time.

Learning with Literature

Our Fables and Folktales theme continues and I'm loving it!  We've done a lot of lessons this week but rather than review everything, I'll just give you the highlights.

On Tuesday we read "The Grasshopper and the Ants" with our friend during school and did some more of the activities.  They were both very good at hopping.  We modified the counting/comparing activity a little, using popped popcorn instead of the unpopped kernels since Littlest was wandering about and still sticks things in her mouth from time to time.  I gave the Ant card to Miss M and the grasshopper to her friend, then they took turns take a number card and putting that the many pieces of popcorn on their card.  It was a little hard getting them to wait long enough to see who had more before they ate the popcorn but I think we got a good introduction of the concept into their heads.

On Wednesday it was "The Tortoise and the Hare".  The girls ran around fast and then walked slowly as I read the story a couple of times.  We played the folder game that came in our day bag and filled out our journals for the day.  They both wanted to go ahead and do more in the journals but I managed to persuade them to wait.  Since we had a little extra time, I also read "The Dog and His Reflection" and we made the dog masks, which they used later as they each pretended to be puppies.

Friday morning we only had a few minutes so we read "The Crow and the Pitcher" and talked about the /p/ sound.  We found the /p/ card in one of our alphabet sets and I held it up every time I said a word that started with that letter.  When I was a speech therapist, we would do a hand motion that corresponded to a particular sound that we were working on to help the child develop more awareness.  For the /p/ sound, put your hand close to your face, close it and then open it quickly like it is popping open (corresponds to the way your lips "pop" open to make the sound).  We had really good success with the method in children with articulation disorders.  For phonemic awareness, I'd display the letter and use the hand signals while reading the story.  It's a variation of the Lindamood-Bell LiPS system, if you're interested in doing more research.

After breakfast today we re-read "The Crow and the Pitcher".  I found a recording of crows online and Miss M flew around the kitchen cawing like one for several minutes before we settled down for the science experiment.  We used the "pebbles" included in our theme materials to show how the water level rises when you add things to the container.  Since it was just me and I wanted to take pictures as well be there to catch Littlest (she's in a climbing/standing on the chair phase), I modified the lesson by using a 2-cup measure with the lines printed on it rather than a glass and a ruler.  Both girls enjoyed putting the pebbles in the cup and we will be able to refer back to it when they take their bath tonight.  After the experiment they made these super cute crow musical shakers that I am sure will get a lot of use (although the wings may not last very long).

Also this morning we read "The Boys and The Frogs".  Miss M and Littlest had fun pretending to be frogs, finding green objects around our living room.  We also used our "Five Little Speckled Frog" book that I got on clearance at a local bookstore several years ago to sing and practice counting and number recognition.  The game board that came in our day bag looked like lots of fun but Miss M wasn't able to make the frogs hop like they were supposed to so instead of getting frustrated, she got creative.  She turned it into a color matching game where she got to be the teacher and tell me what to do  ("Take a card, Mama.  Oh, you got blue!  Put it here!").  I loved letting her take the lead.

An InLinkz Link-up

Fabulous Fables

I love literature and reading.  I have so many books, I can't even put them all out and have to keep some in storage until we can build my dream library.  So I was very excited to see that the August theme for Mother Goose Time is Fables and Folktales.

We had school on Monday with one of our friends, did a little bit on our own and used the activities to have fun with cousins who made an unexpected trip our way.

 We read "The Lion and the Mouse" on Monday and practiced listening for the word "lion" while making their best lion faces.  We read this story a couple times from the book, then I retold it in a little simpler language and we watched a version of it (from YouTube, of course) so they could get the story firmly in their minds.  I like to read various versions of stories.  It helps introduce new vocabulary in a familiar context, makes for good opportunities to compare and contrast how different versions tell the story and is a good way to let kids know they don't have to use the exact same words when they tell the story to you; it's ok to use your own words.  We made the stick puppets included in the lesson as props for them to use when telling the story with others.  Unfortunately, Littlest got a hold of the Mouse and I have yet to locate it but I'm sure it will turn up at some point.

 On Tuesday Miss M's cousins from California joined us for "The Bundle of Sticks".  They are two and four years older than her respectively and they both loved looking at the theme poster, listening to the story and participating in the activities.  The favorite was using the Counting Sticks provided and spinning the spinner to see how many they would be able to use in their play dough creations.  They were a little more advanced in numerical knowledge than Miss M so we did a little addition ("Ok, you got 4 last time and now you get 3, so how many do you have altogether?").  It was great fun for them, although apparently my homemade dough was a little on the oily side, which they made sure to tell me.

On Wednesday it was just Miss M, Littlest and myself in the morning so we read "The Grasshopper and the Ants".  This is one of my favorite fables, probably because it seemed to be my dad's motto growing up.  We only made it to one activity, which transformed into just talking about the letter A into putting all of them alphabet cards in order and making the initial sounds.  Miss M has been enjoying putting our letter magnets in order for the last few days, much to Littlest's chagrin because she usually ends up taking all the letter magnets and not letting her sister play with any of them.  She got through D on her own and then we sang the alphabet song up to E and so on until she got all 26 laid out.  I was proud of her tenacity.  After that, though, she was pretty much done and as I've mentioned before, I don't push school if her heart isn't in it.  I do hope to go through and finish the rest at some point, though, because they looked really fun.

The rest of the week has been taken up with outings, scary bears (our local life science museum has a 9' tall Kodiak in the lobby that growls when you enter--not Miss M's favorite) and swimming, all of which have provided us opportunity to talk about things that have been previously introduced in various Mother Goose Time lessons.

Closing the Case for Nature Detectives

We finished our Nature Detectives theme this week.  Miss M and Littlest really seemed to enjoy exploring trees, water, air and dirt.  In addition to the calendar, reading stories, counting blocks
and singing songs we did some fun learning activities on Monday and Wednesday.

The kids love the theme posters and cluster around looking for things with their laminated magnifying glasses.  I think it would be fun to make our own poster as the month goes by, drawing or cutting out pictures that relate to the theme we are studying.  It's a great language activity and one they seem to enjoy.

One of the activities included burying letters in dirt or sand and then digging them up and identifying them.  I decided it was okay if they got a little dirty and we actually attempted this as written in my sandbox/planter but as luck would have it, it was quite windy and kept blowing the sand in their eyes so we stopped after a few minutes, even though they were really enjoying the treasure hunt for letters.

We were supposed to draw in sand or dirt but I had the genius idea (insert sarcasm) to use flour instead because for some reason I thought that would be easier to clean up (it's not).  At least the kids loved tracing the shapes in the flour and I know it would be a popular way to work on writing again.  I started this activity by tracing the shape myself and then having them trace my shape before patting the flour down (and up into the air, all over their clothes and faces...) and doing it themselves.  It seemed like a successful way to help them get the idea of making shapes other than spirals and circles.  Salt would have been a better medium to use since it's heavier than flour and would dust up so much.  I will do this again with Miss M and Littlest but not on a windy day, so we can take it outside.  I am also going to make a gel writing pad like this one, that they can use inside and on road trips.

The hedgehog art activity was fun, I let them roll the spiky ball in paint and then around a blank piece of paper while I painted their hands one at a time for the hedgehog.  They liked the sensory nature of this activity a lot and afterwards we watched a little kid's nature video about hedgehogs during snack to learn more about them.

The girls really liked the Mouse Maze activity, although Miss M needed a lot of direction to get started (she just wanted to draw a straight line from the mouse to his mommy).  They didn't know what mice ate so we watched another little video on mice (I'm started to love YouTube) in order to learn what they should draw on the pictures.

I was a little surprised by how much they enjoyed patterning with the cards.  They took turns making each pattern and repeating it out as far as they could.  At the library later, Miss M and I practiced some more with the blocks, using the different shapes.  I thought she was maybe a little too young but with as much fun as she had, I think we will be doing more of this.  I see colored pasta necklaces and patterned collages in our future.

The mushroom houses were adorable.  Since we only have an hour, there wasn't enough time to paint the tops and let them dry but they seemed fine with markers.  I kind of want to make some salt clay and create little critters for them.

That's it for July.  I am really excited for fables and folktales in August since I love stories and reading and want to pass that on to the girls.

Professionalism at Home

This month, we as Mother Goose Time bloggers, have been asked to think about professionalism in regards to how it applies to us personally.  Being a homeschool mom, I have a slightly different take on it than a childcare provider or preschool teacher using this curriculum.  For me, I bring professionalism into our home preschool in two ways:  being prepared and understanding the learning process at different age levels.

Being prepared is huge and it can be difficult at times.  It is tempting to just fly by the seat of my pants during lessons, opening the lesson book up to a page and just picking something.  However, I find when I take the time to read through the activities and gather my materials ahead of time, everything goes so much more smoothly.  Miss M is 2.5 and Littlest just turned 1; neither has a very long attention span at this point so if I want to keep their attention, I have to be prepared.  If I look down to read about the activity or go digging through the closet for the materials, they are off on their own adventures and bringing them back to school can be a fight.  That is not what I want for them or myself; I want them to want to engage in the activities so I need to have my stuff together ahead of time.

I find that reading through the lesson book the night before generally works pretty well, although ideally I'd like to be about a week ahead so I can purchase any materials I don't already have at home (this isn't very common since most of the materials are either provided or quite common).  During breakfast I gather all the materials we will need for my chosen activities and prep our circle time area.  After the girls are done with breakfast, they play while I clean up the kitchen (I can't concentrate with dirty trays and dishes sitting on the counter) and I make sure I give them several warnings that we will be having school when I'm done.  If they are in the middle of an imaginary scene when I finish, I let them play through it and then find that they willingly come into the living room for school.

Understanding child development and the learning process helps me know how much to present, what to expect of them and when I should back off and just let them play.  A lot of this information I learned in my undergraduate and graduate studies in speech language pathology and while working in the schools.  My husband and I took a child development/parenting class when I was expecting Miss and I try to read up on current studies.  A lot of it comes from Baby Center and similar sites right now because that's all the time I have but keeping current and following best practices reduces frustration on everyone's part.  I am working my way through "The Well Trained Mind" by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise and it has been quite helpful.  I'm not going to expect either girl to sit for ten minutes in a chair and practice copying the alphabet.  I can expect them to practice scribbling for a few minutes (maybe longer if I have lots of different supplies to choose from) and maybe work on circles and lines briefly, the precursors to writing.

Above all, I try to stay sensitive to their moods and their needs as really little children.  I know they will learn to read one day but they will never get to be little children again.  The main goal is to build a strong relationship with them, let them play and explore and present information that they may or may not absorb in that moment but will some day.

Here are some pictures from school this past Tuesday.  I let Miss M dictate the length of each activity based on her interest in it and it went really, really well.  Much better than when I decide we are ready to move to another activity.

This "washing" activity was very popular with both girls.  I took our dry erase crayons (if you want to get some, back to school sales are the best time to do that and they are starting now/soon) and wrote numbers on a page protector, then named a number and Miss M got to "wash" it off.  Littlest showed interest in it so I did the same for her but actually wrote her name on a piece of laminated paper.  She had a more difficult time cleaning it off (she wasn't push hard enough) and soon decided shredded the tissue was more fun so Miss M took over and named all the letters as she wiped them off.  I think this could be a fun and easy road trip activity.

Next we did a little sorting activity.  They were supposed to use the ladle to fish out a shape and then we'd talk about what it was.  That lasted two turns before they dumped everything on the carpet so instead of pushing the "rules" of the game, we adapted.  I picked a shape and then Miss M found all the shapes that were the same and the three of us put them in my slipper (it was handy and Littlest loves to put items into things).  Then we counted how many we had and started with a new shape.  They were both very engaged in the activity for over five minutes, until we finished sorting them all.

We also read the "I Wash" book that came with our materials.  I got through it one time before it was taken away so Miss M could read it "all herself", which was fine with me.

Lastly, we did a little mixing experiment with milk, food coloring and dish soap.  Unfortunately all of my food coloring was dried up except blue (a lesson in not being as prepared as I should have been) but Miss M didn't seem to mind.  She got too excited both times and would just stick the q-tip with dish soap right in the blue instead of in the middle the bowl like you were "supposed to" but we still had a fun time watching the dye scatter through the milk.  She loved mixing it thoroughly but I had to put a stop to it when it became a hand printing session on the table and floor.

So that's what being a "professional" homeschool mom looks like to me.

Exploring Air and Water

We are getting caught up on our school units.  There are so many fun activities, it's hard not to do them all but I had to do some picking and choosing this week since we also had to shopping,  cleaning and other necessary things around the house.

On Saturday Miss M and Littlest needed something to do so I slightly adapted another art project from our lesson book from the tree week.  I taped off a tree shape onto a piece of paper and let Miss M paint the whole paper, then peeled it off when it was dry.  It's somewhat noticeable.  Littlest was given crayons but really wanted to paint like her sister so she managed to dip the crayon in the paint and use it to stamp her paper.  She was actually pretty careful with it, not trying to decorate the wall, table or herself, so I stood nearby while she had fun.  Miss M thought that was pretty neat and started doing it, too.  I am working on controlling that part of me that wants to make sure everything happens the way it "should" and let things happens the way they will (within reason, of course).

On Monday we had a great time with our friends learning about air and the fun things it can do.  This month's theme poster is a big hit with all the kids, they love looking for new things during circle time.  We looked for things that float, fly and make colors in the air.  We talked about hot air balloons (one of friends got to go up in one in June during our town's annual festival) and made the adorable craft.  During snack I found a Mr. Wizard clip on YouTube that teaches about hot air balloons so we watched that.  The kids were mesmerized.

The feathers were fun, the kids waved them in the air to feel the way the air moved and then we had feather races, blowing them across the floor.  They were a little giddy and took off, pretending to be birds or I would have contrasted how the feathers moved with trying to blow on something heavier.  

Our last "structured" activity was coloring rainbows.  I showed them the daily poster with the rainbow picture and we talked about the recent rainbow that had appeared in our neighborhood during the last rainstorm.  The kids could name the colors and kind of tried to follow the pattern for their coloring pages but Miss M especially liked using whatever colors suited her fancy.

This morning found us friendless (due to other plans, not because they no longer like us) so we did some school with just the three of us.  I had planned a lot of different activities from the water week but the Puddle Jumping activity proved to be quite fun and then we modified it a bit so that was the only one we got to today.  Miss M liked seeing how far she could jump and then counting her steps to see if she could jump as far as Mommy.  When it got too hot to hop outside, we brought the puddle pieces inside and I made a trail of letters from the start to the finish.  Miss M hopped from one letter to another until she reached the end, naming them as she went.  Another modification could be to make more puddle pieces, number them on one side and put letters on the back.  Kiddos have to hop from puddle to puddle in order and then identify the letter on the back before hopping to the next one.  I think we might try this tomorrow, since we are starting potty training and will be housebound for several days with hours and hours of time to fill close to the powder room.  I really want to do the Eyedropper Art project (dripping watery paint down an umbrella cut out) and hope that Miss M will be amenable to it tomorrow (she just wanted to hop today).  I'll post the finished product if I can get her to do it.