Unit 2: Moon

Unit 2 is all about the letter Mm and the moon. We learned that the moon does not have any light of it's own, but reflect's sunlight. The moon is a light only because the sun shines on it. Caleb learned he is like the moon and Jesus is like the sun. If Caleb takes the time to know Jesus and spend time with him reading, praying, and obeying then Jesus' light shines on him and he becomes a light for other people to see. Jesus said, "You are the light of the world . . . let your light shine in front of others. Then they will see the good things you do. And they will praise your Father who is in heaven." Matthew 5:14-16

One of our activities was to go into a dark room and shine a flashlight onto a round object. Here our flashlight represents the sun and the earth is our moon. As you can see the moon is reflecting the sun's light. Caleb loved this activity and stayed at a long while.

Caleb learned the phases of the moon. He likes to look up in the night sky and tell me what phase the moon is in. Ah, what joy to know your child really does listen even if it seems like they are not.

Moon cake anyone? We made craters and even had a tiny volcanic eruption. Unfortunately, we did not have any regular white milk so we used chocolate soy milk instead. What fun! Only the cake tasted terrible.

   Full Moon

Half Moon

Crescent Moon

 New Moon

In Math Caleb learned the terms same and different. Here he had to match the same pattern and cross out the picture that was different. As teacher, I have to learn to let him answer it on his own after we've reviewed and then discuss if he's wrong and why. Difficult to do sometimes.

He finished the month of April writing in his numbers and continuing with the pattern. Boy did he get upset when I told him there were not 31 days in April. He insisted since we had a velcro dot on the big calendar and it was missing a number. I did my best to explain why. We'll see how the month of May goes.

Handwriting practice still looking great.

Caleb is getting plenty of practice in sound discrimination in preparation for reading. He learned the letter /m/ sound and crossed out any picture that did not begin with /m/. One evening when Larry, Caleb and I were out to dinner we were all playing a game of how many things we could name that began with either the /s/ or /m/ sounds. That was so cool and enjoyable.

This units read aloud was Moonbear's Shadow by Frank Asch. I didn't make it to the library for additional books so I started to read On The Banks of Plum Creek by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Caleb likes the chapter books, but misses the pictures he always asks to see the pictures. Plus he asks a lot of questions like what is a Pa and Ma or why is Nellie so mean and on and on. Sometimes we hardly make it through a chapter. I am happy to answer his questions.

Our instructions: move slowly and gracefully around the room with a beanbag on your head. Well, no beanbags just little teddy bears and not so gracefully either. We danced to Mozart's: Eine Kline Nachtmusik ["A Little Night Music"] (I. Allegro). A super long song we thought would never end.

 Finally, we were reminded that God made the sun.

God made the moon and the stars. This now hangs off the dining room kitchen light. Caleb likes to turn it everyday when it changes from light to dark and dark to light. 

Unit 1: Sun

Unit 1 is all about the letter Ss and the Sun. We learned that Jesus is the light of the world and without light we are in the darkness. We tried to walk in a pitch black closet room unsuccessfully. The sun's light is important to all of life just as Jesus is important to all of life. We read the parable of the man blind from birth and how Jesus healed him. Then we blindfolded each other to pretend we were blind and cried out to Jesus for help. This really helped solidify the concept and Caleb loved acting out the scene. I included acting out the scene on my own and since it was a hit we will do more.

This is Caleb's painting of the sun. He was asked to paint a round circle with yellow and orange rays coming forth to reinforce the math concept of patterns.

Caleb made a sun badge with the words Jesus is the light of the world. The next time you see him ask him what it means. He'll tell you!

Oh no, the grapes are gone! We put out a few seedless grapes to make raisins. Caleb decided he could not wait and just had to eat them.

Another neat project we did was make a sun dial. This kept getting delayed because of the terrible winds we were having hence all the rocks around our sturdy piece of cardboard. We were learning about shadows.

Math includes a 100 day chart. Here we are on day six. Caleb writes in the numbers. When we get to the end we will have a celebration. I was thinking of giving him 100 marbles. Any other ideas?

Caleb is learning the days of the week and months. He writes in the number and then he completes the pattern. Here we have blue circle, yellow circle, blue square, yellow square, and so on. This is part of his math.

Caleb is learning to print his numbers and letters. Looks pretty good. I have extra sheets for him to work on printing is practiced a couple of times per week.

We danced to Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite (Russian Dance). Not surprisingly this went over very well with Caleb. He loves to sing and dance and pretend he is playing drums or guitar.

Here are a few books we checked out from the library for our daily read aloud's. We also read through the junior edition of Pilgrim's Progress before bedtime. I love Pilgrim's Progress and plan to purchase it soon.

In Elemental Science we learned about solids and liquids. Caleb made crayon cookies and learned that crayons need more heat to become a liquid. Later we enjoyed a fudge popsicle and talked about the heat from our mouth melting the popsicle.

Here Caleb choose five different items: cheese, brown sugar, fish crackers, toffee bits, and brown rice to see which would melt. He predicted they would all melt. The winner is cheese! Nothing else melted. I was surprised the brown sugar became hard and smelled like the oven was burning.

Creation - The Foundation

The first 10 days focus on the creation of the world. Caleb is showing days 1 through 5. He learned on Day 1 God made light, on Day 2 God made the sky, on Day 3 God made the seas, dry land, and plants, on Day 4 God made the sun, moon, and stars, on Day 5 God made the living creatures in the sea, and birds, on Day 6 God made animals and other living creatures on the land. God made man and woman, and on Day 7 God rested.  

Caleb's artwork showing God's creation on Day 3. I had to ask him to give me a smile-it took some coaxing.

Caleb is not used to thinking about how to draw what he hears from text. He was not too happy here. You can see his other pages he worked on are on the table.  

2013 Curriculum K4

After much consideration I decided to go with My Father's World God's Creation From A to Z. I needed something that was going to walk me through step-by-step since this is my first time homeschooling. This is the Basic Package. Each unit focuses on a letter of the alphabet and it's letter sound and gently presents a Biblical Worldview. Reading, Writing, Math, Bible, Science, Literature, Art and Character Development are creatively woven into each of the units. The title says it all!

This is the optional Kindergarten Literature Collection from MFW. Each book corresponds to a unit and there are fun activities for us to do after reading.

Although MFW includes math as part of the units there were no math books. The teacher's guide advises in Unit 18 to purchase a simple addition and subtraction book so I decided to add on Singapore Math A and B books. We'll see how we do.

Science is also included, but I wanted something interesting and fun to do in the afternoons. This is Elemental Science Intro to Science for preschool and covers ages four and five. The Mudpies to Magnets, Handbook of Nature Study and Usborne's First Encyclopedia of Science were optional I choose to buy them. We have a great library, but they do not carry a lot of books were are looking for.

MFW takes a multi-sensory approach to phonics which is great and exactly what Caleb needs. However, I again choose to add on these phonics books published by Rod & Staff they are simple and thorough. Right now I am only using the Teacher's manual as a reference as there is more than enough phonics built in to MFW.

Finally, where would I be without all the encouragement of many brave moms and dads who have gone before me. Right now I am reading the Well-Trained Mind A Guide to Classical Education at Home by Jessie Wise and Susan Wise Bauer. I found this book on Half.com for under $10. I've read through the Strong Willed Child and Bringing Up Boys by Dr. Dobson twice and I will probably read through them again. I am waiting for Ruth Beechick's book A Biblical Home Education: Building Your Homeschool on the Foundation of God's Word. 

1st Day of School Pictures

So while we waited for our books to arrive I took Caleb's first day of school pictures. He was being silly. I finally managed one picture without a silly face. Caleb is four years old in these pictures three months shy of five.

Box Day

I anxiously waited all day for the UPS man to deliver our box of books, but he didn't arrive until 5:35 PM. I watched him drive up and down our street three times earlier in the day. I had planned to start homeschooling on box day. We both desperately needed some structure and I thought what better time to start than April 1st.