Multiplication mastery has been a challenge for my 3rd graders this past year. We’ve worked on multiples for a couple of years now through skip counting and repeated addition.
They understand the theory behind multiplication, but they became frustrated more than a few times with mastering those facts. Continue reading
We are continuing our study of letters in the alphabet using God’s Little Explorers and this last week we studied the Letter Q. We visited an aquarium restaurant the weekend before for Li’l Bit’s sister’s birthday. We have been looking for the letter q when we are out and about, and Li’l Bit was excited to find the letter in the word aquarium. She said she could really “hear it” too. LOVE IT!!!
The weather has been spectacular here with the fall colors of the trees and landscape surrounding us equally spectacular. So, we’ve spent a lot of time outside especially on this week. On Monday, we took our gator for a ride in the woods, and Li’l Bit was excited to discover some red berries growing on a bush along the way. She counted all the way to 18 with these berries!
My three younger students love to create works of art. Every week I try to think of ways (thank you Pinterest!) to combine art with planned lessons. Quite often, this is done by extending a book to add in an artful element of learning.
This past week, this was quite effortless. I love it when a good idea actually comes together! I know all teachers everywhere can totally relate. Holla!
I had been trying to snag A Million Dots from our local library for quite awhile. Last Wednesday, we finally found it available. I read it to them on Friday.
This book is so fun, because as you read through it you actually see a total of 1,000,000 dots! Each page shares a 6-digit number and an interesting fact. As we read the book my 3rd graders took turns reading the 6-digit numbers. They also read a page here and there, but this was my read-aloud to them that morning so mostly they listened while I read.
They loved it when I told them they could choose ANY 6-digit number, a favorite subject, AND we would do some research to write a fact about the number and subject matter. Continue reading
The week before we left for our beach trip, Li’l Bit spent a week focusing on the Letter I. The week was filled with learning more about insects including ladybugs and bees, which was perfect as we studied pollination with big brother and big sister.
Who knew painting rocks into ladybugs and bees would be so FUN?! After going on a nature hike to find just the perfect smooth stones, Li’l Bit took her time putting on several coats of paint and adding just the right details.
Li’l Bit also enjoyed making her “Ladybug Numbers” while her big sis and big bro made skip counting ladybug numbers. Most often if it involves numbers, I can individualize for each of my younger students, two of whom are in 3rd grade and of course Li’l Bit, who is 4 and in PreK.
She first outlined her numbers with a red marker, next she colored the inside with a red crayon, she added black spots that equaled the number, and finally she exercised those finger muscles as she cut out each number! I put them all on a clip ring for one-to-one activities! She was very proud of doing this one all by herself! Continue reading
Pre-Kindergarten with Li’l Bit is going well, especially when I think back to this time last year. She still doesn’t relish a choice of things to do. She’d rather have a blank canvas, whether it be beans and things with which to pour, put, place, ponder or a piece of paper and dabs of paint with brushes, marbles, q-tips, or her fingers to make a masterpiece!
This last week, we concentrated on the Letter C and though we spent time on some indoor activities, in all honesty we spent a lot of time OUTSIDE just enjoying the beauty that this Fall is becoming!
Here’s a brief look back at our week:
While working on multiplication flash cards with my 3rd graders, I encouraged Li’l Bit to take the scraps of paper (NEVER throw away those laminated scraps!) and make a collage in her little book. She had so much fun making a colorful sunflower and cutting grass from the green strip of paper! Continue reading
After a short week during Labor Day Week, we jumped back into our God’s Little Explorers preschool learning about the Letter Z using the Bible story of Noah and his ark full of animals, many of which are also found at zoos today.
Li’l Bit’s favorite activity of the whole week was making her very own salt try for practicing writing and exercising those little finger muscles with a tactile activity! First, she painted a rainbow on a piece of cardboard. I didn’t tell her what order to put the colors, so I was impressed that she followed the ROYGBIV color order! Of course, we reviewed color names. She knows them all except she gets pink and purple mixed up sometimes. Continue reading
I’m a little behind in posting but I want to document this year of PreK with Li’l Bit so I am forging ahead. This post will be shorter because of the aforementioned scheduling issues and because I don’t have as many photos of our week 3 adventures.
We were studying Letter A during this week, and Li’l Bit was thrilled to start our Monday off with apple stamping!
Since her brother and sister are studying Botany this year, we all studied the inside of the apple and counted the seeds inside as well!
Li’l Bit, age 4 1/2, just finished up Week 2 with God’s Little Explorers. She was happy to work on a letter that she knows very well, so we worked on the different ways the Letter G can look. So often, even in children’s books the Letter G looks very different. We read a LOT of books this week, some suggested in GLE and some that we have and complimented our study of gardens and growing and the Letter G. Here’s a peak at the ones we read:
Firs,t we made a Craft for our Alphabet Page. I’m all about taking an idea and tweaking as needed to use what we have and/or what I know our Li’l Bit will enjoy! I know she LOVES using my old scrapbook templates for tracing and cutting, so I pulled out the flower one and away she went! I forgot to take a finished photo, but you can see she was working on glueing down all of her flower parts to make a “garden” on her Letter G page!
She also checked on her growing plant from the county fair every.single.day. Thankfully, no more mishaps like the one with Li’l Miss dropping hers on the floor, since Li’l Bit usually checked on Li’l Bro’s each day too! We talked a lot about how g can be used with other letters to make different sounds like gr for GROW! Continue reading
I am so excited about this curriculum, God’s Little Explorers, that I’m using with Li’l Bit, who for anyone new reading is 4 1/2 years old. She is LOVING it, which is what makes me the most excited. Well that and we are talking about the Lord each and every day! I knew this year I needed something ready to go, and while GLE does just that, I really like that Stacie has written the lesson plans in such a way that I can pick and choose and also move things around here and there as needed within each week. She gives plenty of extra ideas and EVERYTHING is linked. Can I get an AMEN?!
While we did the X Marks the Spot hunt inside, we took the tic-tac-toe game outside, since we were going exploring with Li’l Bit’s 3rd grade brother and sister for an assignment for school. Li’l Bit took a basket to collect sticks and rocks for the Os to go with our letter Xs for the game once we got back inside. She dropped one stick along the way, but we improvised with a marker. She loves tic-tac-toe so this was a lot of fun and gave us plenty of opportunities to practice the sound of X too!
We actually just completed Week 2 of 28 weeks this week, but clearly I’m behind on my blogging. Since the first three weeks of school have gone so well, I’m not going to pile on the Mommy Blogger guilt LOL! I do, however, want to try my best to post each week about our journey together through God’s Little Explorers. While we were beginning, I decided to do some informal assessments as suggested by Stacie, and Li’l Bit loved sharing with me the letters she knows while making “Alphabet Cake!” 😀
As you can see from the photo collages of our Week 1 adventures with the Letter X, Li’l Bit was having so much fun with school! Li’l Bit’s favorite activity of the week was the the Scavenger Hunt that went along with “X Marks the Spot.” She wanted to do it over and over again! She is also so proud of her treasure map and can hardly wait for each Monday when she can add a new clue to her map (for each letter we’ve studied).
I also highly recommend the Bible which Stacie suggested. I’ve never been a big fan of Bible storybooks, but this one really is great! It isn’t a story, but rather is truly the Scriptures written with illustrations. Of course, not all of the Scriptures are included but many events and stories from both the Old and New Testaments are included.
I will be sharing about this past week of exploring shortly! This week has been so fun especially for Li’l Bit as she made a BOOK! She is so proud of her hard work!
