Week 23- New Year

Happy New Year! 

It's a new year and we are starting new units.

J will begin typing lessons and review cursive.

In Social Studies, we are moving on from US history to studying the government, constitution, and civics in greater depth. We will also look at the physical map of the US in greater depth.

Together, we will be learning about the human body. We will also study human, animal, and plant cells in science.  A wants to continue learning about animals and ecosystems.

In language arts, we hope to do more writing. We will focus on different types of writing. Ex: descriptive, opinion, informative, letters, poems, etc. We dropped the ball on keeping up with vocabulary words and will try again.

We will continue with Spelling Training, Night Zookeeper, Starfall, Prodigy, Code.org, as well as fun Minecraft and Wild Kratts. Cooking, and other chemistry, will continue to be apart of science as well.

Lessons in Singapore Math will continue. Until it's warmer, PE will continue to be indoor (or snow) activities.  

All that curriculum so much easier to write than actually do.  Here we go!

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Teaching Children Responsibility- Every month we have a new responsibility we try to teach the kids. This month is responsibility for choices and actions. (Other themes have been responsibility for work, things, rules, etc.)

Exploring Technology:  Legos and Crunch Labs

Hidden Bank

Math: Singapore Math Primary Mathematics US edition and brain teasers.

Science: Periodic table came up, so we studied that as well as plant and animal cells.  We also regrew celery and lettuce from the stem base of old ones.

Social Studies: Crash Course Government

Craft Club: Yarn ornaments

PE: We got more snow than our kids have probably ever seen in their lives. Part of science was building a sled track on our small hill.

LA: vocabulary, typing, and spelling with Wiki Sticks

A made a heart too.

All about K and A2

This month's joy, as found in Teaching Children Joy by Richard and Linda Eyre, is imagination and creativity. 

K has really started to develop an imagination this year. It's so fun to see that part of him grow. With his younger sister he pretends to take care of dolls and now follows actions to nursery rhymes and other stories. Their current favorite is Going on a Bear Hunt.

Working with shapes

We also played with playdough, kinetic sand, and slimy sand as both a sensory activity and a creative one.

Another fine motor activity was playing with balloons

In reading, besides reading him books, we reviewed letter names and sounds. He struggles to put the sounds together to form words, but we're meeting him where he's at and working with his interest.

A2 strung beads on pipe cleaner for fine motor.