Week 6 -Letter A

~Big E is 4 years old: Lil E is 27 months~

I can hardly believe we are already six weeks into our new homeschooling plan.   I am so thankful that it continues to go so smoothly.

Due to our non-school schedule, it seems we average only 3 days of school for Lil E.  I'm choosing not to be discouraged by this because she is only 2 years old.  Plus, this schedule will give us extra activities for the weeks of letter review.  Any morning we are home we devote to schooling.

Lil E's highlights for the week:
* Aa letter sheet
* Aa tracing
* Apple dot painting
* fruit vocabulary
* Melissa and Doug Shape puzzle
* Counting Bears color sorting
* Shape identification

Dot painting the Aa sheet

Identifying shapes with magnetic pom poms

Color Sorting the Counting Bears

Letter Tracing (I'm amazed at how well she does with this)

Fruit Vocabulary Identification (see the video below for a taste of how this activity went)

Lil E's letter A crafts 

Big E still manages to get a full 4 day week of homeschooling each week.  On the mornings that we are not home we will use Lil E's nap time to do his copywork, handwriting practice, and creative writing exercises.  On our busy days we still manage to fit in the book reading at various parts of the day.  I love how flexible the Sonlight curriculum is!

Big E's highlights for the week:
* Counting practice with Counting Bears
* copywork with the words "at, fat, mat, rat." and his name
* reading the copywork words
* writing words from signs PULL, MEN, BUMP, and RR
* fishing for letters
* making words with sounds
* helping and participating in Lil E's school
* Creative Writing Assignment "The Day I was Two Inches Tall"

"I woke up one afternoon after nap time and found out that I was only two inches tall.  I think I shrunk because I fell trying to reach something.  I got out of bed by walking to the corner and sliding down.  It took me a long time to walk to the stairs because I was too small, like that big.  After nap time I decided to read some books.  I read books by reading a book that was already opened, because I was too little to pick up a new book.  Then I needed to go to the potty, so I used Elizabeth’s little potty.  I had to jump to get to the top of the potty.  After using the potty I had to use a big stool to reach the sink.  I tried to see if I could pick myself with my arms up so I could get the water on." 

Dot Painting Aa Page

Fishing for letters

Cutting Practice  ( I love that Lil E wanted to watch)

A/a Hunt

Big E's Crafts

Life Skills:

This week I allowed them to make their own apple butter toast for lunch one day.

Favorite Moments:

One of my favorite moments this week included seeing the children excitedly run to their school drawers first thing in the morning, while still in PJ's, before breakfast.  On two separate mornings they pulled an activity out and started working with them before we did anything else in the day.  What a treat to see them enjoying "school". 

Another favorite moment was anytime Big E helped Lil E with her school work. What a joy!

 Pre-Breakfast color sort with Big E's Help

Big E Calling out Fruit for Lil E to find. 

Real Homeschooling Moments:
As the above activity was failing miserably (and it was our 2nd attempt for the week) I thought I'd record the "real" homeschooling moment for all to see, lest someone thought that our days always went smoothly.  Here Big E is trying to help Lil E do her activity and Lil E is clearly refusing to participate.  That's pretty typical!  HA!  Such is life!