Today was full of emotions...

Literally! We learned about feeling Happy, Sad and Surprised! After our circle time, we did some exercises exploring how our face moves when we're feeling these emotions. 

The boys and girls loved our first activity! They had no problem identifying the happy, sad and surprised faces drawn on the whiteboard. 

What better way to explore our faces than to use a mirror? Here we are crafting up a hand held mirror to see how our lips move when we're sad, how we look when we're surprised 

and how many ways you can smile when we're happy! 

As story time approached, we got some snacks prepared and I took out a silly little prop! We read, "The Woodcutter's Woes" and learned more about feeling happy, sad and surprised. Each time the word "sausage" was said in the story each child got a sausage taped to their nose, and boy were they surprised! The story had a great lesson, we learned that happiness comes from the heart and not from the things we buy. Except popcorn - doesn't popcorn make everyone happy? 

We popped right in to introducing the letter "P" by popping popcorn - and ourselves - 

around a big letter P taped on the floor! 

After we pop-pop-popped, we made the letter P out of our popcorn 

and then enjoyed it as a tasty treat! 

We continued our lesson with a Feeling Shapes Game. Sometimes we feel more than one emotion at a time, so each child chose two shapes from the bag and created a pattern by tracing it onto their paper. They were so creative they even drew different emotions on the shapes they traced!

 

We closed our day with a game of Red Light, Green Light 123 outside, 

using happy (green) faces and sad (red) faces. 

With a few distractions from the airplanes flying by, we redirected the children by extending our arms and flying back to the start line for another round of Red Light, Green Light 123. 

 

** Mother Goose Time allows me to follow two of my biggest passions. Educating my children and writing! I am honored to work with Mother Goose Time. I do receive the curriculum in exchange for my blog posts but every word in here is honest and a true example of this curriculum in a multi age home practice.

Chicken Nugget Mom Academy Is Here!!

We had our very first day of our preschool co-op using Mother Goose Time curriculum and boy was it a success! Now, that I have more moms involved and more children, we are really able to expand on ideas, get the kids more involved and get more photos. If the rest of the year is anything like today was, these kids are going to LOVE school and be smart as whips and our Momma Tribe is going to grow close and bond and become a true support group!

Circle Time was an absolute success! I'm not going to fib, I definitely thought it would be pure mayhem the first day but it went pretty darn smooth! We covered the days of the week, counted out the days on the calendar, the months, the weather and the color. Each child got a turn or three to put items on the board and all participated. I loved watching all of them help each other and take their turns. The excitement in little kids faces enjoying learning is priceless!

We talked about the letter "F" today and, in circle time, we passed around the hands-on letter and they traced their fingers on it. We then crawled liked foxes to the table where we began our Fox craft. From this craft, the kids were able to practice cutting, gluing, fine and gross motor skills and use their imagination. As always, I never guide the children on where the pieces should go with the craft. I believe all art is child led and however they want to create, is what we do! All children's
art in a classroom should look different and unique!

 

 

Before the kids, ate their snacks, they all earned their Friendly Bee Badge by saying one nice thing about each other.

While the kids ate their snacks, I read them a story about an elephant who needed his friends to work together and help get him down from the tree. The great thing about Mother Goose Time story books is that they allow the children to interact and to really think about what is happening in the book.

The book helped us transition into our Friendship Headbands. Friends starts with "F" and since this was our first day we were able to work together and make sure we were using team work just like the kids in the book.

We ended the day with some quiet activities playing together with blocks and building puzzles. The mommas were hard at work cleaning up that we forgot to take pictures but I can assure you, it was a great ending to a great day!



** Mother Goose Time allows me to follow two of my biggest passions. Educating my children and writing! I am honored to work with Mother Goose Time. I do receive the curriculum in exchange for my blog posts but every word in here is honest and a true example of this curriculum in a multi age home practice.

The Boys and the Frog

Our last day of Fables and Folktales and I must say, I am so sad to see this theme go. I probably could have went on for a very long time with this one. Luckily, we took a few days off, so when we are home, we will be utilizing those days!

Stories can bring up a lot from our memories and this is what this story did for Sonia. We read the Boys and The Frogs and I asked her the reading comprehension questions.

"How do you think the frogs felt in the story?"

Sonia started to talk about two of her favorite dogs in our animal hospice that had passed earlier this year. She said the story reminded her of Dutchie and Cotton Candy because people were being mean to the frogs, just like the dogs old owners before we saved them. From this, she went on to explain how she knows they are in heaven playing together but she wishes they were here on her lap so she could play with them. It is these teachable moments that I begin to thank God, He has called me to home school my girls. If she were in school and told this story, the teacher would have no idea what she was referring to and moved past it. Because she is with me, we were really able to discuss death, our hospice and being kind to animals. We looked at pictures of Dutchie and Cotton Candy and giggled about how silly they were.

After that heavy moment, I lightened up the mood with a game of Leap to Safety.

"How does a frog move?"

Sonia began to hop as high as she could. I took out the trampoline and let her jump for a few minutes to help her transition and she was ready to play the game! She loved flipping the frog onto the leap pad. She was quite determined to play the game the way the instructions said and she really aimed to get the frog on the matching color of the card she picked. I love her determination.

We slowed down the day with a beautiful arts and craft. Sonia punched out the numbers, put the correct number of gems on each one and colored on them as well.

It was a heavy day and an unexpected moment. So after school, we had ice cream and went to the playground with her sister!


** Mother Goose Time allows me to follow two of my biggest passions. Educating my children and writing! I am honored to work with Mother Goose Time. I do receive the curriculum in exchange for my blog posts but every word in here is honest and a true example of this curriculum in a multi age home practice.

The Young Crab and His Mother

We are still happily working along in our August box as we anxiously await the start date of our Mother Goose Time pre school co-op on September 10. So, today we read The Young Crab and His Mother.

During Circle Time, I used the prompts given in the Teachers Guide and asked, "How are you different from others?" Sonia told me she is not a dog, a cat, or a goose. She is not a boy, she is not old and she is not a monkey." Well, ok then. Great observations! ;)

I read the story and after we were done we did some pantomimes. We are integrating MGT with Sonia's Kindergarten curriculum, so this was a great opportunity to introduce this concept. We retold the story without any words. They had a blast walking like crabs. I joined in the fun and could not take pictures or video but sometimes, the pictures are nowhere near as precious as fully being in the moment with your children laughing and giggling.

Honestly, we did the crab walk for a good half an hour playing along with running, sideways of course, and trying to pinch each other. We laughed when we fell. We laughed when we ran. We just simply laughed... a lot.

After we got all of our giggles out, we sat down and created our art for the day. I laid out all of the materials and allowed Sonia to simply explore and do as she wished with it to create a crab. What do you think?

** Mother Goose Time allows me to follow two of my biggest passions. Educating my children and writing! I am honored to work with Mother Goose Time. I do receive the curriculum in exchange for my blog posts but every word in here is honest and a true example of this curriculum in a multi age home practice.

First Day of Kindergarten and Sonia Can Read!

The pride in my soul from todays lesson is simply priceless. We took our 2 week vacation from school work and today we sat down to start Sonia's first day of Kindergarten! It is only because of Mother Goose Time that Sonia, who just turned 5, was able to read words today. She did not just recognize the word and say it out of memory, she actually sounded out the letters and figured out the words! Wow!

Daniella had a successful first day of preschool as well. She sat with us the entire session and paid attention, she worked on letter recognition, she listened to the stories intently and she created art with us as well. For a 3 year old, that is a job well done!

What a great start to this school year!!

After I read the Bell on the Cat, I asked Sonia to brainstorm some ideas that she could give to the mice to get them to stay away from the cat. Her answer blew me away. She said, "tell them to be brave." Wow. Speechless.

We moved on to the Cat Chase game where Sonia continued to surprise me. Here is where I learned that she can actually read. She actually read all of the letter cards by sounding them out. She had a lot of fun covering the first letter with the blocks and making new words.

And we ended the day with a fun arts and craft. A mouse head band! The girls donned their headbands all day!

** Mother Goose Time allows me to follow two of my biggest passions. Educating my children and writing! I am honored to work with Mother Goose Time. I do receive the curriculum in exchange for my blog posts but every word in here is honest and a true example of this curriculum in a multi age home practice.