Color Worksheets!

If you're working with your child to recognize colors, this is a neat little activity! Creston has all of his basic colors down pretty well....except for Gray! So I'm printing off the Gray worksheets and will go over this with him.

http://www.dltk-teach.com/colors/worksheets.htm

This and that...

After asking Mark today to help me teach Creston a few things in his workbook that I couldn't figure out how to get him to understand.....and after Mark tried, but couldn't get him to understand it either, we had a little talk (which resulted in ME flopping my head onto my arms on the dining room table and sighing loudly...) and decided that I should focus on the Alphabet and only the Alphabet until he got that down pat. Then Mark also said that I should also focus on having Creston work on his name......tracing the letters...spelling his name.....ect.

I had already decided to work mainly on the Alphabet and had found some activities to focus on, so that wasn't such an up-roar for us to decide to stay away from more advanced things. I just sometimes get frustrated that I'm not able to explain things correctly enough to allow Creston to "Get it" and it makes me sad.

However, we sat down with the following "A" tracing worksheet and he did pretty good with that!

Then, I had found this little printable that showed Upper ad Lower-case "A's" and had Vreston match the big and little a's to the page. He did this really well.

All was going good until the very end when I said "What letter is this again?" and he said "R!!!!" and looked so pleased with himself............head on table again......siiiiiiiiggggghhhhhhh.......

"We're done for the day, Creston....you can go play now....."

All about the Alphabet

I have found several really great sites for helping to teach your child about the alphabet.
Here are a few and I will be adding more to this post later!!!

Lesson Pathways ~ http://www.lessonpathways.com/
This is a great site that I was able to get in on when they asked for users to check their site out and provide feedback for a free year of use! I believe that you can join up for a free trial, but I'm not sure how long it is! On this site, you can "build" learning paths for all of your children (even Pre-K!) I've got a learning path set up for Both of the boys dealing with the Alphabet and numbers 1-10. They've got a complete listing of subjects for Kindergarten level through 5th grade. I have not yet looked to see if they offer the higher grades or not. I like this site so far!!! However, if you're wanting something that you can do for free.....you can try it for free and print off everything that you think that you will need for your child and go from there!

Lesson Pathways Subscription Plan Monthly Subscription ~ $12.95/month
6 Month Subscription ~ $59.00/6 months
12 Month Subscription ~ $99.00/12 months
24 Month Subscription ~ $149.00/24 months

I will post several useful items from Lesson Pathways and the links to some of the materials for those of you who wish to see if it's right for you or helpful!

Prep. for introducing the Alphabet ~ http://www.letteroftheweek.com/Preparatory.html


The Alphabet Song ~ http://www.hello-world.com/English/song/alphabet.php
The song is sung while showing the letters on your computer screen! There is also another Alphabet song here at Starfall... http://www.starfall.com/n/level-k/song-abcs/play.htm?f this one kinda scared me, though, as I feel it would probably confuse smaller kids that haven't yet figured out the basics of hearing the Alphabet Song...

Introducing the Alphabet ~ http://www.letteroftheweek.com/alphabet_intro_week.html#alphabet%20songs
This shows several different activities that can be used to help introduce the Alphabet to your child!

Alphabet Flashcards ~ http://abcteach.com/directory/basics/abc_activities/az_flashcards/
(print them onto photo paper for the x-tra thickness and glue them to colored cardstock for variety and even more thinkness)

Alphabet Tracking Sheet ~ http://talibiddeenjr.amanahwebs.com/downloads/la_english_alphabet_Alphabet%20Tracking%20Sheet.pdf
(this allows you to keep track of your child's progress in alphabet recognition by date!)

Make an Alphabet Book ~ http://www.education.com/activity/article/letterbook_preschool/
Take 26 pages and paste/glue/color things that start with that letter, then make the pages into a book!!!

Printable Alphabet Coloring Pages ~ http://www.preschoolcoloringbook.com/color/cpletter.shtml
There are severla different kinds to print off for your little person!!!

Alphabet Catepillars ~ http://www.dltk-kids.com/crafts/insects/mcaterpillar-letters.htm
Print off the B&W or color catepillar letters and make your own ABC bug or your child's name!

Build the Alphabet Activity on the Computer ~ http://www.literacycenter.net/parents_teacher/letter_center.php#
Here, your child uses the computer mouse to drag and drop different shapes onto the actual letters of the alphabet! This might be for older pre-schoolers.....not sure yet how Creston will do with this one!

Other Alphabet Sites with Great ideas! ~ http://www.dltk-teach.com/alphabuddies/links/a.htm

Creston Tied his SHOE!!!!!

I've been wanting to teach Creston to tie his shoe.....and last week, we talked about putting on his shoes, pulling the tongue of his shoe up so that it woudn't bunch up around his toes, and then I showed him how to pull the laces tight. Then I left it alone!!!

Today, I sat down with him and just slowly showed him how to make a loop and wrap the other lace around the loop, poke it though the hole, and then pull both loops tight! He did it!!! (With a little help from me, but he did it!!!)

We'll be practicing this a lot and he'll be an old pro in no time!!!!GOOD JOB, CRESTON!!!!

Some new ideas!!

I found several great homeschool sites at http://confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com/,
http://www.homeschoolcreations.blogspot.com/ , and http://homeschoolcreations.com/preschoolcorner.html.


I found a lot of neat printables and ideas for teaching the Alphabet! Most sites recomend teaching a letter a week.....we may do 2 a week........we'll see!!! I'm still having trouble getting Creston to recognize the letters, so maybe these ideas will help!!!


Here's a cute printable of little "A"nts. There are several colors and you just cut the BIG A's from the little a's and then mix them all up and have the child put them together!!
Silly face!!! He thought that this was neat!

He did this in no time, so I suppose it was too easy for him, but it drilled the "A" into his brain!!

Then there was a "Put the "A"pples in order biggest to smallest". I didn't explain this too well, but after asking him which one was biggest and which was smallest, he put the rest in order!

He liked this too!

THEN...........Mackie wanted to CUT!!!! Oh me!!! I couldn't find the little scisors, so with me sitting next to him, I let him cut a few times on this big paper! He liked this too!!

It was a neat day! I'm excited to be finding new ideas and different ways that other homeschool parents are teaching their kids!!!

Fun with Colors!

I picked up a new box of crayons for Creston the other day...(Mackie likes to EAT any Crayons that he finds laying around!). We were to the place in his pre-school book to start coloring, so I figured that we'd doit with fresh crayons that Mackie WON'T be allowed to handle!!

I pulled out the Red, Yellow, Purple, Pink, White, Black, Brown, Green, Blue, & Orange colors and laid them in a pile. I would ask Creston to hand me a certain color....he did almost perfect except for getting white and black confused!! I was really tickeled about that!!!

His book would ask him to pick out the color, and then it would tell him what to color on his page. Below...he's coloring a pair of pants blue. Then he would look at two pictures (Pineapple and blueberries) and he would have to color the appropriate item blue. Other than the Pineapple being called a "Pum-pum-pum", he figured out that the blueberries should be blue.

Mackie finally wore me down and I pulled out a coloring book for him and his "bucket" of broken and half-eaten colors for him to color alongside Creston!

He likes to be a big boy too!

They had fun, but their attention spans are still really short, so we only worked on this for about 20 minutes or so. Now they are playing "store" in their bedroom......at the moment, they aren't killing each other....so it's nice and quiet at the moment! (Shouldn't have said that!!)

The Registration Letter....

We got it this week......the registration letter for Creston to enroll in Kindergarten this Fall.....actually, we got 2 packs of papers to fill out for him to start school....

And I immediately got a sick feeling in my stomach..................................................UUUggghhhh!!!

Why??????? Because I'm still not sure what we are going to do about Creston and his future with School or Home School. What are my main concerns???? I feel completely inadequate to teach him all the things that he'll need to know. I'm lazy and know that I probably will not be able to keep up a daily routine without the constant help and support of my husband....who isn't able to be home every day due to his job, and when he is home, has multiple other important things to work on that are home or second-job related. My in-laws are anti home school, so we really haven't discussed it with them because we don't want to "go there" with them about it just yet before we've decided.

I look at Creston and can't imagine him in school with all the other kids just yet. I imagine him being bullied and pushed around by the other "mean" kids and it makes me ill. I know that I can't be there with him every minute, and I know that he'll have to learn to fend for himself if he goes to school. (Which is a good thing, I know, but he's my oldest baby, and I worry!)

I'm just not sure!

The drive to take him to wither of the 2 possible school options would be around 20-25 minutes 1 way....with ME driving him. If he rode the bus, it would be longer. I can't imagine putting my little 5 year old on a bus that early in the morning to ride for that length of time....but MANY parents do that every day.

What will we do? I have no idea, but we'll have to decide by April, cause that's when the registration is. Oh me! I wish it weren't such a tough decision. Please pray for me and for us while we make this decision. It is a big one and I don't want to mess it up!

We're BACK!!!

Hello there, everyone!!! Well........keeping up with the posting on this blog has been a little in-between, hasn't it? That's what I get for dreaming big, huh? :o) We've still been doing "school" but not in the way where we sit down at a table every day and do paperwork........we've done a lot of "On the Go" learning! Creston is getting really good with his colors and with really wanting to "read" more. He's never been one to sit down and want us to read books to him, but over the Christmas Holiday, we actually did a lot of reading with him and Mackie both! Mackie is actually showing a bigger interest than Creston ever did! We re-discovered the Library! Creston loves any type of "fire" related book and then we "rented" a bunch of Christmas themed books too! They also love the train table that the Watauga County Library has in it's kids section, so I don't really ever have to pull teeth to get them to want to go!!

This past week, Creston said "Lets do school!" and got out all of his workbooks and papers and sat down at the table. At the time, I was doing something else, but decided that if he was willing, I'd drop whatever I was doing and do "School" with him! We went through SEVERAL pages in one of his pre-school workbooks. He showed me that he has the ability to know what things "go together" and he understood the directions about drawing lines from certain items to the things that they went with! We hadn't done that before and he took to it like he'd always been doing it! We went over the Alphabet again and his 1-10 numbers. He's getting really good at counting too!

On Creston's Birthday (1/3/10), Mackie counted to 10 for us all!!! All by himself!!! Without ANY help!!!! He had never done that before either (except for the night before), but this time he did it in front of Nana & Paw-Paw AND Mark got it on Camera!!! Smart kids! That's all I'm saying!!! :o) (I'll stop gloating now!)

So.........I'm finding that it's a LOT easier at this stage of the game to work learning in when we have those moments that the boys are more receptive to it. I don't want them to HATE learning before they really get inot it! Creston has been a little slower than some to pick up on certain things, but I'm also finding that he's a lot faster at picking things up now that he's 5!!! Maybe some kids just need a little more time to kick it into gear than others!

So...................we'll be reading and learning some more these next few months. I'll try REALLY hard to keep everyone posted on the progress!!! Now that the Holidays are behind us, it'll hopefully be a bit easier!

HAPPY NEW YEAR, Everyone!!!