My little sponge has been doing a lot of learning since I posted the last homeschooling update! ...but not quite the way I thought things would go. I think I'm still stuck in the public school frame of mind. I had thought that after we had gotten back into a routine after Emily was born that we'd go back to our daily school time, working on curriculums I made based on themes Sean showed interest in. Not so much.. With two preschoolers, one little baby and a daycare of under two year olds, that just didn't seem to be working. Especially since school time was during nap time and Sean has gone back to taking naps!
We haven't had regular school time since the end of last year and the workbooks I put together for the kids are gathering dust. However, the one thing that sticks out in my mind is all that Sean has learned and how easily he learned it! He's excelling when it comes to his letters. He knows all their sounds and can write them without having to see them. He's even teaching Maddy. But lately, he seems to be taking a little break from letters and moving onto numbers. The calender has become a big part of our day because Sean is always asking what day it is and so on. He figured out the pattern numbers have just by looking at the calender everyday. The other day he surprised me by counting to 100 (with a little help) when before I didn't know he could get past 20. Then one night he asked me what 2 + 3 was and I started teaching him addition. Easter candy seems to be a great addition (and subtraction) tool. Now he's showing interest in wanting to be able to read a clock. I'm running with it!
Along with the math and literacy, he's been learning about local geography. How? By car rides. He wants to know what city we're in and what street we're on. He can tell you where daddy and Uncle Justin works, what city their works are in, what street and city hubby's parents live on/in, almost our complete address (he doesn't know zip codes yet) and he's working on my parents address (they live on the same street as us so he's memorizing their house number). I credit our Me On the Map until for sparking this interest but he's learned a lot recently just by asking me questions during car rides. He's also learning about chickens thanks to the baby chicks we're raising. I'm anxious to find out what will be next.
I never thought we'd go more toward the unschooling path when we started homeschooling but it works. And if it's not broke, don't fix it!
Here's some learning tools I made for Sean. I got the ideas from pinterest...where else!?
We haven't had regular school time since the end of last year and the workbooks I put together for the kids are gathering dust. However, the one thing that sticks out in my mind is all that Sean has learned and how easily he learned it! He's excelling when it comes to his letters. He knows all their sounds and can write them without having to see them. He's even teaching Maddy. But lately, he seems to be taking a little break from letters and moving onto numbers. The calender has become a big part of our day because Sean is always asking what day it is and so on. He figured out the pattern numbers have just by looking at the calender everyday. The other day he surprised me by counting to 100 (with a little help) when before I didn't know he could get past 20. Then one night he asked me what 2 + 3 was and I started teaching him addition. Easter candy seems to be a great addition (and subtraction) tool. Now he's showing interest in wanting to be able to read a clock. I'm running with it!
Along with the math and literacy, he's been learning about local geography. How? By car rides. He wants to know what city we're in and what street we're on. He can tell you where daddy and Uncle Justin works, what city their works are in, what street and city hubby's parents live on/in, almost our complete address (he doesn't know zip codes yet) and he's working on my parents address (they live on the same street as us so he's memorizing their house number). I credit our Me On the Map until for sparking this interest but he's learned a lot recently just by asking me questions during car rides. He's also learning about chickens thanks to the baby chicks we're raising. I'm anxious to find out what will be next.
I never thought we'd go more toward the unschooling path when we started homeschooling but it works. And if it's not broke, don't fix it!
Here's some learning tools I made for Sean. I got the ideas from pinterest...where else!?
Telling time tools:
the sun rays around the clock and the little time posters for daily events.
Addition tool made from an Easter egg:
He can turn the halves to create more addition problems.
Note: Even Sharpie rubs off of Easter eggs but clear tape keeps it on.
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© Mama Dani's Musings
My favorite unschooling moment lately has been how much Lexi is retaining. She is my little number girl! I go through numbers with Char all the time, our favorite way to count is by playing hide and seek. One day it was Lexi's turn to count while Char hid, she counted to twenty while I stared at her with my jaw dropped.
ReplyDeleteLex is the number girl, Char is the word girl, lol