Seeds and Wings: Our First Day!

Monday, August 30, 2010

Our First Day!

We had a great first day of pre-k! We started out with a pancake breakfast and the girls found their schultutes. I knew I wanted to begin a tradition with my kids for the first day of school to make it special. This is a German tradition that began in the early 1800s. The schultutes are filled with school supplies and other goodies. My girls felt like it was Christmas! I made Maggie a little one since she is officially listening in and doing some little preschool activities. I made Annaliese one that was filled with all sorts of fun things! She loved the little ballerina on the front of hers, and has named her "Carla Marva".

After "first day pictures" by the front door we were ready to begin. Annie and I started with our Reading/Phonics Lesson and math lesson. She did great. Maggie worked with some water colors at her little picnic table while we were busy with the lesson. After math we got to Annie's favorite...ART! She made handprints and painted a rainbow. Those were her choice. ;) After the art was cleaned up Maggie went down for a nap and Annie and I snuggled on the couch for our Peak with Books lesson. We're reading Bedtime for Frances by Russell Hoban, which begins our 7 week Thematic Unit of Family and Friends..

Later in the day it was time for the library! We love walking there and piling books into the stroller. :)

We only spent 1-2 hours total doing school. The rest of the day is spent running and playing our hearts out! :)

I got word today that her handwriting curriculum, Handwriting Without Tears, has been shipped! FINALLY! We are excited to dig into that. I think Annaliese will really like the format of that program. It's very hands-on.

2 comments:

HelenAugust 31, 2010 at 7:58 AM
Oh, how I love Handwriting Without Tears! I taught it in my kindergarten classroom and have been using pieces of it with Brock too.
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Gauger FamilyAugust 31, 2010 at 5:03 PM
How fun! That is so great that you can do this with them. I love Handwriting w/o tears too. I use this with some of my kids with dyslexia- it's great!
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Our Homeschooling Journey

Homeschooling my children just makes sense and feels right for our family. As parents we already do this! For most of us, we are already teaching and engaging our children every moment we are with them. This is a completely natural step for my family. We are thrilled to begin a more "structured" schedule, although we will never be so uptight about it. I think that's part of the glory of homeschooling. You feel out your children and go at a pace/schedule that's a good fit. We are just beginning this journey. I want to document the wonderful parts of homeschooling and the "real" parts. There will be days that just don't happen according to plan. I hold a teaching certificate and was a former teacher in the public school system. As soon as we started a family I knew I would homeschool. This blog will help document our plans so I can look back through the years to see what I did, as well as serve as a hangout for those of you who homeschool or are thinking about it. We will not have everything down perfectly (ever!) but hopefully it can help inspire you and give you some leads on where to begin. Although we have chosen a classical education approach to homeschooling, there are several methods and resources that are valuable and could be a good fit for your family. I encourage you to explore and ignite that fire!