Math~ Place value cups

I was trying to think of a fun way to make a number dial to work on place values.  I simply wrote the numbers 0-9 on each cup and than added a zero/s behind depending on which cup/place value.

 

I wanted something that I could call out a number and he could easier move like a dial that didn't take too much time to play.  This is perfect on the go as well.  I can call out the number and he can just show me in the mirror.

 

Here he is working on the hundreds (127)

I made cups all the way up to the thousands.

 

I like that I can review number sense and place value all at the same time and son has fun reviewing.   Takes 2 minutes to make and takes 2 Min's to practice a few numbers.

 

also a great way for the Little's (under 6) to learn number sense with the ones and tens cups

 

A ittle bit of Math~ Working on fractions

 

We are covering fractions currently.  I love to teach math in a way that son is able to grasp the material both from hearing what I am saying but also visual and hands on.  When I first asked K which part was bigger the 1/2,1/3 or 1/4 he said 1/4.  Without seeing anything he thought umm 4 is bigger than 2 and 3 so must be 1/4.  Than I drew it on the board and now he was able to see it.  When I drew it out is started his brain into thinking how could he be wrong; 4 is more than 2 and 3.   

 

 

 

 

We didn't have candy bars so we used snack cakes. This is where I let son do the work and than I asked him which piece he wanted and of course went for the half. At that point I asked him why "Because it's bigger" Oh!! so what fraction was that? "1/2" so do you still think 1/4 is bigger than 1/2? No! BINGO the concept is now sticking

Than I asked what was smaller and he said 1/4.  Why?  Because, you had to take the same size cake and cut it into 4 parts not only 2 parts,which makes each part smaller than just half of the cake.

 

Here is K making fraction problems with 12 straws

Working on his math sheet

Daily 5 the homeschool way

Here is K reading his daily 5 book.  Yes, I stole the idea of the daily 5 from some really amazing public school teachers.  I use this time to teach K that he can read to himself quietly.  When he's reading I am getting things for school ready for the day or reading myself.  We just started this 2 weeks ago so we are still in the learning stage.  One thing that son loves is that he can read ANYWHERE at our house.

 

 

When the reading to self is mastered (when we reach 20 Min's) I will start to introduce other area's of the daily 5.

 

Read to self

Listen to reading (Books on tape)

Word Work

Work on writing

Read to someone

 

Its a great way for student to work on some independent skills and gives me some prep time in the morning

 

School planner

Our school planner

After years of just writing our field trips on the family calendar, I caved. Field trips, family info just started to mix together and become lost on the calendar.  Most of you know that our family is about to get larger through adoption this next year it couldn't get any better to get this new system started, and work out the kinks.  Well lets dig in and see how I have our planner put together for the year.

First step was finding the right planner for me (The teacher).  I think I spent a good hour looking at all the planners at target before going with this cutie

The front cover I have a list of our homeschool friends and their number so that we can get together and play.

I just have a post it note as this list is always changing.  This is where I write down field trips that are in the works but not yet scheduled.  This keeps them fresh in my head as they get lost on our homeschool board

as you can see I didn't get a huge planner with big squares as this isn't where I am planning our school days, it's only for planned field trips and my blog schedule.  You can see I only have 2 colors written in as of now.  I went out and got a 5 pack of pens of different colors and let K pick his color.  He picked green so he's my green child.  His binders are green his folders are green etc.  my notes are purple.  So this year I figured this planner would work for us as right now I have 1 kiddo and even when we have placement or another child/ren I am only writing down field trips and most will be with K so just will need to add their color dots to trip details.  I hope that makes sense. 

This is where I write our center details for school.  Starting in the fall I start our centers three times a week.  There will be a centers post coming soon which will explain how I am doing centers for math,phonics/language,art

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Spelling with letter stamps

A Fun way to work on Spelling

I pulled out our letter stamps  to practice our spelling words for the day.  Our only issue was we only have 1 O and we are working on our double oo words this week.

After about a minute my smarty started to read the words,spell the words as he looked for the letters; Once he had all the letters for the words he would spell the word again as he stamped the page.

Rockledge gardens.... Part 2

This is part 2 of our trip to Rockledge Gardens.

You can visit part 1 here

While at the garden you just have to go in the butterfly garden.  This place is just pure bliss if you like butterfly's.

Just look at how gorgeous this butterfly is.  Love the Polkadots

Here is a chart that they have inside of the butterfly house.  We had a great time looking for all the different  butterfly's.  We couldn't find a few of them because of season but found a few different types.

Zebra butterfly. 

Not for sure but I think these are the Monarch caterpillars munching away on parsley

Didn't see any Monarchs in the butterfly house but they were all over at the garden

Teacher Filing box

My teaching filing box and all it's glory :o)

Lets take a peek inside and see how I use my filing box

Here it is in a nutshell..or a filing box for that matter.  The first slot I just keep guidelines that I put together each year of what I want to cover within the school year (one for our Summer schedule which is a half day schedule and one for our fall schedule which is a full day 9 month schedule)

This is where I jot down ideas that pop into my head or I find online (Pinterest/blogs etc.) related to schooling

Also a great place to keep my school blog ideas

Our school calendar color coded for easy reading.  We school based on a 4 weeks on 1 week off schedule.  Just seems to work well for us

Math center plan sheets and or printables stored here

I also have one for Phonics but it's empty at this moment so didn't take a photo

For all the school related catalogs that come in are stored right here for easy access for when I'm looking for something for a certain subject matter.

A sneak peek of a homeschool teacher at work

My husband caught me in the act of planning

The night before the 1st day back from Christmas Vacation

I spent my weekend working on getting ready for the month of school. Yes I pull the worksheets and make all my copies that I need the weekend before a new month. Keeps my free time at the end of the night once my student is in bed for me to sit down and relax.

I also have another binder now for Teacher stuff. I am a binder freak for my organizational OCD:o)


Have a wonderful week back to school

Just one of those things you get to do when you call your self TEACHER

Last night while catching up on TV; I sat there cutting out little cards for the new calendar on the school wall.

Classroom pages

If you are following K and his personal class work check out his class page.
His class page is devoted to just his work nothing more.

Our school page will be for everything else involved with our homeschool program and just an update from me on how schooling is going.

In the works

We have found our science series..These are a few of the books in the series. This year we will do the Stage 1 set. Now our science will be more then just these books but we will be using these books as our guides through out the year. I found these at Barnes and Noble a few months ago but the more I looked for science books for Kindergarten the more I heard about this series and the more I just kept coming back to them. I am really excited to gather the books that BN.com didn't have for our science area.



Math books are ordered and will be on their way soon. After months of going through the many different Math books they have for Kindergarten we have chosen to go with Horizons.

My file cabinet is starting to feel up little by little..I am determined to get ready little by little over the summer months instead of having a HUGE rush in July getting ready for our August start date. I have started to write out our weekly theme list so I can build our year around that. I am excited for a new year..K is not use to schooling being out yet so he is asking daily how much longer until kindergarten starts. His summer sports, activity's start this next week so I think that will end a little bit.







Just a little heads up to look for in the near future.

I am about halfway done with our school LOGO. I can't wait to post more about the LOGO but I'll keep it under wraps until it's all done and maybe wait until our shirts are made. At that time you'll understand our school name, see our colors for the first time. Just so excited to have our Logo nearly done.

Have a Blessed Day