Weekly Wrap-Up

Robbie is 3.5 years old.



Pre-READING

Robbie played around on Starfall.com this week. That's really as close to reading instruction that we got.

I picked up the top three books for reading aloud at the Dollar Tree and the Golden Book for a few dollars at another store (probably Walmart).

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Weekly Wrap-Up

Robbie is 3 years old.

I know, it's been a while since I've posted. So much has happened, yet not much has changed.. here's a quick rundown... RockerDad found a job here in IL, but we're still living in the basement of one of his cousins. We're trying to save money to move out, but it's a tough and slow process. It's been rough to keep up our schooling (mostly because I believe that I'm battling a minor depression, but I'm working through that).

I haven't been great about taking photos (even when we actually do things), so I apologize for such a short update covering such a long period of time.




Pre-READING

Robbie has been sailing through his Reading Eggs lessons. He has also been steadily progressing through Phonics Pathways in two 5 minute sessions per day. Although I'm not concerned with his reading abilities at this age, his confidence and attention span are both growing rapidly.

Pre-WRITING

He completed two Kumon workbooks (the last lessons of his Tracing book and all 80 pages of his mazes book) in 3 days. I have yet to get him some new books, but I will soon since he keeps asking for them. He has also been working on his cutting skills.

He's been enjoying his Handwriting Without Tears slate. He decided to write the letters of his name one at a time one day. He actually asked me to grab the camera and take pictures.. lol.


Pre-MATH

We're continuing to use the methods outlined in Activities for the AL Abacus as the basis for our math activities. I'm still waffling over whether we'll use the full Rightstart Mathematics program in the future, but we are loving the way things are presented.

Here is a shot (another photograph request from Robbie) of his completed "stairs" on his abacus. (He has recently taken a keen interest in math over reading, so we've been having lots of fun with this.)


I also made these sheets (which need page protectors... mental note) for matching quantities in various forms.





Robbie has been helping out more and more with household chores. He doesn't have any regular duties yet, but I think they're coming soon.

I snapped a quick photo of Robbie washing the kitchen table.





...watching his new Toy Story 3 movie with his toys...


...riding in a wagon with his cousin, Meghan, while cousin Abby pulls them up and down great-grandma's driveway on Halloween...


...posing with the Peanuts crew at Bass Pro Shop...


...trampoline time with Daddy...


...working his upper body at the playground...





I guess the fact that all of his dress-up costumes are in storage in Tennessee won't stop him from being Batman... (note the Batman boxer briefs over his Speed Racer pajamas..)


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Weekly Wrap-Up

Robbie is 3 years old.

Wow, our new lifestyle is a big, annoying adjustment. We did manage, however, to fit some learning in this week.



Pre-READING

He's been reading for 5-10 minutes daily from Phonics Pathways and completing a page or two of Explode the Code as well (we do the writing portions orally).


Pre-WRITING

He worked through some of his Handwriting Without Tears Pre-K as well as his Kumon Tracing and Coloring books.



Pre-MATH

He did quite a few pages in both his Singapore Essential Kindergarten Math and his Horizons K Math books. He's starting to count money in Horizons and he likes that. Next week, we'll resume our Activities for the AL Abacus. (We did some informal abacus activities this week.)

These are the rocks he collected. He's been sorting, examining and sequencing these (sort of a dual science/math photo).





Trio Block tower just before leaving Tennessee


Some playground fun with Daddy







Posing beside one of his great-grandma's pumpkins..




Kennedy Park (Kenosha, WI)






The Golden Pyramid House (Wadsworth, IL)










Illinois Beach State Park (Zion, IL)






Playing his geoboard harp for me...


Playing with Daddy at Lake Michigan...


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Our Plans: Tray Activities

Robbie is 38 Months Old

As our first day draws near (Sept. 7th), I'd like to post a bit about our plans for Robbie's final year of Tot School.

Our trays will not really focus on transferring, pouring, etc. He let me know sometime last year that those were simply NOT of interest to him. We are, however, using all of the basic Montessori practical life actions in our day-to-day life. Instead, our trays will merely be extensions of what we're doing together throughout the week. Ideally, he should be able to work on and complete all of these activities independently (after a brief intro from me, of course).

The four basic areas I'd like to focus on with his weekly trays are Science, Math, Fine Motor and Geography.

Science Trays: I'd love to incorporate more nature into our trays. I'd also love to give him some basic physical science-type activities on his trays.

Math Trays: These will simply consist of various manipulative activities (some will be open-ended activies/exploration and some will have a specific goal).

Fine Motor Trays: While Robbie's gross and fine motor skills have always been very, very good for his age (he gets that from his daddy... I can trip over air and drop my own hands), I realize that continuing to focus on his small motor skills will help with the stamina he will need when he truly MUST write for his school work. It will not be all pencil or scissor work, so I'll have to get creative here. I may use some brain teasers since these usually require fine motor accuracy. He also wants to learn to tie his shoes, so that will be included. Independent art and craft activities will also go on these trays.

Geography Trays: To be honest, I'm at a loss on this one. I know that I want to cover the continents, oceans and landforms this year, but I'm still working on ideas.

If you have any links/ideas for things we could do in any of these areas, please feel free to leave a comment.

Overall, I'm excited about our new school year.

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Our Plans: Bible and Read-Alouds

 

I'm going to post a bit about our plans for the upcoming year instead of what we did this week. (We have had mostly "free-play" going on around here, anyway.) I have many goals for our final year before he is officially in Pre-K. In these final weeks before our 2010-2011 year starts, I plan to outline some of them in my weekly posts.

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Weekly Wrap-Up

Robbie is 3 years old.

Well, I'm working on finalizing our plan for the upcoming year. I'll be posting more about that soon. Here are some highlights from our very, very unstructured week.



Pre-READING

He's back to doing his reading lessons daily (in Phonics Pathways).


He's also enjoying his last few weeks of his free trial at ABC Reading Eggs.


Pre-WRITING

I have no pictures, but he mostly colored and drew on his own this week.


Pre-MATH

He informally worked on number recognition by adding stickers to his Toy Story 3 sticker book (from Target). He had to look at the number on the back of the sticker and find that number in the book to place the sticker correctly.





For those of you who wondered if he got his semicircle:

If this makes no sense to you, you can read about our conversation here.





I found his old lock and keys and he's had a blast with them this past week.





In typical Robbie fashion, he spent an entire day dressed as a soldier while he guarded his fort. He loves to dress up! (Gotta love the snow boots!)


One day, the temperature dipped into the high 80's, so we went to the park. He had a blast riding his balance bike around the walking track (and I had to run to keep up with him).




Our amphibious friend:












Fun with $1 party favors:

He's such a silly boy! Later, he put on his black cowboy hat and told us that he was Mr. Potato Head.

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See what others have been doing in their Tot Schools

Tot School Homepage

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