OLD HOMESCHOOLERS NEVER DIE . . . THEY JUST WRITE CURRICULUM


"Let my teaching fall like rain and my words descend like dew,
like showers on new grass,
like abundant rain on tender plants."

Deuteronomy 32:2

Courses of Study

To view the Course of Study for each grade level, you can click on the "Course of Study" label
or "Search This Blog" for the specific grade level you wish to see.
To date, I have courses of study completed for kindergarten through fourth grades.

Newsletter Articles

In 2013 the Lord started me producing a newsletter for the homeschool group we are a part of. Every other month I write an article on a topic the Lord has put on my heart. I've decided to add these articles to this blog. I hope you will find encouragement through some of my ramblings. You can click on the label "Newsletter" to find the articles.

Saturday, November 27

Card Stock

A couple days ago I was getting ready to print out some Thanksgiving games and realized I was out of card stock. I found a good substitute was to cut an old manilla folder to 8-1/2" width. The yellowish-tan color of the folder didn't affect the colors of the game very much, and it went through the printer just fine.

Sunday, November 21

Veteran's Day

For Veteran's Day we read an article on-line about what Veteran's Day is and how it got started. We also talked about the poppy being the symbol of Veteran's Day and read the poem 'In Flanders Field'. Then K. made a poppy. I cut two flower shapes out of an old file folder (one larger than the other). Then K. tore constuction paper and glued it on the shapes. When the glue was dry I put them together with a brad. (She had found the brad in my drawer a few days earlier and wanted to know what it was -- I figured this was a good way to demonstrate its use.)


I had requested the book Pepper's Purple Heart: A Veterans Day Story by Heather Henry at the library, but it didn't arrive until December. This is a fun story. The book explains what a veteran is and that it is a good thing to serve your country. Being a newer book it refers to both Vietnam and Iraq. The last page of the book has a brief history of Veterans Day.

More Recommended Books:
  • Veterans Day by Marlene Targ Brill
  • Veterans Day by Jacqueline S. Cotton (for the youngest children)
  • Veterans Day by Amanda Doerling Tourville

Days of Creation

For Kindergarten Science, we are studying Creation. I wanted to do something hands-on for a fun way to remember what God made each day. I came up with the idea of cutting the numbers out of cardboard and then as we study each day, find corresponding pictures and words to glue on the number. I got a piece of corrugated cardboard that was 25" x 49". I made a graph (each square equalled 2") and drew the numbers on, making sure each number touched the next number in 2 places to make it more sturdy.


Then I drew the graph on the cardboard, then drew the numbers on. I used my bread knife to cut the outline of the numbers.


Here are the numbers up on the wall in K's room. I hot glued some popsicle sticks on the back of the middle of the '4' because it was a bit wobbly. I think it will be a real nice decoration when we are all done. Doing this has make K. excited about kindergarten. She is ready to start, but we have 9 more weeks, which is good since I'm not quite ready!

Screws and Wheels

To introduce Screws, I drew a diagonal line on a sheet of paper with a fat marker, then I cut along the line. I asked K. what it looked like: an inclined plane. Then I took the paper and wound it around a pencil so it looked like a screw. To experiment with screws I pulled out my cookie press and stuffed a large piece of tissue paper in the tube (instead of cookie dough). Then we held the button down and watched the tissue paper get pushed out of the tube. After that K. played with the threaded rod from the cookie press, making the nut go up and down. We also screwed screws into some pre-made holes.

To learn about Wheels, I put a LARGE and HEAVY book on the table and had K. push it from one end of the table to the other. It was hard to do. Rolling it on something would make it easier. So we put markers under the book and pushed it along. This worked well, but we had to keep putting new markers under the book, so it was tiresome. The rollers needed to be attached to the book, or the book needed to be on something with wheels. K. went and got her little plastic wagon, but the book was too heavy and the wheels didn't turn, so we got the Tinkertoys out and made wheels, set the wagon on the wheels and the book on the wagon. It worked!

Reading Numbers

The last few weeks we have been working on recognizing numbers: 45 is forty-five, not fifty-four. I made up some games that K. enjoyed and she has learned to read the numbers correctly.
  • Game 1
    • You'll need a sheet of paper with the numbers 1 through 100 written in order and pennies or buttons.
    • I said a number and K. found the number and covered it with a button.
    • I found that doing about 30 numbers was all we could do at one time without her getting tired of it.
  • Game 2
    • Use the same sheet of paper as in Game 1 and 100 pennies or buttons
    • Cover all the numbers with a penny.
    • I removed a penny and read the number, then K. removed a penny and read the number. We just kept going back and forth until we both had taken 30 pennies off the sheet.
  • Game 3
    • You'll need 2 sets of cards with the numerals 0 through 9 (one on each card) and 2 coins or buttons.
    • Turn the cards upside down and mix them up, then spread them out (as you would for a matching game).
    • K. tossed the 2 coins, picked up the 2 cards they landed on, set the cards side by side and read the number, then switch the order of the cards and read the number. We took turns and played until the cards were all used.
    • A variation is to place the cards in a line or circle and use a spinner. Spin your first number, count cards from 'Start' until you get to that number. Spin your second number and start counting from where you picked up the first number.

Saturday, November 6

Reading - Phonics Step 7

K. started reading during Step 5, so she learned Step 5 and Step 6 while reading. I inherited the reading books from Sing, Spell, Read, and Write -- we just finished book 9. We read one story a day. We do not read the word lists at the beginning of each story. That just seems too "classroom" to me and really isn't necessary.

K. also reads books of her choosing to me throughout the day. Right now she is reading Danny and the Dinosaur to me. Before that she read Pancakes for Breakfast (wordless book), and Sammy the Seal.

Wednesday, November 3

Inclined Plane

We started out our lesson about inclined planes by K. picking up a VERY heavy book and placing it on a box (about a foot off the floor). Then we took a shelf and used it for an inclined plane from the floor to the top of the box. K. slid the book up the inclined plane and found it much easier.

Then we looked around the house for other inclined planes: stairs, toys (dump truck, car ramp). Then we went on-line (Googled "inclined plane pictures") to look for more examples of inclined planes. While we were looking at those I remembered a game at pbskids.org - Curious George - Feed Gnocchi. This games lets you tilt ramps (inclined planes) to make a meatball fall onto the plate of spaghetti.