Mama Of Many Blessings

Digging for Lucky Coins

2012-02-24T07:00:00.000-05:00

With the fact that Valentine's Day is now over, I decided it was time to change our sensory bin out. So our first sensory bin for the next month is....

Digging for "lucky coins," Later on in the month when the kids seem to loose interest in the bin I plan on adding some sand sifters so they can sift for the lucky coins.

So whats in the bin?? 2 bags of lucky coins I picked up from Big Lots for $1.

And sand we had on hand.

I also added a couple plastic containers to be able to collect the coins in, a few sets of tongs, scoops, a funnel and an old dressing container. This kept the boys busy for a few long periods today. They did end up of course with sand on the ground, but sand is wonderful sensory input and vacuuming is a great practical life skill :)

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Human Anatomy- Nutrition Unit

2012-02-23T09:50:00.000-05:00

We spent some time last week learning about Nutrition.

I purchased, printed off, and laminated the Nutrition set from Montessori Print Shop, so the kids could sort out different foods into the correct food groups. It is a beautiful set with real life pictures of foods.

The set comes with picture cards, definitions, picture labels, and just word labels.

The control chart.

Here is the cards and control sheet stored all in a basket on the science shelves

Anthony was very excited to pick this off the shelves.

Fruit and Vegetable sort using the felt board.

Enchanted Learning had this page about food groups I printed off and laminated and added to our felt board. We talked about portion control and what the USDA recommends

After discussing the different food groups, the kids worked on this nutrition page, I printed one off for each of the kids to make and add to our lapbook. This page was one of the free printables found in the younger human body lapbook at homeschool Share.

They forgot to read the spot that said don't try to fit all the food on the page....

I also added this page to the felt board for the week. It contains an a-z list of super food and what they do or prevent that makes them "super foods."

The kids filled out this page putting all the super foods putting them all in alphabetical order.

Cody and Anthony read An Apple a Day I printed off from Reading a-z, they also did the comprehension pages to go along with the story.

Check out my Pinterest Nutrition board for lot of great nutrition ideas!

Online Nutrition Unit Resources:

Super Kids Nutrition has the A-Z Super Foods we used along with a bunch of other great nutrition print outs.

Nutrition Interactive has 5 different online games that teach the kids about nutrition.

Spell Outloud has a unit on nutrition with some great ideas.

The Transformation Spot has a great poster to let children see how soda impacts our bodies.

Home School Share has 2 different lapbooks that are free to download, they have a younger kids lapbook and an older kids lapbook.

The First Grade Sweet Life has a great free printable book for kids about nutrition.

Ed Tech has a very large list of nutrition information and online/offline games

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Amazon.com Widgets

Heavy Work Activities Part 1

2012-02-19T13:34:00.000-05:00

I have had parents ask me what sensory products/ideas we use around the house for our "sensory diet." So I have decided to start series about different sensory ideas for all aspects of SPD, this week I am starting with Heavy Work Activities part 1.

With 3 kids who have sensory problems finding a great resource for one kid doesn't always perk the interest of the other ones, so we have a lot of different tools to use. I have a system that is still in the works for storing and making a visual schedule of the boy's sensory activities that I will be sharing as soon as I finish it up.

Ethan, Dustin, and Cody have problems regulating the arousal levels. Dustin and Ethan are very hyper they are my crashers and jumpers, pretty much the kids who find it impossible to sit still unless they are focused intently on something they enjoy, I love the analogy "like a bull in a China shop. Cody on the other hand is the complete opposite and could see the house on fire and slowly mozy his way out of the house lol. Let's just say both aspects of it sure can try your patients as a parent or teacher. Regular heavy work input WILL help to calm or stimulate these children.

These activities are truly used for most sensory processing issues and can have an amazing affect on the nervous system for regulation and modulation.

Heavy Work Activities:

Carrying things:

Wash out and fill a gallon size milk container with rice/beans and have the kids pass it around a circle like "hot potato"

Push a shopping cart/doll stroller with anything heavy inside. We actually would bring a toy shopping cart to the store with us when Ethan was younger and store trips were nightmares, he would load it up with groceries and follow us through the store, it didn't help completly but any help is a blessing!

Pulling a wagon this is a favorite for all the kids.

Pushing a box/laundry basket with anything with weight in it through the house

Using a backpack loaded with as heavy of a load as the child can carry. This has been a huge help for my sensory seekers, especially when we go out on field trips!

Weighted blankets have been VERY helpful for us getting kids to sleep when they cannot keep still long enough to doze off.

Weighted vest or ankle weights we have not found these useful with Ethan he doesn't like anything touching his skin he doesn't approve of, and vests or weights were not one of them. Cody did however like them and tend to keep him more interested in whats going on.

Stacking books, or helping stack chairs

Filling a dump truck with heavy blocks and push around outside or inside.

Weighted Lap Pad for seated work time.

Jumping, bouncing, swinging:

Trampoline, we keep a mini trampoline in the living room, it has been a great way for kids to get energy out expecially when it's to cold or rainy to go outside. The kids really enjoy jumping off the trampoline into beanbags chairs, pillows, or couch cushions.

Hippity hop ball- all the kids really love this toy, and it has held up to quite a bit of use!

Swinging from a trapeze bar and crashing into bean bags, cushions, or gym mats.

Pogo Stick has been another winner in our house, after TONS of practice Dustin can pogo stick no handed for quite a long time, Anthony is trying hard to learn so he can beat his record.

Playing hopscotch.

Playing jump rope

Potato Sack races

Wheel barrow walk races

Skip it

Crab Walk

Climbing or Hanging:

Climbing up rock walls, ladders, ropes, cargo nets, or even trees. If you cant find kids in the summer in our yard look in the tree, it is a favorite place for all the kids who come over.

Monkey bars, trapeze bar, gym rings either outside, or even inside using an indoor swing anchor. Dustin and Ethan seem to enjoy the climbing more than Cody, Ethan could even climb up the rock and rope wall by the time he was 2 years old.

Walking, running in sand

Sandwich/ "Squishing "

Being "squished" between 2 cushions

Roll a child in a blanket/between cushions like a taco.

Bear Hugs- Would work wonders for Ethan when he would get into big fits that he couldn't snap out of.

Firm towel dry after baths and showers, lotion body and dress in tight pj's

Roll exercise/peanut ball over the child

2 adults can swing a child in a blanket. The older kids love this, but Ethan took a very long time to deal with the gravitational insecurities for activities like this.

I have many ideas for DIY or inexpensive sensory ideas on my Pinterest Board

I compiled a list together of 50 heavy work activities you can purchase from Amazon below in the video. Leave a comment and let me know your favorite Sensory Diet activities.

Amazon.com Widgets

Valentines Day Party

2012-02-14T18:25:00.002-05:00

Happy Valentine's Day! I hope everyone has had a wonderful day! Me and Jake went out for a nice dinner last night (to avoid Valentine's day dinner crowd), and Serena stayed home with all the kids! We had our Valentine's Day Party on Sunday so I figured I would post the pictures for it. Serena and Kalli decided that they wanted to do the planning, cooking, and take charge of the party so they did it all!

The party started with a snack of strawberry yogurt, strawberries and whipped cream mixed together and put into muffin tins with popsicle sticks in to hold them, and put them in the freezer over night. They turned out great and were festive looking!

While they were waiting for the girls to finish up making dinner, the kids worked on Valentines day cards and hats!

Cody putting his card into the envelope to be given out.

Cody's Valentine's day picture to me!

The main course was pancakes, the girls dyed them with red food coloring and used a condiment bottle to squirt the batter out into a heart shaped, they chopped up bananas and strawberries to put on top, and

To make it even more special they poured a container of whipped cream into a pan put it in the freezer over night and when they took it out they used a heart cookie cutter for heart shaped whipped cream to top it all off!

The pancakes!

To finish off our meal they also cut out sausage in with a cookie cutter into heart shapes, used rolled up bacon to resemble a rose, and made blueberry muffins.

The girls busy in the kitchen getting food ready for 13 people!

The boys working together to scrub the table up after dinner and crafts!

The girls also made Valentine's for the kids. A Hershey Kiss ring I seen on Pineterest,

Expression suckers! What a fun time! I was so wonderfully proud of Serena and Kalli for all their hard work, and how great the party turned out!

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Organization Bliss

2012-02-13T18:28:00.000-05:00

This past weekend I spent quite a bit of time down stairs reorganizing a lot of our school stuff. Organizing and keeping track of everything we have with 6 kids, ages ranging from 2 all the way up to 13, and after 6 years of homeschooling can be quite challenging. I have changed the way we store our school things many times, but I have to say I think it will stay this way for a while it is so nice to have everything stored in 1 room! I figured I would share my OCD storage with you :)

We added a peg board system to store our items that are used frequently in the classroom area.

I took our english work drawers and hung them with a couple hooks so the kids could still wipe the table easily underneath!

Up at the top right corner of the pegboard, starting at the top and working down, we have a drawer for velcro, an Ikea storage bin for scissors, and Ikea storage bin for dry erase markers, a small pencil basket for staples, a wicker basket for post it notes, another wicker basket for stationary for the kids, and lastly a long hook for tape

On the top left we have a basket for nail polish for misc crafts, to the right is a couple boxes of crayons and a box of dry erase crayons, the next basket over is glue gun glue sticks. moving down in the middle in a pencil basket is extra chalk. I figured out that Ikea 1, 2, 3 baskets fit perfectly on the long hooks and that 2 baskets can share a hook, so you only need 4 hooks to be able to hang all 3 baskets, it's so much cheaper than purchasing expensive peg board accessories! Bin number 2 holds tape, hole punchers, rulers, staplers, and alphabet stencils, in bin number 2 we have book loops, big ones in 1 container and small ones in another container. The third container has dry erase spray, erasers for the chalk and dry erase board, glue sticks, and my line writer for HWWOT.

Just below the numbered baskets I used some Ikea magazine holders and hung them on hooks on the peg board, each magazine holder has a different kind of paper for easy access. The first is big lined paper with a spot for a picture at the top, the next is college ruled lined paper for Serena and Dustin, Wide ruled paper in the next holder for Cody and Anthony, in the last holder is drawing paper half colored and half white. I have another couple hooks next to the paper for hanging our clipboards.

These are the drawers next to my desk, on top I have a folder for each day of the week, and that is where I store the kids daily work that they need to work on. In the small drawers I have extra pencils, pencil sharpeners, a drawer full of crayons, pencils, and markers that need to be sorted through and added to our peg board still, and erasers. In the big drawers 1 has our Grammar Farm animals, The first of the big drawers has bubble wands and accessories, and the 2nd drawer contains the Grammar farm animals and accessories, the 3rd and last drawer holds water toys.

Next to the shelves in our classroom I have added this cart.

The top drawer contains regular and scrapbook stickers

The second drawer contains some coloring books that I change out a few times a year.

The third drawer down is rainy day kits I have picked up on clearance over the years or projects we purchased and never had time to get around to doing.

In my school/craft storage room, right next to the classroom, I have a bunch of carts for storage. The first set are my big drawers of themed items, I purchased 2- 3 drawer carts from Walmart and stacked them. What's inside the drawers?? Well the top and 1st drawer contains 4th of July and Summer items, the 2nd drawer down is Things that go themed items, the third drawer down is Spring, Easter, and Valentine's day, the 4th drawer is insects and bugs theme, the 5th drawer down is Fall, Thanksgiving, and Halloween, and the 6th and final drawer contains Christmas and winter themed items.

This is the next set of carts with drawers in the room and they hold most of my Montessori practical life items, recycled items for crafts, and some of my smaller themed drawers.

The top right drawer on the right holds sorting trays and ice cube trays, the 2nd drawer down is our Ocean/Beach themed drawer, the 3rd drawer is still being decided what to put in it.

Next down the 4th drawer is glass bowls, below that is the pitchers and tea sets, the 5th drawer contains the stainless steel, wood, plastic and wicker items.

The 5th drawer holds big practical life tools and Misc items. Any thing from shower curtain hooks to spooning mats can be found in this drawer.

This is the inside of the 6th drawer down, the small white container holds all of our little tongs, spoons, scoops, droppers etc, the long black container holds small sets of tongs and serving spoons, and on the side of that are chopsticks, and combs. The 7th drawer down is for our open and close containers.

On top of one of the drawers is our big container of Homemade Bubble solution because I make big batches so we always have bubbles on hand! I also put straws in a container for easier access for the kids .

The top drawer contains sponges, milk cartons, empty bottles etc.. The second drawer contains sweets and sports themed items.

The 3rd drawer down holds our space and robots themed items. The 4th drawer is for all our old milk and juice bottle caps, ribbon spools, plastic fruit cups, etc... The 5th drawer is for egg cartons, and empty paper towel / toilet paper tubes. The 6th and last drawer contains anything else recyclable that doesn't have another place.

Moving on in the room is where I store all my small items for sensory bins, practical life, crafts, and ribbon. Most of my small items are stored in recycled Jars that have been cleaned out good and repurposed!

On the bottom are the items that need a home, and my big containers with rocks, pom poms, colored rice, hay, etc...

Here is a couple close ups of some of the containers

Here I have some ribbon stored in an Ikea kitchen bin hanging from a peg board

In smaller containers off to the side I have fabric paint, paper punches, a complete porcelain tea set, and command strips.

Finger paint, and room for 1 more container! Below that in the blue basket is our rick rack, and misc strings and ropes.

Next along the room is an area I still have some work to do on, but it is slowly coming along.

My organized books shelves are still a work in progress because we ran out of book shelf space. We organized all the books according to their theme, I got this idea from Carissa at 1+1+1=1.

Here are the rest of the magazine holders that won't fit on the book shelves and are on the floor awaiting a new book shelf...

Next along in the room is for now a computer desk, but will soon be switched out for a couple more book shelves and these drawers will go on those shelves. There are all kids of art supplies in these drawers

Next to the drawers are 3 stacking containers.

Here is a look at the craft and school shelves.

Below the shelves on the left side is all Science items, next to it is our sensorial items bin, and below that is a bin with Language items.

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Heart Sun Catchers

2012-02-13T11:08:00.000-05:00

We did a simple Valentine's Day art project for our Friday art project 2 weeks ago, that I just realized didn't get around to posting. I got everything together and Serena was in charge of our art project, while I got some of my phone calls done. She was also in charge of pictures and didn't end up taking to many:)

Cut a piece of contact paper, draw a heart on the clear side of the contact paper, peel off the backing on the contact paper, add ripped up valentines colored tissue paper into the heart, cut another piece of contact paper big enough to fit over the top of the heart, peel the backing off of that sheet and place it sticky side, to sticky side, cut out your heart along your outline, punch 2 holes into the top of the heart and hang with ribbon. Such a beautiful and easy art project!

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Human Anatomy- The Skeletal System

2012-02-11T16:49:00.001-05:00

This past week we have taken an early spring break week, due to a family emergency, which means I have had very little time at all to spend on the computer. I have had time to read your comments but not the time to reply, so I am saying one big thank you to all who have commented I will work to answer any questions through the week. Hopefully things will be back to normal next week, after I catch up on laundry, and get my house back in order over the weekend. Don't forget to enter to win the Melissa and Doug Puzzle, the giveaway closes at midnight on Valentine's Day.

After we finished up The Nervous System, we moved onto the skeletal system.

We read through the bones section, from Bones and Muscles, and also read about our bones from our Usborne, Your Body book.

For silent reading this week Serena and Dustin read The Hard Stuff! All About Bones. They also did the work pages that went with the story.

An example of one of the pages in the book.

The readers include a glossary at the end so the kids can study the words and meanings!

We added No Bones about it and Types of Bones to our lapbooks. All of our lapbook parts on bones came from Homeschoolshare.

Anthony working on his lapbook page.

To finish off our skeletal studies, we made Skeleton people out of noodles. These are the noodles the kids had to choose from to make their skeleton people. I gave the kids books with pictures of the skeletal system, and also let them take a look at some completed skeletons on pinterest.

Cody is my kiddo who just rushes through everything and his skeleton was no exception! He took noodles and just poured them all over for his ribs instead of taking the time to make them really look like the ribcage :)

Ethan got home from school and wanted to make a skeleton to, but just had fun gluing the noodles.

When their skeletons were dried, the kids labeled the major bones. I didn't manage to get a picture though.

Skeletal System Resources:

Discovery Education has some great facts about the Skeletal System

Kids Health has a great movie about the Skeletal System geared twords younger kids they also have a free printable of a skeleton to label

Neok12 has some skeletal quizes for 7th-12th graders

ABCYa has an interactive online game where kids can label the major bones on a skeleton

Enchanted Learning has skeletal System printouts

Get Body Smart has all kids of pictures from any angle you can imagine of the skeletal system

Inner Body has a very nice interactive skeleton.

Cynesplace has a free printable Lapbook on the skeletal system

MontessoriWorkJobs has free Skeletal System 3-Part cards and book.

Check out other Skeletal System ideas on my Pinterest board.

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Melissa and Doug Giveaway

2012-02-06T09:20:00.000-05:00

During Christmas I purchased an extra Melissa and Doug puzzle that I am offering as a giveaway for Valentine's Day. The puzzle up for giveaway is a Melissa and Doug large farm jumbo knob puzzle. Its a perfect puzzle for smaller kiddos or kids just learning puzzles.

The giveaway will be open till 4/14 at midnight, I will randomly draw a winner on 4/15 through rafflecopter and contact the seller for their address information, if I do not hear back from the winner within 48 hours I will draw a new winner.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

My giveaways are listed on Contestgirl

Enjoying Nature

2012-02-05T07:30:00.000-05:00

The last week we had some unseasonably warm 50' days, I decided to take advantage of it and in the afternoon head out to the nature center. We visit the Nature Center frequently, the kids have had so many wonderful learning experiences there, and its a great way for them to get lots of energy out!

We took a trip down the wildlife trail to see the injured animals they care for before heading out to the trails.

Watching and reading about the owl's.

Gabe loved watching the animals!

Watching the bobcat, who always paces back and forth.

Running down the snowy paths!

Checking out the nest in the tree, and also noticing there is a second exit for the animals through the top of the tree.

Taking a break on the log.

Ethan would take turns pulling the wagon, great heavy motor work!

Looking for frogs and toads in the creek, soon enough it will be time for the frogs to hatch and the ponds and creeks are full of frogs last year we were able to see them during one of our visits! What a fun way to learn!

Serena and Dustin working together to make sure the wagon makes it across the bridge that still had some icy snow on it.

Gabe going up the stairs, without holding on!

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Valentine's Practical Life

2012-02-04T07:30:00.000-05:00

I added the last of the Valentine's Day practical life work on to the shelves this week, here is a peek into the new works added.

Pouring X's and O's: The kids will pour the little X's and O's from one cup to the other.

Here are the x's and o's that are in the cup. I found them in the dollar section at Target, they are supposed to be used for table scatter, but I decided to use some for Practical Life activities and the others for our math counters the kids have to choose from.

Spooning Hearts: The kids set the sorting tray on a flat surface, use the spoon to pick up one of the hearts and then place it into one of the slots in the sorting tray.

Here is the tray all filled in with the hearts, so pretty. I also found the hearts at Target in the Dollar section, they are really table scatter.

It takes a lot of concentration for them to keep the little heart on the tiny spoon.

Find the letters: Find the letters that are buried in the colored rice and add them to the puzzle.

This was a lot of fun for Ethan and great for letter recognition.

Metal Inset Tracing: Heart inset added with pink tracing paper

Water Transferring: The kids use the dropper to transfer water from one heart container to the other.

Dustin giving it a try.

Connecting hooks: the kids can hook these together, this has been an absolute favorite for Ethan, so I eventually will get more to add to them.

Be sure to check out our other Valentines Trays on the shelves right now Here on a previous post.

Our Valentine's Day Sensory Bin

Our Valentine's Day Mailing Station.

My Pinterest page for a bunch of Valentine's Day ideas.

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Valentine's Mailing Station

2012-02-03T07:30:00.000-05:00

I added a Valentines Day mailing station to the class today. Just a fun way for the kids to be able to make Valentines for each other, and their friends coming to our Valentine's Day party we have planned. In the basket there is Valentine's stampers, stickers or foam stickers to decorate their cards with, there is also a pen for them to address it, along with the blank cards and envelopes.

I picked up blank cards and envelopes from the Target Dollar section, here are the 2 different cards they could choose from.

The mailboxes for the letters to go into. Which has been used a lot already! I also found the mailboxes in the Target dollar section.

This was the first activity that Ethan choose to do off the shelves today. He loved adding the stickers and foam shapes!

He took addressing his Valentines very seriously!

He has mastered writing the "w" for his last name and almost all of his first name.

After he designed his card, he put it into the envelope to be put into the mail.

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Valentines Sensory Bin

2012-02-02T07:30:00.000-05:00

For our February sensory bin I choose to go along with the Valentines theme. I am still alternating it with our Winter Sensory bin.

Whats Inside:

-Valentines Garland with hearts

-Heart bracelets

-Little Heart containers

-A Feather Rose

-Red Star Christmas Ornaments

-Silicone Baking Cups

-Textured Hearts on Sticks

-Valentines container

-Red and pink necklaces

Ethan took the garland out right away and decorated the room for us!

I also added the hearts on sticks for the kids to play with in the bin.

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Human Anatomy - The Nervous System

2012-02-01T13:53:00.002-05:00

We spent a couple days learning about the brain and Nervous System for science last week.

I purchase Blood an Guts and the Dover Human body coloring pages, used on Amazon for $7! They have been a great resource for our Human Body Unit. The coloring book has a bunch of great color by number pages to color, the kids will be making their own Human Body coloring book with some of the pages, I would not use the coloring book for younger kiddos as the pictures are quite detailed pictures. We also are working on a Human Body Lapbook which was found at Homeschool Share for free.

We started our unit by making brain hats, the boys had a lot of fun doing and wearing them, Serena said mom I don't have to wear this all day do I? hehe. She was able to learn from it so that was good enough for me. HERE is the link to the site we printed off the templates from.

We have added a model of the brain to our science shelves, I purchased it from Amazon on sale during Christmas time for very cheap. One side has the names of all the parts of the brain, and the other side is lettered to match the book that comes with it. We used the model to label and discuss each of the parts of the brain.

We also added a booklet of brain facts and our cover to our Human Body lapbook. We discussed how to tell if you are a left or right brain thinker which lead us to find out that Cody is actually a "middle" brained thinker, we also read THIS article about why people get ice cream headaches.

I have a bunch of Human Body links on my new Pinterest account

This site has a huge list of information, it even contains some of the myths we believe about the human brain.

Here is a great site for kids. Learn about the different parts of the brain and how they work in the body. They also have free printables to label, interactive games, and lots of fun facts about the brain. This is a great resource for not only the brain but the whole human body.

Here you can find out just how powerful the brain really is.

Here is a site that teaches kids about the effects of drugs on the brain

Edhelper has a large selection on Nervous System readers and printables

Enchanted learning has a picture dictionary that can be printed off in different languages, and has been a help for Serena learning French.

Scholastic has the test to see if you are a left/right/middle brained thinker, and explains how each thinker learns best

Human Body Lapbook for younger kids-Free

Human Body Lapbook for older kids-Free

Check out other great homeschool ideas from

Friday Art: Blow Art

2012-01-31T13:14:00.000-05:00

For our Friday art activirty we did Blow Art with watercolors. It was a great color mixing activity as well as a fun project!

These are the items used to do this project. Eyedroppers with any 2 primary color liquid watercolors (we used blue and yellow), straws, paper, and an enclosed work area. We used our big plastic work bins from Discount School supply, but you could use a box and cut out the front, for a work area as well. I started out with just 2 colors for the kids to use, but once we started doing it I added a 3rd color (red) as well

Use the dropper and add some drops to your paper.

What a great fine motor activity for little ones!!

And Blow! Not only is this a lot of fun, but it is also great sensory input!

The kids repeated till the page was to their liking, and then set them out to dry.

The finished work! Some of the kids did quite a few, they enjoyed it so much!

Valentine's Trays and Practical Life

2012-01-28T17:11:00.001-05:00

Last week I started printing off some Valentine's work and added them to the shelves. I also changed some of our winter practical life trays and changed them over to Valentines trays. Confessions of A Homeschool has a bunch of great resources on the letter "V" for Valentine's to print off and that is what we used for most of our print offs.

The Valentine's matching game, follow the arrows and spell Valentines were added to a Valentines Tot Book to use for Gabe or Ethan the next couple weeks. The Sweetheart Letter match and follow the lines were found at 2 Teaching Mommies, and Ethan will work on it whenever he chooses to pull it off the shelf in the next couple weeks.

"V" is for Valentine's dot marker page. We use the empty bingo marker bottles from Discount School Supply, and fill with Liquid Watercolors (also from Discount School Supply), they work awesome and are so much cheaper that purchasing dot markers!

Valentine heart counting.

Ethan counting with candy hearts

When they are done they get to count out 10 and eat them! That was his favorite part.

Heart size sequencing.

Heart lacing, I couldn't find a red string, so I just used a blue one.

Upper and Lower case alphabet stamping, to use with our stamp set.

How it's stored on the shelf. All the stamps that are needed are stored in the container, and the stamp pad is under the stamps.

Ethan is working on lower case letters now, so I let him do some Valentines poking with this page, he poked around the circles, letters, and hearts.

Put the red sparkly pom poms onto the circles

I have now added the cards and Arctic Animals to the language shelf, and we review the animals a few times a week, and then Ethan usually plays with them in playdoh and makes animal tracks.

Heart Necklaces. Each clip has a precut and tied necklace, the kids just take one and start stringing their beads.

Pouring heart beads from 1 creamer to the other.

Spooning and sorting heart beads.

Dont forget to stop by and enter the Children's Books giveaway, entries will be accepted till midnight Sunday!

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DIY Crystalized Winter Tree and Snowflakes

2012-01-25T10:54:00.001-05:00

One of our winter projects was making a "crystalized" winter tree. The idea came from the New Child Montessori Winter Manual, and this was one of the projects I was excited to do with the kids. We also made crystalized snowflakes with the left over solution.

We started out by putting rocks into an empty coffee can, and then standing a small tree branch in the middle of the rocks.

I mixed up a batch of Plaster of Paris by pouring the 4oz plaster of paris into a bowl and mixing with 4oz of warm water.

I poured the mixture into the rocks to "set" the branch into place. I was surprised that it only took about a half an hour for the plaster of paris to set partially, but I let it sit for about 48 hours to dry completely.

Next we mixed up 6TBS of Borax and 1 1/2 cups of hot water water into a container, I also added some blue food coloring for a little color. Stir till the Borax has dissolved in the water, if you cant get it to dissolve put it in the microwave for about 2 min and that should work. We made a bigger batch of the mixture so we could make some crystalized snowflakes to add to the tree.

The kids then painted the branch with the Epson salt mixture

Let it dry for about 2-3 hours. And you have a beautiful winter tree covered in "frost."

While the tree was drying I had the kids get to work on making some "snowflakes" to hang on the tree. I took pipe cleaners and cut them into thirds (so they would be small enough to hang from our tree) we twisted 2 pipe cleaners together in the center, then added a 3rd pipe cleaner, twisted that in the center and spaced the pipe cleaners out to look like a "snowflake."

When the kids were finished with their snowflakes we set them into the left over borax solution and let them sit for about 8 hours, then we took them out of the solution and set them out on paper towel to dry overnight.

Some of the kids added beads to their snowflakes.

Anthony's snowflakes before adding the third pipe cleaners.

The finished snowflakes.

What a beautiful winter decoration to add to the kitchen table!

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Human Body and Animals In Winter

2012-01-24T09:05:00.001-05:00

Last week we spent time learning about the Human Body, and what different animals do in the winter.

This was a perfect book to go along with us learning about what different animals do in winter, it was one of my great finds at the thrift store for .50!

The pictures in the book were beautiful real life pictures that the kids really enjoyed!

Each of the kids had to pick 1 of the animals in the book, and write what they do in the winter and draw a picture of the animal. Of course Cody and Dustin both choose to write about the praying mantis's, since they had quite a few of them as pets in the summer.

Anthony choose to write about coyotes. I was so proud of him, he only misspelled 2 words and didn't have any help!

Here is the tray set out for the kids to make their "hand" books. They each took 6 pieces of paper and traced their hands onto each page, and then colored in each finger and wrote the name of the finger, the 6th page they made a cover for their book. I put the hand cards I made up earlier in the week so the younger boys would have a reference as how to spell each word.

Dustin finishing his book.

Cody's hand book, he decided to punch holes and tied ribbon to make his book. He forgot to put a cover on and added that after I reminded him :)

Anthony reading his hand book to me.

Each of the kids had someone trace them onto paper and color them for an activity we will be working on this week about the Human Body.

Serena helped trace Ethan onto paper

I added this new work to the shelves today for Valentines day. They have can make a heart or flower.

Pretty Valentines colors to choose from, in a little heart container.

Cody really enjoys the Disney short chapter books we got from Scholastic. I am so glad he is starting to enjoy reading, he struggled so much learning how to read and didn't enjoy it at all for q. We found out he has Dyslexia along with a few other learning impairments last year, and have been working very hard to get to this point!

Serena has been helping doing Spelling with 1 of the boys on spelling days, and I work with the other one, it has been a great help, and it has been teaching her some spelling rules she needed a little help with!

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Children's Books Giveaway

2012-01-22T00:00:00.000-05:00

The blog has hit 5,000 hits, so as a celebration, I am hosting a giveaway for 3 new winter children's books. The first book is One Snowy Day by Tammi Salzano, the second is Let It Snow by Maryann Cocca-Leffler and the last book is Curious George A Winters Nap.

You have a chance to earn 2 entries for the giveaway, become a follower of the blog via Google Friend Connect for the first entry, the second entry you can earn is for leaving a comment to this post. I will be randomly drawing a winner on 1/30 using rafflecopter. I will contact the winner through email for a shipping address, and if I do not recieve a responce within 48 hours I will select another winner. Good Luck!

Entries must go through the rafflecopter link below to be counted

Stop by and check out the large list of other giveaways at Contestgirl

and

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Snowflake Art

2012-01-21T19:44:00.000-05:00

Our Friday art activities theme was snowflakes. I planned 2 different projects for the kids to work on.

The first was an activity I have seen on a few different websites, and thought it would be a simple and fun activity for the kids.

We put masking tape on the paper in the shape of a snowflake. I have also seen people use painters tape.

Serena helped Anthony make the snowflake on his page with the tape.

Once the tape was down they painted the whole page however they wanted. They had dark blue, light blue, blue sparkle, and purple paint to choose from.

When they were done painting we carefully pulled off the tape to reveal our snowflakes. It was a very easy and fun project!

Our second project was coffee filter snowflakes, painted with water colors.

Here are the finished snowflakes. They will be hung in our dining room!

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New Works on Our Shelves!

2012-01-20T14:14:00.002-05:00

Here are a few of the new works added to our shelves in the last few days.

Tweezing Pom Poms: The kids found this pickle picker this morning and were asking to use it, so I put together a work they could use if for. They pick up each of the cotton balls or pom poms and then put them into a pattern using the pickle grabber. This was a favorite today for all the kids!

The cotton balls would stick sometimes and have to be pulled off, so I may take the cotton balls out and just replace them with all pom poms.

Tweezing and Sorting: Tweeze the erasers and sort according to color

Frog Puzzle: We have been talking about our class (household) pets. Frogs are one of our pets (we have fire bellied toads), so I added our frog puzzle to the science table along with our hand puzzle.

Heart Poking: I am slowly adding Valentines works to the shelves. I found these cute textured hearts on sticks at the Dollar Tree, and then put some foam out for the kids to poke them in.

The little boys really enjoyed this, especially Ethan, it kept him busy for quite a while!

Snowflake counting: Put clothes pins on the correct number. Ethan is working on number recognition so this is a perfect work for him!

How the cards and clips are stored on the shelf.

Tweezing snowflakes: Use the strawberry huller to tweeze the snowflakes from one container to the other.

close up of the plastic sparkle snowflakes.

Cleaning Mirrors: The kids enjoyed this work today, I did put this one higher up so if Gabe wants to use it, one of us has to get it down for him and watch him.

Scrubbing the mirrors with cotton swabs dipped in glass cleaner.

Wiping dry with the little cloths

Anthony enjoyed it so much he told me that our magnifying glass was pretty dirty to and cleaned that for me to :)

Magnet Rings: I put this on the shelves this week, and all of the kids tried it. I helped Ethan work on it, and he got the hang of it really fast.

He followed the pattern closely.

He realized that there was going to be a blue one left over and wasn't quite sure what to do with it.

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Our Hands and Snowmen

2012-01-17T13:59:00.000-05:00

We had my almost 3 year old niece join us on Monday and Tuesday for school, while my sister and brother in law were moving. It made our morning a little crazy, because Gabe knew we were busy with keeping everyone busy, and kept running off to get into trouble, but it was fun. We are starting our studies on the Human Body this week, starting with our hands, we talked about all the things we do with our hands, and experimented with not using our thumbs to pick things up. The kids picked up a little crayon box, and said this isn't to bad, but when they had to pick up a ball they started to see how useful our thumbs are :)

I added our Hand puzzle to the shelves.

We talk about what each finger was called as they pull them out and put them back.

I made some "hand" nomenclature cards for the kids, later in the week they will be making a hand book. To make things a little more difficult for Serena and Dustin I also had them learn the 3 different bone segments in the hand and learn the scientific name for the fingers, "phalanges."

Tip segment: Distal phalanx.
Middle segment: Middle phalanx.
Bottom segment: Proximal phalanx

The kids sorted seasonal clothes (can't remember where I found these, if someone knows please let me know so I can add the link.)

Circle drawn on back of cards with colored permanent markers for control of error.

Our Art for the day was to make snowmen. So we started our day reading about teasing, and then 2 snowmen stories.

We used blue paper for the "sky" cotton balls for the snowman's body, buttons for his buttons, beans for the mouth and nose, and googley eyes for the eyes. The older kids helped the little ones work on this.

We used the hexagon metal inset to make snowflakes.

I added a basket of winter clothes to the class for the kids to practice getting dressed in their winter clothes. There is a couple pairs of gloves, mittens, a scarf, hats, and a pair of boots.

Open and Close Containers: I added some new "open and close" containers for the kids, with some winter and valentines surprises hidden inside.

Tweezing erasers: The kids tweeze the erasers into the heart ice cube tray

Ethan was very excited to work on this.

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What Does Our Daily Routine Look Like??

2012-01-17T08:00:00.000-05:00

I have had a few people ask what our school day looks like. With 6 kids (3 of which are special needs) it can be very challenging some days! The one thing that has been such a life saver for me is to be flexible and realize that our day doesn't always go as planned, and to just work around that the best we can.

This is a rough idea of how our day goes, the mornings are the most flexible time, since both of the little boys are down in the classroom. In the afternoons I work on the older kids subjects because the little boys wouldn't sit through very good through those, I also do any subjects with them that were not able to get done during the morning work period.

8:00-8:20 AM- Start waking everyone still sleeping up.

8:20-9:00 AM- Kids eat breakfast, get dressed, get daily zone and breakfast chore done and get free time till school starts.

9:00-9:20 AM- Circle Time (do daily calendar, review character trait, worship/music, stories)

9:20-9:30 AM- Sensory Diet activities (so sitting through our work period isn't so hard)

9:30-11:45 AM- Morning work period- this is when I work on individual/group presentations, we do our art activities, and try to keep Gabriel out of trouble while the older kids work :) the kids take a 15 min break for a snack, to stretch, or sensory diet activities whenever they feel they need it in this time period

Our mornings are the time that a lot of my focus is on Gabe and Ethan and making sure they have something to keep them busy while the older kids are more independantly working, because the 2 little boys tend to get into lots of trouble if something isn't keeping them busy. Ethan can focus on an activity for quite a while if he is enjoying it, but Gabe gets bored very easily, and likes to throw things when he is done with them, so I am switching out his activities regularly through the morning, when Gabe's busy for a few minutes I sneak in our morning presentations, and the kids work on them as they want through the week.

11:45-12:00 PM- Serena and Dustin head upstairs to make and set the table for lunch, while I have another circle time with the 4 younger kids and read a couple seasonal books, and any fingerplays or songs scheduled for the day.

12:00-12:10 PM- Help make sure everything is set for lunch

12:10-12:20 PM- Get Ethan ready for school (he eats lunch at school)

12:20-12:45 PM- Drop Ethan off at school while kids finish lunch and hopefully start their chores.

12:45-1:00 PM- Help kids make sure lunch chores and zones were done while mom was gone (which really only happens about half the time)

1:00-1:30 PM- Put Gabe down for his nap, and then a little free time. Usually the boys will go outside and get their energy out and ride bikes, scooters, rollerblade play catch etc... till we start back up for the afternoon.

1:30-3:30 PM- This is my time to focus my attention completely on the 4 older kids, since the 2 little boys are not around to need my attention so much (M-Th.) The kids finish any independent work not finished in the morning, we do Mystery of History (M,W,TH), Spelling (M,W,Th), Math Presentations (daily), any presentations that I think may be to difficult for the 2 little boys, or any science experiments that were a little to messy to include the 2 little ones in.
*On Fridays Ethan doesn't have school, so he stays with us for school in the afternoon, that is the day I always plan to do a big art activity, or a fun science experiment for the week. Some Fridays when I have gotten behind for the week, I give Ethan fun messy play or art to keep him engaged while we finish up our weekly studies(pretty much anything Gabe would make a big mess of if he was around) We finish up between 3/4:00 on Fridays it just depends how in depth we end up getting into whatever we are doing.

Gabe usually wakes up from his nap around 3:00ish, and eats his snack and watches an educational show till it's time to get Ethan from school.

3:30-3:50 PM- Bring Gabe to go get Ethan from school while anyone finishes any work that needs to be completed for the day. When the kids have finished school they each have a chore to complete in the school room, recheck their zones, and then have free time till dinner.

Winter Sensory Bin

2012-01-16T16:40:00.000-05:00

I finally finished up our winter sensory bin this weekend and the kids have been enjoying it, even my niece who is here to join us for school Monday and Tuesday this week.

I used pasta that I dyed blue, and blue and white pom poms for the filler.

What's inside the sensory Bin:

-blue dyed pasta
-plastic winter characters

-sparkly snowflakes

-pom poms

-cotton balls
-snow covered fake trees
-styrofoam balls with toothpicks to make "snowmen"
-blue and white necklaces
-tongs

-measuring cups
-scoops

-spoons

While I was still getting the rest of the stuff out for the bin, the kids dug in and started having fun.

Ethan had a lot of fun making snowmen out of the foam balls and toothpicks

Using the tongs to pick up cotton balls was another favorite!

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