Letter A - Day 3

Today was day 3 of learning the letter A. I also wanted to make sure to start teaching Bee how to hold markers, crayons and pencils the correct way. Today he gave me major attitude. He woke up at 6am today, and it showed. I pushed through, though, offering a few different activities while still being able to to do the ones I wanted to work on with him.

Last week while I was trying to see exactly what he could and couldn't do in our 26 week curriculum, I found that he wasn't very able to trace lines/numbers/letters, and made note of it as something I wanted to work on. Do I expect him to be able to draw these things on his own without tracing some dotted lines? Not one bit. He's 3. My main goal in homeschooling is not to force and overwhelm him, and that is the beauty of homeschooling. Things are on the child's terms, not everyone else.



So, here's how he did today. Obviously a lot better. I was impressed. The lowercase a looks pretty funky, lol. I thought it was cute though, and he was so happy he did it that he squealed.

I then had him try tracing along the lines. This sheet was made for "cutting practice", but he's not skilled enough to hold scissors just yet.



Anyway, we're making progress, I can already tell. He's becoming more willing to actually do things with me. When I say "It's time for school!" he goes over to get some of his crafts and sits at the table. We're both having fun!

Letter A - Day 2

Today started off pretty bad. I didn't sleep well last night, and I guess Bee didn't either. So, we were both a mess. We carried on with our day as planned, though.

We're still working on the letter A (all week long). Today I taught him uppercase and lowercase. We matched the case letters with the correct apples. He did great! I love the way he says uppercase and lowercase. It's very cute.

After that, we practiced counting the seeds in the apples and matching it with the correct number. He gets bored quick with this one, so I'll have to find a way that engages him. I have a few ideas in mind.

We also did the "Do A Dot" activity. We did it last week for fun when I received the markers in the mail, and his colors were everywhere but on the spots they were "supposed" to be (in the blank dots). It was a pretty picture, though. So how did he do this time?



As you can see - a whole lot better! He stayed in the dots (mostly) and didn't go insane with the markers. He has a ton of fun with these things!

I then printed off another tracing/coloring page with ants. I, of course, tried to get him to trace the A's, but he told me "I color da ants!" and let out this viscous laugh. He likes to mess with bugs - even on paper. Typical boy, I suppose.



He then spotted the glue sticks in his little pouch and did the "What's that?" thing where he knows what it is, but wants me to give it to him and tries to pretend he's innocent. You know how they get us parents with that. So, then I thought - hey! I'll grab some construction paper, cut out some shapes (do not laugh - they were free-form) and have him glue them onto a bigger sheet. Of course, this is when the attitude came out. He wanted to do it all on his own, but he hasn't learned that glue is NOT a crayon - it cannot go all over my dining room table. So, it didn't last long for the gluing. Then I asked him what each shape was and what color it was and we (me) wrote it down.



After our free time/Mommy's work time, I decided to get out the magnets to play with. He loves to make these things "click" by putting them together. He thinks it's hilarious and I'm not sure why. He played with these for a good 20 minutes, then got upset that I made him keep them on the dry erase board instead of on my floor.




And this is the aftermath of today's works.. so peaceful. It always melts my heart when I see him peacefully sleeping.

Our First Day - Letter A

Today was our first day of school. Yes, even though it was technically a "Holiday". We did activities that were scheduled, as well as some extras because we had time and he was interested in more after lunch. I also evaluated him with a sheet that tells me what he should know by the time we're headed into Kindergarten (he's only 3, so we have a couple of years yet), and he did okay, but obviously needs improvement. It's good to see where he stands.

One thing that is difficult trying to each a 3 year old, is having enough patience with each other. He colored, did some matching, read the Bible verse that was scheduled, etc., then wanted to be done. There was a few times in between activities where he kept yawning (on purpose, to let me know he was done), but I told him, let's make it through this then we can have some free time. So, we did.

Here are two of the activities we did today:



He did try to trace the uppercase A, and did well for the most part, but obviously it is something we need work on. He's 3 - it won't look perfect for a long time yet.



This activity grabbed his attention. I cut out the apples, put some glue on them, and let him stick it to the tree. I tried letting him have the glue, but he treated it like it was a crayon. Lol, NOT very fun for me.

We also worked on Spanish words that begin with the letter A, practiced counting/recognizing numbers, shapes, colors, etc.

Overall, today was a good day.