Homeschool Number Fun

Sofi and I have been doing some really fun number activities for school lately, and I wanted to share.

Numbered squares have a lot of possibility for learning math

First, I used construction paper and cut out 1.5" by 1.5" squares.  I used a crayon and numbered the squares.  I used one color for 1 - 25, another for 26 - 50, etc.  Then, I started thinking of what we could do with these numbers!

The obvious was to put them in chronological order.  Mixing them up first let her practice number recognition while ordering them.  But there are many other creative ways we came up with to use them!

1. Line them up in 2s, 3s, 4s, or 5s and skip count - as pictured.

2. Order them backwards.

3. Figure out how many sets of X you can make with 25, 50, etc.

4. Put odd numbers in one row and evens in another.

5. Draw random numbers and play "which number comes next?"

6. Sort them into piles by their tens.

We started with 1-25, then did another 25, and so on.  We've been playing games with these squares for a few weeks now.  They've really helped Sofi to grasp the one to one quality of the numbers as well as to visually see how addition, skip counting and tens work.  This is setting up the basis off the math processes, which we will be starting in the morning!

What other games can you come up with for the number squares?

Fall Vocabulary Poems for Beginning Readers

In Waldorf education, the children learn to read by writing verses, songs, tongue twisters, etc.  Sofi and I have been working on some Autumn themed poems and I thought I'd share them in case anyone else would like to use them!

Poem 1
Fall leaves
Fall down,
Yellow, orange,
Red, brown.

Poem 2
Moon yellow,
Leaves red,
Nuts brown,
Orange pumpkin bed.
Fall is here!

Poem 3
On a walk,
In the Fall,
Leaves from
Trees tall,
Red, orange, yellow, brown,
Lay down,
On the ground.

Poem 4
Pumpkin orange,
Nuts brown,
Yellow moon
Looks down.
Leaves red,
In bed.

Of course, these are all my original poems and belong solely to Our Mindful Life.  Anyone is welcome to use them for their own personal use, but please do give me credit if you use them for something else!  :D

Uncommon Toys That Encourage Imagination

If you have kids, you have toys.  Toys, toys, toys!  The selection of toys available is dazzling, and bewildering.  What are the best toys for kids?  The answer to this question varies by family.  In our family, toys have to meet many specific criteria.  We have a goal of maintaining a 90% plastic free house.  This is most important in our toys, so we aim for toys made from wood, metal, natural fiber fabrics, paper or cardboard.  Non-plastic toys cost more money, generally speaking, than their plastic counterparts, so we can't be buying new toys constantly.  So, when we look for new toys, we look for toys that can grow with the kids without becoming obsolete.  Also, we look for toys that can be used in many ways.  Open ended toys are amazing sources of entertainment for children.  And, if at all possible, toys should be hand made and beautiful.  Tall order, no?  But, my kids play for HOURS without intervention, guidance, or needing to be entertained.  I thought that for today, I'd share some of our favorite toys!

Top 10 Unconventional Toys at Our House

1. Peg People - Peg People are basic shapes that are reminiscent of people.  But they are clearly undefined people.  The reasoning for this is that then the children get to define what the people are THE MOMENT.  They are no supposed to be named, defined, and remembered as a certain person.

Peg people can be bought in several sizes, but I prefer the large ones because I tend to panic about the baby having small things in his mouth.  Our peg people have been used as characters in Little House on the Prairie, Heidi, farmers, dollhouse families, fire hoses (as the nozzle), phones, baby bottles, spices for play food, and a plethora of other things.

2.  The Play Silk - If you haven't heard of Playsilks, let me introduce you to the wide world of toys that can be used in about a million ways!

Play silks, also called playsilks, can be used to make so many pieces of a child's imagination, that they truly are indispensable.  My kids have used them as hats, scarves, capes, blankets, sleds, canopies, slings and baby carriers, covered wagons, sewing projects, dresses, dragon tails, grass for cows to eat, water for ducks to swim on, and many more things that I can't think of right off.  We have silks that were scavenged from closets, estate sales and thrift stores (read that as what some grandma's would refer to as head scarves).  We have some that were purchased white and dyed different colors.  We have giant ones that reach across the top of our play stands.  We have long narrow ones.  We have the standard 30 or so inch squares.  We have handkerchief sized silks.  And when it is time to clean them up, they all get heaped in a basket - easy peasy.  Actually, that clean up job usually belongs to the youngest member helping us to clean up.

3. Buckets - Buckets are a toy that we often think of in relation to sand boxes or beaches, but may forget in other contexts.  However, my kids play with buckets constantly.  They have a special place in their hearts for anything they can refer to as a "washtub".

4. Wooden Cut Outs - I love Dad's Wooden Toys on etsy.com!  My kids currently have the farm animals set from this site and have literally played with them every single day for the past 3 years.  I never spent a better penny in my life than I did on those animals!  The kids are hoping for a "zoo" and a "fairy tale" set for their birthdays this summer.

5.  Logs - We have logs in so many sizes, and they are used for so many things!  We have giant pieces of tree trunk outside that are used as climbers and seats.  We have firewood sized logs that are used for all manner of outside play, including pretending to build campfires.  We have Tree Blocks that are used as characters, to pretend to build fires inside, to build with, as play food, and, again, way more things than I can think up to name!

6.  Clothespins - Wood Clothespins are used so many ways at our house!  We have painted the ones that you see at the top of the page, as well as several others, just to make them pretty.  We have plain ones.  Occasionally they get to use my spring loaded ones when they need them to hold things up.  These are used to secure playsilks as part of outfits, to secure tents, as characters in imaginings, to build things (Walter's favorite is to build airplanes and drills), and on and on.

7.  Bowling Pins - Bowling Pins are another great accessory to our imagination games at home.  The kids use them for all of the above mentioned tasks.  It is amazing that sometimes they need more than one option for their game, and sometimes they need more than 6 different options!

8.  Baskets - My kids use baskets for so much of their play!  They have baskets in different shapes and sizes.  They use them as beds, for hauling, as boats, as cars, as covered wagons (we are big on Little House on the Prairie around here), for clean up, for organizing the toys.  Our playroom wouldn't be what it is without its awesome array of baskets!

9.  Tins - Walter especially is a collector of tins.  We have tins that used to hold tea, that used to hold mints, that used to hold gifts, tins that used to hold cookies, tins that used to hold spices - tins, tins, tins!  And the kids use every single one of them.  And then they ask for more!

10.  All of Outdoors! - As Papa likes to say, "What do you need toys for when you have all of outdoors?!"  My kids spend the majority of their day outside playing.  They move their bodies.  They run.  They jump.  They swing.  They ride their bikes.  They pretend.  And I watch them from the windows or the picnic table, without getting involved.  Actual outdoor play is sorely lacking in America these days.  Yet, it costs nothing, is one of the best ways that kids can spend their time, and is one of the healthiest things that kids can do!

My Mistake

The Bean has been learning hand work.  She is very excited.  What she really wants is to learn to sew, knit and crochet.  But we are starting small.  Her fine motor dexterity is not fine enough for anything complicated yet. So, we started with sewing quilt squares, and weaving on our pot holder loom.

We got started, and I showed her how to thread up the loom and draw the hook through with the yarn weaving in and out.  And then, she started making mistakes!  I knew it was coming, and at first, I prompted her to fix it.  But I wasn't enjoying that process, and neither was she.  Finally, I stopped insisting that each row be perfect and let her simply do it.

Two rows later, she was able to see that she had made a mistake.  She hadn't been able to find the mistakes when I was the one finding them, but left alone for 2 rows, she found them.  I showed her how to correct it.  A few rows later, she was finding and fixing the mistakes herself.  By the time she was done, her rows were perfect.

Amazing that I thought I had to teach her.  She knew how to figure it out all by herself!  My mistake.

She also took the pictures.

What Did You Learn At School Today?

Today, my kids have:

*Reacquainted themselves with some of their favorite cold weather clothing - Turning of the seasons - Earth Science

*Hauled firewood - Physical Education

*Sat mesmerized in front of a burning fire - Chemistry

*Counted out how many "clumps" of frozen peaches they could have with their lunch - Math

*Reenacted scenes from Farmer Boy and Little House on the Prairie - History

*Built with blocks - Both Math and Physical Science

*Learning new words and building a giant vocabulary - English

And this afternoon they will be

*Drawing with crayons - Art

*Learning the letter H (The Bean) - Reading

*And who knows what else?!

L, M, N, T?

The Bean has begun to learn her letters. I really held out as long as I could on teaching her, but she'd started to teach herself how to spell, and I was worried that she'd get into bad habits thinking that letters made a sound that they didn't. I've been very glad that we went ahead and started doing the letters, in the end.

We are going slowly - learning one letter each week. We started with L. Then we did M. Next came T. And this week we are working on N. And then people have asked... "Why L?"

I looked at many aspects of the letters and took a lot into consideration. Since I'm teaching an early 5 year old who doesn't have a lot of drawing skill yet, I felt it would be best to start with letters that are all straight lines and are not complicated to write. The part I didn't think through was that she can't really pronounce the L sound very accurately yet. But, she can hear it well enough that she can pick it out in a word most of the time just fine!

Bearing the language barrier in mind, I chose M next, then T. I was afraid that M and N would be too similar, but when she began calling Ns M, I knew we needed to address it head on - and she has done just fine.

On letter day, which is Monday, I tell the Bean a story or verse, and draw a picture from the story with her. I have my copy and she has hers. For L we did, "There once was a Lovely Little Lady who Loved to Ladle Long Leaves on the Lawn." Then we drew our lady, holding a big ladle which was actually the letter L, and all of the leaves fallen on the lawn. I write the verse at the top of our pages with all of the Ls in a different color than the rest of the text. Then we get a clean sheet of paper and write a big L in the middle. We go around and around the L in different colors until we've filled the entire page. Last, Beanie likes to practice writing the new letter on lined paper until she feels like she's really got it down.

Throughout the week, we practice the sound, find the letter in different writing, make the letter out of sticks and bark outside, draw the letter with sidewalk chalk, and anything else fun we think of to do with the letter! Bean will write the letter with her crayons when she is drawing for fun a lot.

And then we hole punch all of the papers from Monday and put them in her binder in order. When we've done the entire alphabet, we will bind the pages in alphabetical order in a book that she can keep.

Acorn Hunt!

Today, we went hunting for acorns to add to our classroom and toy collection.

We don't have any oaks on our property, nor any on our usual walking route. Ok, there is one oak with the tiniest little acorns on our route, but I was really hoping for BIG ones. So, a quick "wanted" post on Freecycle yielded some good leads, with one being just a few blocks away from the house. We took our baskets and set off to find some good acorns! It didn't take the kids long to gather up a significant amount.

We took them home and added them to a basket on the shelf. These acorns will become many things - play food, people, decorations, money, even math manipulatives when the time comes! This is the joy of truly open ended toys - they can become so many things beyond what they are.