Adding a little education to our vacation

We are heading to Florida! Woohoo! I'm not telling you this so you will be jealous, but I would understand if you are. I mean, I would be.

What's a road trip without some preschool and kindergarten level education involved??

Here are my ideas for the drive down to the sunshine state (and possibly back if they happen to... hopefully!... sleep through a state).

• Each noodle will be provided with a map of the United States that they are free to color (HERE and HERE are good sources).

• As we enter a new state, they will put a star sticker on that state.
• At some point we will stop and take a picture of the 3 kids in each state.
• For Marie (Kindergarten), I will have a page for each state (found HERE) along with a fact sheet I put together (Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, template). She will either draw or write the information from the fact sheet onto her coloring page. 

I also found a Scavenger Hunt page HERE if the littles are interested!

It's very simple stuff but an excellent way to help them realize what's going on as we drive. We'll see how it goes! I'll have an update when we return.

What are some ways you like to teach your kids while on a long drive?

((Check out THESE ideas, too!))

Colors Unit

Marie is incredibly artistic. In spite of struggling with names of colors until she was nearly 5, she has always loved colors. Now that she has her colors down well, I thought it was time for a little more in depth study! Especially since she's always asking, "What does green and purple make?" (Insert any color in either spot!). We had a great time!

Check out all these ideas I found mostly around the www...

Reading:
We had no trouble finding too many books at the library.

Writing/Language Arts:
My Color Book

Lego Game

Write sentence on how to make favorite color.

Videos:



Crafts:
Make a giant color wheel

Experiment with mixing paint colors and Paint picture with mixed colors
Fingerpaint rainbows
Sandpaper tshirts
Rainbow Crayons

Rainbow Pasta

Science:
Predict what colors need to be mixed to make favorite color/color of choice. Experiment to find answer. Document.
Paper towel experiment

We had trouble getting this to work I think because the cups were too tall. So I had to  flip the paper towels around. Still got the idea and the kids loved it!

Soak 3 skittles in a bowl of water

Bible:
"A Dream of Heaven" in the Jesus Storybook Bible
Wordless bracelet
1 John 1:7
Sing Jesus Loves the Little Children

((We weren't able to get to everything so don't go thinking we're superhuman or something)).

Meanwhile, Jack worked on R is for Rainbow!

Learning God's Word: Daniel in the Lions Den

We've reached the story of Daniel in the lions den in our Jesus Storybook Bible. This seemed like an easy one to expand on so that I did with free online resources! We also worked on the letter L (for Lion and Ladybug) in preschool because I love when everything works together.

Reading:

Daniel 6
Jesus Storybook Bible
Really Big Book of Bible Stories

The Story of Daniel and the Lions

We got this at the library. It rhymes and the kids loved it.

Verse:

Isaiah 41:10 Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Focus:

God is our protector. We can trust Him.

Watch:

Youtube video

Activities:

Order story cards
Telling time game (kindergarten)

Word Search (kindergarten)

Retell the story to each other using stick figures

Crafts:

L is for Lion

Daniel in the Lions Den Sunday School Craft

Sidenote, Marie completed her 100th day of school today! Yay!

F is for Fish and Frog

This week I had hoped to get a fish for our schoolroom but that never happened. I still plan to get fish as soon as we can find a really good deal on a small fish tank with a filter (so if you happen to know of one...).

We still learned about the letter F and Jack did wonderfully! The letters are really starting to click with him. Here are two things we did this week outside of the Letter of the Week curriculum that we really enjoyed...

We learned a little about the life cycle of a frog. Jack cut out (with a little help!) and pasted this chart together.

We had already done some coloring earlier and getting Jack to color more than one thing is just not worth the effort. But he loves to cut and paste!

This fish craft I found in a random little craft book I have in my stash. It was a HUGE hit!

Marie made the third one completely on her own.

Supplies:

• Construction paper
• Tissue paper
• Glue
• Scissors
• Googly eyes
• Markers/crayons/glitter/etc (optional)

Directions:

Draw the shape of the fish and have the kids cut it out and glue an eye on. Then cut out shapes (or have kids cut out) from different types of paper (we used construction paper and tissue paper) and have the kids glue them on the fish. Let them decorate as desired. Cut out strips from the tissue paper and have them glue the strips as a tail.

Hours of fun will follow this super simple craft! Who knew?

Linking up here:

Sight Word Target Practice

First of all, I need to apologize (hashtag sorrynotsorry) for all of the homeschool posts. This is our life right now! And we are really enjoying it. I love sharing all the ideas I spend hours searching for online, too. Maybe save someone else some time since I'm not saving myself any! :)

Speaking of, I found this sight word game idea on Pinterest awhile ago. The kids love it so I figured I'd share!

Supplies:

• Paper plates
• Marker
• Tape that is safe for whatever surface you plan to use (we used masking tape)
• List of sight words 
• Soft ball

Directions:

• Write a sight word on each plate
• Tape plates on a wall or door
• Call out a word and have your kid throw the ball at the word

Marie likes to add a little drama to everything.

Since Jack is not ready to be working on sight words but always wants to join in, Marie will point to a word and tell him what it is. Then he'll throw the ball at it. Marie gets a little extra practice and Jack gets to play! And hopefully he's soaking some of it up!

What sight word games have you been doing?

"Circle Time"

Most days we start school together and this is what the routine looks like...

Prayer time.

Bible verse review.

Songs:
Alphabet
Days of the Week (To the tune of "The Adams Family")

(Sorry for my loud voice. If I didn't jump in, this video would be ten minutes long.)

Months of the Year



Books of the Bible



Calendar.

We found this calendar at a garage sale.

Bible story.

Split for separate lessons. We usually come back together at some point to do a craft, read, and/or watch the occasional youtube video.

This gets changed up a little every once in awhile, and some days we scrap all of it but the Bible story. But I do love having them learn together. Marie is already becoming an excellent teacher!

Learning God's Word: Psalm 23

Usually for "Bible Class," the kids and I will read from The Jesus Storybook Bible one day, color a coloring page from a download I have with a shortened version of the same story another day, then go back to The Jesus Storybook Bible, and so on. Sometimes I will incorporate ideas from the handouts they get in Sunday School. But I'd really like to do more! I'm in the market for a great, theologically sound Bible curriculum (so if you have recommendations, please let me know!), but until then I'm going to try to put a little more effort into teaching my babies God's Word.

This week we read from the Jesus Storybook Bible about "The Good Shepherd." So I decided to spend a little bit more time on talking about God as our Shepherd.

Focus:

God is my shepherd and will take care of me. (I can trust Him).

Memory Verse:

"The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want." Psalm 23:1

We used THIS website to make the trace page.

Reading:

Jesus Storybook Bible "The Good Shepherd."
The Word and Song Bible "Psalms. The Psalm of the Shepherd King David."
Psalm 23 NASB and ESV versions.

Activities/coloring:

Psalm 23 Bingo (123 Homeschool 4 Me)
Psalm 23 word search (kindergarten)

Psalm 23 maze

Story Comprehension

Jesus and the Lamb coloring page

Songs/Poems:

Psalm 23 Song
Jesus Loves Me

Craft:

Shepherd toilet paper roll

Handprint Sheep

We also happened to have this DVD...

I don't plan to always be this elaborate, but we sure had a great time! Looking forward to do something like this again! What have you and your kids been studying in God's Word?