Despite being very pregnant, exhausted all the time, and so sore, we've still been managing to do quite a lot as far as 'lessons' go. Colwyn has made a lot of progress in his math workbook.. he's gotten through counting by 5's and 10's (which he already knew, really), subtraction, and telling time. The time unit was simplified because it came before counting by 5's, so he mainly knows how to tell the hour and if it's half past. Lachlann picked that up as well, and even though our only analog clock in the whole house has Roman numerals, they can still tell what hour it is.

Colwyn's doing great at reading, getting more confidence and all. His main problem now is that he'll guess too quick, rather than actually paying attention to the words. We have to remind him now and then to focus on the words. Lachlann is great at sounding words out, if he knows what sounds each letter makes. He's spotty on letter sounds, so I'm going to try and dig up our old LeapFrog videos.. but still, if I just tell him what each letter says, he can sound words out pretty well. Not reading, but doing quite well for a 4 year old.

In my last post, I hinted that early humans might be a big topic for us, and boy, have they. Colwyn is just so fascinated that we've been spending a lot of time on it. We've done most of the links given in the Usborne Encyclopedia of World History, we've watched various documentaries I've found on NatGeo and PBS, and we've picked up supplemental books from the library (like the DK book on Early Humans). We had been planning to do a science day about it but I was sick then, so our last science day before the new baby comes will involve some caveman role playing. I've got a couple games all worked out, and Colwyn can't wait.

We finally got the deck washed off (the chickens have been free ranging all winter, and they spend a lot of time on our deck looking for handouts.. thus, lots of chicken poop on the deck) and refilled the bird feeders, so for the last couple of days, we've been IDing birds that visit our house. We've also had a few really warm days and we've been out as much as possible. We're due to have another stretch of good weather starting tomorrow, so we've got lots of park playdates planned.

We've been watching some interesting shows on TV, which has led to fun discussions and games. The first was a show where a team of archaeologists tried to recreate an Egyptian sea-going barge. Colwyn and Lachlann were really into and asked lots of great questions. Later they played with blocks and created their own versions. That led us to try some engineering challenges for our science day this month. I love the website Think! Engineering. We tried building a few different bridges using the supply lists given, and we also tried the catapult (which we sucked at).

Another day, we watched Walking with Prehistoric Beasts, which we probably haven't seen in a year or more. Colwyn especially liked the parts with the hominids and Neanderthals, so I think we may skip the dinosaur section of the World History book so we can move onto human evolution. After all, they've been studying dinosaurs for years.

Lachlann surprised me a week or two ago by doing some simple addition and subtraction orally, in his play. A while later I asked him a few questions like, "Hey, I want to bake some cookies, and I need 6 eggs, but only have 3. How many more do I need?" and "I bought 2 donuts and Auntie bought 2 donuts, how many do we have altogether?" He was able to do them all pretty quickly, in his head. Like I said in my last post, he observes Colwyn's math lessons most of the time.. I just didn't realize he was getting that much out of it. It makes me feel better because the other day, my mom seemed surprised that he still wasn't writing his name. Right now, I have him cutting paper as his lesson--I'm trying to come up with fun fine motor activities for him so writing will hopefully come easier.

I checked some of the books Colwyn's been reading to determine his reading level. Turns out he can pretty easily read at the second grade level. He was quite pleased with himself when I told him that. It's normally something I'd keep to myself, but he tends to get down on himself for not reading perfectly like Mommy and Daddy do, so I thought he could use the boost.

Post-Holidays

I love the holidays, really I do. But each year it's sort of a relief to be through with the craziness.

So Colwyn is starting on subtraction in his Singapore Earlybird 2B workbook. He's done great with addition and seemed to get subtraction immediately. It reinforces my feeling that the practical, hands-on, incidental math we do daily really helps. I almost feel like the workbook is just a way of checking to see what he already knows. When he pipes up with, "Mom, you gave me seven pieces of chicken, I ate five and just have two left, can I be all done?" - do we really need a workbook? But it is nice to not have to draw up my own worksheets so he can learn the symbols, I'll admit to that. Lachlann is working on learning how to write numbers. His recognition is great, but his pencil (well, dry erase marker in our case) grip is horrible, and it makes him not enjoy writing. We've been playing with plates of flour or sugar and drawing numbers (shapes, letters, etc) with our fingers. I'd love to let him do that with shaving cream, but Doug doesn't use any.. maybe I'll have to grab some at Target. Lach observes most of Colwyn's math 'lessons' so I'd be surprised if he didn't breeze through subsequent lessons.

Colwyn's reading is coming along really well. It's wonderful to see how proud he is of himself when he reads through an Elephant and Piggiebook. The only time he really experiences difficulty is when his own impatience or irritation gets in his way.. then even an easy word can seem hard. That's when we usually take a break and come back to it later. For book club, we just finished The Five Lost Aunts of Harriet Bean. That was a big hit with Colwyn. Last month was Welcome to the Bed and Biscuit, which was very sweet. We ended up missing the actual book club meeting that month, though, as the kids were sick.

Our other work has been haphazard, at best. We're slowly working through the Early Life section of The Usborne Internet-Linked Encyclopedia of World History, which has included working on learning the names of the continents and oceans. We've explored some of the neat websites on arthropods, and Colwyn liked making the connection at the Museum of Science when we saw fossils of arthropods. The kids got a calendar for 2010, so we talk about that daily. In the process, I've learned that, yes, Colwyn is firm on the days of the week, and yes, he knows his cardinal numbers pretty well. The months are new to him, but no biggie. He likes knowing what day it is, and we draw little symbols or write easy words on days we have stuff planned, so he'll tell me, "Mom, we have two more days until Lego Club!"

What else? We've worked on our Secret Agent social studies sporadically. Our Earth Scouts meeting last month dealt with the water cycle (briefly) and habitats. The kids all created terrariums, which was much more fun than I expected. The mess was exactly what I expected. Thankfully all the moms are great about helping pick up. We also did caroling at a local nursing home, which was a great experience. I was surprised at how Colwyn was really into memorizing the words to the songs, he did really well. The kids were a big hit with the elderly residents as well as the staff. For science day last month, we created a diorama of a dinosaur habitat, as well as Play Dough dinosaurs. The diorama included a volcano, which we set off with baking soda and vinegar. The kids loved that part, and with some foresight on my part, it wasn't very messy at all.

We've got a bunch of stuff coming up this month, it should be exciting. Hopefully I'll get better at keeping track.

Month(!) in Review

Yikes, I really dropped the ball on posting. October was a very busy month for us, so I'll blame it on that. We've done all our usual work - Colwyn has about 8 pages left in his Singapore 2A workbook, so that'll get done this week, then we can start on the second half of his kindergarten math. He's pretty much done with Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
, so we're moving on to using easy readers for his reading lessons (which we try to do for at least 10-20 minutes a day, in addition to our regular read-alouds).

We've been working a lot on science/history. We covered (the basics of) the formation of the Earth, composition of the Earth, plate tectonics, the start of life, early life, and evolution. Most of that was through the The Usborne Internet-Linked Encyclopedia of World History
. We used some websites for the composition of the Earth. Plate tectonics was covered in the Usborne book as well as through some Science Day hands-on activities with our homeschool group. To complement the Usborne book on evolution, we also read How Whales Walked into the Sea by Faith McNulty.

For Earth Scouts, we read When The Root Children Wake Up
by Audrey Wood. Then we brainstormed some ideas on how to take care of the Earth and used those to play "Mother Earth, May I?" It's pretty much just like "Mother, May I?" except the kids say, "Mother Earth, may I compost our kitchen scraps?" and then the kid playing Mother Earth tells them how many steps to take. They seemed to enjoy it, I think. We were supposed to go on a walk to look for creatures outside, but it was rainy, so I assigned that as homework. The week before, we had done a Recycled Art Day (which Dani planned and hosted), so the kids who participated in that got a Recycling Badge.

For book club, we read The Wind in the Willows
by Kenneth Grahame. We only read the first three chapters or so, but Colwyn (surprisingly) really liked it. I think a lot of it went over his head (due to the language), but it was so enjoyable to read aloud. Both boys participated really well during the book club activities and enjoyed playing outside with the other kids afterwards.

We also went on a field trip to the Aquarium, which was quite a lot of fun. The boys spent a lot of time exploring with Alex and Mila, which was nice. We toured the Beverly Fire Department last Tuesday and will do an encore tour of the Danvers Fire Department this Tuesday. That obviously led to many discussions on fire safety, but I think the boys were most excited about climbing in the fire truck.

Our homeschool group's Halloween Party was a big success, as well. We rented a room at Endicott Park and the kids played that "Guess the Body Part" game with cold spaghetti, a peeled tomato, hot dogs, lunch meat, etc. One of the dads entertained the kids with some acoustic guitar music, which was super nice of him. They played Red Rover and Duck, Duck, Goose - both big hits.

So, all in all, a pretty busy month. We also had various park days, playdates, and who-knows-what-else going on. I'm going to make a concerted effort to stay on top of the journaling, since it's a pain the butt to try to remember what happened over the course of a whole month. :)

Week in Review

This week has been a pretty slow week for us. Doug and I have been really sick (the kids just had sniffles), so I haven't been very motivated to do much.

On Tuesday, we got the boys' new bunk beds delivered, so that was an interesting experience. We did our usual reading lesson, and then because Doug was home sick, he helped them do a science kit we had - digging for dinosaur fossils. The kids have done similar activities before, but they still enjoyed it.

Wednesday was our big apple picking field trip and it went so well. I was really dreading it, because when I went as a kid, the branches were all so high and it was a real pain. So, I was imagining having to lift the kids up to pick apples. But we were pleasantly surprised when we got off the hayride to see that the branches were almost brushing the ground, and they were heavily laden with fruit. I think it took the boys maybe five minutes tops to fill their bags. When the hayride dropped us off back near the farm store, we got to have cider donuts and cider, and then each of the kids got some animal feed. I figured the boys wouldn't be interested since they typically hate farm animals (except our chickens, of course), but they ran off ahead of me and fed the chickens and the sheep. Fiona, for her part, loved the pigs and did not want to leave them. She kept oinking, though her version sounds more like a Frenchman laughing (ie - 'Hon, hon, hon!'). It was very sweet. When we got home, we did a reading lesson and called it a day, I was exhausted.

Thursday was a park day, so we met at Endicott Park. There were a few moms there, all new members with only toddlers. It was interesting trying to make conversation since they don't have any older kids, but we managed. That afternoon, Colwyn did his math workbooks (which also included reading, as he's working on the number words). Then we did a page from his history book, though it was more earth sciences than history - composition of the earth, plate tectonics, continental drift.

On Friday, we did more reading, but mostly had a lazy day. In the afternoon, though, we decided to go into business selling eggs (we have a surplus from our chickens). The boys made signs and I filled a cooler with eggs, which we set out in the front yard. I told the boys that they could keep any money people gave us, figuring that would be a good way to move into learning about money. We also gave our neighbors some eggs as a gift, but they surprised us and gave us $5 when they returned the basket. The boys were thrilled!

Week in Review

Last weekend, we went to King Richard's Faire. We didn't think we were going to be able to go, since we usually get free tickets, but our 'source' moved away. Thankfully, we lucked out with a new 'source' and got enough free passes for all of us (admission is normally $22 per person or something like that). We watched a bunch of different shows, including two jousts, and had a really great time.

On Monday and Tuesday, we did reading and history (reading from the Encyclopedia of World History). We also went bowling with our homeschool group on Tuesday, which was a huge success.. we had a few families show up unexpectedly, families that we haven't seen since the spring. Hopefully everyone's gearing up for the 'school year' and will be more active. On Wednesday, we went on a cruise up and down the coast between Manchester and Marblehead with Mahi Cruises out of Salem Willows. I don't know that the kids listened to a whole lot of the narration, but it was definitely a fun experience. When we got home, we did more reading and did 'cookie math' - which is basically just us baking cookies, but the kids do learn about measurements.

On Thursday, we had Calvin over for a playdate in the morning, then did more reading and worked on our journal entries for this month's book club. The books this month were Friday was book club and was (surprisingly) a huge hit, as well. It was surprising because we tried out something new.. instead of all the moms sitting with the big kids while they presented journals, but the meeting being mostly free play, Jen had a few activities planned and also did a lengthy circle time where they read two books and had a discussion. While all that was going on, those of us with little ones hung out in the playroom so the babies wouldn't be disruptive. I was expecting Colwyn and Lachlann to resist, since they're normally very shy at book club, they they did really well. They sat for the whole circle time and even shared quite a bit of info. I was super impressed.

After book club, we came home and worked on a part of their math workbooks I'd been putting off. It involves pouring water from one container into many smaller ones, or filling up one big container with several smaller cups of water. We've done that activity before, but for some reason it came up again. I'd been putting it off because it's involved and makes a big mess, but we did it during Fiona's naptime, so it was fine. After that, they each did a few pages in their math workbooks, and Lachlann actually finished his Earlybird 1A book! Woohoo, Lachlann!

Week in Review

Our week was pretty full this week, but not nearly as full as next week's will be. We did reading lessons most days, two days of math, and three days of reading from The Usborne Internet-Linked Encyclopedia Of World History. We did cooking math one day (brownies, yum). We had health lessons on two days, when both Lachlann and I had physicals.

Friday was our first Earth Scouts meeting, and it was a big hit. At first, I was counting myself as very smart for not inviting everyone over to my house for the meeting, but that morning as I was trying to pack everything, load it and the kids into the car, and get everything into the library, I realized that I was wrong. :) Luckily, the space at the library was just perfect for us and the staff was super nice. While we waited for everyone to arrive, the kids decorated the folders they'll use to keep their journaling pages together. Then we sat in circle and listened to the first Rosie Emery song (I was expecting earthy, hippie type music, but 'Cooperation' emulated a hip-hop, rap-ish song and was a little embarrassing). Then we talked about what Earth Scouts do - the kids enjoyed listing everything they could possibly think of that lives on the Earth. We did a few cooperation games next, with much laughing. Then the kids had a snack. Once snacktime was over, the kids made their individual pictures depicting our Earth community that we made into our Earth Scouts banner. While they did that, I demonstrated the woven belts for the moms, and that was about it. All the kids really seemed to enjoy themselves and were well behaved. Fiona, who I had forgotten to bring toys for, entertained herself quite well for over an hour and a half, with very little help from me. I was so impressed.

I think Earth Scouts will be a big hit for this year, and can't wait until our next meeting. :)

We also made two trips to the park this week.. Lynch Park with Charlotte and Sam, and Stagefort with the homeschoolers. This is my favorite time of year for park days.. the ground is dry, there are a lot of overcast days, and the temperature is almost always cool. Woohoo for fall!

Week in Review

This week we've done our usual 'lessons.' I call them lessons but they're totally optional, and Colwyn gets to choose which ones he does on any given day. His motivation, other than his natural enjoyment in doing these activities, is time on the Wii. I'd been hesitant to buy a Wii because I'm worried that the kids will spend too much time playing on it. But the boys were more than willing to make a deal that in order to play video games, Colwyn has to do two 'lessons' and Lachlann has to do one. Lachlann's lesson can count as observing or helping with Colwyn's, depending on what it is. They can choose between math, reading, social studies, and history.

For math, we're still working with the Singapore workbooks in addition to real life experience. Colwyn is about halfway through 1B and Lachlann is halfway through 1A. They're not expensive workbooks, but they'll add up over time and multiple children, so we use a page protector and a dry erase marker so they'll hopefully last for all the kids. They both have been breezing through them, doing at least five or six pages at a time. They did math on Tuesday and Friday; on Friday, Colwyn was up to learning about even and odd numbers, and skip counting.

For reading, we've been using Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
. It's not the most fun, but it gets the job done and Colwyn likes that each lesson takes under 10 minutes. He's consistently able to sound out easy words. Lachlann has even showed some interested and on Thursday, I did the first lesson with him. He did the second on Friday and enjoyed it, even asking for more (though unfortunately, Fiona woke up before we could go onto the third).

We signed up for a great program through Highlights that teaches social studies. It's called Top Secret Adventures and because it's meant for kids 7-12, I have to help him with it quite a bit. Mainly, he needs help with reading.. the puzzles he can solve on his own when I give him directions. The first package was for Australia and we finished that on Thursday. Then We started the next one, which features Mexico.

We're using The Story of the World: History for the Classical Child: Volume 1: Ancient Times: From the Earliest Nomads to the Last Roman Emperor for history, supplemented by lots of books from the library. For the prehistory section, we used Stone Age Boy and Everyday Life in Prehistory, among others. For the second chapter on early Egypt, which we just started this week, we checked Ms. Frizzle's Adventures: Ancient Egypt and How the Amazon Queen Fought the Prince of Egypt out from the library, among others.

This is all in addition to the regular stuff we do, like art, science, literature, etc, which are done more loosely as the kids feel like it and as topics come up.

Our homeschool group was comparitively inactive this week, with only a park day that we attended on Thursday. We went to Lynch and had a picnic, and the kids enjoyed playing on the playground equipment. We saw Alex and Mila, Simon and Satchel, and two new friends, Morgaine and Ronan.

The kids also spent quite a bit of time helping me in the garden, which not only makes my job easier, but teaches them about agriculture and life cycles of plants, and the niches that bugs and other critters fill in our local ecology.

Living Life

Colwyn has been doing well with the Singapore book. He's got the shapes down pat, especially with the extra reinforcement that all the playdough-playing they've been doing recently has given them. We moved onto numeral recognition which is easy for him, too. Recently, we were doing some oral math, which is a pretty routine part of our day, and I decided to write down the numbers and signs, so he's gotten a little exposure to math sentences now.

We've gotten back into the habit of feeding the birds and squirrels. I'm thinking of seeing if the kids want to keep some sort of nature journal and record what they see out at the bird feeder. It might be fun to have them draw some of the birds they see.

Lachlann surprised me the other day by singing the ABCs. He did quite well. I need to remember that he's getting older now and might appreciate some more effort from me. Hmm.

Our homeschool group is still going well. We're having people at our house this week for a little Valentine's Day party. The kids will decorate 'mailboxes' and exchange cards, and then have some cupcakes or something. Two weeks ago everyone came over here for some Imbolc activities.. it was pretty much a bust, except for the ice cream I gave the kids as a special surprise. The activities I had planned really didn't hold a candle to the epic Star Wars battle they were involved in. Oh well.

Playdough Math

We started the next Singapore Math workbook today and the first lesson is on 3D shapes. Colwyn had no problem with the exercises, but he kept wanting to refer to the shapes by their 2D counterparts. To illustrate, we got out the Playdough.



Ah, the unfortunate nose-cone.. oh well. You get the idea.

Picking It Up Along the Way

Colwyn is making progress both in reading and in math, without us really having to do any work. For reading, all we really do is read books, visit the library, and have occasional conversations about how to sound out words, what letters words start with, etc. From the library, he's figured out how they arrange books, and will look at the bottom of books for the first three letters of the author's last name. He's pretty good at finding books if I say, "Yaccarino. Yyyyy-accarino. Sounds like a Y, right? Y-aaaaa-ccarino. Try looking for YAC." He'll also give me letter/sound hints if we're playing a guessing game, and he's usually accurate, too. I love that he's experimenting with letters, sounds, and words with no pressure, in ways that interest him. I'm thinking of doing some note-writing.. me writing him short notes, and asking him to write me short notes (like, "Colwyn, I have to go change Fiona's diaper, but could you try writing down what you want for lunch?"). It doesn't really matter what he writes, just that he tries. I think it might provide him with some valuable knowledge, so long as he's into it.

He's also learned how to do simple addition and subtraction in his head. I don't know that he'd have the faintest idea of what to do with a written math problem, but if we're talking about, say, cookies, and I ask him, "If everyone in our family has a cookie, but the dog eats three of them, how many cookies will we have?" he can get the answer pretty quickly, and without even counting on his fingers. I was super impressed when I realized he could do this.

I love these validating moments. :)

Star Wars Math

Colwyn is always full of surprises. The other day I got out the counting bears to do a bit of low-key, fun math. There are four different colors of bears (red, blue, yellow, and green) and three different sizes of each color, so you can do lots of different things with them. He didn't seem very interested at first, but as soon as I started naming the bears after Star Wars characters, he really got into it. What I wanted him to do was just sort by size, so we created three spots for big, medium, and small bears. I named the first big one Vader, then the medium one was Obi-Wan, and the small one was R2D2. Then I picked a medium one and we named it Luke, then put it with the other medium bear. The next bear was a small one, and I tried to name it Jabba. Well, Colwyn refused, insisting that if we were going to name one Jabba, it had to be a big bear. Of course. :) We went through all the Star Wars characters they know, first deciding which size bear they should be, then putting them into the right pile.

I'm not saying that it's unusual that he can compare sizes of characters on TV and apply that to counting bears (at least, I don't think it's unusual), but it was really cute and funny how he insisted on doing that himself.

Sick Days

The kids are sick today. Well, it's mostly Colwyn with a fever and lethargy, though Lachlann threw up this morning (and is now acting fine). We've been watching TV all day as I really want Colwyn to rest as much as possible (and he doesn't really seem all that willing to get off the couch).

So I decided to show the kids finger knitting. I remember my Amma teaching me this when I was really little, and despite extremely infrequent use, it's easy enough that I still know how. They each did a bit, though I more or less did it for Lachlann but on his hands. Lachlann really enjoyed the long multicolored 'snake' I made for him, too.

We've finally hit a part in the Singapore math workbooks that Colwyn doesn't intuitively know. It's mainly numeral recognition, but there's also some graphing that I had to explain to him. We were doing up to about 10 pages at a time until we hit this part, and now it's more like two or three before Colwyn says he's done. I always let him stop when he wants, and he's so far he's always been willing to come back to it.

Neighborhood Pests

We had a very exciting evening last night, and as with most things, it was a real learning opportunity for the kids. We were sitting at the table working on a long-neglected math workbook (more about that later), when I noticed a raccoon prowling around on our deck. I quietly got the kids attention and tried to move them slowly to the slider, worried that we'd scare the critter away. Well, this guy certainly wasn't scared. I had set a garbage bag right outside the door for Doug to bring down to the trash barrels when he got home, and the raccoon was happily digging through the bag and pulling out bits of food and wrappers.

Now, let me just interrupt the story here to say that I fully recognize a normal reaction would have been to try to scare the raccoon away to avoid a big mess. Well, first off, it wasn't me that was going to be cleaning it up. ;) And secondly, how often are my kids going to get the chance to see a raccoon less than a foot away, while still protected by a thick glass door?

It was a fascinating experience. We observed the raccoons' behavior (we quickly spotted another hanging near the stairs), how he rummaged for food and held it in his paws, how he got a Ben & Jerry's carton stuck on his head (lots of laughter at that), how whenever they heard a noise outside they would freeze, and sometimes climb up the railing and into the arbor vitae. We got to examine the markings on their faces, their stripped tails, and their long claws. We talked about where raccoons live (Colwyn worriedly told me, "But raccoons live in the forest!" right when we saw them) and the geography of our neighborhood, why their fur was so thick and why their bellies were so fat, what hibernation means and what other animals hibernate and why. We talked about weather and the seasons, and how animals (including humans) adapt to changing weather conditions. We talked about why we shouldn't open the door, and how if we ever see a raccoon while we're outside, how we should stay far away. We talked about wild versus domesticated animals, and why we couldn't let the dog out to say Hello. We talked about baby raccoons and fully grown raccoons and their relative sizes. Today we came up with a few different stories about the raccoons and why they didn't come back, where they might be, etc. We also pretended to be raccoons. If Colwyn is still interested tomorrow, I may pull up some info on raccoons online.

All in all, it was a very thorough lesson. Just look at the different subject areas we touched on. I was quite impressed. And to top it all off, Doug was perfectly willing to clean up the mess (it wasn't that big of a mess anyway) and thought it was very cool that we got such an up-close encounter with raccoons.

As I mentioned earlier, we returned to the Singapore Math workbook after nearly a full month of not touching it. I didn't think it had been that long, but I date the pages as we do them. Well, we did several pages and Colwyn thought it was great fun. I'm always sure to stop him before he gets tired of it, and we only sit down to do it if he's agreeable to it in the first place. I do have to suggest activities like that most of the time, as they're out of the way and he would never think to ask for it on his own, though he does really like doing the workbooks. So far all of the concepts and activities are things he already knows how to do--I haven't had to explain anything other than briefly give him directions. I'm pretty sure that'll be the case throughout most of the book (I've looked ahead), and it isn't until the next book (we're on 1A right now and will start 1B whenever he finishes the first one) that there are some things he's probably not familiar with at all.

We also wrote thank you notes yesterday for Colwyn's birthday party. I've been having him write out "Thank You" on the front and then draw a picture on the inside, and while his spacing is usually a little off, he does great with the letters. I even had to take Lachlann for a diaper change before he had started writing "You" on one of them and he did it all by himself. We've got a few more left to do, including our out-of-town relatives who sent gifts.

Tomorrow we have a playdate with Charlotte and I'm planning on trying to fit a library trip in either before the playdate or maybe after naptime. Either that or we'll go Thursday.. but I've got a book on hold and I'm anxious to get it. :) Plus, I can handle reading the same childrens' books over and over and over again for only so long.

Supplies & Exchanges

Eee! We got a package in the mail from Rainbow Resource and I was so thrilled. I'd only bought a few things, but boy, were they good choices.

The biggest hit, much to my surprise, was these:



The kids just love playing with them. We've used them in a lot of math-y ways.. I make a pattern and Colwyn copies, we talk about different and same (how 2-blues are the same as 3-blues for color, but 2-blues and 2-greens are the same for number), I've showed him some addition problems and some subtraction problems, and some other random stuff. But they've also had fun constructing with them, too.. which I think is half the appeal.

We also got a math curriculum. I know, I know.. strange for someone who's unschooling preschool, right? Well, Colwyn loves workbooks, and most of our workbooks are pretty lacking in math activities. So I ordered Singapore Early Bird 1A and 1B, and he loves it. I looked through 1A, and he'll easily be able to do any page in there. 1B requires that he write some numbers himself, which he's still not able to do yet, so we'll work our way through 1A as Colwyn feels like it, and hopefully when he's done, he'll be able to do 1B.

And for fun, we got a Melissa and Doug outer space puzzle. It's beautiful, and Colwyn and Lachlann both enjoyed putting it together. And the best part is that it only cost us $7.75! Normally they're about $11.

This is old news, but I don't think I actually wrote about it here. We did an exchange with another homeschooling family a few weeks ago. We put together a package of some natural treasures we'd found (stones, seashells, etc), two necklaces that Colwyn beaded, a package of clay, a dinosaur, and some bubbles. We also made a mini-scrapbook with pictures of the boys and information about Massachusetts. And in return, we got all this:




It was a great experience, and hopefully we'll get to do it again sometime soon.

And to end on a kooky note, here's a picture of the boys hanging around.

Catching Up

Here's a little bit of what we've been up to:

Creating a passport for Colwyn:



And one for Lachlann:



Measuring things:


Baking a cake for Daddy's birthday:



Having lunch at the park with Paige:



Going to Salem Willows with cousin Daniel:



Measuring the length of an apatosaurus, using a chalk line to illustrate:



And drawing life-size apatosaurus, T. Rex, and Colwyn footprints:



That's not to mention all the other fun stuff we've been up to.. you can see pictures of hot air balloons and helicopter rides at this Shutterfly album.

We've also done our usual workbook pages, craft projects, library trips, and other goofy stuff.

Co-Op Madness

Some weird things have been happening in the homeschooling co-op we joined. The short version is that everyone has left except for me and the two founders. The slightly longer version is that the people who were in the group were either not committed to homeschooling, or wanted something very different from the group. I think they're going to start advertising a bit and hopefully some new people will join. I think that as the kids get older, it'll be easier to find people who are sure that they want to homeschool (or are actively homeschooling), rather than just considering it.

We had a playdate at our house today with Dani and her sons, Thomas and Aidan (they're from the co-op). Colwyn is the type of kid to just play by himself in a large group of kids, so I wanted to set up a few one-on-one playdates so he could get to know the kids better. Colwyn and Thomas did so well playing, and didn't get into any fights. As they were leaving, Colwyn told Thomas that he loved him and that he could come back after Saturday. :) Dani and the other mom in the co-op, Jen, are bringing their kids here on Monday, so he was actually right about Thomas coming back after Saturday.

So, oddly enough, Colwyn actually enjoys doing worksheets. This is only slightly to my dismay. As much as I'd rather be doing fun, creative activities, if he's happy to do worksheets, I suppose that's fine. After all, I liked (like?) worksheet type things, too.

We played with the states puzzle for a while today. If I take out 10-15 states, he does great at putting them back, but if they're all out, he's a bit lost. He really likes pointing out where we live, where Mexico is, and where the space shuttles and dinosaurs are. We also played with some math manipulatives (a set of bears in 3 different colors and 3 different sizes), but after a bit of sorting - which he called making parades, he kept insisting that one of his bears was going to be mean and knock down my bears. So we ended that game.

I've started showing Colwyn some Magic Schoolbus episodes on TV. He really likes the one about the asteroid. I'd really like to get some of the books, though, as the TV show is just a little.. weird.

Well, Lachlann has a diaper that needs changing, so until next time!

There's Order in the Universe

We were cleaning up Colwyn's room today, and I asked him to pick up his dinosaurs. I told him to put the biggest dinosaurs on one side, and the littlest ones on the other. This is what he did:



Alright, Colwyn!

And while I'm at it, here is a picture of the playstands that Doug built for the boys. He still needs to finish them up a bit, but as they were supposed to be from Santa and still weren't done on December 24th, he was a little rushed. ;) They look great, though, and the boys love them.



We had a great playgroup today at Imajine That! in Lawrence. Lachlann really seemed like such a big boy while we were there. I'll write more about it in my other blog (note the links off to the side) tomorrow maybe, as it didn't really have much to do with homeschooling. But my little baby sure is growing up.