Homeschooling - 12th Week (12-18 April 2010)

This is gonna be a very long post as I have decided to update our learning progress weekly instead of daily. As I find that I really don't have the time to update my blog daily... :(

Theme of the week: Fish
We have a really fun week with the Fish theme, reason being that Fish is one of Javier favourite animals. We did a few fish crafts, read a fish counting poem and did some number fish fishing.

This is our learning board, I just bought this sticky board from popular. It is so convenient that we just have to stick all our learning materials on the board... no need doubled tape or pin... mess free!!!! :)

The Fish counting Poem that we read over the week. Javier like this poem alot!!!!! He would take down the poem from the board and ask me or daddy to read it to him. He would even ask us to hold his fingers to point at the words as he sing along. At the end of the poem, after the verse "The littel finger upon the right", I would bite Javier finger.... He would giggle and say pain pain.... But he really enjoy it!!!!We did a tracing of the letter F, I managed to take this picture of Javier scribbling on the paper, he looked so serious.

Fish Crafts
We did 3 fish crafts: 1) Paper Plate Fish 2)Fishy in the fishbowl 3) Fish Stamping

Craft no. 1 Paper Plate Fish

Steps: First I count out a traingle for the fish tail, then I let Javier paint on the fish body.. (Now My little boy insist to choose the colour himself... I notice that he like black colour alot... Most of the time he will choose black) After painting, I let it dried up before drawing a eye for the fish and attaching the tail to the fish body.

Craft no.2 Fishy in the Fishbowl

Steps: I cut a fish bowl and a blue water shape. And also some oval shapes for the colourful pebbles and curvy seaweeds and some orange fishes. I let Javier paint some glittery paint over the fish. While waiting for the paint to dry up, he paste the pebbles and the seaweeds onto the fishbowl. I did not help him in this craft as I sees the that he is doing very well by himself. So I just let him paste where he wants based on his own imagination. After he fish dried up, I cut out the individual fishes and let Javier paste it on the fishbowl. I like how picture turn out.... very colourful!!! Craft no.3 Fish Stamping on Letter F

Steps: I draw a Big "F" for Javier to stamp the fish. I cut out a fish from a foam and paste it on the lid using double sided tape. I bought a special ink pad just for kids. This ink pad is much easier to mess free for young kids to use.

Our Fishes on the "F"

Fish Games I cut out 5 fishes and paste number 1 to 5 on for a number recognition game for Javier. I don't think Javier is interested in the numbers at all. He is busy using his fishing rod to attract the fish. Books that we Read
These are the four books which we read for this week.
1) Buster Farm by Rod Campbell: It is a simple story of all the farm animals. Javier was not really interested in the story. But he like to touch and feel the different texture of the animals.

2) Swimmy by Leo Lionni : The story is about A school of little fish banding together to scare off the big bully fish . It teaches the kids that when you unite togather, we can do anything.
And the illustrations are reallybeautiful, even Javier like it alot.
This is the favourite book for Javier this weekI personally like the books by this author, as it really got nice picture and the story is simple yet interesting for young toddlers. This book is a daily book which Javier will get us to read to him every night before he sleeps. I really don't mind reading it as I like the book alot.

3) Hoppy's Graduation by Salina Yoon : Javier totally got no feel for this book. Whenever I tried to read this book to him, he will run away.

4) Maisy's Fire Engine by Lucy Cousins
Maisy's Fire Engine is die-cut in the shape of a bright red fire engine with Maisy waving along with her friend Cyril. Cyril checks the water in the fire hose, but he sprays it too near to a little black cat, who is scared and climbs onto a house. But brave firefighter Maisy fetches a ladder and brings her down again! Maisy's Train is die-cut in the shape of Maisy's bright green train and takes Maisy and all her friends on a journey through tunnels and up and down valleys.

Learning other Words
Beside Fish, I also introduce Frog, Flower, Fingers and Foots to Javier. We did some craft to further enhace the teaching of these words.

Frog - We did 2 crafts for Frog. 1) I let Javier use the dot marker to dot on the letter F and frog picture. 2) We did a little green frog craft

Fingers -We did a Tracing for Javier's Fingers and Finger Painting

Finger paintingFoots- I did a foot stamping for Javier.

Learning Numbers

This week, I taught Javier number 2. I used a lot of examples to show him the value fo 2.

Couting Fishes in the Fish Tank

First, I show Javier how to trace 2 using macroroni and I get Javier to try it out himself with me assisting him.

I wrote a 2 on a piece of paper and let Javier paste 2 stickers on it.

Learning Colours
This is the book which I used to teach Javier colour for this week.

For this week, I am introducing orange to Javier. I gathered alot of things that are orange and show it to Javier. These are the things that I managed to find in the house which are orange. When Jayden saw me teaching Javier orange. He also went about to find the orange stuff for me, the tigger softtoy and Nemo hat is contributed by Jayden. :) I try to involve Javier in our 'orange' searching activity. I show him a orange ball, and told him to get another same one for me. He managed to find 1 and showed it to me.

Beside introudcing Orange to Javier, I also played a color matching game with him. I tied the pipe cleaner into a round shape and told Javier to clip the colour peg into the same colour pipe cleaner. He got almost of the colours correct, but he tend to clip the wrong colour when he is not concentrating and just wanted to finish it and wander off to do other things.

Javier in action, he can handle the peg really well.

I really like this picture. He is so looking intently at the colour book...

Our alphabet related Activities
I also prepared some "F" related activities for Javier. We have a 1) animals and fruits pattern games, 2)Fruits mataching game, 3) Treasure hunting for things starting "F" 4) Foam Writitng activity 5) Plucking Petals.

Fruits and Animals pattern activity - I print out this activity since a long time ago. I explained to Javier about the sequence of the patterning. He is still not very sure of it even though I tried to do it a few times with him. I think we got to practice more on this type of activity.

Fruits Matching - For this activity, he can matched up all the fruits by himself. After matching up all the fruits, I also explained to him about the different type of fruits.
Treasure Hunting - Javier like this activity alot, as you can see from the happy expression while is he doing this activity. After digging out all the treasures, he enjoy a 'break' by having his favourite froggy chocolate.Foam writing - I sprayed some shaving foam on the table and I write some letters and numbers for Javier to see. While Javier is busy rubbing the table which is full of foam. Although this activity is fun for the kids, but it tends to get quite messy. Plucking petal activity- As I introduced flower to Javier, I let him touch, smell and plucked the flower. He really liked plucking the petal, keep asking me for more flowers to pluck... :)

Learning Chinese

For Chinese, we read a story book, recite a Tang Poem and sing a song.

We read a book on " 我会穿短裤啦" . Both my boys like this story alot. From this story, Javier even learn how to wear shorts himself. 2 words he learnt from this book are "短裤" & " 小熊". Every nite, he would say " 小熊" book ..... and I would read it to him.

We also read a tang poem " 春晓". As Javier have already learnt this peom in school. So whenever I read it to him, he can recite almost 50% of the poem by memory.

We sing a 儿歌" 鱼儿水中游". As I sing this song to him, I will add in some action while singing to make the song more interesting. He like to hear me sing this song to him. He will take down this printout and ask me to sing it to him many times a day.
Practical Life Skills

This week, we did a few activity related to Practical life skills. Javier is getting really good in this area.

Activity 1 - Scooping and pouring of macraroni. I saw a really cute and nice wooden spoon duirng my grocery shopping shopping at Thomsom Plaza NTUC finest. I find that it is just the right size for Javier to use for his scopping activity and decided to buy it for Javier. It is so small and just nice for his little hand.

Activity 2 - Cutting Practice. Since I introduce Sicissors to Javier a few weeks ago. He has really develope a liking for this activity. He like to cut alot, always cutting here and there. But I am really cuation and careful while I let him do the cutting. I only allow him to do it under my supervision. But there was once, I left the sicissors on the floor and went to talk to my neighbours at the door. When I came back, some of the materials which I have prepare for Javier learning was cut into small pieces by Javier. Luckily he didn't hurt himself while cutting the paper. PHew.... :(

Activity 3 - Transferring pom pom from the container to the Egg Casing using Thongs

Activity 4 - Stringing Beads into a Pipe cleaner

Free Play

Recently during his free time, Javier would take out the puzzles and request me to do it with him. He can fixed alot of simple puzzles by himself now. I am really glad to see that his concentration span is improving alot since he attend the playgroup at Little Friends.