Homeschool Pre-K

Going to keep threading on through homeschooling with each of our little learners.  Four, almost five, Claire, is our easiest to school.  She's Pre-K age and obediently completes any task.  She smiles the whole time and LOVES completing each of her baskets. 

My girl is starting to sound out words and is working through her Bob book set. 
At the end of each one, "THE END" is read with a big exclamation point! 
Sometimes we also "row" books from Before Five in a Row. 



As explained here, Claire gets baskets laid out for her each day.  Usually, just 4-5 with a little reading, a little writing, something math and something artsy.  She chooses the order.  Outside of reading books together, these take her around an hour, saving most of the rest of the day for as much playing as she can squeeze in to her awake hours!

Math is usually just IDing or ordering numbers, sorting coins or adding piles of crayons. 



Journaling is one of our favorite dailies.  Her basket always includes her journal, tape, a pencil (She uses these awesome pencils to perfect her grip.) and a big envelope of pictures of fun things we've done. 

She tapes in a picture and then tells me what to write.   At the end, she "reads" it back,  traces and writes a couple of the words and then circles all the sight words she can find.  Both girls have these journals and they are awesome little, keep forever, kind of scrapbooks. 

The most formal thing we do is Handwriting Without Tears. 
I love, love it, and is by far my favorite workbook ever purchased.  We'll be buying more. 

Because our life is full of crazy, we also need some- save momma's sanity- kind of activities.
 Most of these have been holiday gifts,

 like this Melissa and Doug spelling puzzle,

 Tag Readers (Oh, thank you, God, for these!),

 Hot Dots Jr.,

and really good puzzles. (Nope, all our puzzles aren't all educational.  Promise.) 

 If I can't muster up schooling some days, I feel good about pulling out these to "play" with. 

Another DIY is this "How to Draw" binder made with Googled drawing tutorials. 

 When we really are doing school all formal like, Claire works on printable

sight word packs from the 1+1+1=1 blog.   

 Our Ipad has a favorites folder with tons of learning YouTube videos

on rhyming, animals, days of the week, etc. 

 Now, please remember that this is a glossed up look at our school ideals.  Sometimes we watch Sesame Street and call it a day.  I do really love having my girl home.  She did preschool for two years, then we decided to pull her for Pre-K.  Best intentional decision we've made.  It's given us scheduling freedom, easy mornings during a life-changing year, lots of one on one learning together and plenty of time for all kinds of play. 

 

 

Our little Claire Bear might just be the sweetest student ever.  

Schooling Our Newly Home Little Man

So what does homeschool preschool look like with our little man? Hands on, hands on, and more hands on activities.  Puzzles, learning toys, matching, reading, art, gluing anything, tons of playing and some tracing.  Eli Lan Chang is three years old, turning four very soon.  He has been home for three and half months and is not yet talking.  His attention span is extra short, but he's PreK age in the fall with lots of ground to make up. 

 

One thing we've realized is that he is super smart and LOVES "school" time.  When the girls start doing  their work, he points at his little chest with one finger to ask if he gets some too.

 Melt my heart. 

 

To help the newly adoptive mommas that I've been chatting with, here's a glimpse of his preschool.

Sorting is an important skill for his little brain, and it is super easy.  I pull together a bowl of items and he sorts like it is his job.  We've done beans, noodles, cars, crayons, and pom poms.  Here he is using rubber counters handed down to us, which are great for sorting by color as well. 

 



We learned about Hot Dots, Jr. from my buddy Sharon at Growing Whole Hearts.  Thanks to strategic Christmas listing, both he and Claire have learning games using this handheld little pup who barks learning feedback.  Thank you, grandparents! 

 

These Leapfrog letter magnets adorn the side of our fridge.  This whole alphabet activity was a bit hard at first for him, so we started with his name and will also do the names of the whole family with a picture.  Extra bonus?  If he is making me bonkers during meal prep, I send him over to match. 

Thank you to cousin Madeline for the hand-me-down that keeps on giving!

Our Melissa and Doug Shape Sorter was a gift received long ago that I thankfully held on to.  It keeps him busy, for at least three minutes.  :)



more daily sorting

This foam letter puzzle was a thrift store find years ago, and it has been used 3,678 times.  It really helps my tiny people develop an understanding of letter shapes, and is great, much needed fine motor practice. 

 



As I shared about here, Eli traces his name daily.  When we first started, it was evident that he had never held a pencil or crayon.  Now, he's a tracing star!  Here we were using a sheet protector and dry erase marker.

 



Shape tracing using dry erase are fun as well.  Once all over the place, he now stays on the lines. 



 

Another strategic Christmas list item from long ago, was this Melissa and Doug Tangram Puzzle.  This is crazy good fine motor practice, as the shapes don't lock in.  It would have driven him bonkers when first home, but he now will sit and do every single tile.  

 

Since he had no control of his crayon when first home, I had him stick stickers on paper and then circle them.  It gave him a specific task, and this little man with a plan loved that.  

Play doh.  Lots of play doh.  Sticking penne noodles into it is a cheap and fun little add in. 

One of the fave of all our learning/creative toys are the stacker pegs and peg board.  Between he and Evie, this gets played with at least once a day.  It's a great one for little people to work on during schooling or meal prep.  

 

Just home, scissors became his obsession, so I made thin strips with lines (sometimes stickers) on them for him to cut.  He's way over it now, but used to do it with intense concentration.  

Pom poms, cheap trays and tongs are good fine motor practice. 

They get transferred back and forth over and over.

Santa brings learning games as well, and this old one is Eli's favorite. 

We have the Melissa and Doug Button Puzzle and the Animal Pattern Blocks.  

Found somewhere online, little mounds of play doh, spaghetti noodles and Cheerios is another fine motor activity. 

When Sophia was a baby, I found this beautiful matching set at a TJ Maxx and it has been well loved ever since.  The matching is fun and provides language expansion in an non-flash card way.  

 

 Another favored Melissa and Doug toy are these Water Wow sets.  Thanks again to the grandparents and Aunt Janie, these are perfect for entertaining little ones at our steady flow of doctors appointments.  They are way cool, way easy and have held up well. 

Since our little student wants to be like his sibs, he gets a sheet every day too.  He traces and then is learning to color by filling in the shapes. 

 

Teaching and working with his little brain is a hard joy.  With three siblings, I just don't have the one on one time with him that I'd love to have, but thankfully, he learns quickly and is growing in independence. I'm learning to release my expectations, and am standing back in awe at how much his siblings teach him, without me even being in the room.  In just a short time, his skills and mind have advanced so much.  These combined with heart, trust and attachment growth are a beautiful blossoming.  So grateful for the front row seat.  

A few more learning/creative toys we have:

 Melissa and Doug Sequence Sorting Set

Lacing Beads

puzzles

weekly library books

block set

Mr. Potato Head (fine motor and parts of face)

counting bears with cups (sorting & colors)



I've posted here about homeschooling our Pre-K age daughter. 

 

 

What I Learned in February

Emily Freeman, at Chatting at the Sky, has challenged me to look back each month at what's been learned. 

 

one

Homeschooling with two bigs and two high needs little people is hard.  We've had our sweet confirming days, and a bunch of others that have made me line up schools for them in my mind. 
Our current status for next year is waffle mode.   

two

I can stay in my cozy cabin for many snow days with almost no "get me back on the roads" fever.  Movies, slow meals with tall glasses of wine, chapters read, snowy hikes, new Pandora stations, pages filled in sketch books, fireplace fires and homemade cookies with all my people home just made me happy. 

 

three

It's time for a FB break, but it feels complicated. How sad is that?  Want to see the invites, links to blog posts, messages, funny video clips, adoption news, and posts about organizations I love, but my time on it has crept back up to too much screen time.    The quizzes, the harshly shared opinions on all things, the posturing, the too much info posts and wasted time gotta go, go, go.

four

Water with lemon is the perfect morning starter.

five

Podcasts have helped me survive indoor treadmill time and daily sandwich making. 

Where have I been?

Ted Talks, Art of Simple, Passion City, North Point, David Platt @ Brook Hills,  and some laughs.

Feels like life for a stay at home with four small people momma.

 

six

This little guy, with the cocoa stache, is settling in to life here in the 50 states.  We realized that his attachment is building.  Plus, he makes us laugh. 

 

 seven

I gave myself permission to love to write, to want to write, to make time to write, to share my writing, and to pursue getting better.  Feels good and right.

 

eight

More tests and procedures have been scheduled for our littlest, and we have no idea how she actually feels on an average day, but every day she giggles.  Every day she starts the day with some crazy bed head and a nose scrunched in a smile, ready to take on the next 24 hours.

 So much to learn from such a tiny person.

nine

Intentional time away is needed every week.  One February night, Mark walked through the door as  frazzled me walked past him headed the other direction with purse on my shoulder, saying,

"I'm going out.  No idea where, but I'll be back.  Late."  I need a night, every week. 

ten

Going to a movie solo feels like a treat. (See nine.)  Popcorn for dinner, followed by an almost too hot Dunkin D's hot chocolate might just take that treat up over the top. 

 

Here's to March...



A Double Cocoa Day

It fell softly all night long and the morning did not disappoint.  So rare is it that our world is blanketed in such beauty.  Our jammers wrapped in quilts, we stood long on the porch that morning.  Shivering, but alive with awe, the importance of mugs of hot cocoa was agreed upon.   

 

 
 After the littles ate the marshmallows off the tops of steaming drinks, they tore the house apart



dividing up gloves, layering socks and shoving their little feet in snow boots. 

The New Yorker among us shoveled up some snow memories with a big smile. 

 

 

The littlest got bundled in a mix and match of leftover warm pieces and headed out to keep up with the bigs. 

These two bundled bunnies were thrilled with big winter event numero dos. 

 Determined to tromp through every inch of untouched snow in our yard and a few neighbors, they enjoyed every ounce of the white stuff.

 

When we all finally made it outside, we wagoned up the littles and headed for a new wintry wonderland.

I love how Lama Willa Miller describes snow as "sparkling like a million little suns".   On this day, as the sun came out and started to melt ice high on tree branches, everything was sparkling.  

 We stood staring until water started seeping through our boots.  Such beauty. 



 Next up was the neighborhood playground, which the little people just hated as you can see.  Mr. Eli was too busy, busy to be bothered with photographs. 

 

This double cocoa day was a big, fat gift. 

By early afternoon, we convinced the kids to head for warmer places, and called it a day.

 

A few hours later though, the kids were all kinds of thrilled to find some of the last bits of powder waiting to be played with.  Eight little hands spooned for at least another hour.  Mommy for the win.    

Lou Hoo

Ever have one of those school projects assigned to your kid that you whine and groan about,

then they end up learning a ton and loving every history soaked second?  No, just me? 

 

For the last few weeks, we've learned all kinds of facts about Lou.   Lou who? 

Lou Hoover. 

We know she and her husband spoke Mandarin, travelled the world and studied geology.  She threw great White House parties and after her death, Henry discovered that she'd paid for schooling for many under privileged kids.  In short, she was amazing. 

 

 

On history fair night, our girl proudly paraded in with all her knowledge, her very 1920s headband and her sprayed gray hair. ( I snapped pictures and reminded myself to get my whining in check.)

Saying Yes to Complex Medical Conditions: Guest Post at No Hands But Ours

 

Checking off medical conditions that we would accept on our agency’s medical checklist, and not checking those we wouldn’t accept, was among the hardest tasks of our adoption process. Our human side wanted to maintain our comfortable life, and longed for easy. In our hearts though, we knew that God’s plans are always much higher than ours, usually pushing us beyond the borders of our comfort.

 

Read the rest over at No Hands But Ours

Cranio Crazies

Our two cleft palate babies visited the craniofacial clinic for an evaluation a few weeks ago. 

A plastic surgeon, dentist, social worker, audiologist and speech pathologist all took their turns evaluating these two crazies. 

We are now medical appointment frequent fliers, so we took it in stride. 

Mark snapped some pics on his phone, and we now have a better idea of how these two cranio crazies are progressing. 

The awesome news?  Their palates look great!  No palate surgery for either. This was just a check-up for Claire, but we weren't sure about the little dude.  Can I get a hallelujah?  Good news is good, real good.

 

Expected news?  Dental surgery for both.  Anesthesia here they come. 

 

So grateful for these two gifts, their stories and their smiles.