Here is Ian experimenting with physics and human physiology at the park!

We had such a great trip to see my parents in MA!
The boys thought the snow was a blast and Ian decided he wanted to take their weather man home with us!

Keith's Goals for the Spring semester!

This morning Keith and I talked about his goals for this school semester and this is what we came up with.
1) Do a Play
2) Finish Math Primer
3) Learn about famous artists and musicians: Audubon/Monet and Bach/Mozart
4) Learn a magic trick
5) Be able to read Five Silly Fishermen aloud
6) Write all letters and numbers in the correct orientation.

I wasn't able to get a photo of the white board before Ian took his own marker and hand to it!

Rock Candy!
About two months ago we started this project and finally decided there were enough crystals to examine and, of course, eat!
We got the experiment from Science Bob. I am trying to locate the initial pictures so I'll post them when I find them. The boys made a point to observe the growth of sugar crystals almost every day. It was a long but fun process!

Make 'N' Break
This is a great game that Nana and Papa gave to us for Christmas! Keith and Ian really like challenging themselves with the hardest levels. We tried to start Ian on level 1 but he insisted that he wanted level 3. Here is the result of his efforts!
This game gets two "mom" thumbs up for fun and mathematical enhancement!

Ian's Gingerbread Cookie

Here is a video of Ian making his gingerbread cookies!

The Gingerbread Man
Just before Christmas the boys and I did a literature packet for the story "The Gingerbread Man". First we read the story, then we talked about the characters and the boys did a story timeline. After that it was time to make the gingerbread cookies! I pre-made the dough with a wonderful recipe from recipezaar, one of my favorite cooking websites http://www.recipezaar.com/Easy-Gingerbread-Cookies-105532. The boys rolled it out, cut the shapes, placed them on the cookie sheets and then decorated! While the cookies were in the oven the boys worked on their gingerbread men puppets and we made up little stories. It was such a fun morning!

Literature Pockets

Here is the literature pockets that I used for the Gingerbread Man activities.

Handwriting without Tears

This is Mat Man!
He is actually helping the children learn to write! This activity introduces them to the wood pieces used in HWT. The curriculum has a CD that allows you to introduce the basics of writing by using music and movement. Thank you grandma for this wonderful program!
http://www.hwtears.com/

A box of gifts from Nana, Papa, and Uncle Ryan!

Ian's activities are different from Keith. I am working on phonics with Ian. We supplement with Hooked on Phonics workbooks that my mom sent to us and he really likes tracking his progress with the sticker charts!

He taught himself how to zip, button, and snap after I introduced these learning boards to him! I got them at Lakeshore Learning (www.lakeshorelearning.com) which is a great store for educational toys, games, and materials. The math board that you see in the picture is for addition but he pops the pieces up to form parking spaces for his trucks!

Here is our bulletin board.

It is located in our upstairs playroom. You can see that the same board shared Fall, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. I plan to get new paper and boarders in January.

This is where the kids have circle time. Circle time varies and often includes, calendar and weather activities, the Pledge of Allegiance, our bible verse of the week, and other various games for counting and reading.

Wacky Sentence Reading!

Keith is making sentences by choosing one card from two different sets; subject and predicate. One of the predicate cards reads "sat on a pin" and he used every subject card with this one. He thought it was so funny to make a sentence with everything sitting on a pin!

Keith is an emerging reader!
We use Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, Bob Books, and Headsprout (http://www.headsprout.com/) online reading programs. My sister-in-law also told me about The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading by Jessie Wise and I really like the way she explains some of the rules as well as the games she incorporates into the lessons.

We chose Math-U-See (http://www.mathusee.com/) for Keith's primary math lessons. He really enjoys the lessons, games, and manipulative's with this program and literally asks me for it everyday!

Here are the boys playing the "Welcome to Bethlehem" file folder game. I got this idea from http://www.filefolderfun.com/ . It has many themes and ideas for games to make at home. During this advent season we have been having our bible study and morning prayer in the living room. The boys are learning about the journey to Bethlehem and the birth of Jesus. I found a great curriculum at http://www.explorerbiblestudy.com/ which has short lessons and stories that are geared to the pre-school level and continue through adulthood.

Little Hearts Christmas party was held at the clubhouse in our neighborhood. The boys had fun making a nativity scene and decorating cookies. We also participated in music and story time with a book exchange!