Eden 6th Birthday

 My sweet baby girl is celebrating her 6th birthday today. It's mind boggling how quickly time has passed and what a special blessing Eden has made to our lives. Her entrance into this world changed me and provided a knowledge of love I dared not dream possible. 
 
Eden is a child that constantly amazes me with her sweet spirit and love of all things girly. She is most comfortable in dresses and tiaras. She has countless baby dolls and stuffed animals that all have names an take turns sleeping in her bed. Eden thinks of her future with great anticipation and has spent countless hours planning her wedding. She is a great combination of sweet and strong. I love watching what God is teaching her and her ability to learn and apply truth to our lives. She is a classic firstborn with a strong desire for justice and has a competitive streak that I hope will motivate her to accomplish big dreams.

I started asking Eden annual questions last year so that I can track some of her favorite things as she grows. In comparing her list from last year I can see how she has grown and how some things will stay the same.


1. What is your favorite color? Pink.
2. What is your favorite toy? McKinley, (her stuffed puppy dog)
3. What is your favorite fruit? Bananas and Apples

4. What is your favorite movie? Everafter
5. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? Hotdogs
6. What is your favorite thing to wear? Dresses
7. What is your favorite game? Cooties
8. What is your favorite snack? Oreos and milk ( we had that once to learn the phases of the moon)

9. What is your favorite animal? A puppy
10. What is your favorite song? The Princesses Book

12. Who is your best friend? Lydia
13. What is your favorite cereal? Trix ( that was a one time buy with coupons almost a year ago, but it's still her favorite)
14. What is your favorite thing to do outside? Ride my Bike

 15. What is your favorite drink? Juice

16. What is your favorite holiday? Christmas
17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night? McKinley, her stuffed dog
18. What do you want for dinner on your birthday? Cake and Ice Cream
19. What your favorite Bible Story? Queen Ester
20. What is your favorite thing to study in school? Everything, Studying about Jesus
21. What do you want to be when you grow up? A ballerina

Happy Birthday Princess

Which one do you like best?

Original

 Black & White

Gloss

 

Hint of Color

 

Now that we're slacking off for the summer, (ie we're finished homeschooling for the year.) I hope to devote a little time to taking and editing pictures. Here is a photo of Eden that I love! The look in her eyes, and the sweet mischievous smile; You know she was plotting or imagining something amazing! Which one do you like best?

My Father's World Kindergarten Review

I've been asked many times about the curriculum we've used for Kindergarten. So I decided to give an overview. We used a box curriculum called My Father's World  from A to Z  2nd Edition (MFW)  I also supplemented with other material over this past year.  I chose MFW because it  was a good middle ground between  Eden's and Josiah's needs.  Eden is 5 and Josiah is 4. 

One of the best things about MFW is the basic kit contains everything you need for the year. The Teacher's book is spiral bound and laid out in a weekly manner. All of the lessons are organized in sections which include Language Arts, Math, Activities, Read  Aloud, and Supplies.  You can see the whole weeks worth of lessons on two pages, with the directions for the activities on the following pages. There was not a lot of preparation needed for each days activities, and most supplies you have around the house. It was very easy to use. It also has a great book list to coincide with each letter/theme. 

The program starts in creation where you spend two weeks learning about the wonderful world God made. Then you have weekly letter studies that included a theme. The letter are not done in alphabetical order, so you are able to change weeks around to our fit your needs. For instance, we ended our year with B is for Butterfly and F is for Frog. I did that so we could try to watch the actual life cycles of each species during the spring. We hatched 5 butterfly cocoons and the children let them go. I loved that the curriculum was so kid friendly and helps them explore God through nature.

Another bonus for MFW is that it is Christian curriculum. MFW did a good job at using scripture within the lessons. Each theme had a matching biblical concept that was integrated into the lessons. There were weekly badges and memory verses to go along with each lesson as well. The curriculum spends the first two weeks introducing creation through the Biblical narrative.

The hands on activities, learning through play, and outdoor activities were a big bonus to this curriculum. Josiah is an active learner, so this was a good choice for a busy boy. The kids were interested in the topic through engaging experiments and field trips
.
While the curriculum was fun, I felt like it did not meet my expectations. It wasn't rigorous enough for Eden.  I supplemented with extra material to make up the gaps. There is only one math worksheet each week. I would have preferred math to be done 3 or 4 days a week. I need to put an insert in here. There is a daily activity putting a popsicle stick into a jar to keep up with 100 days, followed by adding a coin to a jar after reaching 100.  They also use a calendar to identify the date. I didn't feel that was enough of a "lesson" to consider that a daily math assignment. Plus, we always forget to keep up with the popsicle stick and it became a forgotten task about halfway through. We didn't even do the coin. I added a math workbook that I got from the public school.  I  also introduced the concept of time and money, neither were covered in the curriculum. We have a neat calendar from Kaplans that the kids keep track of our schedule and holidays. I also used a calendar activity pack from 1+1+1=1. I plan to do Singapore Math 1A and 1B over the summer just to make sure we've hit all of the basics.

While MFW is based in Phonics and has a weekly sounding exercise, I just feel like it didn't do enough to cover blending sounds. It did have exercises in where you blend sounds, but it didn't have enough real word examples. Again I would have like a few more worksheets that covered blending sounds. The weekly worksheets cover each letter sound. MFW doesn't address sight words at all.  In order to address this issue, I added Hooked on Phonics about halfway through the year. I also printed out extra worksheets I found online. I recently started The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading. Ordinary Parent's Guide explains the blending sound rules then gives word examples and short stories to go along with it. My hope is that if Eden gets a better understand of phonics and sound blends, she will read better. My plan is to work through reading and math during the summer so that she will be ahead of the game this fall. 

One of the other issues I have with this curriculum is that it is not long enough. There are 166 days of lessons. There is a 10 day study on creation and 26 weeks of a letter/ theme They break down each letter of the week into a 6 day study. The sixth day included outside activities and a classical music section. There are no worksheets for day 6. Typically, I added the outside activities to another day of the week, or I didn't do the activity. While the 6th day provided for increased flexibility, I didn't consider it a teaching day. In actuality, there are only 140 days of curriculum. We added field trips and community service activities to make additional days. However, If your state requires 180 day f school, you'll need to find additional teaching material.

MFW felt more like pre-school than what I anticipated for Kindergarten. I worked at a Preschool while I was in Seminary. Much of the material reminded me of the concepts we introduced to the three and four year-olds; Knowing letters' sounds and themes studies. MFW was more in-depth because of the worksheets, but not enough for my personal desire. My assumption is that the purpose of Kindergarten is to have all children on the same level. The problem is if child has already been introduced to these concepts, then they can be bored by this curriculum. That's what happened with my daughter. She was ready to move forward faster, so I had to supplement the material. 

It appears the creators of MFW have taken parents input and have revamped the whole curriculum. I am interested in looking it over at our Home School convention. They have a trade in program for the material I just completed. I would to use the material in the future with Titus, but I will use it for Pre-K, not Kindergarten. 

****** Update******

I attended the NCHE conference in Winston Salem this past week. I took my teacher's manual to compare it to the new material. They have a trade in program for old material. You can turn in your book in and pay an additional $49.00 for a new manual. What a waste! The material has not changed! The have change the title of the program from My Father's World From A to Z to  God's World from A to Z. So the cover has changed, but the material is all the same. I compared the intro and multiple weeks lesson they are word for word the same. I was not able to look at the worksheets, but was told it was all the same as the old version. Save your money, don't do the trade in.

1st year down, 16 years to go!

We finished Kindergarten! It's been an interesting year with lots of ups and downs, mostly ups :) I've learned a lot, not only in the subject matter I've taught the kids, but I've learned a lot about HOW to teach my children. It's been a lesson in parenting, organizing, patience and perseverance. This year has given me great insight into each of my children's strengths and weaknesses, learning styles and personalities. I've learned a lot about who I am and who I would like to be in this past year.  There have been lots of days where we had light bulb moments and  laughter. Learning has been a fun endeavor for which I hope a life long passion will emerge for each of our children. For these and so many other reasons, I'm glad we decided to pursue homeschooling.
 
Please don't hear me saying everyday was orderly, scholarly and done in a clean house by and with perfectly obedient children, that doesn't happen in our house! Far from it! There were days of tears, mine and the kids. There was lots of training dealing with bad attitudes and wrong heart motives, mine and the kids. Some days were just hard. Thankfully, those days  were a rare occurrence. 
  
One of the hardships with home schooling is that we are all constantly together. There are only about 4 hours a week that I am scheduled to be without the kids ( that's at church, where I teaching other people's children) Unless Larry and I make other plans I bear the majority responsibility of caring for them. I have chosen to do this. This is not a complaint :)  So that means I am constantly with my children and they are constantly with each other all day, everyday. Many days we all needed time outs from one another. I have just re-instituted a quite time for all of us during the afternoon. It's helped! I've learned that getting outside to play or leaving the house to go to run errands or grocery shop is a helpful diversion for the kids. Having things planned for them to do or giving them a choice between two activities helps too. It gives us something to look forward to so that we can complete our work. We've also developed some great friendships with other homeschooling families that helps tremendously!




Thinking over the past year, we've had so many neat experiences. We've made volcanoes, cheese, yogurt, slime, and done lots of art projects.  I feel like we could hands down win a cut and paste contest as long as cutting on the lines was not a major requirement.  Eden wrote her first book on creation. I was able to bind it at ChildLinks. We've gone on lots of field trips while we studied animals and gardening. We hatched butterflies and caught a turtle and kept a Ladybug Lore. We've visited the local nursing home multiple times so that we could love and serve their seniors.  We've gone to a bird park, pear picking, nature walks, scavenger hunts, and visited neighbors who have cool farm animals. We made trips to the grocery store, bank, Wal-mart and farmers market, not just as errands, but educational destinations. There are lots of other things that I'm sure I'm forgetting to mention. But you get the point :)

Looking back on this school year, I am proud of our accomplishments. I was able to teach Eden to read, which has opened up a wonderful world of literature for her. I've watched my kids encourage one another and grow in their friendship. I wouldn't have traded this year for anything. One of the motto we use is,  "We are Team Gilbreath!" This helps me and the kids understand we are doing this together. So if one child is sick or if something comes up with family or church, then we work around it. We attempt to keep a schedule, while keeping in mind we need to practice flexibility. We encouraged one another to accomplish our tasks and we had FUN learning.

Who's bigger: an Emperor Penguin or one of my kids?

One of the best things about home schooling is that we have lots of hands on activities. As part of Eden's math assignment for Penguins, we got to take measurements to see who was bigger an Emperor Penguin or one of the kids.

 Here are our stats based on the measurement the kids took:

Height

Emperor Penguin = 42 inches

Eden = 41.5 inches

Josiah = 40.5 inches

Titus =  32 inches

Weight

Emperor  Penguin = 90 lbs.

Eden = 39.5 lbs

Josiah = 41 lbs

Titus = 27 lbs 

The Penguin won by .5 inches,  and by 49 lbs!

Penguins  are some short fat creatures!

100 Days of School

A few weeks ago we took the kids to the bowling ally to celebrate 100 days of school. 10 games of 10 pins=100. Good math lesson plus a first time adventure for the kids.

They eagerly grabbed balls and started hurling them down the ally. 

 Check out the look of concentration on her face! 

 Wishing the ball to stay in the middle lane.

 Yes! I hit a some!

 And the dancing begins!

 She's a better dancer than a bowler :)

Josiah used the dragon to launch his ball towards the pins. 

By the end of the game, he had figured out how to hold the ball at the dragon's head and would run from across the room and push the ball for added force.

 Watching

He decided to sit for a while, sometimes the balls took a long time to make it down to the pins.

Overall, it was a great experience for the kids. They are looking forward to a visit from Grandma and Granddaddy. Grandma has skills when it comes to bowling, maybe the kids will inherit some from her :)

Fine Motor Skills

Last week I took Josiah in for his 4 year check up. They gave me a questionare to fill out to determine if he  is on task in learning age appropriate behaviors. As I filled out the paperwork, Josiah bounced around the waiting area, reading books, and playing with toys.

I wondered if he knew some of the answer to the questions, and wanted to keep him from bothering other patients. So I asked him to help me answer some of the question. He got some of the basics quickly, What's your name? What's your last name? Are you a boy or a girl? Then I asked where do we live? And he said with a smile, "Africa!" The people in the waiting room responded with laughter, which just gets him going. We were studying Zebras and I read a book about an African Safari before we left for the doctor's office. He liked the book, so I guess he figured it would be cool to live in Africa! Yes, I'll work to make sure he knows where he lives.

Most of the test he was average or above average, but one section of the test he failed with gusto. I realized Josiah struggles with fine motor skills. When I thought about it I realized, I haven't really worked with him teaching him these skills. This thought can really unnerve a homeschooling mom!

Josiah is a neat kid! He started reading when he was two. He is super verbal and constantly surprises me with some of the things he thinks up. He also hates to write, and has short attention span for things he doesn't enjoy. I haven't made him do a lot of writing or zipping or the other things that were on the fine motor skills list, because I thought he was to young, typical boy, or it was just easier for me to do things for him than make him do it himself.

After talking it over with his doctor, we decided he's developing normally and I just needed to spend some time focusing on helping him develop fine motor skills. With this new information in hand, I do what any mom does when trying to help her kid develop a skill, I went to Pinterest and typed in "Fine Motor Skills" and got myself and Josiah to work!

Here is a list of things we've been working on:

1) Cutting.

Recently our local hardware store went out of business. I asked what they were doing with their paint sample cards, and the manager gave them all to me! So I'm always looking for a way to use them. I asked Josiah to cut the colors apart on the white lines. That's when I realized he didn't really know how to cut. He would cut and tear or pull the paper apart. I had never taught him to cut. Eden picked up scissors when she was young and just started cutting. I just assumed kids taught themselves. Wrong! I had to spend time explaining to Josiah how to hold the scissors and how to open and close his hand.

The other issue we are running into is that Josiah and I haven't figured out if he is right or left handed. Sometimes he hold scissors or pencils in his right hand, sometimes in is left. When he throws a ball or is practicing hitting, He throws and catches left handed. It might be that I can help him by learning how to teach him to be left handed. For now, I'm just watching and letting him take the lead. We'll figure it our soon enough.

2) Writing in paint with a Q-tip.

This was one all three of my kids liked. I would like to make a couple of suggestions if you try this. I had cheap dollar store bags that were kind of thin. So I took tape and ran it all around the sides and top to make sure they wouldn't bust. I would also sick to dark colors. The yellow that I let Titus use was hard to see through, there wasn't enough contrast. I changed the color and he was fine. Also, make sure you tell your kids to push softly! Josiah bag tore a little. He wasn't being rough, just a combination of a plastic bag and pressure can lead to small holes.

3) Golf tees and marbles in a foam block

My older kids really liked this. Get a foam block from the dollar store or the floral department at Wal-mart, a bag of golf tees and some marbles. Let them stick the tees in the foam and set the marbles on top. They have to level the tees so the marbles will stay.

4) Puzzles

This is a fantastic Melissa and Doug puzzle I checked out from Childlinks. It has 6 different kinds of locks. Not sure in the wisdom of teaching Josiah how to unlock things, but it is a great fine motor skill builder!

For those of you who don't know, Childlinks is a resource center for preschoolers. Think the library, but with toys. For a $20 annual fee you can get all sort of great educational resources, games, books, toys, theme boxes, die cuts and paper and a great staff to help give you ideas and support. Childlinks is an awesome resource for early education.

 Titus likes the puzzle too. He figured out how to open door knobs this week

.....hmmm I'm seeing a connection! :)

 5) Hammering Sight Words

We started hammering with the golf tees, but quickly changed them to thumbtacks when I realized they were scratching the table. For this activity you write a list of sight words (colors or shapes) on foam board, and let your child hammer the word when you call it our loud.

6) Writing his name with a pencil and on a magnetic board
7) Playing with Lego's
8)Using interlocking beads

I keep going back and forth with how much I should push Josiah to learn these skills. I've found my happy place in balance. I realize that all of my children have special and unique gifts and talents, and each will have areas of weakness. These will change over time. This was just one of many of my children's weakness I'll have an opportunity to help them grow. My goal is to provide a rich learning environment that is fun, so that they can excel in their giftedness and strengthen their weaknesses.

Josiah didn't know he was practicing fine motor skills. He was doing something new and fun. Most of these activities were a little frustrating for him, because he has to build those hand muscles. He enjoyed trying to accomplish a new challenge. That's one of the most important lessons I want to teach all of my children. Even when it's hard, or you might not be the best at something, You still try, and you still have fun!

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss

Our kids love Dr. Seuss books, so we decided to celebrate his 109th birthday with 2 days of fun. This fun included lunch of green eggs and ham, reading Dr. Seuss books, watching The Lorax movie, and a party at the library with lots of other kids. 

Lunch of Green Eggs and Ham.

Eden wasn't sure she would like Green eggs and ham, but neither was the cat in the hat!

 But just like the cat, she gave it a try, and Say 

she did, she did like green eggs and ham, she did like them Sam-I-am! 

Both Eden and Josiah had two helpings of green eggs.

Josiah proclaiming this was the best Dr. Seuss day ever!

I think Titus is one of the cutest kids ever, 

especially in a Dr. Seuss hat and a super man shirt! 

I do believe this will have to become an annual tradition.