Kindergarten looks like it's going to be a lot of fun though and Boo asks every day if it's time to start. This will be our first time doing K since Sis skipped it and went right to 1st grade at age 5. I kind of regret that decision now that I see how much fun K is even though she was ready for 1st grade. On the other hand she's super excited to be tagging along and helping Boo with her K activities now, because its all new to her. This way she's not going to miss out on anything even if it is 3 years late. I think she's going to be a great helper for me though.
Since we will be doing unit studies with a different theme each week, I came up with the idea of making a bulletin board to display our letter of the week, theme, and our, "words to remember for the week." I found clip art on the internet and printed a picture to go along with each unit. I think they will be excited every Monday to wake up and see the new theme announced on the bulletin board.
Here's a look at our board and all of our images before it's put together...
Here's our finished product!
To organize all of our papers, books and activities by unit, I bought a large plastic filing crate and hanging file folders. I labeled 26 folders with the unit themes. I then filed all student sheets, bulletin board pictures, read aloud books, and any other theme related items in the appropriate folders. Now I can just pull out the folder at the beginning of each week and have everything I will need all in one spot. I also left a few extra folders to keep 3rd grade worksheets and activities filed for Sis's curriculum.
I made copies of the weekly calendar from the teacher's manual, hole punched them and put them in a 3 ring binder to use as our planner. This way I can check off the activities as we do them and make notes without having to write in my manual so that I can re-use it for Baby Bear. I love that MFW does all the work for us and provides these nice weekly schedules. I also made Sis her own 3 ring binder with a planner so that we can have all of her 3rd grade school work scheduled for the week. Since I'm putting together her curriculum myself this year it was a lot of work, and made me appreciate all MFW does for us even more!
One of the things we will be doing for K is earning badges! For completing each of the themed units Boo will earn a badge sort of like girl scouts! This was a little different than MFW suggested, but she loved the idea so much I decided to go with it. I found this adorable caterpiller online. Each badge has her words to remember for the week on it. We will display him on our school room wall as she earns her badges. I knew Sis would be a little jealous of the badges so, I made her one of each too that she will earn for helping Boo with each unit. He was too long to fit in a pic but here is some of him. I have to say I'm in love with this little guy!
This will be our 2nd year using our "workbox" folder system for Big Sis and her 3rd grade work. So far it's worked out great for her. I file all work that can be done independently for the day in her folders by subject (usually math worksheets, spelling practice, handwriting assignments, etc.) She works on them in whatever order she wants, and then marks each completed by flipping the folder over when she puts it back. I wrote "DONE" on the back of each. This helps her to be able to visualize how much work she has left and see what she's completed. It also makes her more independent with her work so that I have more time to spend with the younger ones. She will complete all of her folder work first thing in the morning so that she has time to join Boo for all the crafts and projects in K. Then Big Sis and I will do History and Science together, and anything else that she needs one on one time with.
This is also our 2nd year using "book baskets." I got their baskets at the Dollar Tree and each girls has their own. At the start of each unit I fill their baskets with library books. I try to find books related to anything we're learning about, mostly educational books with lots of pictures, science books, books about animals, easy readers, etc. I also let each girl pick a couple "just for fun" books from the library to add to their basket. Every day we have "book basket time." This is separate from their regular reading when they practice phonic and reading skills, or our family read-aloud time. This is independent quiet reading time for 20 mins. Each girl takes her own basket to a quiet spot and can look through pictures, or read anything in her basket that she wants.
The most excited thing to me while preparing was putting together our "Morning board" or more like "morning wall." This will be Boo's daily morning routine while Sis is working on her folders. We will add the date to our calendar (I'm super excited about this new pocket calendar I found online), review the month and day of the week, do our daily weather chart and graph, add a number to our 100 chart, add a straw to our place value cups, and introduce our letter for the week and theme. We'll also be singing our "Days of the week" song sung to the Adams family tune, and the "Months of the year" song Sis and I made up when she was little (she still sings them to this day!)
Now I just have a few more things to buy, a few things to prep for Big Sis, a LOT more cleaning to do, and we're ready to start!
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