Monday, March 16, 2015

Homeschool preschool: dog theme

In January, I started doing additional structured activities at home with Ellie. These follow my ideal way of learning for her: it's child-led, theme-based, and play-centered.

Each month, she chooses a theme. I find or create activities for her in that theme, around broad educational categories. Many of those overlap, but I try to identify a primary learning objective for each one and hit a number of categories each week. Each day we (usually) do one or two activities, depending on our schedule.

We're on month three, and it's working because I'm planning and prepping EVERYTHING the month before. I've tried planning without prepping beforehand, and then I end up quitting after a few days because I get behind.

Here are links and photos of month 1, week 3!

MONTHLY THEME: ANIMALS

WEEK 3: DOGS

Literacy
Alphabet construction to spell dog breeds (using prompt cards)


First letter sound sort (I put pieces of paper on the ground with initial sounds for "bowl," "leash," "food," "treat," and "collar." She had to place those items on the right letter).

Math: Patterning with dog food and treats (we discussed AB, ABC, and ABB patterns, and she experimented with creating her own)


Science: Dog hair under the microscope


Engineering: Design a machine to feed the dogs (I was quite impressed. It was a simple drawing but a great concept!)

Art: Paint with dog treats

Music: I made the worst-ever (don't judge!) color-coded sheet music, then put post-it note flags with the corresponding color on our piano keys. We learned how to play B-I-N-G-O (or E-I-Ban-Gee-Oh as she calls it) on the piano.


Geography: Placing breeds on their country of origin on our big world map


Cooking/kitchen: Homemade dog treats


No comments:

Post a Comment