More of Hunter's First Week

Phew!  The first week is behind us!  I definitely have some adjustments to make, but when is homeschooling not a work in progress?

Here's a glimpse at what my older son has been up to this week:

Hunter is reading on an end-of-third-grade level, but he could use some extra work on sight words.  This is a page from Lori Rosenberg's Second and Third Grade Sight Word Packets.  Each 10-word list has six different activity pages.  

We read  "The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash", by Trinka Hakes Noble.  I still love this book just as much as I did when I was a kid!  To review story elements and summarizing, we did several of the activities from this unit by Hollis Hemmings.  The school bus activity in the picture was my favorite.

Underneath each animal flap, Hunter has written about that animal's problems in the story.  So cute!  He also completed this cause-and-effect foldable:

Here's the cut-and-paste activity on the inside:

In all, we did four activities from this unit, and it was a really fun way to review!  There are many, many more activities in the unit that we didn't use, but I plan to do the whole thing with my younger son when he's ready.  Check it out: Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash Activities and Printables.

For math, we've been using this workbook and supplementing with other books and activities when necessary:

Right now we've taken a break from the workbook and are working our way through Multiplication Mastery: a Program for Basic Multiplication Facts.  Hunter has memorized his times tables, but I wanted to make sure that he really understands the math so that he can build on it. I've been really, really happy with Multiplication Mastery; I'd recommend it to anyone introducing or reviewing basic multiplication.  

To review the four types of sentences and the appropriate punctuation, we used A Perfect Fit: Sorting Sentences with Cinderella.  Activities that allow Hunter to physically sort, match, or sequence are usually much more effective than a worksheet, and this resource was perfect for him.  After sorting the sentences, he picked one from each category to write on the recording sheet with the proper punctuation, and then illustrated them.  Can you make out his fairy godmother in the picture?  So adorable!

We also did this punctuation activity from Cleaning Up Writing, an excellent resource for teaching editing skills:

This packet is a combination of cool worksheets and hands-on activities, divided up by month.  In only one week I've already used three pages, and I know it will be a staple in Hunter's curriculum all year long.

More of what Hunter is working on to be posted soon, plus a separate post for Colby's kindergarten work!  Stay tuned!

Printable activities featured in this blog post were purchased from the following TpT stores:

Creekside Teacher Tales

Hollis Hemmings

Shelley Gray

Lori Rosenberg - Teaching With Love and Laughter

Sailing Through 1st Grade

Grammar For Young Children

It can be tricky trying to teach a subject like grammar to a child too young to really read or write.  A lot of people don't even find it necessary, in home schools or public ones.  Proper grammar is not only the foundation of writing, however, it's the foundation of speech.  In the interest of giving my boys every advantage in life, where their thoughts and ideas will be judged in part by how effectively they are communicated, I started doing grammar lessons with Hunter when he had reached a first grade reading level.  I used Jessie Wise Bauer's First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind: Level 1 (Second Edition) (First Language Lessons).  The book is broken down into short lessons for the teacher to deliver orally.  There is a lot of repetition designed to help children commit grammatical rules and parts of speech to memory; children who remember things easily may find it a little annoying, but it worked really well for our family.  It would be easy for any parent or teacher to simply skip over any lessons that are unnecessary once their child has grasped a particular concept.

Here's what the book looks like (click on the image to find out more about it and read the reviews of other parents):


This year we'll be starting the next book, First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind: Level 2 (Second Edition) (First Language Lessons).  We haven't done any of the lessons yet (we'll be starting grammar in the fall), but I'm sure it will be very similar and work as well for us.


Once we get the third level, there are also workbooks for the child, who by then should have the skills to start doing some written grammar work. 

Another book I've heard very good things about but never used personally is Primary Language Lessons by Emma Serl.  This book is older and covers a lot of classic children's literature.  I'm told it works particularly well with the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling.


If anyone else is using a great grammar book, I'd love to include your recommendations!