September Reflections & Great Web Resources

 The past month has been a whirlwind of moving in all while getting settled into our Kindergarten homeschool year as well. We have been loving rowing our first few books with Five in a Row, which we may refer to as FIAR on the blog sometimes. In the past few weeks we have read A Story About Ping by Marjorie Flack, Lentil by Robert McCloskey, Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans, and this week are wrapping up September with A Pair of Red Clogs by Masako Matsuno. Through the stories we have covered a few geographical and cultural lessons about China, America, France, and Japan.

W is now on lesson 9 in his Math-U-See Primer and we are working on place value by using the "tens" and "units". Each lesson has 7 pages and some days he does a full lesson while others he will do one or two pages and then other math related projects. He enjoys playing with the blocks after he finishes the lesson part so that keeps it fun. We try to work math in other ways as well, like in FIAR projects and cooking (although he got pretty frustrated when actually trying to use chopsticks for their intended purpose). :)

Initially I did not know where to begin with teaching science. FIAR has a few science projects, but not many, so I picked up The Giant Science Resource Book for grades 1-6 which will be useful in the next few years. We used the section on leaves and trees to identify some leaves outside and then Will wrote the names onto cards which are now adorning our refrigerator.

W has wrapped up Hooked On Phonics Kindergarten levels 1 & 2, and is using a few different materials for handwriting which he is slowly improving with. I wouldn't push him into it except I do want him to be on the same "level" as the public school kids as he will have to be evaluated before homeschooling first grade in NH. Most of all right now we are enjoying settling into our new home and spending more time outdoors. Over the past month we have also attended a Colonial Fair in Massachusetts and an Apple Fest in NH, and have been lucky enough to meet some new friends in our town.

We are always on the lookout for homeschool resources on the internet, and here a few of W's favorite sites for reading, games, mazes, and music.

• Boowa and Kwala
• Starfall
• PBS Kids
• Playhouse Disney
• Childcareland - free printables and activity ideas
• Usborne-Quicklinks - if you have any of the excellent Usborne internet linked books this website has all the related materials. We have used it for the First Thousand Words in French book.

We would love to hear about your favorite kid friendly web sites and homeschool resource sites!