Kindergarten Plans

The beginning of school is still about a month away for us, but I am busy getting things ready. Admittedly, I am a little nervous about schooling all three of them this year. I'm not entirely sure how it will work out logistically, so I am trying to be as prepared and organized as possible going into the year.

I have the materials we are planning to use for kindergarten, for Tiny Dancer. It's always exciting to have new boxes of books arrive at our house!

We are major readers in our home. We just got some new bookshelves for all of our books, and we are constantly at our check-out limit at the library. With that in mind, we will be doing LOTS of read-alouds and fun activities to go along. One thing we will do is literature pockets. We started working with them last year, and we LOVED them! They are definitely on our list for this year.

 She is learning to read now, but it has taken some time to find something that works for her. She is actually a very good reader, but she has little confidence in herself. What has clicked is Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. They aren't kidding about the easy part! I love the way it's laid out. The program introduces new sounds, not letter names, every couple of lessons. There is a focus on rhyming, sounding out each bit of the word, and there is a little bit of writing. She likes reading the little stories and talking about the pictures that go along. You can also go onto the Donna Young website to find printable handwriting pages that correspond.

We are also going to work our way through the Horizons phonics and reading program. I have never used Horizons before, and it doesn't fit in with our classical approach, but she wanted some fun workbooks. I appreciate that it is slightly more advanced. She does not need to start out learning each letter, so why start there?

We'll throw in some Bob readers and other readers left over from her brothers. 

We're also going to use Horizons for math. Again, she wanted a fun workbook, and I appreciate that it is more advanced than many of the other kindergarten programs. I wanted to find something at her level, and I think this fits the bill.

For some hands-on fun, we're going to work with Cuisinaire rods. I think she'll like doing some different activities with these.

Science for everyone this year is biology. We're going to start by learning about animals, then move on to the human body, and we will finish the year with plants. We will mostly read lots of books, craft, and have a nature journal. She loves taking pictures, so I may let her create some sort of photo book throughout the year.

And then otherwise, we will do some seasonal lapbooks. We have had fun with those in the past, so I think we'll use those again. I just need to be organized and get them printed and sorted while it's still summer!

Last year we used activity bags  to keep her occupied during school time. I think we will pull some of those out again this year.

And that's it! Kindergarten at the Oak House Academy!