First Day of Kindergarten!!

Wow, I have to admit I am a little baffled at how quickly Kindergarten came around. I can't believe my baby girl is so grown up!

I think most people know that we chose homeschooling this year. That decision will continue until we feel led for Brianna (and/or Hunter) to be in a different schooling situation. For those who are interested, we chose a variety of curriculum this year: Horizons math, A Beka science, social studies/community helpers, Sonlight reading/language arts/phonics and Bible/history, and Little Hearts For His Glory history.

 The first thing we did was go over our prayer list, and pray for the people on it and for our school day. We have a small journal we usually write in, but today Brianna wanted to write down the people she was praying for. It was really sweet, I thought.

 The next thing we did was say the pledges and went over the rules. Our rules are pretty simple: Listen when someone else is speaking, Raise your hand to speak, Follow directions quickly, Be kind with your words and hands, and Always do your best work. We have the Pledge of Allegiance, the pledge to the Christian flag, and the pledge to the Bible. I found a great book this past weekend at a yard sale which explains why we say the pledge. It really breaks down the Pledge of Allegiance so it's easily explained to a young child. I read it this morning and will probably do it every morning this first week.

The Pledges:

 The Rules:

 We read our Bible story, which was the creation story.

This went along with what we read in the encyclopedia, about dinosaurs and cavemen.

While Brianna colored a picture of our Bible verse of the week (Romans 3:23), I read a book about dinosaurs to her.

 Next we did math. The first few weeks are going to be review for Brianna, but I am choosing to do the activities anyway to help her transition into the routine of school. Today we learned about the number one.

 After math, I realized we'd already been working for over an hour without a break. So - recess!

 After playing outside, we needed a snack. So while the kids had something small to eat, I read out loud to them. Today's Mother Goose rhyme was the original "Old Mother Goose". We also read "Pirates Go To School", "Shhhh! Everybody's Sleeping" and "Extra Yarn".

 After that it was time to finish our school work. Next up was social studies/community helpers. Brianna learned all about people in the community who provide goods and services. She also learned about reading a map. Even at the end of the night she still remembered all the points of the compass, which I was so happy about! Part of her work was to draw a picture of her family and house. She dedicated her picture to her dad of course!

 Next was our work on phonics. This week we are talking about the letter F. We went through the dictionary to talk about the words she recognized in the "F" section.

 Then Brianna completed a couple of copywork sheets for the letter "F".

 After we finished our work it was lunch time. After lunch we sat on the porch and ate Italian Ices and read almost three chapters of the book we're reading right now, "Ralph S. Mouse".

All in all, a great day! Hunter did an amazing job entertaining himself while we did our work. I am so proud of him! And of course I'm proud of Brianna. She didn't complain once during our work time and she did her best with everything.