Sunday, March 18, 2012

Afterschool Blog Hop


Good morning and welcome to another round of the Afterschool Blog Hop! I'm very excited to be hosting today, and appreciate you stopping by. I can't wait to hear about all the activities you've been doing with your kids! Here's a recap of our week.

Pre-K
Yesterday was St. Patrick's day, so we started the day off by going to Brueggers for green bagels. The kids loved them!

At school this week, M had one of her favorite themes: Space. They learned what the word astronomy means; she told me "It's the study of the stars, the planets and space." I was impressed she remembered the definition so well. One evening last week, the sky was very clear so we went outside and looked at all the stars. I pointed out Orion's belt (which she wanted to see), the big and little dippers, and Jupiter and Venus, which are so prominent in the sky now. Is anyone else as amazed as me that we can see Jupiter so clearly? I love it!

2nd Grade
C is finishing up the third quarter at school, so I've seen a few unit tests come home with him, including on on landforms for Social Studies, and one on subtraction for math. He also brought home a beautiful picture he made of landforms. I had to share it. It includes an island, peninsula, plain, mountains, volcanoes, plateau, canyon, ocean, bay, river and lake. I thought he did a great job.

He finally started up soccer last Sunday and had a great time. It's his first time playing soccer so he's still learning some of the basics of the game. But he kept up with the other kids pretty well and I think it's going to be a good sport for him.

Home

At home, the kids have been really enjoying this summer-like weather. They've been playing outside with friends just about every day. It's nice for us to have an early spring since they actually don't play outside as much in the high heat of the summer.

For me, we're just about ready to launch the new website I've been working on since January. This past week, I had to work some very late nights getting things ready. I can't wait until about 48 hours from now when it's finally up and running and I can take a moment to breathe!


Posted by Julie at 10:07 AM 3 comments

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Afterschool Blog Hop


Welcome back to another edition of the Afterschool Blog Hop! This week is hosted by Little Wonders’ Days. I hope you had a great week! I didn't manage to participate in the hop last week so I have a lot to share about the last two weeks.

Pre-K
It seems like a long time ago, but I haven't posted on this blog since Dr. Seuss's birthday, so I wanted to share this picture of M. She dressed up as Thing 2 for school on March 2nd. Several of the other kids in her school dressed up as well, and there was even a Thing 1 in her classroom. That made her (and the boy who was Thing 1) quite happy!

In school, she spent a couple weeks learning about weather and the sky. They covered the water cycle, which she already knew since we've learned about it at home. And they learned the different types of clouds. She's also been working on subtraction and is doing really well now with simple 0-10 subtraction. She's reading more and more independently now, and can consistently read first grade level books (1.5) without missing more than one or two words.


2nd Grade
C is also working on subtraction at school, but he's doing three digit subtraction with borrowing, or regrouping as they call it now. He's doing well with that, and at home, we've been working on multiplication. I find that the advanced math pages that I work with the kids on at his school have many problems that could easily be solved with multiplication, so I figured we might as well work on it.

C is also continuing with piano. He still gets three short songs to practice each week, and he's been progressing through them quickly. Here is one of the songs from last week, Forest Drums, in which he was focusing on rests.



Home
C's school is doing a marathon that started last week. Basically, C is challenged with jogging/power walking 26.2 miles by May 4. We are logging his miles and he gets a bead for each mile completed. The last 1.2 miles is done at the school, so he really just has to go 25 miles between now and then. Yesterday, he and his dad went on what my husband thought would be a walk. They ended up jogging almost the whole thing. They went 2.7 miles! So he's off to a good start. I plan to do the route with C one evening this week as well. My husband and I figure we'll alternate so we can both get into shape too!


Posted by Julie at 11:31 AM 2 comments

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Afterschool Blog Hop


Welcome back to another edition of the Afterschool Blog Hop! This week is hosted by Mama Smiles. I hope you had a great week! We have had a very unusual and exciting week so I have lots to share!

Pre-K
M had a good week at school. She learned about endangered and extinct animals this week. They talked about many different animals, including manatees and eagles. She brought her pink stuffed manatee to school for show and tell. According to the homework packet she got at the end of the week, they're learning basic subtraction as well. I sometimes wonder if the teachers realize this is a pre-K class, not a kindergarten class! I wonder what she'll actually learn next year at school...

The big thing that happened this week is that M turned 5 years old! We celebrated her birthday yesterday with a fabulous princess tea party. She had a wonderful time with her friends, and Rapunzel herself showed up for an hour to make tiaras, give makeovers and read a story. The girls all loved her. We finished off the day with dinner at Chili's per M's request. That's where she had her birthday dinner last year too. Unfortunately, they were pretty slow yesterday and we were there for 2 hours! But she was happy and her being tired made bedtime much easier!

2nd Grade
C had a good week too. He only had school three days last week, so he had a lot of fun on Monday and Tuesday. Actually, we all took off Monday and spent the day at Frankie's Fun Park with some cousins and friends. It was a blast. Most of the kids and adults played laser tag, but M is too young, so we hung out and had a milkshake! Then we all played mini golf, road go-karts and played in the arcade. It was a beautiful day outside, despite the fact that we had snow the day before!

He had a Y Guides meeting on Sunday and they made little birdhouses as a craft. And he had his piano lesson. Once again, he got stickers for all three songs, so he's working on three more now. He's learning 4th and 5th intervals this week.

Home
Besides the birthday party and the trip to Frankie's Fun Park, we also had a crazy weather week! On Sunday night, while C and his dad were at their Y Guides meeting, it started snowing for the first time this year! M and I went out and played in the slush until they got home, and then we all played a bit. We were able to make snowballs but that was about it. It looked really pretty in the morning, but was melted by afternoon.


Posted by Julie at 9:29 AM 3 comments

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Afterschool Blog Hop


Welcome back to another edition of the Afterschool Blog Hop! This week is hosted by Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns. I hope you had a great week! Here's what we've been up to this week.

Pre-K
M had a nice week learning about zoo and farm animals at school. And of course, Valentine's Day was fun. She had a party at school and managed to get all 25 cards made in time. She came home with lots of cards and treats. At home this week, she had her hip hop class, and it was lots of fun. They're starting to work on their routine for the recital in June, so I'm enjoying watching them learn the dances. 

The biggest thing this week was that M got her birthday present a little early. She finally got a bike, and it's amazing how quickly she was riding it around - in the store! She was definitely ready for it. With her being so short, we figured she'd need a 12 inch, or maybe 14 inch. But she ended up getting a 16 inch bike. Her feet don't quite touch when she's sitting on the seat, but they will soon.



2nd Grade
C had a good week too. He had a big party in his class for Valentine's Day but they are also learning about healthy eating at school, so instead of candy, they had fruits and vegetables for snack that day. We sent in baby carrots. He gave his friends Angry Birds cards this year.

At home this week, he worked hard on his three new piano pieces, and was able to play them well at his lesson, so he got stickers for those. Now he has three new songs to learn. He also finally learned how to ride a bike without training wheels. I was starting to worry it would never happen. He is just such a perfectionist that he can't stand doing something he can't do right the first time. So riding a bike has been a huge struggle. But yesterday, he finally did it and we are just so proud and relieved!

Home
I started putting things together for M's birthday party that's coming up. I plan to do a full write-up of it next week since we're going all out for this one. It's a princess tea party, so I'm putting tulle bows on the chair backs and lavender material on the seats, and my grandmother's china cups on the table for the little girls to use. Morgan is very excite to have all her friends over next weekend!

Work has been busy but manageable, so that's good. I've still managed to get to C's school to work with the kids on advanced math. This week there was one problem that really stumped them. It went something like this:
It takes George two hours to mow the lawn. He mows for 30 minutes, then rests for 30 minutes. If he starts mowing at 10:00, what time does he finish? 
None of the kids got it right. And then I had to spend quite a while explaining it. I'm not sure why the concept was so lost on them. It was interesting.


Posted by Julie at 10:15 AM 3 comments

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Afterschool Blog Hop


Welcome to another week of the Afterschool Blog Hop! This week, the hop is being hosted by The Educators’ Spin On It. I hope you'll link up below and let us know what you've been doing at home with your kids who go to school too.

Pre-K
M has been busy making her Valentine's this week. She has to make 25 and she insisted she wanted to make them instead of buying store-bought Valentine cards. I wish I had encouraged her more to buy them! I don't know how she's going to finish all 25 by tomorrow night! At school, she started learning about vowels so we'll definitely be working on that at home this week. We didn't get to it last week.

And the biggest thing this week was that she scraped her knee last Sunday afternoon and has been completely tormented by this minor injury. She has a band aid on it, and went to school every day in sweatpants so she could hold the one pant leg up all day so it wouldn't touch the band aid. She did this all day, every single day. Yesterday we put her in a skirt despite the fact that it was 35 degrees! I really hope this thing heals soon!!!

2nd Grade
C had a good week. He's been playing with his friends after school more because it's daylight later now. So for the hour that he is home in the afternoon and I'm still working, he usually spends that time outside or at his friend's house. At school, he said they finally got into borrowing in math. And he's learning about geography in social studies.

He's been doing really well with piano lately. He's been taking lessons since early December and he has already finished his first book. Last week, he got stickers for three more songs in his new book. He's been practicing about 3-4 times each week at home, playing each song three times. And that's all it's taken to get him to progress so well. My husband helps him usually with his first practice session, giving him tips on tempo and other things that I know nothing about! But it works, and then he seems to get the songs down really well.

Home
We started the week with a big Super Bowl party last Sunday night. We had 13 adults and 9 kids age 4-8 at the party. It was a blast, even though our team didn't actually win. Otherwise, we haven't had any exciting stuff going on. We did get some stuff for M's birthday party, which is coming up in a couple weeks. I'm hosting a princess tea party for her and we have Rapunzel coming from a local entertainment company. Last night, we went to a local Gigi's Cupcakes to check out some of their cupcake options. I think we're going with the Birthday Surprise. Yum!



Posted by Julie at 10:49 AM 8 comments
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