Homeschool Highlights – Apple Week

I already shared the highlights from our first day. The rest of the week went pretty well. I made sure we had a lot of apple-based snacks available. We had apple slices, apple cider, apple sauce, apple cereal bars and apple oatmeal.

We continued to read all our apple books every day. Nicholas definitely had his favorites – Ten Apples up on Top! and Apple Farmer Annie. The other books were okay, but I could tell he had a better attention span with these.

We worked on rhyming with our phonics program. It didn’t seem like he was getting what I was trying to teach him. Well, it didn’t until I told him it was time for a break and that he should play by himself for a little bit. Then he followed after me saying, “Cat rhymes with hat. Box rhymes with fox.” It appears he’s learning more than he was letting on.

Lately he is still giving me grief at nap time. “I don’t want a nap” is said every day. Then he proceeds to whimper and whine in hopes that I will change my mind. Thursday I told him that I was planning to let him play on my computer when he woke up from his nap. But, he wasn’t going to get to play on it if he whined and cried. It worked! All I heard was “Love you, mom. I’m going to play on your computer after naptime!”

He has no problems with the matching and rhyming games on the computer. The only problem he had was with the mouse. He didn’t understand that he only has to move it slightly. Then he had to remember to click the button once he did get the mouse positioned correctly. I’m sure he’ll have it down in no time though.

We also worked on our math workbook. I found that a lot of what we’re going to be learning is following directions. He sees the pages and wants to do whatever he wants. I’m trying to teach him to be patient and follow what the book wants us to do. We’re also working on his perfection. I’m letting him know that he just needs to try. He’ll get better the more he practices.

He told me that he was the teacher. 

We also played a game where we matched the number of dots with the numbers.  I played a couple of games with him and then he played a few by himself.

Nicholas does enjoy our craft time though. Friday we made an apple tree to remind him that apples grow on trees. He glued on red pom poms to represent the apples. I found some apple stickers that my mom gave me and he had fun adding them to the tree too. He’s getting better at gluing all by himself.

Then we worked on some cutting practice. I’m being very lenient in this area and letting him go off script. More than anything, he just needs to practice holding the scissors correctly. My mom said that she use to let me just cut paper and there was always tiny pieces of paper in the carpet. Nicholas really enjoys this activity and our vacuum can easily clean up this mess.

Finally, we made applesauce muffins. I prepared the batter while he was finishing his nap. Then he helped me put the topping on. I can’t count the amount of times he licked his finger. The oven does kill germs, right? Well, at least they’re just for our family and not for public consumption. They are nutritious too. I used this cookbook for my recipe. Our muffins have hidden carrots in them, which is good for Evan and I who aren’t the best vegetable eaters. Everyone in our family loves these muffins.

The shirt says it all!

I’m glad to have the first week under my belt. This coming week we have a little more work to do as we are getting a little more into our phonics program. But, there will be more computer time, so Nicholas will be thrilled.