My Father's World Kindergarten: G is for Goat

Zeke is using My Father's World Kindergarten. He turned five in November. This week Zeke's theme was G is for Goat, and it begins a three-week series on farm animals. (Next week is C for Cow, followed by H for Horse.) 

MONDAY:

Zeke colored and cut apart his letter cards first thing. He practiced saying the words (/g/ is a sound he has been working on in speech therapy) and then put them in his envelope.

We read about goats in the God's Amazing World textbook, and then Zeke did a farm animal/zoo animal sorting worksheet I found for free on Teachers Pay Teachers. 

Next, he colored his farm animal puppets. He cut them out and taped a craft stick to the back of each one. We sang "Old MacDonald Had a Farm" with the puppets and had a blast!

He then worked in Abeka Math and his Rod and Staff workbook.

TUESDAY:

We started off with his handwriting and sound discrimination worksheets. He does a great job on these each week!

Then I printed him a goat coloring page with the word "goat" to copy. We made his badge using black and brown dot markers. 

He then colored the baby and mother animal worksheet and cut them apart. We played a matching game with them (and we tied!) and tomorrow we'll use them for something different.

We read part of this book about Farm Animals. 

He then did a math page in Abeka where he had to write the numbers 80-100, and he did another page in his Rod and Staff workbook. We tried to find a Wild Kratts episode about goats, but no luck. He watched one about mountain animals that did have a goat in it.

WEDNESDAY:

We started off with his math page, which was on telling time to the hour. He's already been doing this in Abeka math, so it was just review for him. He flipped the page over and had six words to read - gum, dig, mom, mug, sit, and gas. He did pretty well with reading these words and matching them to the pictures.

Then we took the farm animals and babies cards from yesterday and played a matching game with some of them. I would say, "I'm thinking of animal that rhymes with coat." He would pick up the goat card. Considering we haven't done any rhyming work yet, he did a fantastic job and caught on to the concept really well. Then I let him glue the mama and baby animals on a sheet of cardstock.

I printed him out two goat dot marker worksheets just for fun. He loves dot markers, but I haven't printed him any pages in a while for them. He enjoyed doing this.

In Abeka math, he is supposed to be learning the number words for one-four. I cut four index cards in half and wrote the number ones on one set and the digits on the other. He practiced matching these and then did the matching activity on his worksheet. We will keep adding to the set.

He then did two more pages in his Rod and Staff workbook. 

THURSDAY:

Zeke had speech today, so we didn't do many extras. He did his blend ladder worksheet, where he blended words, wrote them, and read them. Then he read his word list with much help from me. He's still struggling with blending and the whole concept of reading, but we're plugging along because I know from experience, it will click sooner or later!

I printed out a cut and glue worksheet for him. He had to color the pictures, cut them out, and glue the words that begin with /g/ to the goat. 

We played Bingo with letter sounds and Cheerios. I would say the sound and he would cover the letter with a Cheerio. Next, I said a word and he had to cover the sound that word began with. Then he called the sounds out for me to cover! He enjoyed this and it was a good review. 

We played a matching game with the number words one to four and the digits. He's getting better at recognizing them. He did a page in Abeka math and a page in his Rod and Staff workbook. 

We went to speech and they had decorated for Mardi Gras. Of course, Zeke wanted to take pictures with the decorations (he always does).

FRIDAY:

I made Zeke a journal page with heart sticker patterns. He loves doing patterns!

He had to draw the pictures that begin with /g/ - he chose gum, goat, grape, and gate.

On the back of that page, he had four sentences to read. They all began with "The wig is on..." and had four different people - mom, dad, Sam, and Ann. After sounding out the words on the first two, he realized they were all the same! He knows the words "mom" and "dad" from memory, so it was pretty easy for him.

He did a page in Abeka math and Rod and Staff workbook. We were supposed to read "A Year at Maple Hill Farm," but it came in the mail late (today) so we'll add it and the activities for next week.

That’s a wrap on letter G!

My Father's World Kindergarten: I is for Insects

Insects are always such a fun theme for young kids! I decided not to deviate too much from the lesson plans in MFW because I feel like they're complete just as they're written - but there are so many fun things you can add on to this theme.

Every day we add to his 100 chart and calendar, saying the days of the week and months of the year. 

MONDAY:

We talked about ants today. We read in the A-to-Z book about insects, and I pulled out our jumbo plastic ant to talk about the different parts of an insect - the three body parts, six legs, and antenna. It helps Zeke to have visuals, so I'm glad I kept up with this set!

We read about ants in Proverbs and talked about how hard they work. We also started memorizing Colossians 3:23 in the NIV translation.

I found a cute math page with an ant on it, so I printed it out for Zeke. He had to read the numbers, add one and two and subtract one and two from each one. This was good practice and it counted as math for him today.

He also colored and cut apart his word cards, placing them in an envelope like he does each week, completed two pages in his Rod and Staff workbook, and then we called it a day!

TUESDAY

We started off with his handwriting page and sound discrimination page. 

I had a ladybug symmetry worksheet for Zeke to complete. He did a fantastic job! We used the jumbo ladybug from the insects set to talk about the parts of an insect again. 

For math he did a ladybug addition worksheet and one page in Abeka. 

I made an Insect Rescue with our plastic bugs, a wooden tray, some yarn, and some tongs. I simply poured the bugs on the tray, tied off the yarn, wrapped it around the tray every which way, and then tied it off again. Zeke loved doing this! He rescued them all and then asked to do it again. Of course, I said yes! Then he sorted them by type, and we discussed which were insects and which ones weren’t. 

WEDNESDAY:

Today Zeke completed a ladybug craft that doubled as a math activity! He had to color the lady bugs and put an even number of dots on each side. Then he cut out a leaf and glued the ladybugs to the leaf.

He also did his math worksheet from My Father's World and the cut and paste reading worksheet.

We had to cut school short because we ran some errands in town. It was pouring rain and the roads were beginning to flood, so we went ahead and did what we had to do. I planned to do some math when we got home, but it didn't work out!

THURSDAY:

Today we did the blend ladder page and read his word list. He’s getting a little better at sounding out the CVC words.

 

He also did an insect/not insect sorting worksheet that I found for free.

He did two pages in Abeka math and two pages in his Rod and Staff workbook. He loves those cut and glue activities! 

FRIDAY:

Today Zeke did his drawing page. This is always my favorite! He drew an igloo, insect, inch, and inchworm! 

He also completed a math page in Abeka and one from the Rod and Staff workbook he likes so much. We reviewed letter sounds and he read the words “on” and “in” and glued them to the correct picture. I didn’t get a picture of that side of the worksheet!

I feel like Zeke needs a little more reading instruction than he is getting. I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to supplement with - maybe just some games and hands on activities - but I have the weekend to plan it out! 

Again, we don’t do a few of the activities I had planned, like painting a ladybug rock and playing with hexagons, but it was still a fun week of kindergarten!