Preschool - Week of 7/30

This was a somewhat productive week for us, school-wise! I accomplished much of what was on the schedule. (We start preschool at the Y next week and I'm sure I'll need to re-tweak everything all over again, so I wanted to get some actual work done this week!)

Phonics: We are still working on the alphabet. We put our foam puzzle letters in alphabetical order; I left blanks in the alphabet and had Crumpet fill them in; we played alphabet Bingo; we sang the alphabet every time he washed his hands (he even sang along once or twice - a miracle!!). And Crumpet can now say the alphabet up to S. We're getting there!

Math: Much of the McRuffy work was review this week. We did work with pattern blocks and learn the terms "rhombus" and "trapezoid" though.
For one review project, Crumpet had to place numbered fish in order. He created an ocean scene for them. Doesn't the water look like a fish as well? The green is an island:
Science:
I found this great chart at the dollar store. Crumpet places a sticker on it for each food group he eats each day. So far, we're not keeping track of how many servings of each food he gets. We're just making sure he gets a little of everything, and that he exercises. He loves this chart, and I find that he will eat anything I put in front of him, if it means he gets to fill in a blank spot. We talk constantly about what foods he's eating, what it does for his body, and how happy his body is about the good food he's eating. It really seems to be making a difference in his eating habits.
We also worked through several sections of the water unit in McRuffy Science. We used water to learn more about the states of matter- solid, liquid and gas. We talked about ways to melt ice. We used a flame, a hairdryer, salt, and sun, but my favorite was Crumpet's own idea:
Suck on the ice til it melts! That's my clever boy! We also worked with floating and sinking objects. We experimented with different materials to see what would happen to each. Then, I dropped a ball of playdoh in water so he could see that it sank. Afterward, I shaped it into a boat to show that it would float (wet playdoh is gross, but it did the trick). We also tried to sink a balloon, to help show that water pushes back material pushing down on it, and that's why boats stay afloat.

Life Skills: We worked on phone use, and tried memorizing our phone number. We followed the lesson in Slow and Steady, Get Me Ready for this topic.
Socialization: We went to the library story hour. This week's theme was Sports, and the kids made these cute football players.
Geography: We learned a little bit about France this week. You can read about that here.

Art: We read the book Come Look With Me: Exploring Landscape Art with Children. This is part of a wonderful series of art books. It describes the paintings in detail, but also lists some really good questions to use to discuss the art with your child. Crumpet and I really enjoyed working through this book.

We had a lot of fun learning this week. For more preschool fun, check out Homeschool Creations.