Day 1

Today marks day #1 of school.  The boys started at Faith Academy on Monday, but due to some ongoing house projects I decided not to attempt starting until today.  Today was pretty basic.  We focused on math.  I am still undecided as to what curriculum I am going to use, but for now I am using an abacus and math games from Family Math.  Today we played "On The Dot" from the Family Math book.  Here's the basics:  Draw four large dots on 5+ pieces of paper (I used 4x6 unlined index cards).  Pour out a variety of small objects (I used coins and buttons).  Have the child count out four of the small objects while placing them on top of the black dots on the paper (and repeat for each sheet).  Repetition is the key.  Once the child is doing well at counting out the shapes onto the dots, give the child 5+ pieces of blank paper and ask them to count out four small objects onto the blank sheets.  When this can be successfully done, move on to the next number.  Don't rush.  The boys are definitely at different learning levels (Pre-K and Kindergarten).  I had to make adaptations to the lesson to meet their different learning levels.  My pre-schooler worked on counting the objects onto the dots on the card.  We worked on repetition, on counting out load, and on only counting to four.  When we first started he wanted to keep counting not understanding that we were only counting up to the number of dots that were on the paper.  After we did this exercise several times, I asked him to sort the small objects into "same" and "different" piles.  At first I had him sort all of the coins into one pile and all of the buttons into another pile.  Then I had him sort all of the pennies from the rest of the coins.  By the time he accomplished that, he was ready to be done.  My kindergartner did very well with this game and was able to count four pennies onto the dots and onto blank paper without any problem.  We're going to move on to fives next.  He seemed to grasp the concepts easily and didn't have any problems.  I then explained addition to him.  We talked about the + sign and the = sign.  I wrote out a few simple addition problems on a piece of paper and we then focused on using the abacus to solve the math problems.  He did very well.  We finished up the lesson by practicing on writing numbers 1-10 and on him saying them out loud while he wrote.

The Lesson

Asher

The boys

Isaiah

An up close of the game