Saturday, February 4, 2012

Jackson Begins His Preschool Career

As I have mentioned previously, we are planning on homeschooling when Reagan begins Kindergarten this coming Fall. One semi challenge we have faced is how to keep Jackson busy, happy, and ideally included and learning while I'm working with the girls.

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We are in the process of setting up a dedicated classroom space in our basement (I'll be doing some specific posts on that soon). In that space, we have activities specifically for Jackson. Additionally, by setting up our classroom in the basement Jackson has easy access to several toy areas including our Thomas Table (Jackson is an enormous Thomas fan), the kid's kitchen and our Little People Village. I have also learned that it makes more sense to do things like practicing violin with the girls while Jackson is taking his nap. This is an activity which takes my full attention. As a result, it is a time when he is likely to become frustrated because of my lack of ability to provide him any attention for a prolonged period of time. It's been a slow process (and one I expect to continue - and continue to change) but we're slowly figuring out what are the best times of day to accomplish what.

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On Friday, I let Jackson sit at the table while Reagan was working on her Math and Writing schoolwork. He had a great time working on his Melissa and Doug Door Puzzle (it's not really a puzzle, I just don't know what to call it, every door has a different mechanism to open it and discover different animals in varying colors and numbers). He has played with this before but he was intensely more interested in it sitting at the table working like a big preschool boy. :)

I have fallen in love with a book that was recently recommended to me called "The Well-Trained Mind A guide to Classical Education at Home" by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise. This book was suggested to me by some vetran homeschool mothers who are part of a book club Dorothy introduced me too. If you are considering homeschooling, I highly recommend this book as a resource. It is assisting me greatly in figuring out the framework I want to use for homeschooling. I will provide further details on this in an upcoming blog post, but for now I wanted to mention it because of an acitivity it suggested and I used with Jackson Friday morning.

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The book recommended drawing counter clockwise circles with young children. Many many circles in whatever type of pictures you want including simply drawing circles. This is a beginning writing skill. Many letters include a counter clockwise circle but our natural inclination is to draw circles clockwise. This is especially interesting to me because just recently Reagan, who has been writing for sometime, began trying to write her letters in a clockwise direction (something I've discovered some of her friends have been doing as well). This has led to writing many letters backwards. As such, this activity seemed especially appropriate for us and is something all three kids can do and learn from. The aim is for counter clockwise circles to feel more natural and intuitive.

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When Jackson grew tired of playing with his door puzzle, I gave him a pencil and paper and started working with him on his counter clockwise circles. As you can see from the pictures below he was ready to burst with pride! He sat there and giggled and giggled and smiled and smiled. It was beyond priceless! He absolutely loved sitting at the table with his big sisters and doing his own work. He has colored and done other activities while I've worked with the girls before but somehow he had a different association with this. He clearly thought he was part of the group and doing "real" schoolwork. He is so determined to be a big boy and do whatever the girls are doing I think we can officially declare his preschool career to have begun. :) What a big boy you are becoming Jackson! We are so proud of you sweet boy! :)I'm pretty much caught up on blog posts now (I can't remember the last time I was literally to the day caught up!) so I may be MIA for a few days while I work to put the finishing touches on our classroom. I have several blog posts I want to do regarding our classroom space as well as curriculm choices we have made. As we begin this homeschool journey, if you have any recommendations or suggestions for us we would appreciate and enjoy hearing them!

2 comments:

  1. Congratulations, Jackson! BIG hugs and lots of love from us, especially Baby Professor : ). You are such a big boy!

    Love Ms Mo'mina and the Professors : )

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  2. LOVE these pics!!!! Can't wait to see you all again next weekend! xoxoxo Grammy

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