Letter G

 Olly did not find the "G" in my drawing yesturday. He did notice a lot of things though.

After I pointed out the "G" we drew our "Gs" together in our good books. He did his like we do with form drawing. Going over it and over it again and again until it was dark enough to see.

We also had a verse that went with the story. The verse has a lot of "G" sounds, so he is getting the phonics in that way.

Letter Story G

 Olly and I have started our first Language Arts block for first grade.

We used the Enki Education story "The Little Falcon". One day I read Olly the story. The next day we recalled the story and we colored our pictures.








Olly's picture did start out with a Golden Gate. He also drew the boy and some trees, with tree roots.

Then the dreadful thunderstorm arrived soaking the boy in rain dark black clouds in the dark black sky. He did give the boy his crystal so that he could control the storm and his fear of it.

Tomorrow we "find the letter" in the picture.

Enki Town Board

This is the town board from our Enki curriculum. It is for learning word families such as Eep/eap and Ight/ite.

I used stockmar water colors directly onto a tri-folder presentation board I purchased from Staples. The paint is really thick. I put it on saucers and added water almost as if I was using oil paint on a painter's pallet. I learned a lot about color mixing and using water colors when I went through this process. It will be good to bring that to the kids.

The town isn't finished yet. It could use some flowers around the houses to make it come more alive. But it was functional and the kids really enjoyed it.

Week three - Guess the letter!

Probably not so hard to guess the letter this time! Our story was Rumpelstiltskin this week. The woodsman happens upon Rumpelstiltskin in the dark part of the wood dancing around the fire.




I think Brother and I have fiery temperaments. I managed to include a bit of the darkness of the wood, Brother has almost none.

Week three - Form Drawing

So, I was planning on running wave form for this week. I knew what I wanted it to look like, but when I was out there in our form walking area ready to present the form - I realized I couldn't do it. Oh my! Obviously it is a form that will feed me to work on as well as Brother. Meanwhile, I just quickly pulled this running loop form out and present it instead.

This morning when I was looking in my Enki manuals I read that this running loop form is more advanced because of the midline crossing required and really would be expected to be presented in the later part of the second half of the year. So glad I read that before morning lesson today.




So we took the form really easy. When brother was drawing it on the chalkboard, at first he kept drawing spirals. I had to actually put my hand over his and steer his hand at key points in order to break out of the spiral. After we drew the form a few times together I was able to slowly decrease my pressure and remove my hand.

The same thing happened when we moved to our "sand tray" and then again to his Good Book. It was so neat to actually see or feel his brain mapping.

So, tomorrow morning I will be introducing the running wave. I've walked it a few times in the living room, so it should work out better.




Here is our "sand tray." It's actually brown rice flour in a casserole dish. I was considering purchasing a sand tray, but after the form lesson has been completed Brother loves to build with the flour. So, I guess it becomes like a sensory table tray. It is also how I include Little Brother (Baby). He really wants to be involved, so I try and find ways to include him that are not so intrusive for Brother. Here is Little Brother (Baby) taking his turn with his form work. ;)

Week two - "B"

Brother had a really hard time getting the block crayon to move with the form "B". So, it turned out lumpy. He drew over it to try and make it look more "B"ish. He concentrated so hard on getting the "B" form, that he messed up the picture frame. Oh well.



Copywork! He did less copying, but he used a pencil instead of a crayon, which was a bit of a stretch. And he copied the whole thing from the board, rejecting the idea of copying off of my page. It's fine if he copies of the board, but it sure does lengthen the amount of time he spends on the activity!

Week two - Guess the letter!

I love this drawing. It is just so cute! He didn't mean for it to turn out sideways. I'm glad that even when things don't turn out the way he expects them to, he can move through that and make the best of his art. The black is the bear's cave with a green tree out front.

Week two - Form Drawing

Mine



Brother's

Week one - "T"

Brother is still reversing letters some times and is still struggling with copy work from the board. I was hoping that tracking would kick in over the summer, but it isn't fully functioning in quite yet. Which is totally fine as he just turned seven on the 30th. Hopefully by eight years old he will be fully tracking and can do his copy work from the board with ease.

Today's circle went really well and was a lot of fun! I think it was because the three of us wrestled in the living room this morning before we went on our walk.

Week one - Guess the letter!

We are officially back for the second part of first grade now! We had a couple false starts trying to find our rhythm. This week felt like we were ready! We are starting slowly with our morning walk, circle and lessons followed by rest and afternoon practice.





Guess the letter!

It was really neat seeing Brother fall right into drawing again. He had no resistance to filling his whole page with color. Last year he wasn't really wanting to color the background in and just did it to please me.

R's copywork

We participated in an Enki support phone call and it was brought to my attention that some of our "issues" were most likely due to eye tracking difficulties. Brother's eye tracking in not mature enough to allow him to look at the chalk board and then copy it down onto his paper. He can do it, but loses his place constantly. So he has to re-find his place on the board every time he looks away to write a letter. This takes a lot of effort, tiring him quickly so that he can't write much. A way to support him in his copy work is to put the copywork on a piece of paper beside him so that he doesn't have to look so far away. This is normal, and should resolve on it's own. If it hasn't by the time he is 8, then we can start looking into eye exercises. I put the copywork up on the chalk board as well knowing that someday he will use the board exclusively.

And the letter is!

The Waterfall Of White Hair

Mine



Brother's

Brother slipped into using lines again when he was drawing his picture. And using more symbols. It felt like a step back, and then I looked at my picture - which I am not at all happy with. I outlined as well - just with a different part of the crayon. This is my reminder that I need to practice the picture first so that I can bring it to Brother well. To be fair, our neighbor started cutting down trees during this letter, and I couldn't think. So, we spent a lot of time at parks to avoid the sound of chain saws.

N

Yes, it's an "N". It's hard to see in the picture. The "N" is a combination of the trunk and two branches. The nest is at the top of the "N". You can probably see it better in Brother's picture.



Mine



Brother's



Copy work.

The Little White Dove

This weeks story was "The Little White Dove" from my Enki Fairy Tales book. I led the part of the drawing that included the tree and then let Brother fill in the rest of his picture while thinking of the story. He asked me to draw some flowers for him in the garden so that he could have some flower ideas.

Guess the letter!

Form Drawing

Straight lines are so much easier for Brother. He had a lot of fun with this form, wanting to draw it again and again and change the size. Brother had been complaining about his fingers hurting while he was coloring the yellow background in. We use a block crayon, but he must have been holding it wrong. Something shifted for him today and it became much easier for him. He was able to color almost the whole page in evenly.



Mine. It's a good thing we don't have circle tomorrow. I need some inspiration for which form to try next. He wasn't ready for the mirrored form yet.



Little Bunny wants to be a part of everything. I'd rather shield him from form drawing until he was in first grade but he isn't napping anymore. He woke up so crancky after naps that I'm not really willing to let him sleep unless he goes to sleep on his own. Brother modeled quiet time today though, so Little Bunny put himself up in our room and shut the door while he played by himself. Yippee! Meanwhile, here is his form. He goes through all the steps with use - drawing on the chalk board, playing with rice flour, and then drawing. At least he is drawing what is appropriate for an almost 3 year old! He has started up to that 3 year old resistance by the way. Yikes, he is one strong willed kid. It's no big deal, I just wasn't expecting it to start until he was 3. ;)

Weekly goals

We are starting our second Language Arts block. We are also starting a weekly PE class at the local homeschool center. We also went to the local homeschool groups park day yesterday. I feel like we are in an expansion stage - which makes sense as it's Spring!

I've added an activity to the morning circle called "Strange Family." It is verse and movement used to introduce skip counting in a physical way. Since it's the first week we are working with this activity, we're only walking number 1. Next week I will introduce number 2, and maybe number 3. We shall see.

We have been working with bean bags as well to transition from quiet time to afternoon practice time. We toss and catch a bean bag to a verse. First with one hand for a full verse and then the other. We then toss to a math verse, but this time tossing from one hand to another.

I've finally found the place for handwork in our rhythm! After story, on day 2 we have form drawing, which is pretty intense. It didn't feel right to draw forms right after hearing a new story. Following story day 3, or recall, we have art. So day 1 had a huge gaping hole that hand work fills quite nicely. This week Brother started sewing his tooth fairy pillow again. We had set it aside for a while, but now it seems like Brother is more ready. Little bunny (formerly Baby) laced cards.

Overview for the week

Math or number qualities was our main lesson focus in the morning. For language arts we practiced handwriting the letters that we had introduced last month. We are also tossing a bean bag to poetry. Eventually this is going to turn into a math game, but we need to learn the rhythm of tossing with both hands first.

Next week we are back to letters! And we will play with math manipulatives in the afternoon.

Ta Da! It's 4!

Form Drawing for 4

The geometric representation of 4.



Mine



Brother's