Another Week Complete

So even with the snow day I accomplished everything on my list and lesson plans for the week!  We made granola bars for our G week cooking project.  We made gorilla stick puppets to go with the Yellow Gorilla we watched on the storyplace website.  Today we did some review and assessment, and all three kiddos seem to have learned what I wanted.  They have had a pretty good week, and so have I.  As I am typing Eliza and CJ are singing the Alphabet of Nations from Here Come the ABC's, they really love They Might Be Giants.  Mind you, the CD isn't actually playing, they simply have memorized the entire playlist.  Yesterday I had them stack 7 blocks, and CJ got two, and I asked them how many more they needed, and Eliza never even thought about it and said 5.  I was blown away! 

CJ is writing his name more consistently and finally holding the crayons and pencils properly.  We are working on using the safety scissors.  What a difficult thing to teach!  I have been using the highlightskids.com site for read alouds and other stories, and storylineonline as well.  Since Rich attached my PC to the TV I find it so much easier to do computer activities with the kids.  I have also found that this week went so smoothly, because we finally have ironed out a routine that works.  Each school day starts the same, and it sets the kids up for the learning time.  Each day includes music, and coloring, and discussion and reading.  We also watch very little TV, some days we don't watch any.  And we stick to Dinosaur Train, Sesame Street, Sid the Science Kid and the like.  Though once in awhile, like right now, I let the kids watch a special movie.  They chose Howl's Moving Castle today.  Which is one of my favorites, so I didn't complain too much.  On Saturday's they usually get to watch some Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Imagination Movers as well, while I do some cleaning and such.

Since Monday is a holiday and Rich is home I think we will visit the library and get some materials to go with our lessons for the next couple of weeks.  We never got there this week with the snow.  We are going to work on H, 8, octagon, the color white, horses and hedgehogs (I couldn't pick), and habitats.  I would like to find some age appropriate books about the animals and their habitats if I can.  I just need to choose a letter H day recipe.  Does anyone have a good suggestion?  Wednesday we made German food, schnitzel, spaetzle, cucumber salad, and braised red cabbage, with rye bread.  That was a big hit.  Every meal we talk about the food groups and which foods are healthful or not.

Tonight we will probably play Go Diego Go on the Wii, since they really enjoyed that.  Next week will probably be Hungry Hungry Hippos all week!  I also hope we will be able to get outside to play a little more.  Here's hoping!