Language Lessons

Update on how we go about our spelling and reading activities at home.

We are wrapping up Consonant Blends this month.  I've added another set of activity sheets for our Consonant Blends and this is the Trace and Spell version.  If you have been following my blog, I have a version of this for CVC words as well.  Read about it here and here.

The file Consonant Blends Trace and Spell also contains list of words with pictures highlighting the blends' use.  Here we use Melissa and Doug magnetic letters to identify the beginning blends and the ending blends and how they are pronounced.

See how my son works it out.  By mastering the "sound" of the blends, he was able to spell the words perfectly.  He's just confused with 'sc' and 'sk' though, and the use of the double letters like 'll' and 'ss'.

You can purchase the file by clicking the picture below.

Now when it comes to reading, I have no problem with it for he's such a good reader.  He can read complicated words and my explanation to this is that he was exposed to reading early on.  I read books to him before he turned 1 yr old and by so much exposure I guess, he can now easily decode the words.

Since he is now five, I wanted to train him how to understand what he reads.  It's not good enough that he knows how to read.  I think that he should also learn how to understand what he is reading and be able to grasp and absorb the concepts.  I came across this English workbook in a local bookstore and thought that it would be a good material for reading analysis.  I can't say it is the best, but it's good enough to have something like this to practice on.  This worksheet is for 1st graders actually but he likes it and never gets bored as it challenges him.

It has activities on it as well.  He loves working with words :)

For more learning materials, please check Pinay Homeschooler Shop or the FREE Downloads and FREE Learning Materials page.

Linking to:

Montessori Monday
TGIF Linky Party
Teach Beside Me
Preschool Corner
I Can Teach My Child

There's nothing like... AUSTRALIA (Part II)

This post is waaaay past its due date LOL  We've been busy for the past few days and I can't seem to include this in my schedule.  Good thing, it is a school day today and the little guy is in school and that gives me enough time to write about the second part of our Australia study.

To start with, we discuss about the animals that can be seen in Australia. 

Animals

Using the Animals of Australia/Oceania Nomenclature and Fact Cards and the Safari Toob Down Under, we talked about the habitats and the diets of these animals, juxtaposed to the biomes as well.

 

And there's the Parts of a Kangaroo (Nomenclature and Definition Booklet).  (Click the picture for the link)

And Mavi continued working on the identification of the body parts and added labels onto it.

          

 

Biomes

We discuss biomes as well, which is something new to him and he loves it! Read about here.

We work on the activity sheets that is included in My Adventure Book: Australia

 

 

Map works

For the studying the map, again using My Adventure Book: Australia, we talked about the different states and territories of Australia and he worked on the activity sheet which I provided. (He's obsessed with coloring as of the moment) i 

Flag

I gave him options on how to go about the flag and he wanted to paint it :) 

Aboriginal Arts

We did these few days ago.

Postcard from Australia

And lastly,we created our postcard to send it to a friend.

              

Activity sheets, maps and information pages of Australia that was used in this study is all in My Adventure Book (Australia/Oceania).

Other related stories for studying Australia as a country and continent:

There's nothing like... Australia (Part I)

Biomes of Australia

Aboriginal Arts

Continent Study: Australia

My Adventure Book (Australia/Oceania)

 

For more FREEbies, learning aids and downloads, please visit The Pinay Homeschooler Shop and Downloads. 

Linking to:

Montessori Monday
TGIF Linky Party
Teach Beside Me
Preschool Corner
Teaching Mama
I Can Teach My Child

Biomes of Australia

I made these "biomes mat" based on the My Adventure Book (Australia/Oceania) for hands-on learning.  It's made up of felt paper glued on a cardstock for durability.  Then I printed pictures for each biomes so my son will have an idea how they actually look like.  I also added handwritten labels.

The objects of the activity are:

• to identify the biomes of Australia
• to distinguish the difference of each biome (I used the description chart included in the book I mentioned above)
• to sort out the the animals of Australia based on its habitat-biome it thrives (Animals of Australia / Oceania)

These are the animals cards we used (Animals of Australia / Oceania).

And for the animals, I used the Safari Toob Down Under.

And here's my son working on the activity.  I looooovee how effective this technique is, because if I would just use worksheets first and just talk about biomes without a hands-on activity, for sure I won't get his attention.  But this one, he loves sorting the animals and the felt mats really helped!

              

For more printables and downloads, you can visit The Pinay Homeschooler Shop and Downloads.

Linking to:

Montessori Monday
TGIF Linky Party
Teach Beside Me
Preschool Corner
Teaching Mama

Aboriginal Arts

You've been following me on Facebook, I've shared pictures of our work of Aboriginal arts.  This is still in line with our Australia study (Part I here). Sorry if some pictures are dark as we've been doing the activities late in the afternoon.

To start with, we talked about the Aborigines of Australia and how they use paintings or artworks to communicate.  I used our trusted iPad to check some pictures of the artworks and made my son choose which one he wanted to replicate (he wanted the turtle).

 

I also pointed out that most arts of the Aborigine people uses the technique of Pointillism.  We talked about how we can execute it using the back of pencils or using Qtips/buds. 

When we're done studying the pictures, we started making our version as well.  Here we used red background with contrasting colors for the dots.

            

Another day he asked if we could do it again.  And this time I printed out from a random Google search a ready made art for him to color.

We allowed all the artworks to dry and here's how they look like now that they're dry.  The one on the upper left is my work :)

My son enjoyed the painting, especially with animals on it.   The problem is that he doesn't like pointillism, for he gets tired after making a few dots. 

Linking to:

Montessori Monday
TGIF Linky Party
Teach Beside Me
Preschool Corner
Teaching Mama
I Can Teach My Child

My Adventure Book (Australia/Oceania)

Hello everyone! I am happy to announce that the link to my newest file:  My Adventure Book (Australia/Oceania) is finally up! It features two countries from the said continent and they are Australia and New Zealand.  We basically use this for our geography/continent/country study.

Backstory:  My son loves travelling, he has been crossing continents for 5 years and because of this he's interested on world maps and locations of the countries we're visiting.  He is fascinated with the cultures, the language and just about anything about a country.  So when we watched the movie UP, he was so inspired by the concept of the adventure book.  He told me if he could have one so he can draw/scribble his adventures whenever we travel.  And that's were I came up with the idea of making a guide or an information booklet of certain countries that he would like to go to (or even with just play pretend).

So first in the series is Australia and New Zealand.  Here are the contents of My Adventure Book:

• Fact sheets
• Meaning and use of the country's flag and coat of arms

• Maps of the country (political/state/regional/territories), biomes and landmark locations

• Description of the landmarks
• Animals of Australia and New Zealand
• Famous people from each country
• Famous cuisine/food from each country or foods originating from each country

•     DIY Postcards, images for coloring (including the flags) and postage stamps, VISA, immigration stamps for play pretend
  

• And lots of activity sheets! 

I am happy of the contents of the mini-book and the topics I have included are not too much or not too little for my son to handle. See how we use it here.

The file has 55 pages.  You can now avail it  if you click on any of the pictures posted above or if you visit my website (see Geography:Australia/Oceania) : The Pinay Homeschooler Shop and Downloads

Thank you so much everyone... and for those who are interested, hope you like it as much as we do!

PS. North America is coming soon ! It will feature three countries so watch out for it as well.