Well it's finally here...Back to School... at least for some of us anyways. School starts today for us, which makes me sad because school in the summer is no bueno... Especially in the desert, when we would all like to be lounging by the pool instead of stuck in a stuffy classroom. Due to the fact that we are still into the super hot and lazy days of summer, my plan is to start the kids off easy. Hopefully this will get them back into the school routine before we dive head first into serious lessons. So we are starting the year out with a simple autobiography lapbook . I chose this as a first lesson because I thought the kids enjoy writing about themselves and it would be fun to look back on it later and see how much they have grown and changed (I probably should have started doing this in some form a long time ago...)
I found a great "All About Me" Lapbook on Homeschoolshare.com, I plan to have both of the kids do one. Since he is getting older, Sonshine will have some additional writing prompts included in his. I found a few worksheets on Scholastic.com, this one has him make projections for the future. There is also one for things he likes to do now and in the future. My personal favorite, "Want Ads," is where he will need to write what he is looking for in his future. (I can't wait to see what he says about future children.) For the record I plan on saving all of this to show his future wife and children, we'll see how close he comes to his predictions.
In addition to the autobiography assignments, the kids have been begging me to keep reading from the Little House Nine-Book Box Set
series. They loved these books but I set them aside to do the entire American Revolution series, last school year, and we didn't read them over the summer due to a busy schedule. I thought it would be fun to surprise them by picking up where we left off by reading "By The Shores of Silver Lake." I also found a lapbook to go with the book, so even better!
I really love whole idea of lapbooks because they are so convenient (especially when you aren't writing them yourself) and they provide a great way to visually organize information. They are also fun to make, and allow the kids to be creative. However, Sonshine is getting older, and although he enjoys lapbooks, he needs more practice in writing, so I will be adding some journal pages for him throughout the year.
Hopefully starting the school year off fun will help to take some of the sting out of having an abbreviated summer.
I found a great "All About Me" Lapbook on Homeschoolshare.com, I plan to have both of the kids do one. Since he is getting older, Sonshine will have some additional writing prompts included in his. I found a few worksheets on Scholastic.com, this one has him make projections for the future. There is also one for things he likes to do now and in the future. My personal favorite, "Want Ads," is where he will need to write what he is looking for in his future. (I can't wait to see what he says about future children.) For the record I plan on saving all of this to show his future wife and children, we'll see how close he comes to his predictions.
In addition to the autobiography assignments, the kids have been begging me to keep reading from the Little House Nine-Book Box Set
series. They loved these books but I set them aside to do the entire American Revolution series, last school year, and we didn't read them over the summer due to a busy schedule. I thought it would be fun to surprise them by picking up where we left off by reading "By The Shores of Silver Lake." I also found a lapbook to go with the book, so even better! I really love whole idea of lapbooks because they are so convenient (especially when you aren't writing them yourself) and they provide a great way to visually organize information. They are also fun to make, and allow the kids to be creative. However, Sonshine is getting older, and although he enjoys lapbooks, he needs more practice in writing, so I will be adding some journal pages for him throughout the year.
Hopefully starting the school year off fun will help to take some of the sting out of having an abbreviated summer.
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| Back of lapbook handprints, (top) front cover of each kids book, an inside shot |