PreK – Week 30

This was our last week of school for awhile.  We have Vacation Bible School coming up, camp with the youth group, Uncle Jon’s wedding, and then C.S.I. for a week with the youth so we will be taking a little over a month off.  

Anyway, this week we read about Joshua and the Israelites marching around Jericho to make the walls fall down.  We worked on learning the letter W.  We also continued working with units of volume in math.  Here are some pics:

Practicing writing W We’ve been using Passion Hymns for a Kid’s Heart and learning a hymn every month or so (we spend a week per verse).  We finished learning “Nothing But the Blood” and Samuel drew this picture of what he thought the song meant to him.

Measuring how many cups of water were in the bowl for math.  Daddy had the day off so he got to help.

When we start back to school, Samuel will be a Kindergartener!

PreK – Week 29

This week we continued with Unit 6 – The Promise Land.  We read about Balaam and his talking donkey, which Samuel thought was really cool.  We also read about Joshua sending two spies into Jericho and Rahab keeping them safe from the soldiers.

In math, we started learning about weight and volume.  Samuel had lots of fun seeing how much water different size containers would hold (you’ll see pics farther down).

We’ve been working on writing the letter Vv this week.  I think we only have about 4 letters left. 

Working on his Vv letter sheet Working in one of his workbooks

This was tons of fun for Samuel.  I drew a wall to represent Jericho.  He drew Rahab in a window on the wall.  Then we mixed shaving cream and glue to make “mortar”

Samuel painted the mortar into all the cracks in the wall

Then we added a red thread to Rahab’s window so that she would be saved when Jericho was destroyed.

Measuring how much water fits in different sized containers

PreK – Week 28

This week we finished up Unit 5 – The Exodus Out of Egypt and started Unit 6 – The Promised Land.  We read about the Israelites building and worshipping the golden calf and talked about how silly it was that they would pray to something they had made.  We also read about the spies going into the Promised Land and how they all were afraid of the people who lived there except for Joshua and Caleb.

Samuel finished memorizing Matthew 22:37 and then we started reviewing the verses that we have learned so far.  I was surprised that he remembered most of them. 

We finished reading The Adventures of Reddy Fox which Samuel was really excited about.  Next week we will begin the next book in the series, The Adventures of Peter Cottontail.

For math, we’ve still been working on measuring.  We’ve been measuring things using our feet, paces, and hand spans.  We talked about how everyone’s hands and feet are different sizes so those are not good units of measurement to use. 

We’ve also been working on the letter U this week.  Samuel has been doing a great job with his writing.  His reading is also going well and he only has a few more weeks of his current Hooked on Phonics workbook.  Then he has one more to go to complete the series.  He’s pretty excited about it and keeps counting how many stickers he has left to get on his reading chart.

Working on handwriting – not sure what’s going on with the face Working on his Uu letter sheet Measuring how many “feet” the couch is

Measuring using handspansMaking a golden calf out of playdoug

More handwriting

This was Samuel’s favorite thing we did this week.  In science, we talked about the soil and the various layers in it.  Then, we made “dirt”  We used chocolate chips for the rocky layer…

Crushed graham crackers for the top soil…

And cereal for the humus layer which is made up of dead leaves and plant life

Samuel’s favorite part was eating it!  He’s actually asked him to make him some “dirt” as a snack several times since then.

  So excited to finish Reddy Fox

The Things He Says…

Samuel comes up with some crazy stuff sometimes.  He amazes me and scares me at the same time with some of the things he says.  The other day he was playing and I was cleaning the house and we were listening to his Singing Bible CD  (Little side note: This CD came with Little Hands to Heaven and Samuel absolutely loves it.  We listen to it all the time.  If you have young kids this is a great way for them to learn a lot of the Bible stories).  Anyway, it was the song about Adam and Eve and Samuel said, “Mommy, if that tree was bad, why did God put it in the garden anyway?”  I tried to explain to him that it was because God allows us to make choices, but I don’t think he got it.

Then, this weekend, Samuel, Adam, and I were in the car running around and Samuel got into trouble for something.  After a few minutes of pouting, he said, “Daddy, I asked Jesus into my heart and told him to take away my sins but I still do bad things.  Why can’t I be good?”  Adam was trying to explain to Samuel that he has the same problem and that we will never be perfect. 

(Side note: We aren’t sure if Samuel has actually asked Jesus into his heart or if he just says that.  He actually says it a lot and he knows the story about Jesus dying on the cross for his sins, but we aren’t sure if he really understands it or if he’s just repeating back what he’s heard.  He’s never prayed with one of us to accept Christ, but he says he’s prayed by himself.  We’ll see as he gets older and can explain it better.)

Anyway, I’m just scared if he comes up with questions like this when he’s 5, what he’s going to come up with as he gets older.  We’ll have to stay on our toes to keep up with him!

PreK – Week 27

This week we continued with Unit 5 – The Exodus Out of Egypt.  We read about the Israelites wandering in the desert, God providing manna and quail for them, and God giving Moses the Ten Commandments on Mt. Sinai.  For science, we read about birds and then made a quail out of paper (think a paper airplane decorated to look like a bird).  Samuel had a lot of fun making it but we made it out of construction paper and I think it was too heavy because it didn’t fly very well at all.

We have continued memorizing Matthew 22:37.  Samuel amazes me with how quickly he memorizes things.  He has most of the verse memorized already and really only needs help with the reference. 

We read a couple of more chapters of Reddy Fox and Reddy & Granny ended up having to move because Farmer Brown’s boy found their home.  We talked about what it’s like to move, and Samuel actually remembered a lot more about our move from Chattanooga than I thought he would since he was so young at the time. 

In math, we’ve continued working with non standard units of measurement.  We’ve measured length and width of several different things using Legos, paper clips, pencils, crayons, and books.  Samuel has a lot of fun measuring and likes to guess how long something will be before we measure it and then seeing if he’s right. 

We learned the letter L this week.  Samuel already knew how to make L’s because of his name, but it was a good review for him. 

Working on his L letter sheet

Working on fine motor skills in his Rod & Staff workbooks

Measuring his bed using his math workbook

We Like Sheep

Samuel had his musical for children’s choir last night. They did a performance called We Like Sheep. Samuel knew all his songs, but there were a lot of times he didn’t sing. I don’t know if he was tired, nervous, or just didn’t feel like singing for some reason. We didn’t get too many pictures because even though we brought both cameras, they both had dead batteries after the first couple of songs. That’s what we get for not charging them beforehand. We did manage a few pictures and a short video of them singing.

Samuel's Musical