Since we started Sonlight, any time we have guests over Olivia wants to take them downstairs and show them her "school room". She loves showing off her work and we are very proud of the improvements she has made, just in the last few weeks! I thought it would be a fun idea to take pictures of her favorite pieces of art and schoolwork and post them for our friends and family to see. Sort of like a virtual open house! I have several pictures of her painting and working on projects on my phone, but my phone crashed and I still haven't uploaded all of those pictures from it yet. As soon as I get those uploaded, I'll post! Anyway, I have also had many moms asking about Sonlight and what all comes with the Core package, versus the Multi-Subject package. It can be overwhelming trying to figure it all out, so I took some pictures of what we are using most right now. There are some things not pictured, but most of it is all there!
During Week 1 we started The Boxcar Children, and Olivia wanted to make a REAL boxcar. We used a shoebox to make a diorama boxcar and she loves it. I believe at this point she isn't calling it a boxcar anymore. Now it's a fairy house. Gotta love having kids with imagination! :)
Below is a watercolor she made on her own. It says "My favorite character from The Boxcar Children is Violet."
These two paintings below were made with fingerpaint! Caroline's is the top picture and Olivia's is the one beneath. The picture to the right is Caroline's crayon drawing! She fills up the ENTIRE page with color!
Here are a few pictures of her schoolwork!
The assignment below was from Week 1. She drew a picture of her favorite book and told a little about the story. It says, "This story is about Laura and her dog Jack, and their new house." Of course, it's Little House on The Prairie.
Okay, the Bolt Buddies assignment was hilarious. While using Sonlight, I have discovered so many new things about Olivia that I didn't even know she could do! She looked at the Bolt Buddies picture and was asked to describe as many details as possible about it. I think she did great!
This year we selected Handwriting Without Tears to supplement her Language Arts with Sonlight. This is an option you have when purchasing the Multi-Subject package! It has been great so far. Olivia is left-handed which is something we were really struggling with the past couple of months, but HWT has plenty of pictures that have helped us achieve better handwriting form.
Pretty good for a 4 year old! :)
This is all Handwriting Without Tears stuff! It comes with a foam mat where Olivia can put the letters together in the same order that she would form letters. Next we use the chalkboard to practice the letter formation. Last, she uses a wet eraser to wipe over the letters. After learning the letter formation in 3 different ways, writing it is much easier! It definitely seems to come more naturally using Handwriting Without Tears. Their method is AWESOME and I would recommend it!
Next up, Horizons Math! So far, I am loving Horizons Math. It just really works great for Olivia's learning style. My only complaint is that the guide book is sort of pointless. We don't really use it, because it is very repetitive. I do like the checklist, though. It tells me what manipulatives to use for each week. The only things pictured below that didn't come with the package are the large cardstock numbers. I made those this summer to help Olivia get more familiar with the numbers 1-10. We are still using them just for fun to supplement Horizons. Also, the little plastic containers in the bowl on the right are gerber baby food containers. I cleaned and saved them to put square counters in and they are labeled 1-10. I am using these with Caroline right now to learn to count. She will pick a container out of the bowl, we say the number together, and then count the squares. She is picking it up very quickly!
This is our calendar area. We always start our day here. I move the big yellow clock to the correct time and I let Olivia move her little yellow clock to the same time on her own. We sing Days of the Week, Months of the Year, and sing our bible verses. We learn one new bible verse each week, this week it's C: "Children obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord." Colossians 3:20 AMEN! lol! :) Sonlight sent us a CD that has a bible verse in song for each week so it is VERY catchy and easy to remember. We then spend time in Bible, reading and discussing the devotional for that day. This is something we do each day, the same way! I love the way it works for us right now. It's a great way to start off our day.
This is MOST of our science stuff from Sonlight! Olivia loves Science but I have to admit that it is really my least favorite subject to teach right now. It is very involved and messy. It is great and she has retained so much info already, BUT the projects are so all over the place. This week I decided to do all of our worksheets and reading in our 4 days of school and save the projects for one-on-one time on the weekends. That way when Nathan is home he can either do the science project with Olivia or watch babies so I can do it stress free! Both the babies are still very into putting things in their mouth and so many of those little pieces are scary for me! I love all of the material and I know that once we get further into the year we will figure out what works best for us. The most important thing is Olivia is loving it and learning so much!
This shelf has most of our materials that we will be reading during the school year. I try to keep all our our Sonlight books on one shelf out of the babies reach (to prevent disasters!!!) along with the DVDs that go along with Math and Science, and our Bible CD.
The large yellow box on the shelf above is actually what we are using with Caroline right now! It is a puzzle and toddler book set that I picked up at a yard sale for THREE DOLLARS. It has been awesome! She is learning colors, how to count to 10, shapes, and much more! She is picking up all kinds of things from sitting in on her sister's lessons, too.
I know that was a lot of info, but I am so excited to document our homeschooling journey! When we were looking into different types of curriculum I NEEDED to see it in action. These aren't the best photos but hopefully it will help others to understand how it works! :) Olivia was so excited to see her work on the computer! We'll keep you updated!!!
-Maegan and OLIVIA MAE MORGAN (Olivia typed that!)
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