Our Homeschool Plan for Kindergarten

As the local public school students are getting ready to go back to classes this summer, we are already busy racking up days in our school year, but I thought I would take some time on here and our plan for the school year. Little BBQ is reading on about a 2^nd grade reading level and he is very advanced with basic arithmetic (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.) However, socially Little BBQ is energetic five year that knows no social boundaries. He has some trouble with not looking at people when talking and fidgeting. He is always moving. We also have an energetic two year old, Miss Bubbles, running around.

To accommodate his unique set of needs, I pulled resources from all over the place. Some of the texts that I chose are for much older children, but we will be working with him at his own pace. If we do not finish the advanced texts this year, then that is fine with me. We are also working on some character training. I want him to be aware of more than just himself.

English

First Language Lessons by Jessie Wise and The Complete Writer: Writing with Ease by Susan Wise Bauer: I have heard wonderful things about both of these texts from other homeschooling families, so I am going to be trying them out on Little BBQ this year. I chose not to get the work book for Writing with Ease, so I will just pick out my own copy work from other things that we are studying this year. I will also be supplementing Little BBQ’s creating writing desires with some journaling. Little BBQ loves writing stories, so I want to encourage this behavior as much as possible.

Handwriting

We are not doing a formal handwriting program. I make my own handwriting sheets, and our English curriculum offers copy work, so we will continue to practice handwriting skills with other curriculum.

Math

I will be making my own drill sheets for Little BBQ to work on increasing him math facts speed. I also do play based learning with him to teach him about money and real world problem solving. We play restaurant or grocery store to learn counting money and budgeting. I purchased a set of pattern blocks that I am waiting to come in the mail along with a Pattern Block Book for Little BBQ. We will also be working through Math for Gifted Childrengrade 1 and math analogies for K-2 students. As a real challenge we will also be using Calculus for Young People and Patty Paper Geometry. I do not anticipate finishing Calculus for Young People or Patty Paper Geometry since these are advanced texts. We will work through them over a few years.

Nature Study

This is has been one our favorite activities that I plan to continue. We keep nature journals, find plants that are in our regional field guides, and check out books from the library about nature topics that interest us. The best part about nature study is that Miss Bubbles can be involved as well. She has her own nature journal and flower press.

Music

Aaron Copeland wrote a wonderful book entitled, What toListen for in Music, which is not geared towards homeschoolers, but I find that it is a wonderful basis for a music appreciation. I will be using the Aaron Copeland book as my guide for a music appreciation class for Little BBQ. We will also continue practicing the organ. We are currently using ProgressiveOrgan Method for Young Beginners which we love. The book is written for someone with no music background. The book is brightly colored, and very simple for even a young child to pick up. We will also be working on the recorder using Essential Elements for the Recorder. This text was recommended to me by a musician friend of mine who teaches private lessons. The book is also designed for someone with no music background, and it is very easy to follow. As an added bonus, this was a very economical book. I will also be taking Little BBQ and Miss Bubbles to free classes offered through our local symphony. They cover topics like rhythm and how to bow after playing.

Science

One of the best parts about being in a homeschooling group is that other parents allow me to review their homeschooling curriculum before I buy it. One of my friends recommended Building Foundations of ScientificUnderstanding: A Science Curriculum for K-2. I have a very strong science background, so I was not looking a program that holds my hand through every step of the process. I love coming up with my own experiments, but I wanted a guide or a checklist to make sure that I am covering all the necessary topics. I loved the map that Dr. Nebel provides in his book to show exactly how things in science are layered and build on top of one another. I also love this plan allowed a lot of flexibility, so we can cover flowers during spring time or magnetism in winter time when going outside for a long period of time is not realistic. I will be supplementing our science with texts that we already own and library books. We will be doing lots of experiments as well.

Art

We will be working on Drawing with Children by Mona Brookes, and we will be studying a new artist from each of the fifty different states since we are studying the fifty states this year. The projects range from oil pastel clouds to printmaking to fabric dyeing. I am really looking forward to our art projects this year.

Sign Language

We watch Signing Time about once a week to review and learn new signs. I want to further introduce Miss Bubbles to sign language and keep Little BBQ’s sign language skills up.

Spanish

I am teaching Little BBQ Spanish words, greetings, and conjugations this year. I am not using a set curriculum for this task.

Geography and History

We are studying the fifty states this year, so I am using TheSlightly Odd United States of America by the editors of Klutz as spine text along with library books related to each state. As a review Little BBQ will be getting Snapshots Across America Game for Christmas. We plan to make a three dimensional map of each state this year to help us visualize mountains, rivers, and towns.

Practical Life

As part of our state study Little BBQ will be making one recipe from each of the fifty states. This will teach him cooking skills. We will also be working on our conversation skills with The Art of Children’s Conversation.

Character Training

I want Little BBQ to become more away of other around him, so I am loosely following Teaching Your Children Sensitivity by Lindia Eyre and Richard Eyre.

Physical Education

Little BBBQ will continue with diving team. He practices two times a week and competes in meets as they arise. We also go bowling every other week with our homeschooling group. Little BBQ is really improving his bowling skills by practicing every other week. During winter Little BBQ will work on ice skating again.

Socialization

For socialization we belong to a homeschooling group. We are very active in the group, so Little BBQ gets plenty of exposure other kids with our group.

Chinese

Our Chinese class did not happen this fall, so we are working on putting together a Chinese class for English speaking students starting in January.

Spelling and Reading

We are not doing a formal reading or spelling program. From time to time we get new vocabulary works for our other texts and focus on learning how to properly spell and use those words. We read a lot at our house, so Little BBQ has plenty of time to improve his reading skills.

Posted on Simple Lives Thursday, Somewhat Simple, Catch a Glimpse

Addition with a Soroban Abacus

Soroban Abacus; Shown is the number 123456789 (zero is represented with all the beads pushed toward the sides)

Pin It

Early on I decided that I wanted to teach Little BBQ how to add using an abacus, so I always assumed that I was going to either buy or make an abacus with 10 beads per column since we use a base ten system in our society. However, when I started reading, Here's Looking at Euclid by Alex Bellos, I started to change my mind. He made some sound arguments that our brains can quickly differentiate between 1, 2, and 3 items but as we go higher in the number scale it becomes harder and harder for your brain to process more than three (p 14).

It seems that many ancient cultures understood this phenominon. You can see from the diagram below that the Chinese, Romans, and Idians all used dash marks for numbers 1, 2, and 3, but once you got past 3 they changed the symbol to another unqiue symbol in order to quickly distinguish the higher number (p 14).

Armed with this new found perspective I decided that an abacus with 10 beads did not make sense because Little BBQ would not be able to quickly distinguish the difference between 6 beads or 7 beads. I wanted the abacus to be an efficient tool for learning, and not a source of frustration. Many modern abacuses designed for children use brightly colored beads to distinguish the different numbers, but I still think that fewer beads will allow for faster processing.

I decided that a soroban abacus made the most sense. The soroban abacus uses five beads per column. By adding an extra horizontal line bisecting the columns you can quickly represnt the numbers 0-9 on one column. The soroban abacus was used between the seventh and nineth centuries in Japan to accomidate a new merchant class of people who needed to be able to quickly add numbers (p 40). To ease the transition between the abacus and the electronic world an abacus attached to an electronic calculator was sold in Japan for many years (p 41). Interestingly, addition is still quicker with an abacus than an electronic calculator since the answer to an addition problem is in front of you as soon as you  input the values while the calculator still needs to be told to process the information to come up with an answer (p 40). The efficiency of the abacus is probably why it is still a popular tool studied in Japan today by school children who form after school clubs to compete in adding a long series of numbers as quickly as possible using a soroban abacus (pp 40-41).

When a student becomes an soroban abacus master, he can move on to azan. Azan is a technique for visualizing a soroban abacus to quickly add numbers. Proficient pupils in azan can add a series of 15 numbers quicker than a person can use an abacus, pen and paper, or calculator. The catch is that each number is only shown for 0.2 seconds (p 42). That is hardly long enough to process the number on the screen. Azan students keep a visual soroban abacus in their head and when a new number is flashed the student visually moves the beads on the soroban abacus around in his head keeping a running tally of the sumation (p 42).

Interestingly, nueral imaging studies have shown that adding with soroban abacus stimulates areas of the brain that are associated with visuospatial processing while pen and paper addition stimulates areas of the brain that are associated with linguisting processing. In other words, the abacus uses the right side of the brain while the pen and paper method uses the left side of the brain. The soroban abacus is an excellent learning tool for visual students.

Want to really stimulate your brain? Some Japanses students can play shiritori while practicing azan (p 43). Shiritori is a word game where the first person says a word then the next person says a word that starts with the last syllable of the original word and then the first person makes a new word using the last syllable of the second word. The game continues on in this pattern. Bellos gives this demonstration of a young Japanese girl who is a soroban prodigy while she plays shiritori. In the demonstartion the girl is shown 30 three digit numbers during a 20 second time period while playing shiritori (p 43). Her shiritori dialogue with another student is shown in the text below

Ringo
Gorira (gorilla)
Rappa (trumpet)
Panda (panda bear)
Dachou (ostrich)
Ushi (cow)
Shika (deer)
Karasu (crow)
Suzume (sparrow)
Medaka (killifish)
Kame (turtle)
Medama yaki (fried egg)

At the end of the 20 seconds the girl states that the summation of the 20 numbers is 17,602 (p 43).

Given the sucess of soroban abacus training, I have decided to teach Little BBQ addition using a soroban abacus. To make the experience more person for him, we made our own soroban abacus out of a card board box.

Materials

card board box, lid removed
paint
ruler
knife or scissors
string
breads
tape

Procedure

1. Have the student paint the card board box.
2. Decide how many columns you want the abacus to contain. Cut notches into the top and bottom flaps of the cardboard box equal distance apart for the set number of columns that you chose (we  made our abacus with nine colums all 3.2 cm apart).
3. Cut the string to stretch across each the box from one notch to the other. Place 5 beads on each string. Insert the string in the notches and tape the string to the box. Continue in this pattern until all the columns are finished.
4. Make two notches on the sides perpendicular to the columns. These notches should be close to the top of the box but far enough away from the edge so one bead can comfortably fit abvoe the string line. We decided to use a red string to distinguish this line from the columns in our soroban.
5. Insert the string in the notches perpendicular to the columns. Tape the string.

Posted on Tutorial Tuesday

All references are from the book: