End of the Month, Feb 2010

Math:

TM made Lola's goodies into useful props for the Math lesson on money. Just a little set up to practice addition, decision-making etc. It also doubles up as a reward and snacks after a play/study session.


Wrapped up Half-hour Clock lesson for now. We managed to find some paper play money and this had helped in mastering the 10's, 20's..At least, he can now add in tens (up to 100) and perhaps a bit of 100's. We haven't got the 1000 bill yet. We have yet to collect and wash real coins for our class use. We should have started with coins but what's the big deal. It's quite hard to collect the coins and use it when we need loose change. :)

Here's what our limited paper money resource bought at 1 peso each in front of a school.

10 - 5 pcs.
20 - 5 pcs.
50 - 2 pcs.
100 - 2 pcs.
500 - 1 pc

Finally managed to print out the Singapore Math 1B placement test. Addition skill is improving, and we still need to work on subtraction. After browsing other resources to work on subtraction, we started a bit of MammothMath samplers on addition and subtraction. The latter is still a sweet and slow work of progress.

Science:


As planned, we finished the five classes of vertebrates: Birds, Mammals and Fish

Even if TM wasn't really planning to do the invertebrates, we decided to start the starfishes and introduce the echinodermata.

The science part were thru a lapbook. We are still working on it. Hopefully build it (finalize in the lapbook) by mid-March.

Reading:

No lapbooks for language this month. Instead, we worked on Reading Starter 1 and Reading Spectrum 1. P finds the first one quite easy. He generally can answer every part of the post reading questions. The format is very consistent in every post-reading questions.

As for the Reading Spectrum, the selections are also easy but the post reading exercises varies every now and then. Different approaches on vocabulary, thinking skills and phonics. P finds it a bit challenging sometimes when the question format is a bit unfamiliar. But so far, he manages alright.

We haven't had a lot of bedtime stories since we got sick at the start of the month. Hopefully, we can get back to it by next month.

Geography:

Not much Seterra Geo this month.

Art:

Got a chance to do a little t-shirt printing with Tita B's last Feb. 22. P designed his own shirt, a heart and two frogs. He was really proud of his handiwork ;)


Thanks Tita B!

2 Little Hands Baking

We invited a friend over to play one afternoon. They also had a chance to play little baker last Monday. Here they are and this is what they made.

For February

List to cover for the month of February:

Science - Mammals, Fish, Birds
Lang.&Lit - Oz relating to mammals like Dogs,
Math - Wrap up Clock half-hour, try move into Minute BUT if not, do MONEY
Geography - Review Southeast Asia, move on to Mid-east Asia

January 2010

Science

Vertebrates:
Reptile - lapbook, origami (snake)
Amphibian - lapbook, origami (frog)

This month, we had been working on the animal lapbook. This should have been better if followed accordingly from water to air habitat but Teacher Mom decided to let the kid have a hand on deciding which one comes first. It should be fun at this point anyways.

TM prepared(pre-cut) the papers, searched for the books and P did some interesting reading and gluing at the library. We can't take books out of the library.

Language and Lit

The Wizard of Oz

a. Included a little of geography. We now know where to find Connecticut on the U.S. map. Our next will be Kansas.

More to do on ti next month. Tornado, dogs, etc.

Math

Clocks

Last month, we started on the clock thing. Used Mammoth Math pages outdoor. We actually went far this time, at Baker's. But P seemed got an overload with the minute part. TM went overboard. We have to slow down for a month. We'll be reviewing this before this month ends.

Geography

We discovered another good software to play maps. Seterra. We had occasionally played this one this month. We've covered Southeast Asia. But TM has already explored Northern and Mid-east Asia. Located usual places mentioned in the news (CNN) such as Pakistan, Afghanistan. ;)

The Diary of Riding Bike Without Training Wheels

Here's the timeline how we started on this independent bike ride journey;

Dec. 2009 - Mid-month, a few weeks before the year ends, we decided to remove the training wheels of his bike. He got this bike since we got here back in 2007. We thought that it was time for him to learn without the training wheels before he finally outgrow the bike.

We started with pushing him but he was still scared of the idea. U, a neighborhood friend, had tried on his own and he looked like he might learn faster than P. After two days of pushing from behind, we sort of forgot about the bike. (We actually had our backs hurting ;> ) P still needs more courage to try it on his own.

Jan. 19, 2010

While I was preparing my compost, P started to try to ride the bike. When the F saw this, he tried to help push his bike. It wasn't much. We took turns on this. As I was about to call it a day, P finally managed to ride a meter or two all by himself, without falling. The Father was ecstatic. We were all surprised and happy. Ah..my pushing almost over. He may not need our physical help anymore but mere moral support instead. We can simply give him technical suggestions and cheer him on. He has overcome his fears finally.

Ja. 20, 2010

After the big hurdle of overcoming his fears yesterday, we set on more opportunity to practice. We still had to push him a bit but since he has overcome his fear and he was willing to try on his own. He tried very hard that by the time we finished and had to wash in the bathroom, he complained about his hands and wrists hurting. I had to explain to him how he should put his weight on his butt and not on his arms as he ride.

Jan. 21, 2010

We shot a video today of Pilip riding a bike by himself.

On to another day of practice, along with his friend today. P seems to be decided on learning to ride on his own. Even with his friend around, he has concentrated on riding by himself for sometime. They did have enough time to play together, nonetheless. When the friend left, we got on to some "serious" practice. I took a short video finally as we cheered him on. This week was a milestone. It was fun. Hopefully, he'll get better by the end of this month. That's one week to go. :)

A Bit of Philippine History

Found some interesting video of Manila back in 1930's.

Great Illustrated Classics

Last month, (Sept. 15th, 2009) we happen to go to the third floor of the one and only "mall/department store" in the city. Even though it wasn't really planned to buy books, we ended up buying some. A Marc Brown book on patience and a Great Illustrated Classics book, "Wizard of Oz".

I was hesitant to get the classics book at first thinking that P's level is not that yet and will be reading a couple more years later. I would have to keep it for a while before giving it to him to read. Was I surprised to see him later at home looking for the book and trying to read the Oz. At first, he looked at the pictures on the pages (each page has one full text and the opposite is an illustration). Keeping an eye on him as I was preparing dinner, I noticed that he has started to flip the pages at a certain tempo and was actually reading the text and not just the pictures. In more or less two hours, he had finished it. He figuratively devoured it.

I was very surprised but happy. At the same time, worried that he just swallowed it too soon. I mean, he can read it fine but that should be my cue to get him started or train him to read in a slightly higher reading skills not merely devour the book. And since he still has the appetite to reread the books that he has, I think it won't be a bad idea to slowly introduce this skills in these classics.

The next day, I went back to the store and got the three remaining books. He might or might not read it right away is fine with me. In time, he will read be glad to have these books in our bookshelf to read when he gets around to it.