I make our three year old do our CC intro day with us and most of the review time as well, but she doesn’t
have to ‘do’ all the motions. She needs to stay in the area and not distract,
but other than that I am not too strict. She usually does like to participate
in it all because we try to make it fun. My kids’ favorite part is the Skittle
map!
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| This basket holds all my 'current' CC stuff, cards for the week, subject summaries, current science and timeline notebook, and any extras |
Last semester both girls went to Local School in the
morning. They will this semester too but it is delayed a whole month for
repairs/upgrades. When in school, we would do our CC ‘hour’ in the afternoon
from 2:30-3:30 while baby bro was still napping. Sometimes I would just have
them go to local school in the afternoon on that particular day, and do CC in
the morning. This did work fine for us, but for some, this afternoon hour with
littles can be tiring and easy for them to get off focus. While they are out of
school I do the CC hour from about 9-10 in the morning. During that hour, I usually
have our helper take baby bro to the market or outside. He is almost two and
likes to get all in the mix. He also has had ‘pack n play’ time or drawing in
his highchair for however long it will last. You really need an uninterrupted
hour, or I like it that way, but again, there is flexibility. If I have to stop
for discipline/training I will.
I put my Subject Popsicle Sticks upside down in a little
bucket and let them choose which subject to do. I used to write ALL the facts
on a huge white board and erase as we finished a subject. They liked to help me
erase and we could see our progress through the hour even if they couldn’t read
it all. I haven’t done this the past few weeks.
I actually changed this a few weeks in and now I start
every hour with the Timeline because
it takes us the longest to get through. Then I let them choose the subjects out
of the bucket. I do this differently than how I saw it done in the U.S. I introduce each card one at a time, pass it
to the girls, I might talk about it a little if it is something interesting, or
not depending on how I am feeling, or how antsy they are. I show the motion
that will go with that card and event. As I intro each card I always repeat the
previous one and add another up to the 7-8 cards for the week. After doing this
(and repeating it all for each card), I shuffle the cards and let my oldest (5
yo) put them order. Next we all stand up and I play the timeline song (I
usually back it up to the previous week or 2) then we get to the new stuff and
practice it. I try to go through it about 3-5x for them to hear it (plus they
had a good intro). This was done way faster in the U.S. They intro all new
stuff in about 30 minutes, where I take an hour, but they do blob maps, science
experiments, previous review, and fine arts, and presentations, etc. so their
total time at a community is all morning.
After the time line we go by subject they choose out of the bucket. I try to get them singing or saying each
subject’s memory work 5-8x (this was a bit more than in the U.S I think or with the tutors I witnessed). If they
aren’t saying it with me or trying to, I don’t count it, and they know it.
Math: For math
skip counting, we would get active, skip around the room, do jumping jacks,
skip to the number (if I had them written on big cards). Now that we are out of
skip counting we sing the song and walk around. For teaspoons and Tablespoons,
I got out actual teaspoon and TBS and water, they loved it.
Latin: for
noun casings we would march and used different voices (robot voice, whisper,
etc.) for all the others we just sang the declensions to the tunes.
Geography:
Skittle maps. This is their fave for obvious reasons, they are always trying to
squint their eyes to select the Geography stick. I put them at the table, get
out their big laminated maps and the Geography map from the power point
(resource CD) that I had printed in color (It is close-up). I show them where the things are on the map,
give them the 5-6 skittles it will take and then play the song that I found
from CC connected (or that I made up) and
we put the skittle on the location, then play it again, take the skittle off,
then eat the skittles while we listen to it 3-5 more times. If you don’t want to use skittles you could
use a dry-erase marker, or any other little snack.
Science: These
facts are usually short, so we just play the song 5-8x. Maybe 3 times out of 12
have I done an added activity with this. I made an animal cell out of felt,
they liked it and I will use it in the future, but I don’t think it added that
much to the actual intro, though all visuals are good. From CC connected I
printed a ‘parts of the flower’ activity. For the plant systems I had them do a
match up activity. At this stage I don’t think these activities helped. But
when went outside and took apart a flower, they really caught on to how Science
helps explain God’s world. There is one
lady on CC connected, Mary Bryant, I use all of her Science songs. Walking
along the beach in Thailand Sophia saw a jelly fish and said: ‘look a
stinging-cell animal’. Even though this is the grammar stage of memorization
these facts do come to life way more than I ever thought they would this early.
English Grammar:
These are always super short. I intro the preposition or helping verb, unless
it is the actual definition, then add motions if necessary, do 5-8x (3-5x is
enough really).
History sentence: I read the history sentence, if there are
motions I introduce them (unless they are having problems focusing, I don’t
make them do the motions, but they usually do it with me). Then we may walk
around while the song plays, depending on the kind of music we may get out
instruments, or act like we are in an airband. These are always more fun and go
over better than I think. CC provides this music, so we just play it 5-8x.
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| I hook up my phone or computer to the speaker and we blast the songs! |
There are a gazillion activities out there to enhance any
of these facts. But starting out I was
advised: stick with the basics, don’t try to do too much. And this really
helped me get into Cycle 1 and get the hang of it, I can tell weeks I have
tried to do too much haven’t necessarily gone better. Of course as the kids get
older we will fill out more of the info. But I am so amazed at what they are
learning, not just memorizing, and the great questions they ask about history,
etc.
Next post: how we review, how this looks in our week,
links, and extras (fine arts, science experiments)
