I'm really loving the idea of teaching in more thematic units when it makes sense, but I'm not really big into pre-purchased curriculum. Even in the classroom, I preferred to make most of my own stuff (or find) because even with a curriculum I felt I was always adapting everything.
However, when my friend Kelly shared a unit that her curriculum started with (The 7 days of creation) it seemed like a great unit idea! So I created my own unit with ideas from different blogs and people!
This blog had great ideas and I used most of them :)
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| Charlotte's creation book |
One of the ideas I was sure about from the start is the girls re-creating the story of creation for themselves through illustrations so they could read it again and again.
Because I wanted the girls to both draw pictures and write, I knew I should make the books on the larger side. So, instead of folding 8.5x11 paper, I made these books the entire 8.5 x 11 with cardstock covers. The bottoms of the picture pages have handwriting strips (2 of them) photocopied onto the bottom.
I also made copies of hollow numbers (1-7) for the girls to color, cut, then paste into their books!
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| Each girl started by coloring their number any way they wanted |
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| While coloring, I read from the Bible about Day 1 of creation. |
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| Then, each kiddo cut out the number 1 |
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| This is a cute song from the blog I linked above |
After the fine motor work, we took a break to sing a song!
I looked specifically for songs for this unit because Adelyn is really into songs/singing and really retains information when it's in song form!
No surprise, Charlotte wanted to perform for the camera and her sister didn't :)
Then, we opened our blank books and colored a picture of what we thought the first day of creation looked like!
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| I used my own piece of lined paper to show where to write |
After we colored a picture, Charlotte wrote a simple sentence "God made light" while Adelyn practiced writing the number 1.
Finally, we pasted our number on the opposite page!
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| Here is Charlotte's final page (4 1/2) |
I love that Charlotte included both the light and the dark!
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| Here is Adelyn's final page (3) |
We moved from the actual story of creation to talking about the number 1.
We talked about how you can draw a 1 two different ways. The girls took turns coming and writing their favorite type of 1.
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| Adelyn made giant, long 1s :) |
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| Charlotte chose to try the more difficult one. |
I've been exciting about introducing ten frames to the girls and I'm stoked that this is the perfect introduction!
I bought this book back at Christmas, but have yet to use it. There isn't any profound about it, but it has lots of fun graphics, so I knew both girls would like it!
I laminated 3 of the sheets at Lakeshore for a whopping 68 cents so they would last us awhile. I cut off the squares and put them in a snack bag, but will use all different manipulatives with the 10-frames.
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| Today Charlotte chose a purple kitty (Adelyn a yellow bear) |
We talked about the ten-frames for a few minutes. We started by counting how many squares there were total (10) and then how many were in each row (5) and that 5 on top and 5 on bottom make 10 altogether. Then, we put our bear or kitty on the 10-frame anywhere we wanted. We predicted how many empty spaces we thought there were if 1 was taken. Then we counted to see that on a 10-frame if 1 space is taken, there are 9 empty spaces.
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| We made 1s with wiki sticks |
Then, we came back to the topic for the day to make a craft (a light box).
It cost me $3 to make both of these (had the paint at home).
The blog I linked above does a great job of explaining step-by-step how to complete this!
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| I didn't have shoe boxes, so I used what we had! |
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| Used a utility knife to make the holes! |
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| The girls loved the painting part! |
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| The $3 was spent at the Dollar tree on 2 flashlights and batteries! |
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| Charlotte, seeing the "light" |
Lastly, I used magnetic letters that I had put on the easel and had Charlotte try to spell out the sentence she had written. Writing is really laborious at this age, so to add a spelling (or word study) element, I used the letters and just mixed them up!
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| Obviously, I had to help with the silent "gh" but otherwise awesome :) |
After reflecting, I'm really excited about this first day.
It seemed to be a great balance of a little bit of scripture, a lot of hands-on fun, but a really big idea!
The girls were engaged and got lots of repetitive practice in a ton of skills!
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