wy_kid_wrangler04 Posted March 13, 2010 Share Posted March 13, 2010 OK, I am looking for ways to add fun into our school day. We do enjoy what we are doing, but is there anything you do to spice things up that you would be willing to share?? Thanks! I have a preschooler, 2nd grader, 6th grader this year Next year Preschooler, Kindergarten, 3rd and 7th Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aurelia Posted March 13, 2010 Share Posted March 13, 2010 Hands on science projects, art projects, declare a reading week every couple of months - no curriculum, just reading, both aloud and individually, poetry teas, reader's theater or dramatic interpretations etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rafiki Posted March 13, 2010 Share Posted March 13, 2010 . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2cents Posted March 13, 2010 Share Posted March 13, 2010 We start the day with our read-aloud (books on Audible) for about half an hour. It is a nice way to wake up, have coffee and listen to a good book. We like to watch Unitedsteaming videos to go along with our history and science. We have lots of geography and strategy games to play for taking breaks. We play quick memory games for Spanish. In the summer we do the Hogwarts Summer School. It is a lot of fun! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FloridaLisa Posted March 14, 2010 Share Posted March 14, 2010 (edited) Here are some of the fun things we've done through the years: *100 day celebration. Have your Ker put one popsicle stick into a jelly jar each day, counting them each day. On day 10, bundle the 10 sticks with a rubberband and place in the tens jar. Continuing counting until you reach your 100th day and then celebrate with lots of fun activities! *Eat your way through math -- you can google lots of ways to use foods in math. One of my kids' favorites was a Halloween candy sorting activty the day after trick or treating. There are other activities with weighing/measuring/estimating pumpkins or learning ones and tens with the cereal cookies. Google for good ideas. *School outside on a beautiful day. Spread out on a blanket and enjoy the gorgeous outside. *(my favorite) School at Chick-fil-A. Ours is quiet in the morning. We get a chicken biscuit, take some books with us, and let the littles play while we do some school. *Book Club. That lit list is so much more fun when a few friends come over to discuss once a week! When we've hosted book clubs, we've added in hands-on extension activies and, of course, snacks and fellowship time! *competitions like the science fair, geography bee or history fair always added variety and excitement as the kids thought of and developed their projects. My boys *still* love to fire their potato cannons made one year for science fair physics experiments! *Field Trips. This probably goes without saying. But there's nothing like a good day outside of the house in a museum or history site to mix in some fun to the school routine. HTH, Lisa Edited March 14, 2010 by FloridaLisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nova mama Posted March 14, 2010 Share Posted March 14, 2010 Bumping this because I want to hear more ideas! We've had a couple of days. My kids keep asking for a pajama day. Maybe I'll consider it. Keem 'em coming! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolybear Posted March 14, 2010 Share Posted March 14, 2010 Last year we did Adventure boxes over the summer, but you could do the same thing one day a week. Each child picked a theme. Then they decorated a cardboard box with pictures about the theme. One of them picked boats and the other nature. Then once or twice a week I would surprise them with something new in the box. I bought somethings at the dollar store. (Like little divided plastic boxes for a bug collection.) And I had other things around that I had been saving--books, puzzles, dvds. I also sometimes put library things in, but mostly not. At any rate, it was sort of like a unit study, but with lots of surprises. Woolybear Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tracy Posted March 14, 2010 Share Posted March 14, 2010 I recently started something for my 2yo that has been a big hit with my 5yo. We do singing and signing time. We sing all kinds of songs, especially those that require lots of movement. When we are done, we review signs (ASL) that we have learned. We have been borrowing the Signing Time videos from the library also. We started this for my 2yo, because he isn't speaking yet. But dd5 is really enjoying it. DH and I are also really enjoying learning a little sign language with our family. Tracy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FloridaLisa Posted March 14, 2010 Share Posted March 14, 2010 Thought of another hit. One year we pursued *delight directed* science. Each child (my oldest were then 10, 8, 6) picked something s/he wanted to study. My oldest wanted to raise quail. He read and read and read. He met with a local biologist who gave him a dozen quail eggs. We bought an incubator. He built a candler, brooding box and pen. He ended up raising several generations of quail and learned so much in the process. We could have extended it more with bird anatomy, etc. My dd pursued gardening and planted a square foot garden. We added in several math and science projects as she planned, planted, maintained and harvested. My youngest raised chickens. The beauty of these projects is that the excitement and learning bleeds over to the other kids in the family. All of my dc can identify different breeds of chickens and tell you about the qualities of the eggs because they all spent hours studying the Murry Hill catalog like it was the Sears Christmas edition. :001_smile: And this kind of learning is especially effective for boys, who need a break sometimes from reading/writing based instruction. We enjoyed that year of science so much. In fact, this post makes me think about doing it again next year! HTH, Lisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EmeraldGirl Posted March 16, 2010 Share Posted March 16, 2010 Since we love the outdoors and hiking, we got a hand-held GPS and started adding Geocaching to our hikes. These are hidden EVERYWHERE across the country. It certainly spices up our hikes now! You can do these around your area, or even when you go on vacation. Our goal for when each child is ready, is to plant our own geocache for others to find so we can track it on line. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wy_kid_wrangler04 Posted March 16, 2010 Author Share Posted March 16, 2010 WOW!!!! I am LOVING these ideas!!! Keep them coming!!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helena Posted March 16, 2010 Share Posted March 16, 2010 I have a few things I only bring out once in a while: color mixing and diffusing paper http://www.montessoriservices.com/store/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=96_169_2625 http://www.acornnaturalists.com/store/COLOR-DIFFUSING-LEAVES-P3893C0.aspx (we just did a bunch of butterflies) building sets along with a classical cd http://www.rainbowresource.com/product/Early+Simple+Machines+Set+III+%289656%29/024581/1268765136-1050201 http://www.rainbowresource.com/product/Marble+Run+with+Motorized+Elevator/002300/1268765136-1050201 http://www.rainbowresource.com/prodlist.php?sid=1268765136-1050201&subject=17&category=5644 Sometimes I'll count dancing around to this cd as french for the day: http://www.amazon.com/French-Children-Lucienne-Vernay-Quatres/dp/B00005CEP5/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1268765510&sr=1-4 I count baking as school work :) My 11yo can follow any recipe, my 8yo does basic recipes with my help. here is my 11yos current fav: http://www.amazon.com/Vegan-Cupcakes-Take-Over-World/dp/1569242739/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1268765818&sr=8-1-catcorr We started a garden journal, it's amazing how the tiniest bit of work here and there has turned into such a great project. We mostly do it when they are restless or crabby, maybe once a week. They go out and relax, look for changes, we write in one sentence entries, glue in photos, or press some flowers and leaves to add later. Poetry is spiced up by acting the poem out. For instance this month we are studying Lewis Carroll, Jabberwocky. Yesterday they took out their various swords and daggers to reenact slaying the beast (complete with the head coming off), last month we did a poem called 'A Ship Sails up to Biddyford' and we drew out the ship and all the cargo described in the poem. They like to get a visual of the poem.:) On magically beautiful days, we do math, piano and violin then go outside for the rest of the day, we go to a little creek park and spend hours in trees and water. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
extendedforecast Posted March 16, 2010 Share Posted March 16, 2010 I don't know if any of these have been mentioned yet, but I randomly declare cooking days, lego days, reading days, etc. I would like to incorporate board games into lessons, but I tend to forget. I'm going to look over the replies for suggestions that I can use. Thanks for posting this question. Cindy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TXMary2 Posted March 16, 2010 Share Posted March 16, 2010 We play lots of games throughout the week. Some of our favorites right now: Spaghetti and Math Balls Math Rummy Quick Pix- Not Just an Animal Game Yahtzee Boggle We also use educational videos to keep things interesting. National Geographic, History Channel, Science Channel, Discovery etc are all great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolybear Posted March 17, 2010 Share Posted March 17, 2010 Tea time! with yummies and good stories. Woolybear Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Poke Salad Annie Posted March 17, 2010 Share Posted March 17, 2010 I'm enjoying these great ideas. Thanks for sharing! :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pippen Posted March 17, 2010 Share Posted March 17, 2010 *Eat your way through math -- you can google lots of ways to use foods in math. One of my kids' favorites was a Halloween candy sorting activty the day after trick or treating. There are other activities with weighing/measuring/estimating pumpkins or learning ones and tens with the cereal cookies. Google for good ideas. Bubblegum tape helped us over a fraction hurdle. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wy_kid_wrangler04 Posted March 17, 2010 Author Share Posted March 17, 2010 Here is an idea I had, then a friend had said something about it :glare: (It was my idea first :lol:) Starting next year, possibly this year we are going to have a learning game day. As of right now Im thinking once every two weeks (they have to earn it by staying on task :001_huh:) and I am getting games for all subjects. Right now I have games for all subjects other than science, still looking for one in science. The kids are really excited about that! I will have to get used to counting a day of games a school, but I figure as long as we do a game for every subject it could work, right?!? Any thoughts on that?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
2_girls_mommy Posted March 17, 2010 Share Posted March 17, 2010 We are taking a break this week from regular L.A. work to make books for the annual PBS young writer's and Illustrator's contest. It is for grades K-3rd. We have a good time doing this each spring. A whole week of art and creative writing. I save copies of the book for their end of year scrapbook, and they get a certificate in the mail for entering too. We have also taken weeks in the past to do a unit study on a holiday. Last year we did a free lapbook from Currclick on St. Patrick's day and Ireland. It is not our usual kind of thing, so it was fun. Plus they turned out really cute. We still look at them occasionally. I just put them into the history binder. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FloridaLisa Posted March 17, 2010 Share Posted March 17, 2010 Bubblegum tape helped us over a fraction hurdle. :) :bigear: Should I google this or can you spare the details? Also, I remembered something else that *I* loved at least. We read through the Ruth Heller books on parts of speech. She has gorgeous illustrations! Then I had my dc use colored pencils and illustrate each part of speech a la Ruth Heller. I bound and they are in their keepsake boxes. Lisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woolybear Posted March 17, 2010 Share Posted March 17, 2010 Mad libs for grammar. My only requirement was that they couldn't reuse a word too many times. Yes, butt is a noun, but as funny as it is (I have two boys--so it's hysterical--to them) they need to figure out some other nouns too.:D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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