WTM Kindergarten

[TheAutumnOak]

What are people doing?...Everything in WTM seems to be geared towards first grade and up...Now I am lost again :tongue_smilie:

 

Everything I want to use starts at first grade...Math Mammoth, Rod and Staff, Mystery of History...I could do intro ES, but am stuck after that now...

 

Any good, classical, K stuff out there?

[AngelBee]

Be back...

[boscopup]

There is a section in the book that talks about K.

 

My middle son will likely do Right Start A, AAS at a slow pace (just because I have it for older DS... Otherwise I'd use OPGTR), and HWT. We'll use MM1 for first grade unless he's ready for it earlier.

 

Anything else he can tag along with big brother or wait until first grade.

[2_girls_mommy]

She has a chapter on preschool (including K) in WTM. Mostly the suggestion is to get your child reading and counting. They suggest Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading and Saxon K math. I can't remember if they start HWOT in k or 1st.

 

For us, I was in the midst of doing K on my own when I discovered WTM, and started with their 1st grade suggestions mostly (except for moving up a grade level in my core subjects that I had already chosen, instead of using their suggestions) so I have never done K using what WTM suggests.

[kristinannie]

I am using:

 

McRuffy Color Math

 

Little Stories for Little Folks (readers) and MCP Plaid Phonics

 

Who Am I for religion (Catholic)

 

Beautiful Feet Early American History (with some other additions) spread over 2 years

 

Spanish (haven't decided between Sube, Sonrisas and Singnspeak)

 

Astronomy (haven't decided between REAL Science Odyssey or

RealScience4Kids)...I hadn't planned on doing science, but DS is obsessed with astronomy and I want to encourage that. We will also be adding in some living books (about Galileo, Copernicus, etc)

 

Handwriting, Art and Music

 

I am planning on doing about 90 minutes of "real school" with a lot of art projects and read alouds throughout the day.

 

 

HTH:lol:

[FairProspects]

We are doing K with ds 6 this year. OPGTR is the standard rec, but it looks like you are already using that. Memoria Press has a boxed K that is classical and based on LCC, you might like that. We finished HWOT K last year and are working on HWOT 1 this year along with various copywork. For ds 2's K I'm thinking about doing AAR when it comes out.

 

For math we did RS A (now on B), but I also like MEP reception & Kitchen Table Math for that age.

 

It takes a bit of prep work to pull together materials, but GEMS science guides have been awesome for both my boys. We are really looking forward to the bee study.

[MyFourSons]

We used Memoria Press Kindergarten, they have great literature selections and poetry. We ended up modifying their program quite a bit, and I used their schedule as a guide and added in some other things. You can see their picture book suggestions on their website. I like their copybooks, but the one that came with the package was a little too advanced for my son.

 

Ambleside Online also has a great booklist for read alouds, Kindergarten is called Year 0.

 

We also used HWOT Kindergarten.

 

I started out using Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, but I am making the switch to ElizabethB's free phonics lessons. I do like the Ordinary Parents guide as well, but I'm looking for something free :001_smile:.

 

www.starfall.com is great for phonics at this age too, and free.

 

For math, I would say that your child just needs to practice writing his letters and lots and lots of counting. We play a lot of counting games, and pattern games, etc. We also have a Melissa and Doug abacus that we use to practice counting and basic addition and subtraction. When I taught preschool, 4 year olds were expected to be able to count to 20 by the end of the year, while Kindergartners were expected to be able to count to 100 and do simple addition and subtraction with numbers less than 10. If you feel like you need formal lesson plans, you could take a look at MEP math, it is free online. Kindergarten is called "Reception." I use it with my older children to supplement Singapore Math. I am not a big fan of the Kindergarten books for Singapore Math, but I know a lot of other parents on this board use them and like them.

 

At this age, fine motor skills are very important. HWOT covers this pretty well (it was designed by and Occupational Therapist), but just make sure your child is writing, cutting, using legos, lacing cards, puzzles, playing with playdough, etc.

 

We are also using Intro to Science by ES, we are using the 2 day a week schedule. I like it because it has gentle, short lessons, and I can call it "nature study" and get that checked off my list. My son loves science, and so I wanted something a little more formal. We follow it up on Fridays with a nature walk.

 

I can not remember if WTM has a time recommendation for preschool or kindergarten, but our alotted time each day for formal "schooling" is between 60-90 minutes, usually things take less than that. This is not a continuous 90 minutes, as we take breaks in between activities and when i need to assist my older kids. This also doesn't include all the read alouds we do, as we have family read alouds as well. But we are always done with his Kindergarten work by lunch. In the afternoon, we have recess, and then my Kindergartner has the option to play, or he can listen in while my older sons and I do history, geography, science, etc. He usually just plays.

 

HTH!

 

Beth

Edited February 8, 2011 by MyFourSons

[cholderby]

I'm doing the stuff listed below, but I like thinking that I'm not "officially" starting HS until next year. I just read something about how Finland doesn't have K and they do great on tests...IDK, I'm trying to keep it light and fun (before the heaviness of first grade :D).

[SilverMoon]

WTM K is pretty light. Put the focus on learning to read phonetically and writing the letters legibly, read to dc often, count their toes, point out the shape of the stop sign, and if they want to do school like big brother get them a chunky workbook from Costco.

 

Here's the "curricula" list I used for kindy for most of my older kids. I'll use it again for my last two as well.

-Phonics Pathways, supplemented with Leapfrog videos, http://www.starfall.com and BOB books

-a writing tablet

-pile of blocks

-lots of outdoor time

-frequent trips to the library

[elise1mds]

DD isn't technically homeschooled, but since we've had so many snow days here lately, I've been teaching her alongside DS. She's been playing around with the MUS blocks, learning about place value and doing some simple addition problems (no emphasis on memorization). She's been reading her BOB books and doing tidbits of OPGTR here and there, and we do some copywork/handwriting practice. Other than that, she's allowed to tag along with Big Brother for subjects like history, science, grammar, etc. but doesn't have to do, and she isn't required to do all/any of the pages that go with them (though sometimes I make extra copies of coloring pages or invent coloring pages for her to color, since she loves doing that). She blew my mind today. DS was writing his history narration about Henry V and Joan of Arc, and the second DS mentioned Agincourt, she piped up, "That was where Henry V fought!" DS had been struggling to remember the English king's name. Now, to be fair, she thought the French had won, but hey, it's a start ;)

[Whereneverever]

I'm planning K4 for the second time. This is my line up:

Saxon Math K

Cursive First

Ordinary Parent's Guide and Hooked on Phonics

Prima Latina

Le Francais Facile

Lots of reading time with mom

Play time

[PentecostalMom]

We are using Memoria Press K and Sonlight K as written. I did add on a couple of things that we use throughout the week (see signature). Dd will be five in March, and is doing great with all of it.

 

We used R&S Preschool, Sonlight P3/4 & P4/5, Abeka math, and Abeka art for K4.

[blondeviolin]

We're focusing really on reading. So Abby's working on Funnix and we'll continue through Funnix 2. We'll also do FIAR and RS Math A come the start of the school year.

[lexi]

We are doing kindergarten this year. Here is our lineup:

 

Math-U-See Alpha (We did Primer in PreK as a warm up and my daughter loved it. She enjoys math!) We will only complete the first half this year.

 

The first half of the Phonics Road with focus on learning the phonograms and the handwriting. We're doing a little bit of the spelling but will finish up the spelling next year.

 

She does copybooks that I made for her on the computer.

 

Explorers Beginnings for Bible

 

Several Usborne books for science on different topics-supplemented with library books and one of the Usborne science activity books.

 

A Child's History of the World for our history and geography. We add in interesting websites, historical videos, and books on certain time periods as she's interested. It's just our snuggle/read/discuss book. We do some narration with this book and sometimes make notebook pages.

 

We do lots of painting and crafts and use ideas from Primary Art by Kohl.

 

We listen to classical music.

 

Then we have a very ambitious read aloud list that I compiled pulling from Sonlight, Veritas Press, Winter Promise, and some other booklists. We love to snuggle and read.

 

We also spend lots of time outdoors and doing hands on things but my daughter begs to do "school" so I put together our K curricula. We go fairly slowly and it has been very fun. Next year we're going to continue with Math-U-See Alpha and the Phonics Road and then we will add Tapestry of Grace, a new Bible curriculum, Apologia Astronomy, Artistic Pursuits, some readers for her to practice her phonograms and work on reading, and more great read alouds.

[Chris in VA]

K was my first year of really homeschooling (we had done a little preschool stuff before that). We did

 

Phonics Pathways, supplemented with some Montessori games and other games

Saxon 1 (we did K in preschool)

A bible curriculum that had us reading two story books, making some crafts, memorizing a verse, and that sort of thing--it was written by a friend of mine and is called Names of God.

A nature journal--not a lot, but occasional nature walks documented by narrations and drawings, put into page protectors and a 3 ring notebook

 

That's it--just simple. Oh, and I read a lot to her, too.

 

I found myself ready as a teacher to do more, and we did start SOTW in January of that year, moving quite slowly (not even finishing untl the summer after 1st grade). That's the temptation for new homeschoolers--Mom is ready to teach, but the child is young, and Mom needs to realize the best teaching will come from setting up an environment for learning, not tons of direct instruction. It feels like "not doing anything" but it's really doing quite a lot.