Covering little things? Need some hand holding.

[LAmom]

I'm not exactly sure how to word this question right. I guess I'm looking for a neat,organized, all written out for me kind of thing. Kind of like a very detailed scope and sequence. I am thinking my Ks and younger miss out on simple things they would normally get in school. I try to do some of what I am talking about, but what else is there. For example, when do kids learn months, days of week, etc. It isn't in any curriculum I use. Or learning their address, phone. I know that is common sense but is there other things that is routine to learn? Weather, seasons, etc. :confused:

 

I know feel like I have left out geography this year and need to squeeze in yet more stuff to the week.

 

I hope this makes sense. It is hard to explain exactly what I'm looking for. I can't remember all the examples. It is something I feel I would get if I used a complete curriculum from day 1 until the end and had everything covered. I feel like my piecing everything together will leave gaps and things not done. This at all levels now, not just K.

[Starr]

Unfortunately it's not often anyone likes just one curriculum for everything. Would you want secular or Christian?

[LAmom]

Well, I don't want that box curriculum. I'm just wondering how to put it all together and remember those common sense (of course they need to learn the days of the week) little things. How does everyone else put it all together and have a nice flow? Yes, I've read and reread WTM. I still can't put it all together especially adding in other kids, etc. I hope I'm making sense. :tongue_smilie: I don't think I'm explaining myself well.

[Black-eyed Suzan]

What about the What Your _____ Needs to Know series by E.D. Hirsch? Our library has them - if yours does, too, you could see if that is what you are looking for.

 

Hope that helps!

[blondeviolin]

FLL 1 does phone number, address, days of the week, months, etc for memory work. FWIW, my older two learned days of the week and months through everyday life. "Today's Tuesday and we have swim tonight. It happens again on Thursday, let's check and see when that is." or "Your birthday is in May and it's February. How many more months until you're five." We do have the Core Knowledge books and we skim through those occasionally. EM's Beginning Geography is great for a quick geography overview.

 

TBH, everyone is going to have holes/gaps. It's just the nature of learning. Even if you teach it, they may not remember or retain it. I just feel like I'm in a better position to catch the gaps before they become gaping chasms because I'm the one instructing the kids. I'm also with them all. the. time. and can catch any misunderstandings. And I'm not just talking academics, but day-to-day things.

[kitten18]

Well, I don't want that box curriculum. I'm just wondering how to put it all together and remember those common sense (of course they need to learn the days of the week) little things. How does everyone else put it all together and have a nice flow? Yes, I've read and reread WTM. I still can't put it all together especially adding in other kids, etc. I hope I'm making sense. :tongue_smilie: I don't think I'm explaining myself well.

 

I think I know what you're talking about, things like fire safety!

 

I don't have any great suggestions, for now I just try to cover things as they come up.

[MomatHWTK]

I have found a lot of those topics covered in K level "social studies" books or workbooks. They are usually titled something like "about you and your community."

[laughing lioness]

seasons and months are often covered in science, months, days of the week in english, etc.

I teach my 3-7th graders the various ways of writing the date when we talk about turning in papers, etc.

Several moms do calendar time and talk about this stuff, or a math rubric in the a.m.

We cover a lot of geo in lit studies, but we are also doing MP's world geo and states. For littles, we've loved the goegraphy puzzles- dd 9 still loves doing them, and we've always had maps on the walls.

There's always going to be things that you want to cover that aren't by the curriculum. I would make a list of what you feel they should know and incorporate it into what you are doing.

[christielee7278]

We do morning time where we cover all of those things and more. I just wrote out a list of things I wanted them to learn that didn't really fit into a particular area and lumped them all into morning time. Calendar,weather, memory work, etc.

Some of my inspirations:

http://homeschoolcreations.com/CalendarMorningBoard.html

http://mamajenn.com/MamaJenn/CalendarTime.html

http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/blog/tag/calendar-time

[Guest TheNorthWind]

I searched yesterday on this forum for 'circle time.' Everything you are talking about in the first paragraph of your post could be covered in circle time. Usually first thing in the morning with all the kids. Weather, day, month, copy and say address and phone number- the basics. This post was referred to in the circle time threads and it gave me a good place to start. http://theplantedtrees.blogspot.com/2012/06/circle-time-with-preschool-and-second.html

[Mom2Es]

RightStart math does days of the week and months of the year, number of days in a month, filling out a calendar, etc. in level A or B (maybe both?)

 

Weather usually gets covered in science at some point.

 

I know they drill a lot of that stuff in preschool, but I haven't found it necessary. We just talk about those kinds of things as they come along (Oh, the weather has been cooler lately and the leaves are starting to change. The fall season will be here before we know it!). I used to keep a wipe-off board with things like "Today is...yesterday was...the month is...the season is..." but it got tedious after about a month and we quit doing it. It started reminding me of those depressing signs in hospitals and nursing homes.

 

I made up a song for our phone number and just sang it in the car until the kids could sing it themselves. We did something similar for our address.

[boscopup]

Some of that stuff just comes up in daily living, like seasons and weather. I've never had to teach those because they happen every year, and we just happen to talk about them. Just yesterday, I was explaining to my 3 year old why it was getting cool out even though the sun was out. He thought it would be hot because it was so sunny, but this week has been nice and cool for fall! :)

 

Days of the week and months of the year have also come up in daily life, though my middle son needed some concentrated work on it (he doesn't pick things up on his own as easily as my other two do). Thankfully, Life of Fred Elementary series teaches such things. After doing Apples, he now can tell you the days of the week (and continue reciting them :lol:), he's learned some of the months, and he knows how to read an analog clock. I've also seen days/weeks/months/time in our math programs. I know Math Mammoth had it every year up through 3rd or 4th grade. I'm not sure about Singapore, as we are in 1A with DS2, and DS1 started it at 4A, so if it was in earlier grades, I haven't seen it yet. I do recall the K one having some calendar time of some sort.

 

The one thing you mentioned that I tend to fail in... memorizing phone number, address, etc. I know this is stuff my oldest had to memorize in K, and he has promptly forgotten it by now. :tongue_smilie: So that one is just concentrated memorizing effort, which I haven't done much of yet. He's always WITH me. He could tell you what road he lives on and even give you directions to get there, tell you which house it is. He just can't remember the 5-digit house number. But at the same time, when would he need to know the 5-digit house number? If he's lost, no one is going to mail us a letter. :lol: They'll call us or drive him to the house. So really, the phone number is what he needs to know most at this age, and I have slacked on that.

 

I agree with looking through the What Your ___ Should Know books. You can often pick those up at thrift stores for cheap, or just check it out at your library.

 

Oh, and we do geography as part of history. My K'er is not doing any geography right now. My oldest has done plenty of geography just via SOTW 1 and 2 and now Sonlight Core D. I've never done a separate geography course. My son didn't do geography at school in K or 1st grade either. He learned that there were 7 continents (or did he learn that at home? I forget). I remember they made a map to their house one day when learning about "neighborhoods". That's about it. Most of what he learned at school in both science and social studies were things that he had already picked up on at home, just through conversation in daily life.

[happypamama]

A lot of that gets covered naturally in daily life discussions, but my kids have liked the BrainQuest workbooks. A couple of pages a day, and it's a nice reinforcement that hits any holes.

 

This year, I also instituted a subject called "General Skills." Every day, each child's GS box has something in it -- the workbooks, a logic problem, stationery if they need to write a letter, fire safety and health worksheets (we cover those topics naturally, but I have them do a quick worksheet or two to throw in the portfolio as proof that we did them), civics/election book and worksheet, etc. It's a good place to throw small stuff like that that we need to prove we covered.

[CatholicMom]

Maybe check out Home Learning Year By Year by Rebecca Rupp to help you fill in the gaps and make sure they get covered. I just ordered this months ago to help with exactly that.

 

Teaching Textbooks math does cover how the calendar, how to write the dates, etc, in their 3rd grade program.

 

But I know what you mean... calendar tends to go by the wayside for us, tying shoes got left behind for a while, memorizing phone numbers, fire safety (we have just talked about it mainly), reading temperature has. If I were you I'd make a big list of all you can think of and just go through them and cross them off as they are taken care of. Tackle one of these "extras" at a time to make it doable.

 

Home Learning Year By Year will also give you some guidelines and help you keep in mind where your child should be at the end of every year in terms of skills and things.

[sagira]

There are scope and sequence books. One such book is "Teaching Children" by Diane Lopez. I use this book. Online there is the World Book scope and sequence too, or Typical Course of Study:

 

http://www.worldbook.com/typical-course-of-study?wbredirect=1&Itemid=216

 

I notice that we do cover many topics naturally, but I note the ones that I feel need attention. I use the Diane Lopez one because I use the CM method.

Edited September 22, 2012 by sagira

[ChicoryChick]

I understamd what you are saying. I realize that we have those gaps too, especially having multiple children. xthings I have taught my first two or it was included in their curriculum, my 3rd child naturally picked up in his own, but my 4th child (by now we have switched curric) when he was finishing up 3rd grade I realized while he knew most of the months couldn't tell you all of them and how many days were in each on (something my daughters had learned in FLL 1&2). Of course we have remedied that by teaching the "Thirtys Days hath September" poem. It does depend on the curric or just realizing it and making a concious effort with each child.

[CyndiLJ]

I totally know what you mean, and have found little things too...like we need to teach our kids adopted at older ages who never went to school something basic, like the Pledge of Allegiance and the National Anthem! Hahaha! Felt like a fool recently in public when I realized "Uh oh...we forgot something here!"

 

I suggest the World Book scope and sequence link shown above, or you can also check out your state education web site, and they always have a scope and sequence for each grade posted as well. Of course, it is just a guideline, and things don't have to be taught in certain grades necessarily, but I have found it does help keep those surprise moments from creeping in for the obvious things our kids should learn.

 

Cindy

[Mommy22alyns]

When the girls were younger, I had a "breakfast board." I got the idea from a member here. It's basically a trifold board with little things like a calendar, cute bulletin board weather tracker, a world map for continents and oceans, a 100 chart, a tens and ones counting board with straws in plastic bags, things like that. You can put anything you want on there. We'd just spend a little time on that in the mornings before school.

 

 

ETA: Here you go: http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/showthread.php?t=78974&highlight=breakfast+board

Edited September 23, 2012 by Mommy22alyns

[serendipitous journey]

Agreeing with the others that there will be gaps; and this is something I am working on, not something I've mastered. Here are some ideas I have liked:

 

You might want to just pull out a binder, add some lined paper, and write what they should memorize. You could create dividers by putting tabs (or just paper with homemade Scotch tape tabs sticking out) for daily, weekly, monthly. You could do one item per page (address, days of the week, &c.) and review that one thing daily until it is learned; then move it to weekly for a while; then monthly. Add a new item when each is mastered.

 

Regarding content, if you track these things with the "What Your _th Grader Needs to Know" you will catch a great deal of it.

 

A little less systematic, but excellent for these things I think, is "I Used to Know That".

 

Those two will have you covered quite well; I sometimes look at The Educated Child also.

 

The book "In Living Memory" contains a good deal of other content, not all essential, but covering such things as the planets & a very sensible selection of Bible verses, quotations, &c. This is a little off-topic but I thought I'd mention it.

 

... I am :bigear: and following along, and glad to see in this thread sources that are new to me ...

Edited September 23, 2012 by serendipitous journey

[bttrflyvld]

I'm not sure if this is what your looking for but at http://abcjesuslovesme.com/ they have K5 lessons that covers all that stuff in their free weekly lesson plans. I used the k4 with my daughter last year and she learns a ton from her addresss, phone number, days of the week, etc. Just an idea to look at. And it's free.

[BrookValley.]

I wondered the same thing myself! I use Moving Beyond the Page and Right Start Math, which do cover some of those things. To kind of round out things, I just purchased "What your Kindergartner Needs to Know" (the Core Knowledge Series), and after briefly perusing it I think that will fill in the gaps nicely.

[JESSICAinMD]

I just made a list of things I wanted them to learn. I took about five minutes a day to go over things. I work on one new thing at a time. I also used the list to practice handwriting. We review once a week. I let the kids place a sticker next to the things they mastered.

[tammyw]

- Brain Quest cards by year

- Cricket magazines

- What Your *Blank* Grader Needs to Know