What subjects to teach kindergarteners

[luvmykids]

I will be teaching my son kindergarten this fall. I wondered if you taught subjects like history or science to that age or if you just work on the basic reading and writing concepts? I've currently homeschooled my 6th grader two years now and didn't know if he should join in with history or science with her or not. I'm not sure what's expected of a kindergartener. Any advice is appreciated.

[boscopup]

I teach phonics (reading), handwriting, and math... plus lots of read-alouds. The read-alouds can be history or science related. ;)

[Tawlas]

We have basics that we (try to) do every 'school day'. At the beginning of the year it was calendar (for counting and patterns), Handwriting Without Tears, OPGTR and some kind of game (think snakes and ladders or Pengaloo) with plenty of fun read alouds. Now, more than half way through the official school year, the basics have expanded to include All About Spelling 1 and Miquon Orange with Life of Fred Apples - and calendar covers a lot more (mostly math) concepts and (mostly geograhpy and character) memorization.

 

All year though we've been reading a two page spread of Usborne's Prehistoric World once a week and supplementing with docs, extra reading from the library and the occasional activity. Also, whenever I'm organized enough, we do some nifty little experiment from Science is Simple or Small Wonders - sometimes with a read aloud to go with it. In January I added Avant Gaston French as well.

 

Honestly, I think you just need to follow your child's lead and see what he's able to do in a day. How you start at the beginning of the year will probably vary a lot from how you end it. Things progress (or don't!) and you figure out where to go next. And just because he COULD sit still for hours on end filling out worksheets doesn't mean he should lol! My son also spends A LOT of time with blocks, trains, puzzles, books, as well as outside. The beauty of homeschool! It's all good, it's all okay, as long as there's some small progress made!

[UrbanSue]

I teach phonics (reading), handwriting, and math... plus lots of read-alouds. The read-alouds can be history or science related. ;)

 

Same here. We do WRTR and gentle math and lots and lots of read alouds.

[beaners]

Our planned work is reading, handwriting, math, and French. We do artsy stuff regularly. Science and history is completely interest led at the moment, and that's working out really well for us so far. So well, in fact, that I feel a bit unnecessary! :lol:

[ByGrace3]

We focus on the 4 R's for K. When dd was in K we did history/geography via missionary studies 1X/week and science here and there. Now ds in K tags along regularly for history and science. So we have done it both ways.

[Motsy802]

We do math, phonics, writing, nature readers, dab a little into SOTW, and read, read, read!

[Staceyshoe]

We just do phonics, reading library books, math, handwriting, and oral reports (2 minute presentations for immediate family only). We don't do history (although he enjoyed watching Liberty Kids with his brother). My kiddo is not an auditory learner, and I know it would all go in one ear and our the other even if we did it together. And there's plenty of time for that down the road. I *really* want to add science---some Mudpies to Magnets. I don't expect him to learn a lot of content at this age. I think it would be fun and stimulate his thinking and interest. It's just hard to fit it in, so we are sticking with what is working for now. I want the basics to be really solid so that's the focus. Maybe we'll add science in the summer or fall.

[violamama]

Our boys are closer together in age, and my 7 year old is not yet a strong reader so we share a lot more "teaching time" activities than you might with a 6th grader + kindy.

 

That being said, you could probably involve them both in a lot of school together. My 4 yo really wants to be included in any text reading, story listening, spoken lessons, etc. He "gets" a surprising amount of the science and history we do. For history we: read pages from Usborne; memorize a timeline; read about timeline events; sometimes do history activities like coloring, crafts and projects; watch short history shows on YouTube and netflix with lots of pausing/discussing. For science we: memorize grammar like parts of leaves, the scientific method, taxonomic categories, etc.; do experiments together from VanCleave; LOVE some of the YouTube science songs we've found, draw pictures and do narrations; raise pets (caterpillars and hermit crabs); go on field trips.

 

We just started a science curric that gives specific assignments/activities and is designed for multiple ages. (Apologia zoology) I think it's going to work well and I'm expecting him to retain some of it as long as we often revisit the memory work & info.

[AimeeM]

Reading, writing, and arithmetic here. I agree with another poster though - read alouds are a great intro to history and science. I plan to get the magic school bus books for next year.

[freeindeed]

For kindergarten we used Five in a Row, and I added Phonics Pathways and Saxon Math K.

[ondreeuh]

We're doing a light K4 year now. We finished PAL Reading and are practicing reading every day with readers and poetry. Math is pretty varied, and we are circling the block with handwriting. I have him to dot-to-dots and cut/paste to work on fine motor skills. I have put off science but plan to catch up on that. We are reading a lot of fables and folk tales, and animal stories.

 

Next year for Kindy, we will do spelling instead of phonics, and we'll do handwriting and copy work. we'll do math of course, but I am really looking forward to science/social studies. We're going to do readings and crafts for animal habitats, and Magic School Bus videos with their science kits. That's the fun stuff. My kiddo doesn't play a lot on his own, so this isn't taking away from his dirt-digging and mud-pie-making.

[Guest 2bgurley]

This is so helpful. Thanks everyone!

[lattedrinker]

Like other people, we always do reading, writing, and math. I try to plan read-alouds and hands-on projects so that we hit on science, history, music, art, etc. regularly.

[Ailey]

Like most of the other posters have said, our focus will be on reading, handwriting and math. She'll learn a bit about animals and US history/geography, but those will be mostly through picture books and the occasional hands-on activity. I don't plan to try to include her with my 4th grader, but if she wants to join in, I'm sure he won't mind. :)

[nmariec23]

We strive for reading and math everyday. When I sense dd getting tired of "school" I try to incorporate more learning games and hands on activities. We do plenty of read alouds daily. This is where I can throw in science and history as well as lots of good literature. All of my kids like to listen to audio books. Jim Weiss is a favorite, including SOTW. She is also very into painting and drawing, so lots of artsy stuff when she feels like it.

[Plateau Mama]

Right now (K4) we are doing Saxon Math K, phonics (logic of English Foundations), handwriting w/o tears. Story time at night is Sonlight K.

 

Next year my plan is either Saxon 1 or Math Mammoth, continue LOE, HWOT and I will add one Magic Schoolbus video a week. We will watch the same episode daily and read the book. I will try to get coordinating books from the library. That ay or may not happen. I may continue Sonlight for story time, I haven't decided yet. If I don't do that I will do Newberry or other award winning books.

[Tanikit]

We do reading, writing (spelling and handwriting mostly) and math daily and then I am using BFSU for science which we do about twice a week and SOTW also twice a week. I have found that if I do only the 3Rs that my DD needs something more and something fun which is what she considers science and history since we do a lot of hands on activities for these. We also do a lot of read alouds for fun.

[luvmykids]

The advice is great! Thanks! But I'm also curious about how many hours of teaching is average for this age group each day? Two hours a day of full attention? He has a really short attention span right now. I can't keep his attention more than 10-15 min at a time. Should they be able to read a few short simple sentences by the end of the school year or is that more of a first grade concept to accomplish?

[boscopup]

The advice is great! Thanks! But I'm also curious about how many hours of teaching is average for this age group each day? Two hours a day of full attention? He has a really short attention span right now. I can't keep his attention more than 10-15 min at a time. Should they be able to read a few short simple sentences by the end of the school year or is that more of a first grade concept to accomplish?

 

 

My K'er could not do 2 hours of school work. :lol:

 

We spend 10 minutes on phonics, 10-15 minutes on math, and about 5 minutes on handwriting. Then we do read-alouds for about 20-30 minutes. I do all the skills work in one session, one after the other. Then the read-alouds are done later in the day.

 

Even first grade likely won't be 2 hours of work.

[Plateau Mama]

The advice is great! Thanks! But I'm also curious about how many hours of teaching is average for this age group each day? Two hours a day of full attention? He has a really short attention span right now. I can't keep his attention more than 10-15 min at a time. Should they be able to read a few short simple sentences by the end of the school year or is that more of a first grade concept to accomplish?

 

I just go until he's not focused anymore. I say he has less then 2 hours a week. I do school 2-3 days a week for 20-30 minutes at most. I schedule out what I want to accomplish for the week and I will work on a subject until he loses interest. I usually do phonics each day, math I will do 2-3 lessons at a time (usually 15-30 minutes), handwriting is 5 min a week (plus there is handwriting in his phonics) I don't count reading time. We read for about 30 minutes almost every night, plus whatever we read during the day.

[blondeviolin]

In K, my goal is to get the child reading and reading fairly well if I can. So we start with just doing reading lessons everyday. When we've got that going fairly well, I add in some math here and there. Then we get consistent with math. Then I add in spelling, slowly (at the child's pace). Spelling includes writing some words (AAS 1 sticks with 3- and 4-letter words for a while), so it doubles as handwriting instruction. That's as far as my 5yo (K4er) has gotten. All of his work says year 1 on it, but we move at his pace. With my oldest, she began grammar a little later in the year. I'm not sure if I will with Emmett. We'll see...

 

My son's current day takes 40 minutes if you don't count history or science (he doesn't...lol).

[luvmykids]

If teaching a K can be accomplished in such little time each day, then why do public schools act like they need 7 hours class time 5 days a week? I've got a friend that is a k teacher and she says homeschooling K would probably average at least 5 hours a day just to teach main concepts. After hearing all the replies I'm feeling a little more confident in my decision to homeschool him. I just couldn't figure out how so many families could juggle teaching numerous children different ages. I'm feeling a little more confident that he can stay home and be a kid, have down time, and still learn with just a small amount of learning time each day instead of devoting most the day that is so busy already. Public schools make you believe that it is a full time job, that that is why people are hired to do these jobs 40 hours a week. Thanks all!

[boscopup]

If teaching a K can be accomplished in such little time each day, then why do public schools act like they need 7 hours class time 5 days a week? I've got a friend that is a k teacher and she says homeschooling K would probably average at least 5 hours a day just to teach main concepts. After hearing all the replies I'm feeling a little more confident in my decision to homeschool him. I just couldn't figure out how so many families could juggle teaching numerous children different ages. I'm feeling a little more confident that he can stay home and be a kid, have down time, and still learn with just a small amount of learning time each day instead of devoting most the day that is so busy already. Public schools make you believe that it is a full time job, that that is why people are hired to do these jobs 40 hours a week. Thanks all!

 

When my son was in private school K, another mom subbed one day, and afterwards she mentioned that their work could easily be done in 2 hours (as a class!), and the teacher agreed. Then you make it one child versus a classroom, and it is even shorter.

[pehp]

If teaching a K can be accomplished in such little time each day, then why do public schools act like they need 7 hours class time 5 days a week? I've got a friend that is a k teacher and she says homeschooling K would probably average at least 5 hours a day just to teach main concepts. After hearing all the replies I'm feeling a little more confident in my decision to homeschool him. I just couldn't figure out how so many families could juggle teaching numerous children different ages. I'm feeling a little more confident that he can stay home and be a kid, have down time, and still learn with just a small amount of learning time each day instead of devoting most the day that is so busy already. Public schools make you believe that it is a full time job, that that is why people are hired to do these jobs 40 hours a week. Thanks all!

 

I think it's b/c she has to teach a classroom of children who are at different levels, have different needs, etc. Lots of juggling. 1:1 is very efficient!!! Plus, because children are expected to be at school all day (unless it is a half-day program), they add in activities (crafts, arts, 'centers' etc) that we don't really count as 'school' at home b/c it's just....life!

 

I honestly cannot imagine teaching 20+ 5-year olds. My hat is off to kindergarten teachers!!

[Sleep-Deprived]

I've followed a similar plan with each of my kids (I'm working through kindergarten for the fourth time this year). My oldest was the only one I was teaching the first time around, and he loved it, so we spent the most time in kindergarten of any of the kiddos with him. That was MAYBE an hour and a half on long days, split up with lunch (but often done in about an hour plus reading), and lots of trips to the zoo, library, or anywhere else that seemed interesting. I started the day with math (Saxon), then phonics (Explode the Code), and then History (Story of the World) or Science (looking at anything under the microscope we could get our hands on and reading The Kingfisher First Animal Encyclopedia).

 

My second son was SURE he wanted to start kindergarten early (4 1/2), and then petered out after two months...so we set it aside and waited another year. That was a smart choice for him. He was ready at 5 1/2. He is a highly distractible child, and of all my kiddos has needed me to be "at the elbow" for the longest periods of time. This son had fabulous gross motor skills, and needed to work on his fine motor skills. He tired easily writing. I often wrote his math answers for him. Letting him do some work orally gave him the ability to learn more without getting overwhelmed at the writing.

 

My third son started early. He had amazing fine motor skills, but needed work on the gross motor skills. I was pressed to start him in kindergarten because he was teaching himself to write his letters and I didn't want to have to reteach him later. This son, more like my first son, liked finishing his work all in one sitting and then having more play time. He is still that way. He's in 2nd grade, and with the exception of waiting for his older brother so we can do Science or History together, he is usually done with school in less than 2 hours.

 

This year my daughter joined the mix. Of all my kiddos, she is the only one that I have started the day with phonics and then moved to math. Math first for the boys has always worked best, but not for her. She probably has the shortest kindergarten days of all of them. I think the biggest thing is to get them reading well, and understanding math concepts, and the rest is gravy. With each of them, there has been a moment part way through kindergarten where I've seen a big jump in their understanding and interest- for the boys it was reading, with my daughter it was math. My daughter usually does all her work in one sitting - about 40 minutes plus books that we read together, but she doesn't think of that as school :)

 

All that to say, kindergarten has been very flexible and has looked very different for each of my kids even though we've followed a very similar plan.

[Plateau Mama]

If teaching a K can be accomplished in such little time each day, then why do public schools act like they need 7 hours class time 5 days a week? I've got a friend that is a k teacher and she says homeschooling K would probably average at least 5 hours a day just to teach main concepts. After hearing all the replies I'm feeling a little more confident in my decision to homeschool him.

half day kinder is only 3 hours. That includes PE, library, music, so essentially 2.5 hours a day.

[luvmykids]

Thanks all for all the wonderful advice! It has helped me greatly!

[blondchen]

I teach phonics (reading), handwriting, and math... plus lots of read-alouds.

 

 

This, exactly.

[a27mom]

I have also been focusing on phonics/reading, handwriting, and math. We take anywhere from 30min to 1.5 hours about 4 days a week. Plus I do try to read chapter books aloud. I think reading level can vary greatly. A few sentences by first grade would not be unacceptable.

 

We do do science and "social studies". But it is all off the cuff. My hubby was not completely sold on homeschooling, so I printed off our districts curriculum targets for K, to make sure we covered everything. If you spend time talking to your kids you will pretty much cover the whole curriculum. Much of this I teach in conversations in the car. Social studies involved jobs in the community, basic understanding of geography formations, (lake, mountain, etc...), understanding that other countries and cultures exist, holidays. Science involved weather, solids liquids gases, living/non-living things, life cycle of a plant. Really basic stuff. I just take advantage of opportunities, we did states of matter while boiling water for spaghetti one night. Talk about weather in the car. Plants and animals on walks. Biology in conjunction with dr's visits. Social studies we discuss in our reading, watching the amazing race, around the holidays etc...

[*Michelle*]

We're doing reading, handwriting, arithmetic, and religion. The first three are for one hour per day, four days per week.

[throughpagesandfields]

When I start I'm planning on focusing oh phonics/reading/handwriting, early concrete math, LOTS of read alouds, nature and music. And lots of other exploration. I'm kinda planning on doing lots of experiment/exploration regarding science, history and arts, but nothing too concrete or set in stone b/c I also want to start more structures work with I can include the younger one too. (In other words, I plan on doing SOTW - but beginning the cycle when we can all do it together, which means waiting for DD)

 

I guess I think especially for Kindie - it's personal choice a bit. For me I want some basic skills to start, reading and math, but it's most important to me that we start to get in touch with nature, routines, begin doing some music, and be exposed to LOTS of read alouds, art, music, culture, that kind of thing but with no expectations... Does that make sense?

[Walking-Iris]

My Kinder does some lang arts and math every day. Practicing handwriting (HWT or ETC), reading practice (either OPGTR or a phonics game or online) and math (SM Essential or a hands on math game). And lots of read alouds. I use Peak With Books for lit activities. And he listens (more or less) to what my 4th grader is doing. I just follow his interest, so lessons are about 15-30 minutes.

 

He has his own science, ScienceWorks level K-1, that we do a lesson in about 3 times a week. He does some Mudpie activities with his sister. History and social studies has just been listening to his big brother's lessons at this point. He is obsessed with all things dinosaurs, prehistoric human and animals, Ice Age stuff, evolution etc so he watches lots of docs and looks at books related to that.

 

We all do art together on Friday. Reading/phonics is my priority. The other stuff just stimulates his curiosity and thinking.

[lea_lpz]

I use MFW K, so in addition to daily Bible, math and Language Arts (phonics, reading, handwriting, hands on activities, games, songs), and read alouds, each unit has activity time, which rotates hands on math, science, art, social sciences, geography, music and literature. We also do about 15 minutes of Spanish most days. These are great extras. To do that, with my preschooler's "mommy and me time" it takes us about 2 1/2 hrs.

 

Right now I am in my first trimester and exhausted, so I feel like to me my focus at this point is to do Bible, Read Alouds, Math, and Language with my k'er and spend 15 minutes one on one with my preschooler doing his workbook and mfw preschool toy activities. So that cuts back our day to about an hour and a half. The rest if we get to it great, but if not, they still learn. They do a lot of imaginative play, they play outside in the afternoon with neighborhood kids, and yeah, I will get educational DVDs at the library to watch together.

 

I'm hoping in a couple weeks I will be back to myself so we can do more.

[stm4him]

We do:

 

Math: Saxon 1

Logic: Building Thinking Skills Hands On (this is manipulative based so close to math but helps with spatial reasoning and visual skills and thinking skills)

Greek: Hey Andrew! Teach Me Some Greek Reader (the Greek alphabet)

Phonics: Learn the multi-letter phonograms beyond the alphabet (we're using YesPhonics to do this)

Spelling: After we finish learning the phonograms we'll do the first three lists from Spelling Plus

Reading: Bob Books (we read or spell the words from each book and then he reads it to me a couple of days in a row). After he finishes the last set we will do the McGuffey Eclectic Primer. He will also read the Kindergarten literature books and readers from Veritas Press and Dr. Seuss books this year.

Writing: He is learning to write cursive using PreScripts Letters and Coloring (from Classical Conversations)

 

Memory Work and Enrichment: Classical Conversations, Character First, First Catechism, Linguistic Development Through Poetry Memorization (IEW), and AWANA

 

Bible: The Children's Illustrated Bible and family devotions with hymns, manners, and Small Talks on Big Questions (based on our catechism)

 

Read aloud: Mother Goose and classic picture books from A Thomas Jefferson Education list and Teaching the Classics list.....

 

We don't do history or science beyond what they learn in CC except to watch videos and take field trips in summer related to what we've learned.......I have lots of picture books on the topics but I choose to focus our read aloud time on literature......

[NewDawnNewDay]

Hi,

New here! I'll be starting K this fall with my dd. DS is in 5th grade in a charter school. My language delayed 3 year old will be a part of our K fun in any way he is able to! I love the support I've been reading in many threads and all the valuable info, resources, and feedback.

I felt pressure to cover so many things and this thread reminded me that the basics can also offer introductions to the "extras" in a k year.

I've just started collecting what we will use. So far we will do Right Start Math, FIAR, HWT. I'm torn over a reading program. She's reading the first set of BOB books for now." I also purchased lollipop logic and Mudpues.

[Mom2TheTeam]

We use MFW K. It includes science and a few other things, like random geography, art and music. While we definitely do follow some of it, I don't do it all. We do what we can get to. We try to do phonics (most important to me), handwriting and math daily....math is low key and often taught more in a real life way than by sitting down and actually teaching it. :)

 

It takes us 30-60 minutes a day depending on what we get in...sometimes a little more if we do something super involved, if you know what I mean.

[lea_lpz]

We use MFW K. It includes science and a few other things, like random geography, art and music. While we definitely do follow some of it, I don't do it all. We do what we can get to. We try to do phonics (most important to me), handwriting and math daily....math is low key and often taught more in a real life way than by sitting down and actually teaching it. :)

 

It takes us 30-60 minutes a day depending on what we get in...sometimes a little more if we do something super involved, if you know what I mean.

 

 

Hi! (Waving). Remember you from the mfw board. Hope you guys are having a great year. We're finishing up and starting unit 19 on Thursday. We're are you guys at?

 

I am pregnant, 12 weeks, so am sometimes only hitting the priorities too. I try to hit math, Lang, Bible and "preschool time" with ds as our priority on days I am feeling zombie like or have too much going on.

[Mom2TheTeam]

Hi! (Waving). Remember you from the mfw board. Hope you guys are having a great year. We're finishing up and starting unit 19 on Thursday. We're are you guys at?

 

I am pregnant, 12 weeks, so am sometimes only hitting the priorities too. I try to hit math, Lang, Bible and "preschool time" with ds as our priority on days I am feeling zombie like or have too much going on.

 

 

:) I recognize you to now that you say something.

 

We just started K again with the 5 year old twins. We are finishing up unit 1. We do 1st with my 7 year old and they tag along with him. But, I did K with my older son last year. I was mostly speaking from what we did last year and intend to do again this year. I was going to wait till fall to start them, but they were begging. So, now, I'm actually hoping to be starting 1st with them sometime this fall. (We school year round.)

 

I got pregnant around the same point last year with K. I slowed WAY down because I was so sick. My K'er was older. So, after I was feeling better, we ended up speeding up a lot and doing several days worth in one day to finish up. We finished in June. I'm hoping to keep a more even pace with it this time around. LOL.

 

I will say though, I LOVE the extra Bible included in the new edition. (But, I'm not a fan of the grid. It's more flipping back and forth than it used to be, IMO. But, maybe I will change my mind.)

[NoseInABook]

I do Ordinary Parent's Guide To Teaching Reading, MUS Primer, Handwriting Without Tears K, and Five In A Row. Lots of read alouds. AWANA for everyone but the baby. This Fall, my new K-er is going to be doing the same minus FIAR (he did it as preschool) and will probably listen to what I'm doing with the first grader too but he won't be required to do that.