2016-2017 Homeschool Plan, Preschool....

Our baby turned four years old this summer.  He will not be attending 4K.  I am not a huge fan of preschool.  I'm of the mind that young children need to romp and roam.  They need to be read great books.  They need time in the out of doors nurturing their imagination.

“In this time of extraordinary pressure, educational and social, perhaps a mother’s first duty to her children is to secure for them a quiet growing time, a full six years of passive receptive life, the waking part of it spent for the most part out in the fresh air”. - Charlotte Mason, Vol. 1, p. 43

These are the days I am so thankful for homeschooling.  I can allow our children "quiet growing time" as Charlotte says.  Only because Levi has been asking to "do school" like Riley and Ruben did I pick up a few things of an educational nature, particularly to fill time on those long cold Wisconsin winter days.

Before Five in a Row - I wish I would have used the Five in a Row program with Riley and Ruben.  Now, I finally get my chance.  I'm so excited about the books.  Levi loves to be read to and I believe FIAR offers some of the best children's literature.  I'm not sure how many of the activities we'll do, but we will definitely be snuggled up reading.

Levi loves to cut paper so I was very excited when Timberdoodle sent us Faber-Castell My First Scissors and Kumon More Let's Cut Paper in exchange for a blog review.  He's used to a regular scissors so I'll be curious to see how he does with the ergonomic design.  I'll let you know how it goes.

I also purchased We Live on a Farm coloring book and About Three, both from Rod & Staff.  Again, because these are activities Levi enjoys.  He's already asking to color in his new coloring book.

Lastly, I plan to create activity boxes so he has something to do while I'm working with Riley and Ruben.  I found two large Ziploc bags of Play-Doh toys at a thrift sale.  I plan to buy or make some new Play-Doh and put it with the toys in one activity box.  I also found a Lakeshore Learning caddy with child size crafting scissors, which I will pair with scrap paper and glue in another box.  I'd like to make four boxes total, one for each day of our school week.  Let me know if you have ideas for other quiet activity boxes.