From the category archives:

Read & Write

Our Favorite Board Books

Wanna take a trip down memory lane with me? During the long (and apparently never-ending) unpacking process at our new house, I came across a bin of board books that I had saved. Even though my girls have mostly outgrown these little treasures, I couldn’t bear to part with our favorite board books. These books [...]

Continue reading →

Interesting Books for Beginning Readers

We have been doing lots and lots of reading this summer. I’m reading aloud to the girls as usual, but now they are both reading on their own, too. So exciting!
Delaney is a beginning reader – she can “sound-out” many words, she knows about 25 sight words, and she is good at using [...]

Continue reading →

Spring Audio Books for Kids

We love listening to audio books, especially in the car. Luckily, our library has a pretty good selection of picture book/CD sets and audio chapter books. I also like purchasing audio stories and making themed audio story playlists for the girls. We can listen to them on our iPod or burn a CD for the [...]

Continue reading →

Family Mail

{Originally posted November 2009 at Early Bird Homeschool}
I like to provide my girls with lots of “real-life” writing opportunities – helping with the grocery list, writing letters, making signs, etc. They draw pictures, scribble-write, use invented/phonetic spelling, or copy words from a variety of sources. I have been wanting to set-up a family mail center [...]

Continue reading →

4 Simple Skills to Practice During Read-Alouds

A bit of thinking-aloud, conversation, and encouragement are all you need to add a little extra learning to your snuggly read-aloud time! Boost your child’s reading comprehension skills by incorporating these simple activities into your existing read-aloud time:
1. Predict

Look at the cover and read the title. Ask, “What do you think this story will be [...]

Continue reading →

Welcome, Spring!

Happy First Day of Spring! We are working in the garden this weekend – transplanting some seedlings that have been hanging out in my garden window, building some trellises, and just enjoying the spring weather. I hope you are all finding a bit of spring where you live, too!
I’m also sharing one of our favorite [...]

Continue reading →

Rainbow Poems

We have been having a crazy mix of rain and sun (and hail!) – just the perfect weather for rainbow-hunting! With rainbows on our mind, I gave the girls this simple rainbow poem coloring sheet:

Natalie decided to make her poem about rainbow-colored fruit, and Delaney was using Lois Ehlert’s Planting a Rainbow for rainbow flower [...]

Continue reading →

Make a Leprechaun’s Walk Book

My girls have been looking ahead on their calendars to find the next holiday – guess it’s time to pull out some St. Patrick’s Day activities!
In the deep, dark archives of my teaching days I found this fun fill-in-the-blank book that you can make with your child, along with a happy little leprechaun to walk [...]

Continue reading →

Thankful Poems

Doesn’t Thanksgiving fall at a perfect time? Just when my girls start rattling off their extensive Christmas wish lists, I can pull out some Thanksgiving books and crafts and we can all reflect more deeply about what we are truly thankful for. Gratitude is always a topic of conversation around here, but even more so [...]

Continue reading →

← Previous Entries