How It All Began

This is how the adventure that is homeschooling all began. I have mentioned on my regular blog posts that Mr. Blue has always wanted to learn, has craved to learn about all things and know all things. It started when we were living in Arizona - so we started with puzzles (linked in a separate post). We did numbers, letters, and colors to start. Then I had gotten some counting bears for counting and colors (linked in a separate post). We used pipe cleaners to string on beads for fine motor skills and would count the beads he put on, and also began to make patterns. He knew all of his numbers and letters by the age of 2 and could count to 20, not only recognized letters but also their sounds. We continued to just hone in on those skills organically and would count trees on our walks, pick up rocks and count those. We would pass flowers and I would ask what color they were. We would look at signs and point at letters asking if he knew what that letter was and if it was uppercase or lowercase. He knew it all, so early. From there I grabbed a few wipe clean workbooks that worked on pre-writing skills, and did a lot of crafts and coloring. He was progressing so quickly and I didn’t know what to do about that. I mean he was only two! But he just wanted to learn everything. 

Fast forward to when we moved back to Iowa, Mr. Blue was 3 and I was still staying home and we didn’t feel that putting him in preschool was what we wanted to do. So I found a preschool curriculum that I started using with him. It was exactly what I wanted and how he learns best - learning through play - zero worksheets. The Playing Preschool is every overly active toddler mom’s dream curriculum. It gave us routine, and helped keep me on track for what he should be learning at his age, but in a fun and engaging way. We did that for 2 years (ages 3 and 4) and it was a great foundation that I have now been using for Mr. Orange. We have loved everything about the Playing Preschool, from the suggested activities to the books and the easy-going, no pressure nature of all that is being learned. We then moved onto Kindergarten material (when Mr. Blue was the age of 5) and I chose Blossom and Root due to there being a big nature theme to it and spending time outdoors, and there was also a space adventure for math and science. We really enjoyed the nature study since Mr. Blue loves to be outdoors and loves all things bugs, animals, getting dirty, etc. We also enjoyed the space adventure for math and science - but since it was definitely more for fun and not very structured with specific learning objectives we added on Kindergarten math from The Good and the Beautiful. However, we did not love the reading/langauge arts section from Blossom and Root. I wish I would’ve listened to my gut earlier on instead of just pushing on hoping it would get better because I feel like it put us behind where we could’ve been. I just did not like how it was going about the foundations of reading and phonics, and then the literature selections just were not interesting to him whatsoever. So we started this past fall with Mr. Blue at the age of 6, finishing up the K math and then started all over with K Language arts from the Good and the Beautiful and we have loved it and he has made such huge strides in reading! He didn’t have much to finish up for K math and very quickly moved onto 1st grade material for math. We are over halfway with math and language and are looking forward to the next challenges. Alongside our regular curriculum, we have been utilizing Reading Eggs as an extra fun way for learning. They both took a placement test and started on the level based on how they scored. While I’m doing school work with one of them, the other is doing Reading Eggs or Mathseeds and then we swap. It has helped to keep the other busy while also learning and I truly have noticed a difference in a positive way of how the games are helping them with math and reading skills. For all of my curriculum choices I have not purchased hard copies from them, I have purchased the PDF, downloaded and printed myself.

For Mr. Blue we are only focusing on Math and Reading/Language Arts as those are the two big foundations for learning and school refusal is pretty big with him. So instead of pushing too many subjects on him now, I’m focusing on the super important ones and then have been sprinkling in science, social studies, emotional development, art, PE and others through play instead of a set, sit down curriculum. For Mr. Orange the Playing Preschool is working out very well for him so we will stick with that as well. For exercise we have done obstacle courses both inside and outside, depending on the weather. We have also done Cosmic Kids Yoga on YouTube, they have walked or ran on the treadmill, and also just done some calisthenic type workouts. We want to instill in them a priority of keeping the body healthy with food and movement, but also teaching them to listen to their bodies and move their bodies when they need to.

With the boys still being young I still have a lot to learn about curriculum and what is going to work best - but these are things we are using or have used and how it has worked for us. I will also share some of the tools, toys, and extras that we use for learning through play or things we have used alongside our curriculum. Next post I will share what a day in the life looks like for us. 

XOXO, mischief managing momma. 

Oldest (1)- Mr. Blue

Middle (2) - Mr. Orange

Youngest (3) - Mr. Green