First Day Of Pre-K!

Today was Owen's official first day of Pre-K. Back in September I kept seeing all these cute pictures of kids holding signs and hearing all about the emotions of what it was like to drop their child off at the first day and the tears that were shed. I must say....I'm so happy we are homeschooling and I didn't have to go through that! Not to say that homeschooling is for everyone, but I'm so glad that my kids get to stay with me and I get to be their teacher...with Miss Kim's help!

Since Kim and I are homeschooling our kids together we wanted to try and include Jack and Andrew in as much stuff as they want to be included in, but we are keeping in mind that they are only 3 years old!

These boys are so cute! I am excited about what they will learn this year and a little scarred, but I know that this is a learning experience for all of us! The fun part of homeschooling is we can adjust and change things to suit our kids needs and their learning styles.

Arriving at school aka Miss Kim's house! Owen was a little bummed that he wasn't riding a bus to school, but I did tell him that our van is gold so it's almost the same color as a school bus. Then he reminded me it wasn't the same and that was that!

Andrew was all ready for school too!

Miss Kim used to teach at a small private school in Des Moines. Sadly with the economy that school had to close this year. When Miss Kim heard about it she decided to contact her old boss and find out if we could purchase some of the supplies and materials that the school had. She was able to get some great stuff for a GREAT price!

Miss Kim has an extra room in her basement that she turned into the school room.

The first thing we did was the pledge to the American Flag, Christian Flag and the Bible.

Then we did calendar time where we explained what month, day and year it was and the season we were in. Then we sang a couple songs and then it was time to sit down and look at a few books.

We are only planning on doing 26 weeks of school (2 days of school a week....Mondays & Fridays). Each week we are going to focus on one of the letters in the alphabet. So of course this week is 'A'. Kim asked the kids if they knew words that started with 'A' and then wrote them on the board. Then wrote 2 capital 'A's' and two lowercase 'A's'. Then each child got to come up and write them on the board. Andrew and Jack needed a little help, but Owen did his all on his own.

I read a book about Astronauts and they also got to color an Astronaut page. The snack we had was applesauce to go along with the 'A' theme.

We ended our school day with playing with shapes and making towers or objects. Then we did a counting sheet with the kids. We worked for less than 2 hours and we had 2 breaks...one with toys and one with snacks. It was fun! Of course there are normal growing pains that are going to take place like Owen wants to snuggle me when he gets antsy and I was having to explain to him that there is a time for everything and this was learning time not snuggling time. It's hard for him since Ella can pretty much do whatever she wants, but he is also learning that she's a baby and she doesn't have to be held to the same standards as he does. I'm so excited for all 3 of the boys!