Learning the States the Fun Way

I saw on Pinterest where another homeschool mom made a sight word game using popsicle sticks. I was just talking to a friend the other day about Geography, the states, capitals and other generalized topics. I had stated how I felt we were ignoring learning the states and capitals, mainly because it is so boring. I have tons of popsicle sticks lying around. Mostly because we do a lot of crafts. I was going to throw them away, but then I decided to make a stick game with them. So, today, and this was way more time consuming than I expected, I took on the task of writing on 50 popsicle sticks. On one side I wrote the state and the abbv. for that state. On the other side, I wrote the year it became a state and the capital. Then I placed them in a clean pizza sauce jar with 50 states written on it. You can see the results in the image. Since we have a states wall map they will have to find the state and the capital. We probably won't start this until after the Christmas holiday. If I can squeeze it in sooner I will. You could do this daily, or weekly, however you want. It is a great memorization tool. You could do this for multiplication, skip counting, sight words, spelling, etc. Be creative with it. If your child is having a hard time learning something, or is just bored to death, try something different and new. That is the beauty of homeschooling. And popsicle sticks are cheap and you could recycle the container. Matter of fact you could go into a lesson about recycling at the beginning of using your new jar game. Huh think of that.

School On Monday

Lesson Plans For 09/12/10:

DJ:
Sign Language
Math: Fractions, addition, subtraction
Writing: Main idea and details
Language Arts: Spelling list one three times each, proper nouns
Reading: Reading comprehension with worksheet
Writing: Blog post, My Summer Vacation

Caitlin:
Sight Words
Clock Work with skip counting by fives, o clock, and half hour
Calendar Work
Rhyming: Worksheet
Skip Counting by twos
Spelling: Sight words 1-10
Printing Practice
Math: Addition
Language Arts: Short U, blends br, beginning sounds
Same/Different: Worksheet

Learn To Skip Count By Twos, Fives, and Tens

For kindergarten, Caitlin really only needs to be able to count by twos to 20, but we are starting to learn all three. It is not a concept she enjoys, so I think these fun videos will help. It has been a crazy week here at my house. The puppy got fixed on Tuesday, and we had to keep the two of the dogs separate, so she could not wrestle around. It has been a real pain in the you know what, and I will be glad on Tuesday when things can go back to normal every day craziness. If you did not hear on the news yesterday, Chile suffered a huge earthquake, so be sure to include them all in your thoughts, and prayers.

Lesson Plans For 03/01/10:

DJ:
Reading: Perronik the Fool with summary
Art: See last Monday
Writing: The Royal Gramma fish
Sign Language: Numbers 1-20
Math: Adding fractions
Language Arts: Root words
Cursive Writing

Caitlin:
Beginning skip counting
Animal Book: Jungle Animals- monkeys
Reading: HOP Pom Pom
Arts and Crafts: My dinosaur
Site Words
Flash Cards
Graph Practice
Math: Number words
Phonics: Beginning sounds of fruits
Printing Practice