Saturday, March 22, 2014

Quick Update

I still want to give a more in-depth post of the things I promised last time, but I thought I'd post a few quick things while Thing 3 is sleeping on Big Daddy.

We got the Singapore math material. I was a little surprised when I looked at it. There's something that seems almost... cheap?... about it... I'm not sure how to explain it. There are a lot of pictures. Most of the problems are worked via pictures. It's something that always bothered me with public school math, math is numbers not pictures! At least, in my head. But I am a very logical thinker and it seems that my kids tend to be more creative thinkers so this might be just what he needs. I've honestly been dreading math for this very reason... that I might not be able to explain it in terms he can grasp. We started on 1B and I also bought the extra practice book (which unfortunately also includes materials from 1A). Thing 2 Breezed through a whole bunch of stuff already in the practice book. We also did a lesson from the current text book. So far so good, we shall see.

I've also been reading some forums and blogs. I saw this whole "lapbooking" thing. I'm not going to get into what it is now, you have Google. I ordered some stuff to do this, it looks like something fun for us. It also looks like it might be a real pain in the ass thing to get sucked into buying stuff for and spending time I don't have making. Again, we'll just have to see.

I am starting to get our stuff organized. I bought a cabinet (here) in which to put everything I don't want Thing 3 to get a hold of. The handles are perfect for putting childproof locks on. I also grabbed some plastic storage bins of various smaller sizes for the loose stuff. Maybe I will take pictures after it's all set up.

I got some more of our supplies today:

  • 2 Magic School Bus Science kits (Nature and Rainbows), I definitely want to grab more of these as topics arise.
  • Some more books, including Slow and Steady Get Me Ready, one that I am really looking forward to for Thing 3
  • I also got some math manipulatives: Big buttons (awesome if you have little ones because all the other "counters" are choking hazards), clock, di, and an abacus
That's it for now!

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