Fall Crafts

A17 loves crafts. He made these leaf decorations with his Grandma. They collected leaves and ironed them between wax paper.

They were hung by punching a hole with a hole punch and tying coordinating ribbon.

He also made these leaf rubbings with his Grandmas. Leaves that were thicker are easier to see when you rub the crayon over them.


These foam and pom pom turkeys were made with a kit I found on clearance after the holiday last year.

Next up--Christmas crafts!

Columbus Lapbook

A17 and I read the picture book In 1492 by Jean Marzollo today and put together this lapbook on Columbus. I found some printables at Enchanted Learning and ABC Teach.

We used Boardmaker pictures to write a sentence about Columbus and highlight the dates. I did the cutting and A17 helped with coloring and gluing.

We also did a simple experiment with a ship, water and wind. The ship is made from a plastic lid, playdoh, a toothpick and a square of paper. We set it in a tub of water and blew on it to see how fast it went and where it would end up. A17 really loves any kind of experiment!

Christmas Bags by Kendra

I know it's early, but if you are like me, things that aren't planned in advance don't get done! Kendra over at Aussie Pumpkin Patch posted about her Christmas bags. This is a wonderful idea for organizing and completing holiday crafts. Basically you put the supplies for a craft in an individual bag. These bags are then given out one at a time. I like that it helps me be ready in advance with supplies. I also think more craft would be actually completed this way. These would also work well for workboxes.

First Day of Fall!

September 22 is the first day of fall. The smell of apples and cinnamon, crisp fall air, the sound of crackling leaves --our favorite season!

We've had a slow start to school, but have made some plans for enjoying the fall season season. We're planning a trip to the apple orchard followed by crock pot applesauce, a wheelchair accessible hayride, fall leaf walks, pumpkin decorating, and a halloween party.

One of our favorite fall books is The Apple Pie Tree.

We are also thinking about fall crafts. A17 picked out some fall/halloween themed foam crafts at Joanns. We also found some fall ideas on the Crayola website.


Happy Fall!

Teacher Book Bag

Have you looked at Teacher Book Bag? I just received the August PreK-K Book Bag, Seasons, Trees and Me, to review and I am very impressed! I have purchased the book bags in the past and have always liked the product, but I think I will like the new format even better. Now, the company offers 3 different levels of book bags each month. You can pick the level that best fits your child or combine levels for multiple children. They are very reasonably priced and are packed with activities. You can also purchase a year's worth at a time for the best value.


Seasons, Trees and Me has three different units. Each unit has ideas for reading, language arts, math, movement, art, booklists and more. Each section comes with suggested variations for the activities. For example, there are several different writing and cutting pages so you can choose the one that best fits your child's skill level. These variations would also be helpful for adapting materials for a child with special needs.







The seasons unit came with a story cube that you can print on cardstock and put together. The cube can be used for several activities for the books on the list such as " What do you wear?, "Find this in the story," etc. I really like the story cube idea! I'll post more when we have delved further into the book bag. Can't wait to try out the seasons graph and tree art with Ds!

If you are looking for units that you can pull out and do with a minimum of prep, lots of variety and engaging activities, then check out the monthly book bags from Teacher Book Bag.

HSS: Lots of new materials!

Homeschool Share recently completed it's annual Blast contest and has posted lots of new materials on the website. They have new units, lapbooks and things for workboxes under a new category called Workboxables. Some of the new items Ds and I are looking forward to using are the units and lapbooks for How to Make a Cherry Pie and See the USA and Christmas Around the World.

There are also new units and lapbooks on Ancient Greece, Rome and Egypt, a Spanish lapbook, lapbooks on bears and beavers, Goodnight Gorilla lapbook and a unit on the Laura Ingalls Wilder classic Farmer Boy in addition to many other fabulous parent created materials.

Planning for Next Year

I am starting to plan for next year based on some choices A17 has made for science topics. Some of these topics include volcanos, polar bears, pumpkins, and birds.

We will start off the school year with a unit on the human body. I am gathering resources from several places including Little Otter's Science Curriculum. This is a wonderful human body study geared toward preschool--first grade and would work well for some special needs students. Our library has many of the books on the suggested reading list.

I will also be taking pieces from several HOAC lapbooks including Human Body and Germs.

We will doing some projects from this book.

In addition to science units, we will be continuing with Touchmath. I am considering supplmenting Touchmath with some living math books from the Mathstart series. I have read a lot about a Living Math approach on Kendra's and Heather's blogs.

Since A17 has been very interested in arts and crafts, I have been putting together a unit for him on art which I hope will have us exploring some different types of projects. We will be using this book :

plus some stories about artists and their work. One of these is the Katie series by James Mayhew.

We will also be checking out the Smart About Art series and Touch the Art which is a board book series with textures.



I like to have a general plan down on paper and then tweak things as we go along. If A17 is really into something I want to be able to spend more time with it or if interest is flagging I can switch gears.



If you are homeschooling or creating a meaningful day, have you made any plans? Comments and links are welcome!