Gnome's Bonfire Autumn Nature Table

Main Lesson Block: Money!

This week was my first try at a math main lesson block. *gulp*

First we made the Accountant Gnome.

Here he is attached to a pencil:

And here he is hanging out with Katie Grace's money bag:

And here he is helping Katie Grace with her very un-Waldorf workbook:

And here they are with our typical supplies for the week: a main lesson book, crayons, a bag of money, and our gnomies:
Oh, and an eraser, because Accountant Gnome is covering the pencil eraser.

Pennies, nickles, and dimes are great for reinforcing counting by 1s, 5s, and 10s.

We also enjoyed this poem by Shel Silverstein:
My dad gave me one dollar bill
'Cause I'm his smartest son,
And I swapped it for two shiny quarters
'Cause two is mroe than one!

And then i took the quarters
And traded them to Lou
For three dimes-i guess he don't know
that three is mroe than two!

Just them, along came old blind Bates
And just 'cause he can't see
He gave me four nickels for my three dimes,
And four is more than three!

And i took the nickels to Hiram Coombs
Down at the seed-feed store,
and the fool gave me five pennies for them,
And five is more than four!

And then i went and showed my dad,
and he go red in the cheeks
And closed his eyes and shook his head-
Too proud of me to speak!

I posted about this game we played earlier this week. The columns are labeled "pennies" "nickles" "dimes" and "total". She rolled a die and counted out that many coins, and then also drew them on the page. She then counted out the total.

Here is a main lesson book page, featuring Accountant Gnome!

Creating a candy shop was fun, as was having a gnome pay day.
But the most fun was decided what each gnome would buy, and how much change they got. See the orange gnome? He didn't have enough money for anything, so her bartered dusting the candy shop for a lolly.

We also visited the bank to get some half-dollars and a dollar coin (which she thinks must be fake!) and tomorrow we're opening a savings account. We also worked through some stuff in her Brownie book, and she will have earned her Penny Power Try-It when we're all through.

If we had tons of time, I would have done more. We'd talk about the history of money, and look at money from around the world. And who knows, maybe we can revisit it before the year is through. She's an excellent money counter though. Maybe she has a future in finance?

From my notebook...

Show your child how to choose a new screen saver to suit the season or a current interest. We like to put seasonal "Waldorf" pictures in a folder and choose that folder for the screen saver to cycle through. You can also choose the marquee option and type a message. We sometimes enter our Bible verse for the week.

Glueless Collages
When I was teaching toddler preschool, I loved doing this!

Tape a piece of clear contact paper, sticky side out, to a table or wall.

Set out bowls of "stickables"--felt scraps, tissue paper squares, crepe paper streamers, ribbon pieces, magazine pictures, foam pieces, feathers, etc.

Let your child explore the sticky paper and place the objects on the paper.

Preserve the collage with a second piece of contact paper on top of the first.

These make great suncatchers!

A Day in the Life...

We've had two lovely days in a row. To be honest, I'm almost afraid to blog about it, in case I jinx it or something.

We started the morning with devotions. Two weeks ago we talked about thankfulness. Last week we discussed contentedness. This week we're discussing generosity, which flows nicely from the previous two weeks.

After devotions, I got Michael set up with his independent work-- working a few math problems, reading some of Boy by Raold Dahl, Daily Geography, Handwriting, Calculadder, practicing spelling words, and working on this "Map in a Month" thing we're doing. It looks like a lot, but really, each thing there probably takes less than 5 minutes.

Nicholas meanwhile was playing with some farm animal manipulatives, and then moved on to the gnomes.

Katie Grace and I had her main lesson. We're doing a "time and money" block with a little accountant gnome we made. I'll share that later this week. Today, we practiced counting by ones (pennies), fives (nickels), and tens (dimes). Then the accountant gnome paid the other gnomes, and we had to decide if he was paying them the correct amount. We played a game with dice. We made a chart in her main lesson book:
PENNIES NICKELS DIMES TOTAL
She rolled the die, and put the correct amount of coins in each column, and then she added up the total. She's doing really well!

After Katie Grace's main lesson, we all went to the kitchen. I told the story of St. Martin while we made Martinmas horseshoe cookies. Yum!

Katie Grace went outside to practice her spelling words--she chose to bounce a ball while spelling her words. And Nicholas was cracking nuts. He's a very serious nutcracker.



It's actually pretty funny. Nicholas and Katie Grace both like to crack nuts, but not eat them. Michael likes to eat them, but not crack them. Everyone wins!

Meanwhile, Michael had his main lesson on long division. I will say it was interrupted by a very fussy baby, so there were little breaks and gaps where Michael went off and read while I nursed the baby. But that's life in a family, and one of the good parts of homeschooling, in my opinion. We are all learning together how to wait, how to be patient, how to bear one another's burdens in love.

We reviewed long division, both with and without remainders. Up until now, we had only done problems like 4 into 35, 8 into 66. Today we moved on to 2 in 45, etc. Divide, multiply, subtract, bring down... it's amazing how quickly it comes back. We worked some problems on the board and then on the dry erase. In his math journal--he doesn't like "main lesson books" so much anymore; big boys of nine apparently have journals-- he explained the concept of a remainder, and write a few real-life examples of when you would have a remainder. This was a jumping-off point for a writing idea, and he wrote a story about how the inventor of football used math to work out the logistics of planning the first game.

Throughout this, Katie Grace came in and did her handwriting and geography.

When Michael was done, we had a little art mini-lesson and drew fall trees. Art Projects for Kids is a great blog for these little projects!

Michael was done for the morning, and so was Katie Grace, and now it was time for Nicholas (and Daniel!). First we had circle time. We're doing the Gnome Circle from Autumn Seasons of Joy. It's so sweet to see Daniel starting to participate. He especially loves blowing out the candle! We said our nursery rhyme together (see sidebar) and acted it out.

At the table, Nicholas did a page in his math book. Not Waldorf or even Waldorf-inspired, I know, but he wants to be like his big brother and sister! Then we warmed some beeswax while we read a story--The Apple Cake. We modeled beeswax gnomes for the nature table, and then played Dwarves and Dice, and then it was noon.

My mornings are crazy packed. Sometimes I feel like a ball in a pinball machine, bouncing from kid to kid. It seems to be working though.

Lunch, and then I had some Mothering stuff to take care of. Then we read a chapter of The Indian in the Cupboard, and followed this up with Latin. I drew a picture, and they told me the noun and adjective that described it. We also sang "Mica, Mica"-- Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.

We read the beginning of the next chapter of Story of the World, and I decided the world wouldn't end if we skipped science for the day. Daddy came home and Katie Grace and Nicholas had screen time (Webkinz for Kate, Little Bill for Nick) and I took Michael to orchestra.

In the afternoon we made cookies for the church ladies to pack up and send to college students, tieing in nicely with Martinmas and our study of generosity. We also changed the nature table and made a lantern.

All in all, a lovely day. I hope yours was lovely as well!

Blessed Martinmas!

The sunlight now is dwindling.
My little lamp needs kindling.
Its beams shine far in darkest night,
Dear lantern, guard me with your light.

Thrift Store Motherlode

Last Saturday, I hit the jackpot. Look at what I got for $3.45.

A place value abacus, an insect science kit, a wooden paddle boar, two picture books, alphabet (jello mold? ice cube tray? playdough toy?), three educational bingo games (US, fractions, and decimals), counting chip manipulatives, a farm animal manipulative game, transportation magnets, a Lauri crepe puzzle, a US Map rug...

Oh, and a bouncy ball!

Stripes and plaid. This is what happens when you let your five-year-old dress himself.

From my notebook...

Vibrant Play Dough
Combine
1 c. flour
1/2 c. salt
2 tsp. cream of tartar
1 c. water
4 tsp. baby oil

Cook over medium hear, stirring constantly until the mixture forms a ball and pulls away from the sides of the pan. Cool and then knead until smooth. Divide the dough into 4 portions. Put on rubber gloves and then pour about 2 tsp of liquid watercolor into each ball. Knead until the color is evenly distributed. Store in an airtight container and put in the fridge for extended storage.

From my notebook...

Five little chickadees sitting on the door.
Hold up hand.
One flew away and then there were four.
Put down one finger at a time.
Four little chickadees sitting on a tree.
One flew away and then there were three.
Three little chickadees looking at you.
One flew away and then there were two.
Two little chickadees sitting in the sun.
One flew away and then there was one.
One little chickadee sitting all alone.
He flew away and then there was none!

Weekend Round-Up!

Whoops! Missed the weekend again!

Here are some blog entries that caught my eye this week.

Sew, Mama, Sew! has some great entries for homemade holiday gifts. I especially liked the gifts for babies and toddlers, holidays at home, and gifts for music lovers.

Tomie dePaola made me smile as he answered some school kids' questions.

Zen Habits had 7 keys for turning bad habits into good ones as well as 7 fail-proof ways to rev up your fat burning and get lean. Apparently 7 is very Zen.

I discovered a great new-to-me blog, A Year of Crockpotting. Yum!

WeeFolkArt has the sweetest little gnomes in sleeping bags here.

Have a wonderful week!