Homeschooling Work Samples | February 2017

It’s hard to believe there are only four months left for school! Didn’t we just start the first grade? If only we could stop time. This photo will just have to do!

The good news is, over time we get better at doing things. We’ve been much better at producing a collection of work samples to choose from when it comes time to submit to school.

This time I let Pinky choose which pieces she wanted to turn in. I asked her which samples she was most proud of and which ones she wanted to share. There were some pieces she couldn’t part with but I assured her that we’d make copies.

She did some great work this period and I’m excited to share it with you.

We definitely kept the samples simple, but there was a lot of learning going on these past few months. I hope these samples, though simple, help give you ideas on how to school your kids at home, or at least get them excited about a certain subject.

Here we go!

Language Arts

Alana thrives on art. When asked to create her own comic strip and story she was very excited about it. In this work sample she planned out her story by choosing the scene, creating characters, deciding on a conflict and finally a resolution. She then used a comic outline we found on the internet to tell her story in pictures and thought bubbles.

This project helped Pinky use her imagination, practice her writing skills and allowed her to express her thoughts artistically.

Math

Alana has been learning the concept of greater than and less than in class. We created several ways to practice this at home. In this work sample, Alana was given two dice. She rolled and added the numbers together to create her own word problems.

After plugging in numbers on either side of the red box she then had to use the greater than, less than or equal signs to show that she understood the concept.

This activity was very engaging for her. She was confident in her ability to use the dice, create her own problems and answer them independently.

Science

Alana took an interest in learning about the weather, especially since we’ve had some interesting patterns here at home.

After reading the book, “The Best Book of Weather,” she learned that the air is made up of gases – hot, cold, wet, dry – and that the changes in the air closest to earth is called the weather.

What stood out to Pinky the most is that the earth is wrapped in a thick layer of air, called the atmosphere. She wrote, “The atmosphere has 5 layers.”

She then labeled them with pictures of what items or objects can reach those layers – troposphere, stratosphere, mesosphere, thermosphere, and exosphere.

Social Studies

To celebrate President’s Day Pinky learned about some of the famous presidents including George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Barrack Obama. She learned about some of the important jobs the president is responsible for like, passing bills and making laws. She discovered that the president travels by personal plane and lives in the White House.

Pinky wrote about what she would do if she were president and also drew a picture of herself in the White House, traveling in air force one and giving a positive speech to the people.

Physical Education

I usually don’t share what we do for P.E. here but since we logged almost 1000 minutes of it I thought it was worth mentioning. Especially since we went on some fun hiking adventures.

Here we hiked about 4 miles up and down some rugged trail at Black Mountain Open Space Park. A hike fit for a 4 year old. Maybe? My nephew joined us for the first, and maybe the last time. Just kidding. He was a solid trooper! He walked the whole way with Pinky and her friend.

We went so high up the mountain that it looked like we hit the first layer of the atmosphere where the clouds hang out.

In the photo at the top of this post, we found a secret playground with friends on a trail in Poway. I have to find the name of it. But the kids had so much fun playing on the swings, climbing trees and walking planks!

Lots adventures already in the books for this year.

How are you getting your kids excited about learning. What exciting projects are you working on right now? Leave a comment below.