Momma School

I wanted to do a little bit of an organized learning time with Chess this year.  She is three and asked to go to school (after hearing about it from her cousins).  Well, I am not ready for her to go anywhere, but I thought, "I'm a teacher, I can do some school with her!"  Thus, Momma School was created.



I used my fridge space to put our calendar up.  We do "school" on Tuesdays and Thursdays for an hour or two.  The girls love singing the days of the week song and using the pointer to find the date.



I bought Chess a Kumon workbook.  I love the way they start with the most simple letters to write, instead of going in ABC order.  Chess has just started to hold the pencil correctly consistently.  She is doing great with straight lines and the letters L, T, and H.  Although her name has some of the most difficult letters to write, she loves working on her C's and tracing her name.



I love that this time gives the girls time to work together and practice sharing.  That is something we need a lot of practice with.  They did great putting this puzzle together.  Lera is very good about finding pieces that go together, but doesn't have the ability to line them up easily.  She would give the pieces to Chess, and Chess could see the correct placement and make it work.



We also made some homemade wheat bread together.  The girls always want to help me cook, and I must admit I need to learn some patience with this.  I tried to relax and let them help as much as possible.  There were a few tears, but overall it was successful.



I just love this picture of Lera.  Our little shadow student.  She thinks she is as big as Chess and wrote and colored right along with us.



Chess loves her color by number/shape book, but I have to work with her on doing it nice and slow.  She's used to just scribbling on each page in a coloring book and flying through all the pictures.  As she was working on her butterfly, she kept wanting to do the bird on the next page.  I really want her to learn to put time and energy into one thing at a time and make it beautiful and feel proud of her work.  She's learning how to fill in the shape instead of just putting a little scribble inside.



Here is our bread all finished and ready to snack on - yum!



I made the girls their own boxes.  Those letters have already been ripped off.  Hmmm.  I think all three of us will be learning a lot from this Momma school experience!