Author Archives: pbjhomeschool

Books and Curriculum

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We will be using Konos this year for our main curriculum.  I’m really excited to get started!  I’ve been getting ready.  My favorite Konos information I’ve found is from Sprittibee.  She is SO organized and makes it seem possible to use Konos successfully. 🙂 If you do a google search for Konos organization you’ll find links to her blog.  We’ll officially start school this year just after Labor Day. Actually, we really haven’t stopped this summer we just do less and I try to make everything more fun.  B will start Kindergarten this year and J will be doing stuff along side us.  I love lapbooks and plan to do as many as we can of different subject.  Last year, Five in a Row was big for us.  We’ll continue rowing some books this year as well.  I love Five in a Row.  The booksare awesome and we never mind reading them over and over.  Some, like Lentil, we’ve read well over 5 times.  I started off just rowing the books I could find at our local library but then ended up buying quite a few used at Amazon.com.  You can also buy lots of Five in a Row books on e-bay.  Most of the books are so good you’ll want to have them in your home library.  
This summer we’ve been reading some good books.  B is almost 5 1/2 and is really close to reading on his own. I think he can read but lacks some confidence.  We’ve just discovered the Magic Tree House Series.  Here is a review from HomeschoolBuzz.com.  B and J have liked chapter books for a while now but these seem to really hold their attention.  They usually want me to read the whole book in one setting (this only takes 30 mins. or less).

A great book we checked out from the library, and love is The American Story which is  series of 100 short stories from American History.  They are short enough to hold everyone attention.  
Another book I love is Discovering Great Artists.  Each page has an artist and their story along with a project kids can do in the style of that artist.  We plan do get into some of these projects this year.  I might co-op some. It’s always neat to do projects with other families.  Makes it more fun and exciting.

Playmobil Fun Park

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Today we went to Playmobil Fun Park which is about 30 miles from the house.  This was the first time we’ve been. It’s $1 to get in but then you are tempted by the store on the way out. I let the kids get one thing and they wanted take a long kits.  We met up with some friends there and stayed for more than 2 hours.  It was a perfect escape from the S. Florida sun and time to have fun with friends.

Wildlife in our neighborhood

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A couple of weeks ago, while on our evening walk, we noticed woodpecker holes in a dead palm tree.  As we approached, we saw an adult woodpecker leaving the tree and I told the kids to go up to the tree and see if they hear babies.  Sure enough!  We could really hear them chirping away.  We hung around for a while looking and listening carefully.  A couple nights ago we stopped back by to check on them and my husband put his camera in the hole and took a  quick photo.  Looks like there are 2 live babies and one that didn’t make it.  We’ll keep an eye on the tree/nest.  I love seeing wild life and nature right in the middle our neighbor here in South Florida.

Happy about our new/used table for the school room

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We are fortune enough to have and extra room in our house that we call the school room. We do lots of our activities in there. I have the room set up so the kids can find lots of hands on things to keep them busy. They have buckets of blocks, legos, coloring books, markers, crayons, colored pencils, scissors, hole punchers, and stencils. J has magnet Dolls. There are puzzles and marbles, books…. you get the idea. A couple weeks ago, I just happened to walk into a thrift store and saw a wood table and 6 chairs for $39. The table has 2 leaves and was perfect for our needs. I bought it, and love it! We have been using a large folding table but it’s just too big. Now, I just need to figure out where the kids can put their personal stuff. I keep thinking it needs to be at arms length but that might not happen. Don’t look too closely at the mess. Hehe, the kids just left the room. 🙂 

Almost the end of our swim lessons

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We only have 2 more weeks of swim lessons left and we’ll be missing one of those to go to our local homeschool convention next weekend. We have loved learning water safety and the basics of swimming but it’s a 12 mile drive each week that I’d like to avoid. I wanted J to be comfortable in the pool before we stopped that we’ve accomplished that goal. Very exciting!!! We have a pool in our back yard so we’ll be swimming most afternoons this summer. We’ll probably do some school work in the morning then swim and relax in the afternoon if we aren’t out and about or with friends.

April Showers class at a local nature center

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Today we had a class with some homeschool friends at the local nature center. First, we went out and collected 5 flowers we would later press into a book we were making. It’s a great book we can add pages to in the future. Also in the class today we learned about spring showers and how the water cycle works. We have been going over this at home so it was a perfect time for this class. The kids seemed to really enjoy it. This is right up Beluga’s alley. At 3 1/2 that’s all she wants to do. Every time we go outside she’s looking for flowers to pick and bring home. I have a little bud vase she put them in. We keep it on the kitchen table a lot. Many mornings we have woken up to  a dandelion seed explosion all over the table. 🙂 

Accountable Kids

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In January we started using a program called Accountable Kids and we LOVE it. The program helps us gently remind the kids of what’s expected of them daily. There are 3 sets of reminder cards; morning, afternoon, and evening.


Each set of cards completed earns the child a ticket that allows them to do a privilege like watch a TV show or do something on the computer (anything that works for your family).We only have them do simple daily chores that they should do anyway; make they beds, clean their rooms, clothes into hampers, get dress, brush teeth (with our help). The tickets can also be taken away for discipline for not listen, name calling etc. It’s really worked out well.   We don’t expect perfectly made beds but sometimes they do extra well and over time, we hope, it will stick with them and realize that it’s nice to have a tidy area to play and live. Over time we can start to pay them for extra chores completed like taking the trash out. a reward for 10 days without loosing a ticket your child can get a date with whoever they choose. Here, J went for ice cream with Mama



Easter Photos

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Our Easter was rainy but we made the best of it. We had dinner at GG’s (grandma’s) and had an indoor egg hunt because it was really raining at the time of the hung. We are fortunate enough to be in south Florida so the kids and hubby even got in a little swim….. as it sprinkled.