So then, we thought, “Ok, we’ll send him to St. John’s for sure.”  St. John’s is the church that we attend, and the school does have a half-day kindergarten option, but there isn’t a separate half-day kindergarten class.  Most of the kids stay for the full day, and the half-day kids just leave halfway through.  This past year, there weren’t even any families who chose the half-day option, so Stryker might be the only one.  Full day kindergarten there costs $2,496, and half-day is half that cost.  So it’s a little pricey. 

And the more we learn about school and learning and teaching, the more we see that there is a lot of wasted time in any school.  Kids have to sit and wait a lot, or “learn” things that they already know.  We know a few homeschool families, and their kids are turning out quite well.  There is a big homeschooling association in our area, and a homeschooling mother that I know told me that there are at least 7 homeschooling families in our church alone.  I also had some students when I taught high school at Living Word who had been homeschooled, and they were some of my best students.  I am already homeschooling Stryker for preschool.  It takes a lot less time than traditional schooling, and Stryker still has plenty of time to play, as children are meant to do.  We could also tailor the kids’ education to suite their interests.  Our kids will also have a strong foundation of our Christian values by the time they do enter school (which they eventually will do), and less likely to succumb to peer pressure.

On the other hand, I really enjoyed school, so I would feel bad keeping Stryker and Peytra away from something they might like.  Here’s a positive AND  a negative:  I would be with the kids ALL the time.  We’ll probably end up sending the kids to St. John’s, but it’s nice to have options.  I wish there was a half-day option for grades 1-12.

Owen with his O sandwich on O Day

For this upcoming school year, I’m going to be babysitting a little boy named Owen, the son of one of Keith’s coworkers.  It should work out well, since Owen and Stryker are only one day apart in age, and Owen will have the same vacation schedule as us. 

Owen and Stryker having a snack

I watched Owen this week while his mom was at a conference.  We spent the majority of our time at our house, but we did go to Ziegler Park and Quaas Creek Park, as well as the library and Leonard Yahr County Park, where the beach is.  We did a little bit of preschool stuff, mainly repeats of things we had done before and having a letter of the day.  Monday was O Day, when we had Oreos, Oranges, and O-shaped sandwiches.  The boys drew big Os on paper and then glued little cheerios on the O.  I also froze little toys inside an O-shaped piece of ice, and they chipped the toys out with a hammer and screwdriver. 

Owen with a pool noodle at the beach

Tuesday was S Day, when we did a lot in swimsuits – squirt guns, slides, sprinkler, and attempted slip n slide.  They had soup and strawberries for lunch, along with bread that they shaped themselves.  I was hoping they’d make letters, but we got mostly balls and snakes.  The boys also finger painted with shaving cream.  Wednesday was P day, so we had pizza, peas, and peaches.  And Thursday was M day, when we didn’t have food that started with M for lunch, but we did make muffins in the afternoon, talked about Mexico, and made a collage of things that start with M.  One of the things we did this week was attempt to set a Slip n Slide.  I put a huge sheet of plastic at the bottom of our slide, and left a hose running at the top, but for some reason, the boys couldn’t really get going on the plastic. 

Stryker, Owen, and Peytra filling a hole with water

So instead, I put a small pool at the bottom of the slide and let them land in it.  This they loved.  The only negative was all the mud they were creating around it.  Click below to see video of the boys trying it out.

Owen going down slide

Stryker going down slide

Stryker and Owen sharing a chair and a book at the library

Overall, the week went pretty well.  Owen was no trouble at all, and he is inspiring Stryker to do more pretend/make-believe play, which is nice.  Stryker is struggling to share his toys, and to realize that not everyone wants to play exactly like he does.  I think it’s better for him to learn this lesson now than in kindergarten. 

Owen and Stryker finger painting with shaving cream

Chipping away at O ice

Stryker and Owen at Ziegler Park

Stryker's reading work

This week, Stryker started working on learning to read.  We reviewed the sounds of most of the letters.  He knows almost all of the consonants, but H and Y give him trouble because he thinks they should make the “ch” and “w” sounds, respectively.  The vowels are a little tough, too, since they make so many different sounds.  But I had him trace the letters he knew on the first day green, the second day he remembered more, so those were blue, and the third day he used orange.  Some of them remain untraced because he can’t remember them on his own. 

I then used a technique that my sister Gina supposedly used to teach my brother Jacob to read.  She gleaned this teaching strategy from the educational program, Full House.  Ok, it’s an 80s sitcom, but I guess it worked.  She first taught Jacob to sound out “at” and then moved on to bat, pat, rat, etc.  I tried it with Stryker.  He is good at saying the individual sounds in order, but he can’t quite get them linked together to form a word yet.  Words that start with vowels seem to be easier, like “it,” or “up,” because the sounds blend together more easily.  Words that start with consonants, like the word “no” sound like “nuh-oh,” when he sounds them out.  But he’s getting there!  I think he would be able to read quite soon if he was motivated, but he really likes listening to us read to him, so that may actually slow his progress.

This week was Garden and Plant Week.  We didn’t do much this week other than read a lot of books about plants and gardening.  We talked about what things are plants.  We kept an eye on the progress of our garden, where the pea plants and corn are coming up, and the radishes need to be thinned.

We did a little activity where Stryker pretends to be a seed, and I “plant” him under a blanket.  Then I water him, and he grows taller and taller.  Then I stop watering him, and he withers.

Flower-shaped sandwich

I made a flower-shaped sandwich for Stryker using a cookie cutter.  He was surprisingly ok with it and didn’t complain about the unusual, girly shape. 

Yesterday, Stryker ran in from outside and said, “Mom!  One of our plants is leaving us water!”  I didn’t understand what he was talking about, so I followed him outside, and he pointed at a bleeding heart bush with water droplets on the leaves and said, “See!”  He thought the plant was actually producing water.  He was pretty disappointed to learn that it was just raindrops from earlier in the day.

Stryker (in blue) playing Kerplunk with a group of kids

This week was also the last week of Play School.  It was a really worthwhile activity since they did quality projects, ate mostly healthy snacks, and he worked on sharing with other kids.  I am already looking forward to signing him up again next year.

One day, Stryker said he was bored ( a common phrase from him lately), and I told him to read a book.  He said, “But I don’t know how to read the words!”  I asked him if he would want to learn how, and he said yes.  So next week will be Reading Week.  I’ll try to teach him how to read.  We’ll see how it goes.  That will be the last week of preschool for the year while we enjoy the summer.  Stryker can’t wait for Vacation Bible School, which is the second week in July.  He’s been talking about it since he went to it last July.

Stryker and his fruit list

This week was Fruit Week at our house.  We made a list of all the fruits we could think of.  Stryker wrote “Fruit” at the top and drew all the pictures.  He also did a dot-to-dot of bananas that I found at www.kidsparkz.com.  I made him a ladybug apple snack by using a melon baller to scoop out circles, so it would look like it had spots. 

Stryker making fruit pizza

Stryker has already had fruit at every meal for the past 3 years or so, so we really had to get creative to do something different with fruit.  We made fruit smoothies, fruit kabobs, and fruit pizza.  We had chocolate dipped strawberries.  I let him have one of his favorite snacks that I don’t like to make for him – a banana dipped in a peanut butter and honey mixture, and then dipped in raisins. 

Peytra watching Stryker slice her banana

I let him slice a banana for Peytra with a plastic knife.

Stryker with dried apple rings and an apple ladybug

We made dried apple rings, and raisins.  The instructions that I found online made it seem quite easy at first.  Just lay the apple slices and grapes on a pan and put in the oven at 100-150 degrees.  Open the oven door every few minutes to let out the steam.  Not hard so far.  But then…”the fruit will be in the oven for 6-12 hours.”  I am supposed to open the oven door every few minutes for 6-12 hours??!!  Well, fortunately, the apples were done in about 4 hours, but the raisins did take about 12 hours.  I just opened the oven door whenever I thought of it – every half hour, or less often later in the day as I forgot about it.  They turned out fine.  The banana chips didn’t fare so well.  I had them in the oven for about 3 hours when we had to leave for the library.  I turned off the oven and left the pan of banana slices in there, figuring I’d just turn the oven back on when we got home.  Well, when we got home, I did turn the oven back on – to 350 for supper.  Once the oven was preheated, I opened it to put in the chicken parmesan, which was when I found the little burned banana circles. 

We sorted play food into two groups:  Fruit and Not Fruit. 

Stryker with the citrus creature

We made a citrus creature.  You take a napkin and twist the corners.  Then, draw a face in the middle of the napkin.  Lay it over an orange, lemon, or lime, and poke it.  It will skitter across the table or floor.

We played Guess That Fruit by putting fruit into a paper bag, and then Stryker would stick his hand in, feel it, and try to guess what it was. 

We made patterns with fruit by laying out grapes and berries.

Next week will be about gardening.

Stryker with his list of things we do as a family (Go to the park, watch videos, landscape, eat, go on trips, pray, and go bowling)

This week was Family Week, since we just had family visit last weekend, and Mothers Day is tomorrow.  We talked about who are the members of our family, and also who are the members of our extended family.  We made a list of things we do together as a family.  I wrote the words, and Stryker drew the pictures. 

Stryker with his family tree

He made a Family Tree.  This one is a family apple tree.  I cut out the trunk and leaves of the tree, and he cut out the apples and glued everything together.

Stryker's picture of me (with long hair), Keith (holding Peytra's hand), Peytra, Stryker, and Defense

I wanted him to draw a picture of our family, but as I guessed, he said he couldn’t do it.  So I had already cut out circles for our heads, and I got him to draw the faces on the circles, glue the circles to the paper, and then add the bodies.

Sorting game - Stryker wrote all the blue letters (He even knew how to spell Mom and wrote it without any help.)

The number of the week was number 5, which is the number of members in our family if you include Defense.  I had him write each of our names, and then I had a basket of stuff for him to sort.  Each thing in the basket was something that one of us uses, like a pacifier for Peytra, a potholder for me, etc.  He had to lay the things on the papers with the correct name on it, and he did great. 

Stryker with our dice game

He loves dice games, so I made up a little adaption of Yahtzee where we took turns rolling five dice.  We got to take a token for each 5 that we rolled.  When all the tokens were gone, the one with the most was the winner.  You could also play the first one to get 5 tokens is the winner.

I gave him 5 tater tots at supper on Wednesday night, but he didn’t eat any of them.

Four little monkeys jumping on the bed (one already fell off)

We sang “Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed,” and I let Stryker jump on the bed with Peytra and 3 stuffed monkeys while we sang it.  We also did it using the trampoline, which was a lot safer.

I also have a little picture from Stryker’s Play School last week.  They were learning about sea life, and they made an ocean scene in a baggie using blue food coloring, shampoo, and candy fish.

Next week at Traska Preschool, the theme is Fruit, and on Tuesday at Play School, a real firefighter is coming to visit.

Again, we have a light week of Traska preschool, due to Stryker going to Play School.  The topic was manners, and I also just couldn’t find that many activities related to manners.  I wanted to do some role plays with puppets, but for whatever reason, Stryker just doesn’t like puppets.  In fact, he got in trouble at Play School this week for throwing a puppet across the room when his teacher asked him to do puppets.  Obviously, he needs to work on his manners.

Excuse Me Elephant, Thank You Turtle, Sorry Snake, and Please Pelican

So one idea I got from www.perpetualpreschool.com was to use animals (they suggested puppets, of course) to represent the courteous words and phrases.  So we had Thank You Turtle, Please Pelican, Excuse Me Elephant, and Sorry Snake.  When he would say please, for example, I’d tell him that Please Pelican was very happy!  He seemed to like that.

We read plenty of books on the subject, too, but he still needs lots of help, so if anyone has any good ideas for teaching kids manners, let me know!

One of the activities we did this week had nothing to do with manners, but it was just fun.  We are growing a hairy caterpillar.  I saw this idea in my Family Fun magazine.  You cut a row of cups from an egg carton and fill them with dirt and plant grass seed.  You can draw eyes and a mouth at one end, and it looks like a caterpillar with green hair, once the grass starts growing.  I had wanted to do this all winter, but we didn’t have any grass seed, and it would have been hard to dig up some frozen dirt.  This week, I asked Keith if he had bought any grass seed, and he said yes.  I said excitedly, “Good, I’d like to use a little for a project.”  Then I added glumly, “But I’d need some dirt, too.”  Keith responded, “Yeah, like we don’t have any of that.”  I had forgotten that our backyard looks like this right now.

Keith and Stryker digging in the dirt

This weekend, Keith is filling in some low spots in our yard with these two dump truck loads of topsoil.

Stryker by the door to his Play School room

At West Bend West High School, there is a child development class that hosts a Play School for about a month.  The high school students are learning how to plan lessons and teach preschoolers, so they invite preschool-age children to come and attend a “school” two mornings a week for 5 weeks.  Stryker’s first day was April 20, and he did fine when I dropped him off.  I tried to say goodbye to him, but he was already immersed with starting to build with Megablocks.  They have a theme each day.  So far, the first day was about the dentist and the second day was about the doctor.  He tells me about what he does there, and it sounds like they do a lot of different activities, which is great, like songs, dramatic play, art, and snack.  I was very impressed with the snack on the first day, which was bananas, apples, and grapes.  The second day, though, it was cookies and ice cream. 

Stryker with his traffic light snacks

On Wednesday, we did a mini-theme of Safety for our Traska preschool.  Stryker made these little traffic lights with graham crackers, frosting, and mini M&Ms.  We played Red Light, Green Light.  We practiced our phone number, and also 911.  I taught him a song about 911 to the tune of “Bingo,” which is one of his favorite songs.  He didn’t actually sing the 911 song with me at the time, but I sang it over and over again, so it would stick in his head, and sure enough, I heard him singing it to himself later. 

“There’s a number you can call, if you need some help.

Just call 911.

Just call 911.

Just call 911,

And somebody will help you.”

Stryker with the sport list

This week was Sports Week here in Stryker’s preschool.  We started by making a list of all the sports we could think of.  I wrote the words, and Stryker drew the pictures.  He drew something for every sport except biking.  He came up with target shooting on his own (because it’s a game on Wii Sports), and for racing he drew a cow (because of the cow racing game on Wii Play). 

We tried to play as many sports as we could this week.  We played preschool versions of tennis, frisbee, golf, t-ball, catch with a football, basketball, ring toss, and racing.

I tried to teach him to sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” but the best I could do was sing it myself and leave out some words for him to fill in the blanks.

Stryker with 4 trucks, 4 balls, 4 markers, and 4 drumsticks/wooden spoons

The number of the week was number 4, so Stryker found groups of 4 things.

Football-shaped refried beans

For a side dish at supper on Tuesday night, I heated up refried beans, and then spread them on a plate in the shape of a football.  I piped on sour cream for the laces.  I forgot to take a picture of my bean football, but this is the picture from the Chinet ad that gave me the idea.

Stryker with all of his balls

We also collected all of Stryker’s balls as you see here, and then he counted and sorted them according to sport.  He has 3 beach balls, 3 soccer balls, 5 footballs, 5 basketballs of various sizes, a tennis ball, a golf ball, a baseball, a Winnie the Pooh ball, and 14 wiffle balls/plastic baseballs.

Stryker playing ring toss

This week we didn’t do a whole lot regarding preschool, since the weather is so nice.  We did a lot of playing outside instead, which is what little boys are meant to do anyway. 

Bunny Snack and Stryker

We did make this cute bunny snack, with a lettuce leaf, canned pear half, dried cranberry for the nose, dried raisins for the eyes, almond slices for the ears, and cottage cheese for the tail.  The recipe came from his High Five magazine.  I almost bought sliced almonds, but I didn’t because they were so expensive.  I ended up literally slicing a whole almond that we had.  Later, I realized I could have just picked out two almond slices from my cereal, which is Honey and Oat Blenders with Almonds.

Stryker with his dyed eggs and bunny basket

We also made a bunny Easter basket, which is similar to one I made out of a milk carton when I was in kindergarten.  It was Stryker’s first time dying eggs. 

Of course, we talked about Jesus dying on the cross and rising, and I tried to point out how bunnies are like Jesus because they are in their holes, like Jesus in his tomb, so he would not just think of the Easter Bunny and candy this weekend.  And we listened to a Very Veggie Easter CD (VeggieTales).

The number of the week was three, and I simply asked Stryker to find 3s everywhere he could.  He immediately pointed to him, me, and Peytra, and counted, “1, 2, 3!”  He found 3s everywhere – in books, in his toys, etc.