You know the first day of school, really, the first week of school - when your kids jump out of bed, do their chores, and are eager and excited to start each day of school? Then something happens...you have a long weekend, daddy has been home, you've had a bit more summer - and wham - WEEK TWO - slams you in the face? Kids start to whine, slowly, through their chores - they complain about math and spelling, and heaven forbid you ask them to write something. Gasp! What a horrible homeschooling mother you are. :)
I wanted to find a way to combat that this year. On Monday night, we were starting to get a bit grumbly about school the following morning, so I (off the top of my head - seriously, all my best ideas come out this way) said - "How could you possibly not be excited about school tomorrow?" Curious glances met mine... "Don't you know what tomorrow starts?" Now I had their attention. "Starting tomorrow morning, and for the next two weeks, we will have color days." After the questions died down - what is that, why colors, which colors, will rainbows be involved? I said, "Each morning when you awake, there will be a clue card on your dresser, letting you know the color of the day. You need to dress in that color (as best you can) from head to toe." On the top of each paper that you have to write you name - you can do that in marker (oooo - this is a big deal at my house) in the color of the day, and each day we'll do a craft that has to do with that color. Well - I can't begin to tell you how well this worked. They went to bed quickly and easily the night before, and eagerly woke up to do their chores.
Day one, the color was blue. Jake's card simply had the color word written - Alex and Bee had clues for each letter and had to solve the puzzle to figure it out.
Here is how they dressed:
We're still doing "apples" as a theme this week, and we needed new bookmarks, so we made "blue apple bookmarks". They were thrilled with these, and they were so quick and easy to make. I simply shrunk a picture of an apple that I found on enchantedlearning.com, and copied it three times. I had the kids pull as many shades of blue out of their crayon bins as they could find.
First they colored them in.
Then, have them glue their papers on a piece of blue cardstock (or construction paper).
Next, help them cut out a length of contact paper (I did this for my kids - they always tend to have a hard time with it.), to "seal" the bookmark.
Finally, have them cut out the bookmark, and add a ribbon or lenth of yarn.
Here is the final product.
A cute, easy, and exciting way to start week two.
I hope your homeschooling adventure is off to a fantastic start, I know ours is!!
Stacy
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