Homeschool Journal January: Week #1

Theme: All about Me!

Focus: Name, age, likes and dislikes

Phonics: s, a, t

Huruf: ma, ba, da

Numbers: 1-20

Arqam: 1-10

Surah: al-ikhlas

Do'a: Before entering the toilet

This week we actually had 2 days only of full schooling, as their great-grandma and aunties came over. So the assessments for some main subjects will be carried forward to next week. 

I am taking the montessori style approach, with activity trays and 1 to 1 assessment. I hope that this way I can focus on both Kakak and Adik, and lessen Adik's interference when I do lessons with Kakak. 

Day 1

Our simple trays/boxes. We got the shelves at Carrefour for only RM30!  

No beans at home, so I used dhal instead. They love this!

Finger stamping on numbers. Printed from here.

Arqam puzzle with cards (they were cutouts from a RM3 poster).

Pringles container, punch-holed lid, with pipe cleaners.

Face parts word and picture cards with magnetic alphabet

Painting corner

Great sensorial too!

Make own snack : peanut butter sandwich

Sprinkle sprinkles

Concentrating...

tadaa!

Masterpiece of the day

Writing activity with brief explanation on the meaning of her name, princess Balqis.

I'm quite amazed that she can actually say out wahid till asyarah

Day 2

Changed to magnet buttons with whiteboard - both  from Daiso

Hammering activity. A hit as well! Styrofoam, golf tee and wooden hammer

Changed from pipe cleaners to straws.

Hammering away

Full body outline

Just woke from nap and straight to hammering

Adding details on her body

An everyday activity

Phonics assesment

Fine salt on card

Masterpiece of the day

Ended the school day with water activty - full dressed..lol

 Day 3 (half day)

New tray - coins and camel bank

Adik's fav!

Still at it!

Masterpiece of the day

Locked legs when full of concentration

Lil Chefs: Pancakes!

For the last 2 days, we had been having pancakes for snack time. Chocolate Chips Pancakes. The plus point of being preggy is that you can stuff yourself and put the whole blame on it!

The 2 girls just love them soo much! Kakak prefers the prep and cooking part more of course. For the second time round, she actually did it by herself while I just instructed. She even flipped the pancake in the pan, and lift it out onto the plate!  

For cooking preps, it is much easier to use clear and simple instructions. Prepare all the ingredients beforehand, explain briefly what each are, and maybe let them taste. For beginners, use the cups and table/tea spoons measurement. And also, be prepared for the mess! Don't be afraid to let them try harder tasks, like cracking the eggs. Kakak cracked her first egg successfully when she was about 2 years old.

Mixing the ingredients together. Adik not missing out on the fun too!

The camera just don't take pretty pictures. Gotta get a new one! This is by far our fav pancake recipe..its soo fluffy! 

Well, Mama just got to show off too! Craved for Roti Jala, didn't have the mould so used the plastic bottle ketchup, this method is everywhere on the net. Some people are just plain genius! Doesn't it look pretty...and with curry its just soo YUM!  

And below is a masterpiece by Kakak. She just looove to draw. She would take a piece of paper and a marker, and started to draw whatever she wants. She hates colouring though.

Flowers, picture of herself with long hair, a cat, a bear, ermm the 2 bees are actually squirrels, and below them is the Ipad?? Her tall house, trees and cloud. ~according to Kakak

'tis the season

of DURIANS!

Its that time of year again. Where you can see mushrooms-paced-growing roadside vendors (only in Malaysia though) with baskets and baskets of the spiky loots.


Either you love it or hate it. Let's see what my girls have to say about them.

Apparently some chubby fingers have deleted this particular picture, luckily Abah saved it as his wall.

It sure is face-stuffing finger-licking gooood!

And oh! Notice the new ticker at the side:

Alhamdulillah, we are expecting! 

And that could be the reason of absence. 

Or that Mama's been slacking. Big time. Time to get back on my two feet again.

O Allah I pray that you grant me enough strength and rid me of this laziness and helplessness.     

Ocean themed crafts!

We spent the last few days creating crafts relating to our ocean theme as computer is down, so no printables. Some were borrowed ideas while some others were self-inspired. 

Tissue roll Anemone

This idea was borrowed. 

 Jellyfish

Self-inspired. Used a clear cake container and painted it with Artzooka's not-so-secret paint recipe for plastic. They dry clear.

Octopus

Self-inspired. Bunch up newspapers, cover with masking tape, paint then stick in pipe cleaners! Easy!

Ocean diorama

Fish out of bowl

I actually remembered this craft was done by my tutor when I was in my primary school. Ages ago! But he did a bird on one side and a cage in the other. So I just changed this to an empty bowl on one side, and a fish on the other. Stick the pictures face out together with a stick, we used a disposable chopstick. The trick is to spin the stick between your palm as fast as you can, and you can see that during the spinning it will look as if the fish is in the bowl! 

And we also did sensory tub!  

This was played during bath time. Once.

Some real shells, miniature ocean creatures erasers, stingray and lobster wind-up toys that swim, blue water, and some water beads. Note: There was an article in the paper that Malaysia has banned these water beads, as there were cases reported of kids swallowing them and had to undergo surgery! Be extra careful with them.

Of course I had to keep my eyes peeled, Adik was already getting ready to pop everything in her mouth!   

And when I got tired of keeping vigilant in the toilet, I tossed all the creatures in a big ziplock bag, squirted in lots of hair gel, and tadaa, a safer sensory bag! This idea was inspired by another mommy, but I'm truly sorry I coudn't find which. Chanced upon it quite some time ago. 

A for angelfish

Current theme: Ocean!

Letter of the week: A 

Craft: Angelfish

From the letter 'a'

With her art supply and googled images of real angelfishes

Pasting fins and tail

Painted and done!

The paper plate fish was done much earlier. Now instead of pasting them on walls, which drove me crazy as they fell to the floor all time,  I hang them up as a mobile with fish line and clothespins. Makes the room look more interesting too! Don't you think?

Scoot scoot makeover!

There was this particular day we went to a relative's house and Kakak saw this scooter outside and started playing with it. It was in a truly wasted-looking condition but works alright. The grandma said she could take it home since they wanted to throw it away anyway. 

It was quite sad actually seeing her scooting happily with it. She didn't mind a bit that it wasn't new, as a matter of fact, it was so worn out! As much as it saddened me, I did not plan to get a new one for her, because I still stood firm in my beliefs that my children will not be getting ALL the things they want as easy as they thought, material things that is (books are different story). Some will have to wait, while others may have to be earned even if we have the means. I hope by this way they will learn to value more of what they owned and not be spoiled senselessly by materialistic wealth.   

So what I did was to promise her that one day I will make her scooter pretty and pink! That was just what we did last weekend. With cans of spray paint, some fabrics and mod podge, we started our project. After about several hours of spray and mod podging later, I was honestly elated upon seeing the transformation of the scooter! Kakak was beaming too!

Now, all it need is just a change of tyres! And maybe a bell and some ribbons. 

Tadaa!