A Summer School of Sorts

I have a list of things that I wanted to go over with Elina before she starts Pre-K in the fall. A few things are more academic like rhyming words and beginning letter sounds. Then there are social things like making friends and stranger safety. On top of this stuff, I also want to incorporate literature extensions whenever I can because I LOVE them. What are literature extensions? It's when you read a book and then extend the concepts learned through songs, movement, arts & crafts, etc. I think it's an awesome way to learn because you can reinforce the concepts in many different ways. Because we all tend to learn in different ways (I'm more of a visual learner), this helps to make sure your child will pick up the concept one way or another.

I knew I wanted to do something more structured with Elina at least once a week. I'm not really into structuring things like this, but if I don't actually schedule it in, it will get lost in the shuffle. If you don't schedule it in, you'll always find an excuse to postpone it. It happens to me all the time. "I can just fit it in tomorrow..." "I'll have more time to do it this weekend..." And it never ever happens.

I also decided to invite one other friend to participate in this "summer school" with Elina because I figured she'd have more fun if she had a little buddy. We decided to ask L if she wanted to do this with us. I really don't mind teaching 2 well-behaved (for the most part) girls for 2 hours once a week. If I had to teach more kids, then I would feel a bit more pressure and stress. With 2, it's easy.

The last few weeks we've done Where the Wild Things Are, The Frog in the Bog, and Little Blue and Little Yellow. The last book we did was so much fun. The story is so cute...2 colors, blue and yellow, are best friends and one day they hug each other so hard they become green. So it led into a big discussion about colors and mixing primary colors. The girls loved it. First I made rainbow milk, which they thought was the coolest thing ever. They were so amazed that just a few drops of food coloring could make different colors. Then we played with paint and made colors. They couldn't believe it when they mixed blue and yellow and made green. They were so excited to make purple out of red and blue. I love the excitement and surprise in kids' faces when they see things that we take for granted...mixing paint colors to make green, adding food coloring to make rainbow colors. The facial expressions are some of the best things about being a parent.

Even though it takes some effort on my part, I love love preparing these little lessons for Elina and L because they always takes away so much. It's amazing how much these preschoolers can remember and recall. Can't wait to see what other books we can explore...