Project ideas for a 5 yr old

[DharmaDisciple]

Starting from Monday my son (was 5 in September) has two weeks of authorised absence from school so we can try out homeschooling before we commit and lose his school place by pulling him out.

I want to come up with easy fun projects for him that we can do over the next two weeks. Hopefully I will already have the resources in (we have homeschooled before so have a fair bit).

I was thinking something that is hands on, sticking, cutting and colouring type things. I just haven't found a topic to do it on. I don't have long to prepare!

I want to be able to show dh who has HUGE reservations about this, that homeschooling is okay and we will get things done.

Are there any good websites I can go to for ideas or to purchase PDF's?
Any books... I may already have them, I am going to have a look tonight.

[artgoddess]

How about a unit on the five senses? Get a book (or three of four) from the library to read at home. then go for a walk and try to ID things using only some senses. Say cover your eyes and try to figure out what kind of bird you hear. Or just smell the kitchen when supper is cooking and figure out what's for dinner. Draw pictures of the things you use the 5 senses to learn about.

[AustinMom]

Counting, cut out large numbers and stick magnets to the back and have him put them in order on the fridge

YBCR (Your baby can read) is good for reading, or I was homeschooled with the phonics system

Time-Make a clock and use it to teach time

Colors-get a basket for each color and have him fill each basket as quick as he can with things around the house. (I'm sure he already knows colors by now)

Writing-tape up large pieces of paper on walls and "write on the walls". You write something and have him copy it. Take breaks if he seem frustrated or you seem frustrated, and have him just draw or color

[artgoddess]

Are you reading? You can get a package of clothes pins and write with perm marker each letter of the alphabet, make several for common letters. Then clip the clothes pins to a pieces of cardboard or one of those paint stir sticks work great. Use the clothes pins to show sounds like "at" and what words you get when adding a "c" or an "h" or a "p" just by replacing only the first letter clothes pin.

[artgoddess]

This site has some great ideas. use the drop down menus to look up specific subjects and grade levels

http://www.education.com/activity/kindergarten/

[Momma Aimee]

i don't have a prob playing to the refree

What would impress you DH and make him feel confident??

[DharmaDisciple]

Originally Posted by Momma Aimee

i don't have a prob playing to the refree

What would impress you DH and make him feel confident??

Well the main one is socialisation. He is very popular at school and I doubt they will play with him when home schooled as the parents think it is weird and tend to stay away. So he will lose friends, and have to start making new home schooled friends and the group seems to be very small and spread out.

The other is he wants it very structured to cover as much as they do in school one that encourages self discipline so they won't shy away from hard things and can integrate into a structured environment when it is time for them to get a job!!!

[DharmaDisciple]

Thanks for all these ideas by the way, they are fab and I will be using them xxx I can't wait

[alicia_woods]

This site offers lots of free worksheets. Just pick the category and it will give you a list of worksheets you can download in pdf format. http://www.kindergartenworksheets.net

[Love_My_Babies]

You could ask the public school or check out a book on "What a Kindergartner Should Know" and then put together a plan from there to comfort your DH.

My oldest is 5, and here is the project he recently came up with on his own....

He collects leaves while we are out on nature walks. He brings them home and traces around one leaf on a piece of paper. He looks through his tree identification books until he finds the leaf and then copies the name onto the tracing paper. Then, he asks me to dictate the date and street name where he found it. Finally, he punches holes in the paper and puts them in his three ring binder. This week the leaves are starting to change colors, so he would like to start pressing and preserving his favorites. Another homeschool mom suggestion he make a tree mural in his room with the preserved leaves, and he is very excited about that. He also picked a few trees in the neighborhood that are his favorite. So, he is going to take a picture of these trees weekly and keep a flip book to see how they change throughout the seasons. When the leaves are all gone, we will try our hand at identifing trees by bark and make bark rubbings.

Last year he enjoyed putting out new bird feeders. Inspired by Little Acorn Learning, we kept tally on a big bulliten board of how many times certain types of birds visited. He made observations and predictions about his visitors migration patterns and dates. There are great websites that have bird identification by sound or sight.

[Lillian J]

I guess you're probably aware of this, but a two week "trial" of homeschooling is neither realistic nor fair, especially with a child that young and with a dad who doesn't know much about homeschooling yet. If you find that your child balks, just be aware that it's perfectly normal when a child suddenly finds himself in that situation - so the most practical way to cope with it is with more relaxation rather than tightening up.

You might take a look through my page of links to articles about learning at that age, and below those a number of annotated links to websites that have lots of ideas for fun activities for children that age - preschool/kindergarten. And a good investment of your free time in the next few weeks would be reading through the threads here about people dealing with skeptical spouses or relatives - lots and lots of helpful ideas, tips, and related experiences: DH is *really* concerned about socialization. This post has some suggestions for other helpful reading, including some very positive research.

Have fun! - Lillian

[SundayCrepes]

What about science experiments?

This is a book of random experiments http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/158...=ATVPDKIKX0DER There are many others out there.

This is an actual science curriculum that you can use http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/143...=ATVPDKIKX0DER