Kindergarten practice at home?

[blane12]

I didn't know what to title this. We just had our open house the other day for K (he starts Monday). I'm a little overwhelmed by the amount of things they will need to know and write by the end of each 9 weeks.

We are dropping private therapy due to the distance and support he's getting during school, but I really want to refocus and work on things at home as well because I'm worried especially about the writing.

I'm going to buy some of those BOB books to start working on reading, but do you guys work on stuff at home? What 'tools' do you keep? I have some preschool books that we pull pages out of to work on already.

[Deleted]

Do you know what reading plan their using? We're less than 2 weeks in and I'm loving the one A's teacher is using, I think it's American Reading Company. They start with 60 "power words" aka sight words. They're learning basically 4 a week. The thing A loves are these books her teacher printed them out and reinforces the words. They're super simple but build her confidence. They say like "I see a bird" and then on the page is a bird so she doesn't have to read the word bird but does have to read "I see a" She's already reading 8 words when she knew 0 before she started! We read 30 minutes a night to her or with her new books.

[onehitwonder]

We have some of the activity books to practice writing letters and numbers, but I also bought an M&D wipe clean placemat and pens so we sometimes play games with it at dinner. I also have sight word flash cards that I keep in the car. W's school used the BOB books last year so I have the 1st 2 sets. Costco and Sams have them with activity pages in stock now, but I have also found them at the library. I just checked out a Starfall set and W seems to prefer them to the BOB books. All that being said, we "practice" less than an hour a week and just in short snippets here and there, like 5-15 minutes. He will start getting homework after the 1st 6 weeks so I'm not sure what we will do then.

[jaime183]

We really emphasize writing with a purpose so writing notes or making books instead of just practicing handwriting
Are you worried about the pencil grip? There's a rubber finger thing that helps them figure it out or you can put a cotton ball under the last (folded) fingers
Play doh is great to build the fine motor muscle for handwriting also practicing different types of lines in a continuous motion (zigzag, wavy, straight, loops etc)
Teach him how to spell "love" so he can write for a purpose quickly I love mom I love dad I love (picture) it empowers them as a writer

[jaime183]

Here's one of the pencil grips

[Deleted]

A's teacher provides those finger grips posted if a kid needs them, she said a lot of kids do need them at the beginning. We've also been doing play doh. Making letter and then I got letter cookie cutters so she can cut out letters.

[blane12]

Aug 23, 2017 9:39:56 GMT -5 jaime183 said:

Here's one of the pencil grips

I think those would be really helpful for him!! He's a lefty - does that matter?

[muppetinma]

Aug 23, 2017 11:51:27 GMT -5 blane12 said:

Aug 23, 2017 9:39:56 GMT -5 jaime183 said:

Here's one of the pencil grips

I think those would be really helpful for him!! He's a lefty - does that matter?

Nope.  Andrew used to use one of those and he's left handed.  I'm sure it's different for every kid, but he really only used it for a week or two until he got the hang of gripping a pencil correctly.

[imimahoney]

Our district does not allpw homework until grade 3 but I don't know if "practice" will count as homework.

Ari reads a lot but hates writing, which I understand because I hated it when I was younger. I'm hoping his teachet helps with that.

[blane12]

imimahoney - his teacher newsletter said he'd had homework weekly. When I'm home, I'll take a picture of some of their benchmarks. They're broken down by every 9 weeks (the grading period). My H thinks I'm being ridiculous and that the teachers will teach him all this stuff. Lol.

[Deleted]

Aug 24, 2017 7:17:17 GMT -5 imimahoney said:

Our district does not allpw homework until grade 3 but I don't know if "practice" will count as homework.

Ari reads a lot but hates writing, which I understand because I hated it when I was younger. I'm hoping his teachet helps with that.

I still hate writing lol. I'm glad I live in a world with computers. Handwriting was always my lowest grade

[Deleted]

Aug 24, 2017 8:08:52 GMT -5 blane12 said:

imimahoney - his teacher newsletter said he'd had homework weekly. When I'm home, I'll take a picture of some of their benchmarks. They're broken down by every 9 weeks (the grading period). My H thinks I'm being ridiculous and that the teachers will teach him all this stuff. Lol.

I have been super impressed with what they've been teaching A so far! She comes home daily knowing something new. I couldn't get her to learn a thing this summer so she did really bad on her entrance test thing but man her teacher must be a miracle worker lol.

[blane12]

I got him that pencil claw, sorting type things to use with tweezers, and the BOB books. I also got him some memory tie shoelaces which are supposed to help learn to tie shoes. Does anyone's kids know how to tie shoes?

[Deleted]

Aug 24, 2017 10:57:48 GMT -5 Loco Coco said:

Aug 24, 2017 10:06:03 GMT -5 @lindy said:

I have been super impressed with what they've been teaching A so far! She comes home daily knowing something new. I couldn't get her to learn a thing this summer so she did really bad on her entrance test thing but man her teacher must be a miracle worker lol.

My kids do so much better with teachers/instructors that are not me. Lol! They'll go more out of their comfort zone and let them push them a lot further. Just one more reason I could never homeschool. Lol.

Oh my gosh yes. I don't know how people homeschool. She's so stubborn with me.