Apr. 3, 2008 - Circle Time: New and Improved
I love the idea of circle time. I first discovered it over at Preschoolers and Peace. She uses it in a variety of ways, but for some reason it stuck in my head that the time was primarily used for Bible devotions, Bible memorization, and reading stories. We used the time close to Easter this year to go thru our Ressurection Eggs. For a time I also attempted to fit in Brain Gym activities. The Brain Gym activities generally got pushed aside as I saw the minutes ticking by with no "subjects" in our school time done. (Yes, yes I know, our schooltime is not all about worksheets. Let me tell you, though, if my hubby came home and couldn't find physical evidence of education I would have a difficult time explaining myself. No unschoolers here!) I struggled to find a balance for what I wanted to do during our circle time. I feel it's an important tool for me as Peanut (3) joins in with us officially next fall.
This past weekend my hubby and I were able to go to the Cincinnati Homeschool Convention. One lightbulb moment came during the "Teaching The Distractable Child" session. She showed a couple of pictures of her daughter doing calethenics while reciting math facts. Insert glowing lightbulb here! Why oh why didn't my wee little brain think of that before?
New and improved circle time now includes Brain Gym activities daily along with some sensory diet activities for Little Monkey (5). It fits in perfectly as we're doing these things as a group while skip counting. We do jumping jacks while counting by 10's. We have one child jumping on the mini-trampoline, one (Peanut) jumping on the couch (this is an old garage sale couch, they're allowed!), and one spinning on the sit-and-spin while we count by 2's. We switch sit-and-spin with trampoline and count by 5's. We do streamer figure 8's while counting by 25's. We do cross-walking while counting by 50's. We do wall push-ups while counting by 3's. Just this change in our circle time, doing this physical activity right before doing desk work, has improved everyone. It helps Peanut feel involved in part of our school time. It helps Little Monkey get the wiggles tamed before being expected to sit and concentrate. It helps Big Man get those wacky brain connections going.
I really, really need to do my post on Right Brain Learners from a seminar I went to last fall. This is where Brain Gym came to live with us. This was also a part of a couple of seminars I went to at the Homeshoolers Convention. I think it's fascinating how you can improved the brain connections by a few very simple "exercises". Yup, that post is probably coming up next.
Comments
Apr. 5, 2008 - Untitled Comment
Posted by MayTheyBeMightyMen
Oooooh! I love what you're doing here!
I've been working in some low level, similar things at the beginning of our day, but I can see how it can be improved. Even though my kids are a little older, I'm betting I can find something that would work well for us.
I definitely used calesthenics with my kids while they were young with certain things. We also had an agreement with my sons that they could tell me when they could no longer sit still, and we would do something to help that. (Habanero used that the most, and still does at almost 7.)
I love your posts this week! Fantastic!
|
|
This site owned by Enter name here |
|
|
|
