So we had our first day “Back to School” today…
We always have (only) fun on the first day of a new grade. We do not immediately start with structured learning. We use the first day to celebrate and introduce the new grade. Here are some things we do:
- I get up extra early so that I can have my quiet time with the Lord, and still have time to prepare the living area and schoolroom for first day fun before Buck gets up!
- I put the new stationery, books, files, and whatever else we’re going to need during the year where we can easily access them (like on a coffee table in the living area, or in our case, Buck’s little craft table), to introduce them a little later. This will create interest and curiosity as to what the year holds
- I also place our special guest “teacher”, like Mr. Fuzz or Monty the Meerkat, next to the books on the table
- I write a welcome note on the chalkboard (even though he’s an only child, I do this because it helps sets the atmosphere!)
- I always have a “1st day” poster somewhere in the area – it is almost like a trophy to Buck! I also take photos of Buck and his “1st day” poster and include it in our grade-album (a scrapbook album that covers only this year’s grade)
- I make sure our music for worship time is ready
- When the time comes for school to start, we first take “first day” photos to get the excitement levels down a little
- Then we have discussion time:
- We’ll, as usual, start our day with the Lord, with the difference at this time that we commit our whole year to the Lord, including all our plans, activities, desires, interests, expectations and fears concerning the year.
- Next, we go through the New Stuff as an overview of the year (books etc.), and introduce new ideas to make homeschooling more fun/structured (I’ll record all the ideas so that I can implement it when necessary).
- THEN, I will bring out the Homeschool Survival Kit! I thought this was a fun idea to introduce to kids. It is a simple container (in our case an A4 envelope) that we can bring out on one of “those days” (that things will just not go smoothly…) to remind us of some goals and inspire us. These are some of the items ours contains:
- Chewing gum to remind us that we “stick together” through thick and thin
- Eraser to remind us that everyone makes mistakes
- Some star stickers to remind us that we’re all stars
- A shiny coin to remind us that each one shines in his own special way
- A handkerchief to remind us to wipe one another’s tears and comfort one another when we’re sad
- A band-aid to remind us to help one another when we hurt
- etc.
- Craft Time!
- Time capsule:
- a personal photo (or two)
- photos of close friends
- hand- and footprints
- a sample of his favorite nonperishable item
- a record of his height and weight
- a handwriting sample (e.g. let him write the alphabet on strips of paper that you can use as a border on the page, or let him write his height and weight…)
- a list of his favorite music, movies, books, and foods (You can download the file here)
- Tie & Dye T-shirt
- Bookmark
- Spell our names
We will start off with Bible Reading and discuss new beginnings (I’ll use examples from the Bible), and what it means to him to have a fresh start.
We will then move on to chat about the year, the themes, highlights and goals, and include discussing what he expects (including qualities from his mom who teaches him), what he’s afraid of, and what he looks forward to.
Then we’ll present it all to the Lord in prayer (Phil 4:6)
After all the serious stuff has been covered, we will move over to do some special (first-day) crafts.
We usually make a collage of all the things Buck likes and are in his interest at the time:
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We will cut out pictures that he likes and paste it on cardstock that will be included in our grade-album, and we will include
It absolutely fascinated Buck that one can create patterns on T-shirts just by folding it and dipping it in dye. The first time we did this, we used three different color dyes. This created an interesting shirt – one he would simply not stop wearing! It was his special “first-grade” shirt, and he just loved it!
We usually make a special bookmark and use it in as many of the books we read during the year as we can
One time we used pre-cut wooden letters to spell out our names, painted them bright colors, pasted them together and hung them in the schoolroom
We do “special”crafts we can’t really do on other days, because all of it has a first-day theme. And sometimes we get carried away, and some of the crafts get done on the second day…!
I found this is a wonderful way to start a new year/grade, and it makes it special and something to look forward to (it creates an expectation of what the rest of the year will be like, though, so you’ll have to keep it up!)
