FREE preschool homeschool curriculum!!

I'm a sucker for homeschool freebies because it just makes homeschooling a whole lot easier! As I've shared with my mom friends, I don't really follow a curriculum in our preschool homeschool. I just observe what my girls are into and incorporate it in our daily lessons. The problem with my system is that I always lose track of what my kids are "supposed to learn" in preschool. And that's where homeschool freebies come in, particularly free preschool homeschool curriculum!

There are a lot of homeschooling moms who offer free curricula that you can download online. However, the problem with these is that they offer the curriculum in sets. For example, one homeschooling blog is offering an alphabet-based preschool curriculum. She releases ABC this week, DEF next week (or month), and so on. After maybe 3-4 weeks, I completely forget to download the next sets!! Sucks. Download set - print - lesson - wait for next set - forget :(

 

So when I received an email from Homeschool Giveaways (I'm an email subscriber; you should subscribe too! They send fab freebie and giveaway alerts!) a few days back about getting a FREE preschool curriculum, I was ecstatic! Now I can follow our girls' progress in one single PDF. And if I feel extra industrious, I might even print some worksheets (also in the pdf) for the girls to work on ;-) Which reminds me, I need to buy ink for our HP printer, haha!

The "Look What I can Do!" curriculum is $19.95 normally~ fair price actually but if you can get it for free, such a blessing for frugal homeschooling family! :) It is composed of 34 lessons that will teach your 4- and 5-year olds about letter recognition, phonics (letter sounds), writing upper and lowercase letters, writing their name, read simple words via phonics, counting 1-10, shapes, opposites, days of the week, and most importantly: positive character traits! You can download the free curriculum HERE.

Your next step? Download the free preschool curriculum asap as it expires on February 28, 2015. And then share this blessing to other homeschooling families! Remember, sharing is caring! ♥♥♥

FREE Valentines Day preschool printables!

Hello February!! :) I can't believe January is done! It seemed like the New Year celebration was just yesterday. How time flies!! And so, here we are, the second month of 2015. Valentines Day in two weeks, Chinese New Year, and our girls' birthdays in five weeks. Yes, yes, I have tons of stuff to do! But first, I will print and prepare homeschooling items for Valentines.

I have 3 main websites that I visit to download free homeschooling printables: education.com, Teachers Pay Teachers, and CurrClick. There are a lot of homeschooling blogs and websites that offer free printables but I prefer these sites for the sheer amount and variety of printables they offer :) Also, just to make it clear, these 3 sites also have paid homeschooling stuff, and the Davao Homeschooling Family has used both free and paid content on these sites. Anyway, here are some awesome free Valentines preschool printables that we found:

Valentines Day preschool Math printable from education.com :) The site has seven more preschool Math printables for Valentines so don't forget to download it all! Go here: http://www.education.com/slideshow/preschool-math-printables-valentine/valentines-day-beginning-subtraction

Homeschool Saturday Wrap-up 2015: Weeks 2 and 3

Hello everyone! Welcome to the first edition of Homeschool Saturday Wrap-up. Twice a month (or bi-monthly if you prefer that term), I will be doing a round-up of our homeschool activities for the previous 2 weeks. I hope that this peek into our Davao homeschooling life will help you / give you an idea how to run your own homeschool too :) Enjoy the photo overload! Haha!

Week 2: January 4 - January 10, 2015

Jan 5: First day of school for 2015!

Jan 6: Big blocks and Lego bricks the whole afternoon :) 

Davao Homeschooling Resources: Offline Edition

Hello, hello! A handful of moms asked me where I get my homeschooling items here in Davao City and I shared with them the few stores that I buy from. I figured it would make a good post in case there's someone out there searching "where to buy homeschool items in Davao" :) Without much further ado, here's my top 3 favorite stores for our homeschooling needs:

1. BOOKSALE - This is a bookstore that sells preloved books so it's very, very affordable. I bought several almost-new Level 1 reading books from them for only P20 each! My usual budget when I go rummaging in BookSale is P100-150, and that's good for 5-10 books already. Frugal me is very happy! :) BookSale has branches in different Davao malls. It's in SM Ecoland (second floor), NCCC Matina (ground floor), SM Lanang to name a few. Here's some of our photos while visiting BookSale and the books we bought from it:

Recent rummage in BookSale, mid-2014 in SM Ecoland I think.

All the Christmas books here (left side) are from BookSale. That awesome Charlie Brown Christmas was only P75 and in mint condition! Love love!

Hardbound books of classic nursery songs with hand / body movements (Eensy Weensy Spider, Row Row Your Boat, This Little Piggy, etc) for only P25 each! I bought all I could find, 7books in all, hihi! That's the stack of books in lower left :)

From 2013! This is in NCCC Matina BookSale :) Aside from story books, there's also school activity books here and non-fiction (animals, plants, science) for your homeschool subjects.

Top 3 Gifts for Homeschoolers

Christmas may be over but we're not done opening gifts. It's not because we received too many gifts but because I don't let the girls open ALL gifts during the holidays. You know how it is when you let kids open everything at once: they get bored with the gifts all at once too! And you are left with bored kids and rejected toys (all the while coping from the holiday stress). So not fun at all! And the precious gifts aren't appreciated properly also, plus the kids miss the value of gift-giving.

And thus, until now (nearing mid-January), we still have presents to open :)  Here are the top 3 favorite gifts that my Davao homeschoolers received (so far) for Christmas 2014:

1. BRICKS AND BLOCKS! Whether it be Lego, Megabloks, Fisher-Price Little People Building Sets- you can never go wrong with blocks (except probably when the kids don't clean up and the 'rents step on a Lego block~ major aw! haha). Plus it fosters bonding time with the child and parent as they build blocks together :) My kids' paternal aunt and uncle got them Lego Friends sets while we gifted our youngest with the Fisher-Price blocks. Small bricks and big blocks~ perfect for their fine and gross motor (hand) skills!

Check how it looks like when fully built in Amazon :)

first day high!

And just like that, we're back to homeschooling! :) It's as if the hectic Christmas holidays didn't happen and we're just rolling along our "normal" routine. Unfortunately, I'm reminded everyday that the holidays did happen because there's a huge stash of opened gifts by our bedroom door that I didn't clean up yet. Hohoho! #OrganizeMe2015 is clearly not happening in our home! But... we'll talk about organization in another post as today is all about our first day of homeschool for 2015!

If you're a bit confused with the post's title, it refers to the feeling of optimism or excitement ("high") during the first day of school. Which is what January 5, 2015 was in our home :) And instead of slowly easing into our homeschool routine, we jumped right into it after breakfast! I remember when I was a kid that I dreaded going back to school after the Christmas or summer breaks; but thankfully, our two girls are excited to do school activities again.

The Eldest (right) wanted to color her Jollibee placemat (from her cousin's birthday party) while The Youngest started her pre-writing exercises. Her book is wipe-clean and is a gift from her aunt. Thank you Aunty Rye! She loves it and finished half of the book in one sitting, w00t! Our toddler's focus is definitely improving :) After all the writing and coloring, we had our reading and Math lessons with this awesome flip book:

Top 4 activities homeschoolers do on Christmas break

For us homeschoolers, the term "Christmas break" (or any other school break) is a misnomer because we don't really take a break from educating our kids. I've noticed that homeschooling families or parents are always wired to look for opportunities that encourage hands-on learning and let the kids work on non-academic (but equally important) skills :) They are actively participating in their kids' education~ wherever, whenever. Of course, there are non-homeschooling parents who are like this also so I'm not judging okay? Haha!

We live in a tropical country by the way so it's easy for us to spend time outdoors as listed below. If you are experiencing winter during Christmas, you can substitute catching and petting animals to making snowmen or playing with snowballs. We would love to experience that! Soon, we hope.. <3 Anyway, without much further ado, here are the Top 4 activities my homeschooled kids did this Christmas break. 

1. Learn new skills. In our case, the girls started their piano lessons. The Eldest also expressed that she wanted to learn playing the guitar / ukelele AND doing art lessons. Okaayyy.. That will take up her summer break as well, haha! Ask your child what his / her interests are and look for lessons in your area that fit it.

FREE Homeschooling Resources - MOOCs 1

One of the many reasons why I am thankful for the internet is that tons of educational sites are literally just a click away from me and my kids. And because of these sites, I've started "homeschooling" too :) The websites where adults (or highly advanced kids) can learn university-level subjects or courses are called MOOCs or Massive Open Online Courses. I have tried and finished (some, haha) different courses from different MOOCs, and loved it all! I'm a lifelong learner so it wasn't a surprise that I'd take to this new learning tool like fish takes to water ;-)

I first heard about the term "MOOC" in 2011 when Sebastian Thrun made his artifical intelligence class available online. I think I saw the link to his class being passed around in Google+. He's a much-respected Stanford professor so a lot signed up for his free, QUALITY course. I was one of them. But alas, I wasn't able to finish it as I became pregnant with our second child (plus a hyperactive toddler) which left me with no energy at the end of the day. Due to the popularity of his course, Mr. Thrun soon founded Udacity in 2012. I signed up there and took CS101 or Introduction to Computer Science. I love tech, CS and programming* but my teen brain was stuck on making my childhood dream of becoming a doctor come true so I took BS Biology in college instead of BS CS. But thanks to Udacity, I was able to self-study CS at my own pace in 2012 :)

DIY Advent Calendar

The last I checked the calendar, it was December 1. And now we're down to the last 12 days to Christmas! That meant we were halfway the Advent season! Which reminded me that I haven't shared our DIY Advent Calendar here yet. This is actually our first year of doing the calendar and introducing the concept of Advent to the kids. Which, of course, leads us to the discussion on the real meaning of Christmas :)

That's our calendar above, which I posted in my Instagram last Nov30, the first day of Advent 2014. Here's what I said then: Our #AdventCalendar! :) The kids and I painted the paper rolls a few days ago and I finally assembled it today as it's the first day of #Advent. To assemble, I used leftover ribbons (to tie rolls together), washi tapes (to decorate white rolls), and Sharpie pens (to write numbers). Easy peasy! <3 As for the daily gifts, since the preschooler can read already, I'll tuck in clue notes inside the rolls on where to find the gifts. Exciting!

Yes, we used recycled toilet paper rolls. And yes, I hoard the rolls. Haha! We used poster color to paint the rolls and let it dry fully for days before I assembled it :) How about you and your family? Do you celebrate Advent? If yes, do you make your own calendar or do you just buy one in stores? Share your experience with us in the comments below!

FREE Nativity Printable set for PreK-K :)

Yey! The search is over! I've been looking for a cute and not-too-academic Nativity printable set for the girls to work on this Christmas season and I finally found one! We are already doing Advent calendar daily and occasional Christmas worksheets but I felt the need to have Nativity printables. Probably to instill more in the kids that Christmas is about CHRIST and not gifts, hihi! ;-) Thank you mommy Tara of EmbarkOnTheJourney.com for making this. It is very lovely! :) Take a look at it fellow Catholic homeschooling parents:

Nativity printable set for PreK and K students :)

As you can see, it has writing exercises (whole alphabet and names of the Nativity characters), puzzles (for pairing small and big letters), do-a-dot page (dot "J" for Jesus), stick puppets (sooo adorable!), and The Eldest's fave activity: beginning sounds! :) The whole set is 19 pages in all. Go download the FREE set here <-- Mommy Tara also has a great Polar Express printable set if you and your kids are into this wonderful classic story. For free also! So generous of her! <3

How about you mommy? Found an awesome Christmas printable for your PreK/K student? Do share in the comments below! I looove hunting down lovely printables!

3 Tips for Homeschooling Success!

My girls have been homeschooled for more than a year now, and it has been such a joy to witness them bloom and learn! There were rough days (mostly me being impatient) but the reward of being part of their learning makes everything worth it :) If you're new to homeschooling or has hit a rough patch (it's normal by the way, hihi), here are the top 3 things I learned to make it enjoyable for you and your kids:

1. KNOW YOUR CHILD'S INTERESTS.

And use it in their lessons. When I started homeschooling the kids, they were very fascinated with penguins and anything that lives in the North / South Poles. And so, for Math, we counted penguins (stuff toys, small figurines, etc) jumping into a bowl of water. Needless to say, it was a hit and it made abstract Math more concrete and enjoyable :) For pre-writing, I look for writing implements with penguin design. That's how The Eldest learned to make shapes (see below). See the pattern here? Lessons with the kids' current favorites WILL hold their interest long enough for them to learn what you are teaching.

PRE-WRITING / Preschool Writing :)

Homeschooling young kids

And by young, I mean less than four years old :) When I started homeschooling, very informal mind you, my kids were 15months old and 3years & 3months old. Our "lessons" consisted mostly of sensory play with play dough and blocks. Some involved food, hihi! Here are some of our Instagram photos from mid-2013:

PRETEND PLAY WITH PLAY DOUGH! The Eldest made bacon, spaghetti, burger, and pizza. Green bacon doesn't look appetizing noh? Hihi!

PRESCHOOL ART by The Eldest. Correction fluid + wooden blocks = toddler modern art :p