This week has been full but fun! We have really been enjoying our Jan Brett book focus for language arts this month, (We read Gingerbread Baby and First Dog the previous two weeks) but this one has been our favorite so far. I have a whole bunch waiting in our book basket for the next few days leading up to Christmas and I am super excited to read them to Wyatt.

This week I tried to turn what we had to do into more fun versions for the holidays. We played with word families, by adding the reindeer for each word family to the correct sleigh (ex. red went into the -ed sleigh) and Wyatt loved this! I am going to have to figure out more ways to do something similar throughout the rest of the year. We did journal and copywork for The Wild Christmas Reindeer, and imagined what it would be like to have a pet reindeer. Then we read a brand new to us book, Santa’s Story which we both really loved. I am pretty sure it has become Wyatt’s favorite Christmas book this year. We also retold the story using little stick puppets and then did some story mapping.

For math, we used some Forest Friends printables that I bought, which is adorable. It is a framework with little forest animals that you can use for adding and subtracting manipulatives, and since it is not Christmasy only wintry we can continue to use it alongside our regular math this winter. Science and nature was well, all about reindeer themselves. Diagramming a reindeer, experiments and lessons on how they communicate, what they eat, their life cycle, how they eat, how they see, etc, which ended with making a reindeer castanet to simulate the sound of reindeer’s hooves, and a mossy reindeer ornament after a reindeer’s diet. We also talked about herd migration, which was tricky since Wyatt is a Santa believer and in his magic reindeer. I told him that all other reindeer walk, unless they are one of Santa’s reindeer. Today we have a few painting projects left but I am waiting until later in the afternoon to do them, as Wyatt generally needs a bath after.

And now, we are on break! We try to follow the same schedule as my niece in public school, so today is our first day off for two weeks! Wyatt and I both definitely need one. We finished strong and with a bit of holiday magic to get us to the end, and now we can relax for a bit. Or at least, he can. I can relax once Christmas is over…

Books We Read:

Resources:

Curious Trails: Reindeer from Books and Willows (I bought this as part of a winter bundle but you can buy it separately)

Forest Friends Math from A Childhood Set Apart (also bought as part of a winter mega bundle)

If I had a pet reindeer printable (free!)

And Jan Brett’s website has a ton of free printables to use with her books!

And with that…I had better get ready to paint!