Homeschool Unit: Independence Day

Early this week I posted some of our favorite Independence Day books and thought also share some of the activities we've been doing as well. As I've mentioned before, these activities are geared for my children ages three to six. They are used as a supplement to Big Buddy's (age 6) first grade curriculum which you can read about here. Flag themed rhyming cards I've made the pdf available here.

Language -

Nomenclature cards and definitions. I've made the pdf available here. If you would like to create three piece cards just print two copies and cut the names off the ends. 

Flag themed rhyming cards. I've made the pdf available here.

Stamping vocabulary words; the younger children just focus on their names. The  alphabet stampers can be found here. They ink pads are from Dollar Tree.

Matching historical American flags. The younger kid just match them. Big Buddy and I use them to play memory. I've made the pdf available here. 

Patterning with ribbons.

Math -

Star number boards. Depending on the child's ability they can matched on a number sheet, placed on a blank sheet, or used for skip counting. I've made pdf available here. 

Threading and counting star beads

Dice and balance counting game: child rolls dice and then balance that many marbles on golf tees in a play-dough star.

Science - 

Magnetic bottle: child uses magnetic stick to make pipe cleaners in the bottle fly/dance. The bottle is a recycled plastic orange juice bottle. The magnetic stick is a strong magnetic glued to a paint stick.

Other -

United States Puzzles; both of these are from Dollar Tree

One of the quesitions I get asked a lot is how I keep my younger children occupied while I'm working with Big Buddy. Below are a few of my favorite resources.

Window Clings can be found for at Dollar Tree or on clearance after the holidays at craft stores. The sticky texture and that the kids can easily manipulate them keeps them engaged. Decorating windows, in general, just seems to be exciting; I'm also a huge fan of Crayola's window crayons. 

Flag window clings

For some reason my kids really enjoy stabbing, especially the boys; so pin punching with giant push pins is one of their favorite activities. I also keep my eye open for fun food-picks, which I let the kids count with of create designs with in styrofoam. 

Pin punching stars. I've found that notecards work well for pin punching because the weight makes them less likely to tear. Under the notecard is a piece of foam. I use small push pins to keep the the postcards in place. 

The one item we almost always have in our school room is play-dough. I make a fresh batch every couple weeks and try to keep it interesting by rotating the color and sometimes adding smells. We have a couple Play-doh sets but the item that we get the most use out of is the Wilton 101 Cookie Cutter Set. It comes with letters and numbers and plenty of holiday themed cutters so there always something applicable. 

Red glittery play-dough; the cookie cutters can be found here.