LOL sorry for the music

I don’t know how the Mario Bros. video game music got onto my playlist but I can’t get it off! I have to redo it and then I might put it back on the blog. How come nobody told me?! I never have the audio on so I had no idea. :p

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From a Reader – Remember Italian Muslims in Your Du’a

Mujahida says:

As salamu aleikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu.

I’m an italian revert sister, please share it and support your brothers and sisters in Italy. Barak’Allahu fikum.

Italian MP Calls Prophet “A Paedophile”

Words of Encouragement for Sr. Mujahid, InshaALLAH:

Abu Qabeel said: “We were with `Abdullah ibn `Amr ibn Al-`Aas and he was asked which city would be conquered first, Constantinople or Rome? So `Abdullah called for a sealed trunk, and he said, “Take the book out from it.” Then `Abdullah said, “While we were with the Messenger of Allah writing, The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) was asked, “Which city will be conquered first, Constantinople or Rome?” So Allah’s Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) said, “The city of Heracilius will be conquered first,” meaning Constantinople.” (Ahmad, Ad-Daaramee, and Al-Haakim)

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Whole Words

A couple of years ago, I purchased some flashcards from Staples to help make reading more fun. I never used them though. My daughter preferred to read words off the whiteboard and never really used flashcards that much, so I tucked them away to be used later on by one of the other children.

Now that I am the only one home with four children, they are an integral part of making things run smoothly and keeping folks from getting into mischief as I help out the other little folks.

My son seemed to like the cards because the pictures are very colorful on one side (the back has other words and it’s in black and white).

Three Letter Words Split

Three Letter Words

This is what my oldest was reading at three:

our daily words

Yikes, I’ve been taking it easy on the boy! I didn’t realize she was so far ahead at that time. I started homeschooling her three months before her fourth birthday and he started a month before his fourth birthday. This reminds me that all children are different but I should also push them beyond what I think they are capable of doing so that I don’t hold them back.

Don’t worry, InshaALLAH, he gets his fair share of words too. He hasn’t learned all of the sounds of the alphabet yet, but he knows enough to read these words. I like to mix it up and add a few here and there so that we can get started reading sentences right away. It’s empowering to them and it’s so nice to see them picking up books on their own.

Find The Word Game

Read The Word

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Reading and Writing

We have a calendar in the classroom which I purchased from Staples some time ago. It’s bright and colorful and comes with lots of goodies. But I don’t have the time or patience to keep up with it when the time comes to change it. It’s just not a priority but it’s embarrassing when it still says September on the first of November, lol. My husband brought home a nice solution:

New Calendar for the Classroom

It’s so much easier to keep up with this one! I still have the weather graphs and the other accessories up but this will save a lot of time, InshaALLAH. I also need to add the Hindi numerals so that they can practice their Arabic counting as well.

My son is doing well with his reading, MashaALLAH and learning new words by the day. We are still doing the alphabet folders and should have the next couple finished soon, InshaALLAH.

Today, we played around with the Scrabble letter tiles. I asked him to put them in alphabetical order and he used the mini chalkboard as a guide. He knows how to sing them in order but I didn’t allow him to sing the ABC song as he went along. This frustrated him but I made him finish.

Alphabetical Order

Tomorrow, InshaALLAH, I think we will work with some whole words (three letters) and see how many he can figure out….

In other news, the illegible handwriting issue is being resolved, InshaALLAH. We are doing a unit study on the animal kingdom and classification and it has some nice copywork pages for my daughter.

I made her go over it several times to correct the punctuation mistakes and saw her using this:

For Kids Who Like to Erase

What a funny kid!

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A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Sometimes it’s best to just let them out for the whole day.

Let's Go Outside!

Uplifting

Forest Grump

A Babe in the Woods

One Lone Boy

Falling Up

Golden

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Free Reading Resources

This is an intervention program designed to help students who are weak in phonics but it can also be used as a free reading curriculum for K-1. There are lesson plans laid out for 40 weeks, 5 days a week for 30 minutes.

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Mini Office Completed

Quick Reference Mini Office

I finally completed a mini office for my oldest. It’s handy as a reference tool for her and I can push her to work independently every now and then since the information is at her fingertips. There is information on all four sections, front and back.

Quick Reference Mini Office

Quick Reference Mini Office

Quick Reference Mini Office

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She’s Done It

So, after a few weeks of using the multiplication chart, my daughter has managed to fill it out, MashaALLAH.
A few days ago, she completed it but when she left the room to tell me, my two year old erased it! So, after many tears, she started it over but took her time because her motivation was down.

Almost

Yesterday, she brought it back and showed it to me and here is the finished chart: There was lots of erasing and rewriting on the bottom right corner but she managed to get the answers.

She did it! She finished it the next day after erasing a lot.

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The Letter Bb

Today was lots of fun for the kids. My oldest is a great help and I don’t know what I would do without her presence. She is responsible enough to finish her own work and then assist with the others, AlhamduLILLAH.

She’s currently finishing the third installment of her second grade reading series and I think that we will both be glad when she’s done, InshaALLAH. Then, I hope to take a stronger literature approach.

Last In The Second Grade Series

We are also pushing along with multiplication and we’ve added copywork so that it will sink in.

Copywork

She started division as well and she’s grasping the concepts well, AlhamduLILLAH.

Division

Then, we made a lapbook/folder for the letter “B”.
Letter Bb Folder

We use Alphabooks so that my son can learn whole words as he recognizes the letters and their sounds.
Alphabooks - Letter Bb

For the inside, we used a story called A Little Bird and we made a hand puppet to go along with the poem.

Bb Folder Inside

B is for Bird

Coloring the pages

We also made paper boats after listening to and reading Curious George Rides a Bike and of course they had to try them out immediately.

DSC_0856_edited

The instructions are in the book and once my daughter got the hang of it, she was off and running.

Docking Station

We made 19 boats throughout the day!

We Made About 19 Boats

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