March Study Guide 2020
Just a few short weeks until the official start to Spring. Daffodils are popping up in the yard.
This is what we have on deck learning-wise this month. For reference, both my kids are roughly at a first grade level. Many of the resources I’ve linked to reflect that.
For more family fun inspiration, check out my March list.
Ballet classes continue. We’ve been challenged to learn the splits for a banana split party at the end of the season and we’re continue to learn a new routine to a song from Zootopia called Foxy Fakeout.
Forest school continues. Rain, sun or snow, we’re in for another round of Forest School. We have a new teacher and new friends with plenty of exploring abound.
Monthly kids book club. The group’s age range is 5 to 10. We meet with other homeschoolers and a children’s librarian to talk about the month’s selection. We also do an activity around the content of the book. This month, we’re reading The Emperor’s New Clothes by Ying Chang Compestine.
In other learning news:
Language arts
We’re continuing to learn word families and consonant blends to build our vocabulary. The kids have a matching word family game they like to play. We also broke out our Scrabble Slam Card Game recently. We try to read together as a family every day and at bedtime.
The kids have a game called Teach Your Monster to Read that I have them play for twenty minutes or so before they can play the other games on their tablets. The game is geared towards the K-2 set and the adventure play is right up my youngest’s alley,
One of our favorite activities, poetry teatime (inspired by Julie Bogart’s Brave Learner) continues. It is our special time to read our library book selections and talk about literature over a treat and a cup of tea or another tasty beverage and treat.
The kids seem to enjoy learning ASL (American Sign Language). I’ve checked out Signing Time DVDs through our local library and still use our flash cards that I pull out when we have some down time in the car.
Podcasts are perfect for our car rides and we’re still listening to Circle Round. Each week, this literary-focused podcast tells folk tales, fables and stories.
Music
I like to kick off our Mondays with a bit of Mozart. It helps us ease into a busy week. General music appreciation is part of our everyday. We often have music playing in the background — from reggae, bluegrass, opera to a motivational playlist of favorites. The kids love playing the keyboard freestyle and dance parties with different music.
We’re continuing to learn piano but mostly informally. Although we check out the free video learning series for piano called Hoffman Academy from time to time.
Movement
Between our goal of spending 1,000 hours outside this year, our impromptu evening dance parties, forest school, family hikes and our weekly ballet class – we have a lot of movement going on in the house. Tee ball starts up soon and our youngest is very excited about that.
Arts and crafts
We usually have a few crafts tied into our learning during the month but the kids tend to go off on their own and create what they see in their heads. They’ve even taken to designing their creation beforehand. It’s a fun process to see. Read more about some of our favorite craft activities here.
Social emotional
We found this resource for watching older episodes of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood and the kids enjoy that.
We also turned blank notebooks into gratitude journals. Every few days, the kids draw a picture of their current mood and a few of the things they are grateful.
Another thing I’ve been looking into is improvisation. I recently checked out 101 Improv Games for Children and Adults and recharged a few ideas for practicing control, emotion and creativity.
Social studies
March is Women’s History and Irish American Heritage Month in the United States. While not a heavy focus for us, we plan on learning about them.
Health
We are continuing our food logs and have been learning about different vitamins and minerals in food. We get the kids involved in food prep and baking often.
Science
We’re continuing the Exploring Nature with Children curriculum. I like reading the text and the different areas of study found each week. From art appreciation, a poem, outdoor exploration and extension activities. This month, we’ll be studying nesting birds, spring ponds, the vernal equinox and garden snails.
On the weekends, the kids look forward to doing a Kiwi Crate box and science experiments from the Magic School Bus Chemistry Lab.
Math
We cover a lot of math (especially fractions) when the kids are in the kitchen cooking and baking. We also practice our number combinations with our math dice game. Printable worksheets and guided game-centered lesson from Education.com continue to be a tool for us. The kids work on number tracing daily with calendar practice and through their math sections in their workbooks.
The kids also enjoy playing on the app, Moose Math and practicing functions on their dry erase board.
We also recently checked out Bedtime Math from the library. So far, it’s been a fun way to teach practical applications and story problems. Each story ends with several math questions geared toward different age groups.
Other things:
Forest School has inspired us to get outside together as a family more, so we’re planning on taking more hikes in addition to exploring our community together.
That’s our learning plan for March!
