Easter 2013

FINALLY getting around to getting this post up. Before I go into the fun little things I added to our shelves this week, I want to say that I absolutely think the focus of Easter should be on what Jesus Christ did for us. I don't mind having fun with my children, but we don't go overboard with Easter in a commercialized way - that drives me crazy to see so many people use ANY holiday just as a means to make more money.

As most of you that have read the posts on my blog, Montessori is relatively new to me. Thankfully, there are so many good resources in the 'blogosphere' (okay - I admit, that word still rings odd to me!). I am at a point now where I think I have the basics down as far as what I would like to see happen with our homeschool, and know where to go for quite a bit of information that I need to make that happen.  No way on Earth do I have anything mastered - I am always learning, and probably will be until the last child graduates! What I am trying to swing my focus on now is organizing and keeping a good schedule for myself , so that I can learn what needs to be done when, and try to stay ahead. I would love to have a great big school room where I could have everything needed at my finger tips whenever (much love over the school rooms here and here). But due to small space, I really have to learn to stay on top of what I need to have ready when current works are accomplished. All that to say this - I sat down a week ago and tried to start compiling an organized schedule of what I wanted to do, theme wise, for the next few months and what we were covering currently in the general subjects, so that I can figure out what I need to try and have ready, or what I need to get together to take the place of books that are still on the shelves. So I was able to do a bit better about knowing what I wanted to bring in this week for our school shelves, that I could put a fun twist on for the sake of Easter being on Sunday.

Here's what I came up with:

One of the first things I set up was numbers/counters. I wrote the numbers 1-10 on 10 eggs, and filled them with the right number of objects. I actually had this one out for two weeks, but didn't get pictures the first week. I rotated the objects from various small types of erasers (fish, eggs, rabbits, smiley faces etc.) the first week, to different colors/styles of pom-poms, some smooth, some with a sparkly rough texture, the second week. That gave us the opportunity to explore the difference in rough and smooth, as well, as you can see in the picture below. Buddy Boy really liked to rub them on his cheeks everytime he opened a new egg.    

I took a picture of the orange ones to show the rough texture of the sparkly ones, vs. the smooth texture of the green ones above. Something really surprised me when Buddy Boy opened up the egg with the orange ones. He saw them in the egg, gasped, and said "My rawr!!!" 

Do you get it now? I didn't expect color recognition to show in this work, but lo and behold, the connection was made :)

 I also pulled out a new filler for the sensory box from our Presidents day works - using Easter basket 'grass', I hid small erasers, ducks, birds, eggs, rabbits inside, each with a matching eraser, for them to find the matches. Buddy Boy fell in LOVE with the erasers, and would yank out all the grass, dig through and find the erasers, put the grass back in, and just play with the erasers. Not necessarily the way he was supposed to go about it, but he did enjoy himself. So much so that when I replaced the filler halfway through this week with beans, TINY egg erasers (making it harder), and a control of error sheet showing how many of each color to look for (see picture below)       

I replaced his small sensory bowl that did have beans, a scoop and a couple trucks, with a lot less 'grass' and the erasers.

I also found this really cute Chick-Tac-Toe game at a local grocery store, with a mat and pieces that all fit inside an overly large egg. I laid the mat on the shelf, and kept the pieces inside the egg. This one has been a BIG BIG hit this week - maybe it's the thinking process behind the simple game, or maybe it's the competitiveness - either way, they love it!

I also took 26 eggs and - you guessed it - wrote each letter of the alphabet on them. I actually did lowercase on the top half, uppercase on the bottom half, to make two parts to this next work. 

I decided to pick 2 colors at a time, and use all the letters from those two colors, for that particular day or two for the tray, to keep from having so many different colors getting mixed around together. I placed them all on the tray, taken apart, with the tops on one side, sorted by color, and the bottoms on the other side, sorted also by color. I wish I had a picture that actually shows what the tray looked like on the shelves, but I never took one and so you will just have to imagine what it was like. I also put a small brown basket (pictured) on the tray, with enough small objects for each letter sound. The object was to first match the upper/lowercase letters together, then find the right object that makes the beginning sound for the letter (K is for Koala, etc). I changed this one out frequently - every day, or every other day atleast - to make sure we got through all of the sounds in the alphabet.

Large eggs with small objects, and our moveable alphabet for spelling words. I changed this one out every day or two, as well, to keep it interesting. Side note - I will most likely do this off and on throughout the year with these eggs, just because I like that it gives some fun practice with the alphabet and spelling. 

I also kept this small bucket on the shelf (you can see the Chick Tac Toe next to it) with some rhyming word matching. Some were a little easier than others.

Add to that the Spring playdoh that I made for them, along with a few Easter cookie cutters (a cross, egg, and a couple different bunnies), and you have our Easter themed activities for this year! I hope you enjoyed this! I hope to have a fun and educational 'egg hunt for the alphabet' later this week, but that will have to wait for another post later this week, or next.

I encourage all of you to grab those eggs when they get marked 50% off - I plan on using them off and on all year, for many different things! Thanks for stopping by and don't forget - you can find me on Facebook under the name No Greater Honors. I'd love to connect with you there to find good ideas, funny stories, and encouragement!

Happy Easter! And remember - Jesus is STILL the reason for the season!

Matthew 28:5-6 - And the angel answered and said unto the woman, Fear not ye:for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified. (6) He is not here, for He is risen, as he said, Come, see the place where the Lord lay.

John 14:1-4 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself: that where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.

If you want to find out how our Alphabet Egg Hunt  went, follow this link to see pictures!