The Verb

As most of you know that have been reading the last couple of weeks, Little Mama has been getting a review of parts of speech. Most she already knows - or doesn't realize she knows, but knows. :) Confused yet?

Anyway, we don't have to take it as slow as I would, were I presenting this to Hoss, or Miss Priss, because this is just reviewing before we start on the advanced parts of speech and sentence analysis. I wanted to get the verb presentation in this week, and begin to teach her about the different types of verbs in a sentence, some of which might be a little new to her. She has been trying out sentences to show other parts of speech, and linking verbs and helping verbs pop in there, so I know she has the correct usage down, just needs to know what she is doing. 

On Wednesday, I had prepared to give her the verb review presentation. Then, she woke up wanting to sew. My little girl wants to sew on a machine badly, and I will admit I just need to MAKE myself sit down and get her started. I love to sew - when I have time - but I have to be in the mood to do it, and I wasn't. So I sat there, trying to figure out how I was going to deter her from sewing - because I didn't want to - and give her a verb lesson instead. Then a light bulb moment came - why not combine both? I told her I would sit with her and teach her how to start using the machine - as long as she brought her notebook, because we needed to review verbs first.

I will put in a disclaimer here - normally, the verb lesson would be given with a black pyramid and red ball. You can buy a wonderful set for this lesson here through Kid Advance, or almost any other site selling Montessori equipment. But, I don't have one - yet. I would NOT give this lesson to Hoss or Miss Priss without the correct materials, because they still have so much time to spend with the grammar symbols. Little Mama is moving so fast though, and I knew she would be able to understand what they should be and the connection between these and the printable grammar symbols we use.

We talked again about the role of the noun, and then the verb. She was able to tell me already what a verb does. I  used this opportunity more to show the place of the verb with the noun family. I did use these materials to give her the experience of the verb showing action and always moving - such as the ball.

We talked about where the verb can go in the sentence, and that it does not change the order of the noun family at all.

Example #1 - Noun family + verb

Example #2 - Verb + noun family

I have a simple work basket set up with mini objects, word cards, and phrase slips (missing their verb) set up for work on this. We used it to practice labeling phrases with verbs - I think I have about 8 example phrases in it.

Then, we moved to the sewing part of it. The excitement was paramount!

Not pictured above is me teaching her how to thread the machine, where the thread is going to come out, etc. Then the steps to pulling the bottom thread up and so on. Then I asked her to record what was going on in her notebook. Her first two phrases were "The needle moves" and "The material spins". 

I asked her about the second phrase (The material spins) so she showed me what she meant.

Needle down, presser foot up, spin the material. :) Silly me for not knowing what she meant... ;) 

She recorded one more, while we reviewed the direction that the wheel must always turn while threading the needle. 

Then, I left her to do a little practice on a small scrap of material. She took to it like a duck out of water, and several times that night, I caught her threading and unthreading the machine, just for practice. 

Out of the ordinary, I know, but that was our review for the verb. Next week I hope to get through at least two more with her, along with delving deeper in to verbs as much as possible. I am very careful to make sure I don't rush her. At the same time, I have taken so much of the past couple of school years trying to familiarize myself with the changes I chose to make, and so now we begin a few months of catch up. I think it will go smoothly - I pray it will go smoothly - and that by the time next school year starts, I won't feel as if we have to do any more backtracking! 

*In other news, I had to turn on word verification. I hated to do that, because I know sometimes it's can deter someone from commenting. I LOVE to see comments and hear what others are thinking, or their suggestions. However - the amount of spam coming in was ridiculous! So I am going to try this for a while. If you are a reader, and you have an opinion on word verification's pros and cons, I would love to hear them!*