Teaching Fractions with Fraction Plates

Fractions were always hard for me. When I was a little girl, my dad made me a wooden set of fraction blocks to help me visualize how 2 halves make a whole, 2 fourths make a half, etc. Recently, I asked my brother-in-law if he could make me something similar for our homeschool room. He didn't disappoint!

I am excited to announce Little Light of Homeschool is offering 3 different color palettes of these fraction math manipulatives in our Etsy Shop!

Rainbow:

You can download the free worksheet, here.

Unicorn Princess:

You can download this free unicorn worksheet, here.

Beach Party:

You can download the free sandcastle worksheet, here.

Each set of fraction plates comes with 1, 2 halves, 3 thirds, 4 fourths, and 8 eights.

We have created a fun worksheet that you can download for each. Just follow the links above.

To purchase your fraction math manipulative plates today, see our Etsy shop at Little Light of Home.

~ Andrea

Summer Bucket List Patches and Memory Ideas

Each year, my sister puts together a summer bucket list with her family. They make a big summer-bucket-list-poster and everyone is super excited to get started on the adventures they have planned. But, she goes one step farther by incorporating patches for each of the items they accomplish. Read on to learn more!

As the family marks something off the summer bucket list, the girls are presented with a fun patch to remind them of that activity. All summer, they collect their patches by attaching them to a ribbon that hangs next to the summer bucket list poster. At the end of the summer, Andrea sews the patches on their backpacks or other fun memory item. Now, they can look back over summers of memories!

This year's list included making rockets, seeing dolphins, building sand castles, and that was just the tip of the iceberg! Below, I have made a list with a link to each of the items on their bucket list. You will notice that some patches are on sale now for as low as $0.74, while other unique one's may be at the $1 or $2 range. At each of the patch websites, you can browse through their other patches which will also give you some great ideas to add to your summer bucket list if you need some help!

Make a rocket
Moving night outside

See dolphins
See caverns
Ride on a boat
Go tubing
Lego chain reaction
Geo-caching
Go star gazing
Learn a magic trick
Go to Farmers Market
Find shark tooth
Sleepover on trampoline
Night swim with glow sticks
Go fishing
Tie Dye
Build a giant sand castle
Play minigolf
Watch fireworks
Summer reading challenge
Car wash day
Play in the rain
Paint rocks
Water balloon fight
Bowling
Smores
Create a fairy garden
Have a pen pal
Family game night
Bonfire with friends

The backpack in the pictures is a Fjallraven Kanken mini backpack and it comes in 50 colors. You can see it here. It is a bit on the expensive side. As another option, I suggest this one from Kayond. It comes in five neutral colors.



Another idea instead of using patches is to try stickers. Stickers put in a sticker book could also be a way for your child to journal about the activity and what it meant to them!

Hope you all have a terrific and safe summer! Let us know what things your family has put on the summer bucket list for 2020 in the comments below.

--Amie

The Fletcher Farmhouse has entered an affiliate relationship with Amazon. Clicking on links provided in this post may result in a commission being paid to The Fletcher Farmhouse at no additional cost to you.

Lego Disaster Island

We have so many Lego's in our house! I wondered what more we could do with them and started looking. Introducing Lego Librarian and his awesome idea for Lego Disaster Island.

The Lego Librarian blogs about Lego Clubs and other library program ideas. His idea for a Lego Disaster Island Game caught my eye. You can see his blog post about it, here.

Here's what I did with my girls:

1. Use 10 to 20 minutes creating your island oasis with Lego's.

2. Take turns pulling a disaster card from the pile. I used some of the cards from Lego Librarian, but I also made some of my own. I really wanted to add a picture to each card for my littlest who is a non-reader.

3. After you have created something to overcome your disaster, share your creation by telling the other players what your disaster card said and what you built.

We had loads of fun and the girls were asking me to create more disasters!

Attached below are 8 picture cards for Lego Disaster Island. Feel free to print and share with your friends! Click here to download the flashcard PDF.

If you need some additional Lego's to make your disaster island even more realistic, the items below from Amazon are perfect!





--Andrea

The Fletcher Farmhouse has entered into an affiliate relationship with Amazon. Clicking on links provided in this blog post may result in a commission being paid to The Fletcher Farmhouse at no additional cost to you.

Shipwrecks and Seashells! Ideas for Homeschool Science

Our family really enjoyed our recent trip to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. I have BIG ideas for upcoming homeschool science lessons with all we saw and experienced on our vacation. Here are some ideas I wanted to share with you!

Shipwreck!

The Outer Banks is known as the Graveyard of the Atlantic because of the thousands of ships that have wrecked there. Some of the wrecks are on the beach and some are in the water. When the ocean is clear, you can explore the underwater shipwrecks by kayak or paddle board. We stayed on the beach, but we found this shipwreck at Nag's Head.

Book ideas for shipwrecks:




And, I found these fun virtual tours of shipwrecks that we can use from YouTube!

"Virtual Dive on the wreck of the Melckmeyt (1659), Iceland's oldest identified shipwreck":
https://youtu.be/hovKu1bi7kA

"A 452 Year Old Shipwreck was Found off the Florida Coast" : https://youtu.be/XDuo3J8DFZU

Seashells by the Seashore

What is it about seashells that delight the mind? Maybe their colors and mysterious shapes and sizes. My girls have always loved collecting shells and this week, they have returned home with quite a large collection of treasured finds to add to our cabinet of curiosities!

One of our favorite activities is to create art and jewelry with the seashells, but this year, I think we will learn how to identify them and more about the animals that live in each!




The book titled "Seashells by the Seashore" includes tear-out shell identification cards!

-- Andrea

The Fletcher Farmhouse has entered into an affiliate relationship with Amazon. Clicking on links provided in this post may result in a commission being paid to The Fletcher Farmhouse at no additional cost to you.