Winter Themed Morning Basket
After taking a much needed long break over the holidays we are ready to dive into homeschooling in 2018 with a fresh new take on it. I spent our six weeks off listening to every podcast, watching every video and reading every blog. The one thing the seemed to peak my interest the most was Morning Basket. The idea of starting our mornings out with truth, goodness, and beauty instead of yelling and rushing sounded foreign and impossible but I decided we would give it a try. If you would like to learn more about Morning Basket I would suggest listening to Pam Barnhill’s podcast “Your Morning Basket” it was a wonderful resource.
Things I am currently planning on including a version of every month include Journal, Bible, Poetry, Folktale, Non-Fiction, Art, Math, and Read Aloud (for her and me).
Q & A a day for Kids: A Three Year Journal – This was a Christmas present Santa brought to Emily and I am so excite to start using it. It has a simple question for everyday of the year, and on each page is space for three years worth of answers. So you will circle around to the questions again each year. I love the thought of having this for years to come and seeing how her answers change each year. For now I will be the one doing the writing because this is about her thoughts and feelings and not handwriting practice.
Jesus Storybook Bible – This Bible is absolutely beautiful. The story is written eloquently and makes it easy for children to follow and the illustrations are to die for. It makes me happy just to look at it and I am hoping reading from it every day will make us happy too. I am planning on reading through the entire thing so you will probably see this in future Morning Baskets.
Winter Bees & Other Poems of Cold – We live in Florida so while our weather is still warm enough for short sleeves it is still winter so in January’s Morning Basket I wanted to make sure I added in some winter themed reads. This book has short and sweet poems that are perfect for young children and beautiful illustrations.
d’Aulaires’ Book of Norwegian Folktales – Since we are focusing on a winter theme and Frozen is her favorite movie in the entire world I though Norwegian Folktales would be a good fit this month.
What Your Kindergartner Needs to Know – This book will encompass our non-fiction, art and math for the month. This book includes read aloud selections for every subject and it is one of my favorite resources thus far for kindergarten. We will read from a different subject each day of the week.
Mr. Popper’s Penguins (my read aloud) – It only seemed natural to pick Mr. Popper’s Penguins as our read aloud for January since we were focusing on winter. We will read a chapter a day and have a movie night once we have finished the book.
Frozen Story Collection (her read aloud) – She will be so excited to have a Anna and Elsa book she can read! We will take it at her pace and she will read to me a little each day throughout the month. We will only read on days she wants to and as much or as little as she decides. We do phonics and reading programs at other times of the day so this is not about reading instruction it is about reading for enjoyment.
All of the above things will be done everyday and even if that is all we get done I will be happy and feel as though we have a had a great homeschool day. But in the spirit of having a more fun homeschool day I have also added a few fun educational goodies to our Morning Basket too.
Disney Frozen Look & Find – Look & Find books have always been popular at our house, they are perfect for quiet time or traveling with. I added this book because it will be one of her favorite things and keep her engaged a little bit longer.
Olaf’s Frozen Adventure Mad Libs – We have really started to enjoy Mad Libs as a family. If you have a young kid be prepared for all of the words to be potty words. But hey if she can make potty words fit every part of speech correctly more power to her!
Disney Frozen Word Search – I am not sure she is ready for a word search of this size yet, but she asked for one because she wants to be like daddy. So I grabbed this one to let her try it out.
Smart Games Penguin Parade – This is a great single player logic game that is great for morning because it is magnetic and self contained. I plan to add this to our travel pile after this month because it would make such a good travel game.
Safari LTD Penguin Toob – Since we are reading Mr. Popper’s Penguins I thought it would be fun to include this toob. She can play quietly while I read and afterward we can discuss the different types of penguins. This will be her favorite part of Morning Basket because she loves the toobs of animals from Safari LTD.
Sleeping Snowmen – We love games! I am going to try and add a simple short game every month to our morning basket so we end on a happy playful note everyday. I made this game because Sleeping Queens is such a favorite of hers. I also have her Little Hands Card Holder to use with it.
I am so excited to try this out and see how it works for our family. I am hoping it will transform our day and add some enchantment to our mornings.
Are you new to morning basket?
If you are new to morning basket and would like more information make sure you check out this morning basket questions and answers post. If you would like to see our baskets in action be sure to watch our join us for morning basket time videos. Also, make sure your join the Morning Baskets Facebook Group for more ideas, inspirations, and support.
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