School!!!

George and I wanted to talk about school.  Even though I am only 3 1/2, all the grown ups here always ask me if I am going to school.  Here in Curacao, kids have to go to school by the time they are 4, and some kids are even in school when they are 2 and 3!  Sometimes I tell Mommy that I want to go to school to wear a backpack, play on the playground, play with kids and color.  But really, I get to do most of that stuff with Mommy and George every day - and Daddy when he is home.  Mommy says she is going to be my teacher and we are going to learn together at home.  I think that is a good idea.  Because, really, look how many interesting things happen at home all the time!  You've already seen how we take neat nature walks and learn about all the plants here....and you've see all the animals we've been able to touch and hold and see up close!  So, Georgie and I will show you some of the other things we do for school.

We work on our numbers and letters.  I can point out J for "Jack", A, B and C for my letters and George and I like to find house numbers when we take our walks.  Mommy plays hide and seek with us a lot, so I can count to ten almost without any mistakes.  (Sometimes I skip 3, 4 and 5 and go right to 6, but that's okay...I'm still learning.)

I work on my Mighty Mind game (which I'm really good at) while Georgie works on motor skills by spooning beans from one dish to another.  I used to do this, too, but now it is too easy. 

Then I work on my shapes and colors.  I like to try to trace them with my special shape cards.  George likes to play with the peg board ....although he usually ends up throwing the pegs on the ground.

Then we take a popsicle break!

We really love puzzles.  Aunt Merri had a good idea once...there should be a puzzle library so we can always have new puzzles to do!  My favorite puzzles are the huge floor puzzles we have - one is of Noah's Ark and the other is an alphabet train.  If Mommy helps me with the corners of the Noah's Ark puzzle, I can do the rest all by myself! 

We like to draw and paint and make things with paper.  Mommy helps us.

And we like to play with play dough!  We make new colors each time.  Georgie sometimes throws his on the ground and I laugh at him, but Mommy tells me not to laugh when Georgie is naughty.  But it is really hard, because he is so funny!  One day we made fruits and vegetables with play dough.  Another time, after I caught two spiders, we made a spider and I counted their legs and learned that spiders have 8 legs! 

After all this, it is time for another popsicle break!  Mommy found these great popsicle makers so we can make our own popsicles with juice or lemonade or yogurt! 

Sometimes we like to help Mommy in the kitchen.  She bakes lots of things, since Georgie gets sick if he eats regular bread, so I like to help her. 

We've learned about new fruits here, too.  Our nice neighbor, Doina, has a nice garden and she brings us things like papayas and bananas, which we know about from Hawaii.  But she's given us some very strange things, too.  Like this......it is called "soursop".  I've never seen anything like this before!  It was kind of soft and sweet inside.  Our neighbors make ice cream with it.

Then, she gave us these!  I bet you can't tell what they are from looking at the picture.  I didn't know.  They are cashews!!!!  Now, I love to eat cashew nuts...but when I took a bite of this fruit, I had to spit it out, because it left a weird taste in my mouth.  But....it was interesting to learn about. 

So...we have lots of busy days.  Most of the time we play outside and have lots of  "P.E." like Mommy says.  Georgie and I both love to swim and play baseball, make mud pies and search for bugs or hermit crabs.  And, we love to play trains and cars and just be silly at home. 

But....after all this, I have to say that my favorite thing to do is to read books.  I love when Mommy or Daddy read to me.  I love to look at books by myself.  Sometimes, I can't even take a nap, because I am too busy reading.  Sometimes I even fall asleep with books on top of me!  I love books.  We all love books!  Mommy got some good ideas from Aunt Merri, so we are reading some of the same books that our cousins Luke, Ben, Gracie and Jacob are reading.  Right now, my favorites are:  Treasure of Picture Book Classics, The 20th Century Children's Book Treasury, A Child's Book of Art, The Big Blue Beginner Book, The Flip Flap Body Book and lots of others.  George's favorite is My Big Truck Book and some books of Thomas the Train which are teaching him about his colors. 

Basically, we all just love to read and play and be together at home.  It is a good life.  I think I like this homeschooling thing! 

I'll show you some more things later, when I learn them.  Bye for now!

Love,

Jack (and Georgie, too)