My version of the "breakfast board" and how to motivate a 5+ year old

I'm spreading this all around right now. A WTM board member shared her blog and a fabulous idea called a "breakfast board." I finally got it together and made one and took pics. Do you know that this is probably the first voluntary project I've done on a trifold board? Anyway, on to the good stuff:

First off, thanks to Johanna at this blog http://stopforflowers.blogspot.com/2...for-those.html for inventing and sharing the "breakfast board." I finally decided to get my act together and put one together for the girls, so here's my version. The flash is obscuring our "weather frog." There are 2 velcro dots there to attach today's weather squares (in a bag taped to the back of the board). The purple pockets hold a couple of Latin flashcards and a couple of history review cards. I have a poem for memorization/review, a tens/ones bag, hundreds chart, coin bag, assorted shapes for Sylvia, a clock, calendar, map (for continent practice) and the yesterday/today/tomorrow strips. Oh, and a month/season spinner!



I have to say that the girls raced to get started this morning just because of this board, so I'm already impressed!


I figured I'd also take a couple of pics of my motivational system for Becca. Sylvia just gets stickers on her hand and she gets to pick a treasure whenever Becca does. Every day, after we've completed our school work, Becca gets a sticker on her handy little chart.




Once we've done a full week (five days), she turns the whole sheet in to me and gets to pick a treasure out of the treasure box (they were so excited to see it they couldn't stay out of the pic!).I found the box at Dollar Tree, and I stock it with assorted little goodies from DT or the Target dollar section.



There's puzzles, stickers, temporary tattoos, crayons, cups, lip gloss, jewelry, things like that in there. Becca was pointing out the Strawberry Shortcake lip gloss. She gets very excited about picking a treasure and likes to count how many more stickers she needs before her next prize.

I've been waiting for this!

At last, our human body studies have started! I'm so dorky excited about this - luckily Becca's excited too so at least she's not looking at me like I've lost my last marble.

I traced both girls' outlines on some giant paper last night. Becca's looks strangely alienesque - she's eager to add some hair.




Sylvia had pigtails in and I just couldn't resist tracing them too. If you know Sylvie, you know that that child has a TON of hair! The result is too cute for words:

And here's both together:

We're starting first with the five senses, but Becca's already asking when we're going to add the liver and intestines to their bodies.

Now for a little more news... Sylvia has decided that she doesn't care for preschool anymore. Nothing terrible happened, we just think that she's over the whole idea. She's always been more of a homebody than Becca and more attached to me. I think she feels like she's gotten all she can out of preschool and she'd rather be at home with Mommy and Becca. Since I have no real reason to make her go, I now have two full-time students! Actually, Sylvia's still participating at will. I encourage her to practice a few skills, but her own pace is pretty quick.