cycle 1 week 1 books and materials laid out on table

Cycle 1 Week 1 At Home Activities for Classical Homeschooling

Read along to see the activities I have planned to do at home with my kids to help them practice the Cycle 1 Week 1 memory work.

It’s that time of year again to start getting back into school rhythms. We all relaxed during the summer which was nice, but I’m seeing the need for my kids to get back into a more structured routine. Watch my video here about how we ease back into morning school rhythms.

Tutor Ideas for Classical Homeschooling

Have you had your first community day yet? It’s so exciting to be back with your community and have your tutor introduce the memory work to your children. Or maybe you’re tutoring this year? If you are, be sure to check out my posts with tutor ideas for the first four weeks of Cycle 1 below:

  1. Cycle 1 Week 1 Tutor Ideas
  2. Cycle 1 Week 2 Tutor Ideas
  3. Cycle 1 Week 3 Tutor Ideas
  4. Cycle 1 Week 4 Tutor Ideas

Also, I have a youtube channel where I make videos with tutor and memory work ideas each week. Below is my video with tutor videos for Cycle 1 Week 1. If you are thinking past the first week, I also have videos for Cycle 1 Week 2 and Cycle 1 Week 3. Visit my channel for tutor ideas for future weeks and other videos with homeschooling tips and encouragement.

Cycle 1 Week 1 Tutor and Memory Work Ideas

Practicing the Memory Work at home

In this post, I share with you about my weekly homeschool rhythms with my small children (ages five, three and one). I explain about the activities, games, and readings we do together to practice the Cycle 1 Week 1 memory work (new grammar) at home throughout the week.

Morning Devotional Time

I begin each day with our morning devotional time. This is my favorite part of the day with my kids. It is also one of my favorite things about homeschooling. I love that we don’t have to rush out of the door in the morning. My kids get the sleep they need and we can linger over breakfast and read God’s word together.

I have learned some morning habits that help us all get down to breakfast at the same time. This helps me make the most of our morning time together. Read more about these habits here.

school books and morning reading set out on top of table.
mom reading a children's bible to her children at the breakfast table

Once we are all sitting around the breakfast table and my kids start eating, I begin with our Bible study time. I read to them a small passage from my Bible and then the corresponding story in The Complete Illustrated Children’s Bible. (TCICB). This Bible has BEAUTIFUL illustrations and is very accurate to the truth of the actual Bible.  We follow along with the Bible readings and study that corresponds with the Bible memory work we are learning. 

bible, bible study, coloring books, and breakfast plates set out on kitchen table.
Foundations of the Bible study and Children's Bible laying out on top of table.

Bible Study

What Bible study am I doing you might ask? I love using the Foundations of The Bible study from @drivenbygrace. This Bible study goes along with Bible memory work. Lindsey, the author of the study, matches the stories from TCICB that go along with the Bible study and Bible memory work for that week.  If there aren’t enough Bible stories for each day of the week, then I find others that go along with the theme.   After I read, I try to ask my kids a few questions about it to see how much they understood.  My five year old is pretty sharp at this. 

If you’re curious about more of what I do in our morning devotional time, read my post about it here.

This week, I read Lesson 1 from the Foundations of the Bible study about Creation. There are four parts to this lesson, so it works perfectly to read one part each day to my kids. The Bible stories from TCICB that I read each morning either correspond to the Bible study or part of this week’s memory work. This week I could only find two Bible stories that relate, so I let my children pick a story to read the last two days this week. See my lesson plans for details of what I read each day.

As I read to my kids from the Bible Study Lesson, I have them either color their 24 Family Ways coloring book or one of the activity pages from the Foundations of the Bible study activity book. This works well because they can concentrate on coloring and listen to me read.

Foundations of the Bible coloring activity pages and book sitting out on table.
Little girl coloring in her 24 Family Ways coloring book

The 24 Family Ways

After I read the part of the Bible study lesson to them and we talk about it, I go over the Family Way (from Sally and Clay Clarkson’s 24 Family Ways) we are learning about this week. We also work on memorizing the Bible verse that goes with that Family Way. I write both the Family Way and the Bible verse on chalk boards that I have hanging up by our kitchen table so we can see them often. 

The 24 Family Way of the week and Bible verse written on chalkboards on kitchen wall with books laying on table.

I also have found songs that match with each Bible verse that I play after we eat breakfast.  Songs are amazing for helping children memorize the Bible. Download my matchup of the 24 Family Ways with Bible verses and songs from my Resource Library.

24 Family Way Devotional plan and books.

Then comes my kids’ favorite part, SINGING HYMNS!  I stumbled over this gem of a book called My First Hymnal by Karyn Henley and it is AWESOME!  My kids each choose a hymn to sing and I sing it for them (sometimes they join in).  I love that they are learning hymns and the ones in this book are fabulous for kids.

Bible study books and kids hymnal laying out on kitchen table.

This week I’m singing Amazing Grace with my kids (pg. 69 from My First Hymnal). I love reading about the history and author of each hymn to my kids using these beautiful Hymn Study Cards.

Math and Language Arts

Each day I try to do at least a little math and language arts with my oldest daughter. This year she is working through The Good and The Beautiful Level 1 math curriculum. Read here why I decided to switch from Saxon math to The Good and The Beautiful (TGATB). TGATB is very open and go and a good mix of lessons and activities. It’s beautiful too! I try to do a lesson with her after our morning devotional time. She is usually the freshest then and if I wait until later in the day to do it, I’m not as consistent.

The Good and the Beautiful math curriculum laying out on table.

I also have this Handwriting without Tears for my oldest daughter the first level for my younger daughter. Sometimes it works out to have my girls do some of this in the mornings. If we don’t have enough time the, I have my older daughter do a bit in the afternoon when it’s quiet time. I don’t do it every day with her, just a few times a week.

Handwriting without tears book opened up on table with little girl working on it.

Weekly Memory work songs

I try to review as much of the weekly memory work with my kids as possible during the week with songs and games. Often when I’m cleaning up breakfast, I play this week’s playlist of memory work songs. We also listen to these songs in the car when driving. See my playlist of Cycle 1 Week 1’s songs for English, Science, Geography, and Latin below.

Cycle 1 Week 1 English, Geography, and Science songs

Daily Subject Focus

I like to dive deeper into one subject each day. I’ve found that focusing on just one subject each day is very manageable and doesn’t feel overwhelming. Here is our usual weekly schedule (you can download this template here):

Weekly subject focus schedule

Geography

This week in geography, we are learning about the Fertile Crescent. During our morning snack time, I start out showing my kids a globe and reading to them from Maps and Globes by Jack Knowlton. I show them where the Fertile Crescent is on the globe and how far away it is from where we live.

cycle 1 week 1 books laid out on table.

Then I show them where the Mediterranean Sea, Mesopotamia, Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, and Sumer are on their placemats. I encourage my oldest to outline the Mediterranean Sea with a dry erase marker. My younger daughter enjoys drawing on her map also.

pointing out the mediterranean sea on placemat map on kitchen table.
mom and daughter playing geography dice game at kitchen table.

We sing the song together to the tune of Hokey Pokey. See my video below.

Cycle 1 Week 1 Geography song

Then we play the geography dice game I made (see picture here). To play this game, my daughters switch off rolling a die. Each number they roll corresponds to a location in the Fertile Crescent that we are learning about this week. For example, if they roll a 4, they try to identify the place on their map that is labeled with a number 4. You can get this for free with my other Cycle 1 Week 1 Memory work activities from the Resource Page on my blog.

History

This week in history we are learning about the first five of the ten commandments. I give my kids the Timeline Image from Cycle 1 Week 1 Scribblers (page 3) in ccconnected.com to color.

Ten commandments coloring page and book laying on table.

I like to laminate these each week and make a timeline of them on our wall as we go through the school year. Here is a picture of what last year’s timeline looked like.

timeline history coloring pages hung up on wall.
a few of the history timeline coloring pages from Cycle 3 laying out on table.

My oldest daughter works on a tablet of God’s rules (Cycle 1 Week 1 Sandbox Ezine page 12). She wrote a few of the ten commandments on the first tablet.

We also play the ten commandments memory game I made. Get this also for free from the Resource Library on my blog. My kids and I love playing games. I love making the memory work into a game so we are playing a game and practicing the memory work at the same time!

I read What Are the Ten Commandments? by Yona Zeldis to my kids. We usually have some reading time while they have a snack mid morning.

I am also trying to start some read aloud time with my oldest daughter. She is very into puzzles lately, so I read one of these chapters from Story of the World Volume 1 (SOTW) that relate to the history we are learning this week (Chapter 6 & 14).

Science

This week in science we are learning about the Classifications of Living Things. I give my kids the choice of coloring either the Scribblers coloring page or the Cycle 1 Week 1 science coloring page from @amysniderDESIGN. This week my younger daughter chose the Scribblers coloring page and my older daughter wanted to keep working on her Foundations of the Bible study activity that she had started earlier in the morning.

science book and activities for cycle 1 week 1

I made a Classifications of living things Word Search that my older daughter enjoys this week. You can get this for free with my other Cycle 1 Week 1 Memory work activities from the Resource Page on my blog.

I also spend a little time doing the “storytelling” activity from “Take A Look” in Scribblers. I have my kids write their names and talk about why we chose their names for them. Our names are how we are each “classified”, similar to how we classify the different kinds of living things.

I also read to my kids from the book, Many The Diversity of Life on Earth by Nicola Davies. We sing a song to help us remember the Classifications of Living Things to the tune of Head Shoulders Knees and Toes. See video below:

Cycle 1 Week 1 Science song

Lesson Plan Templates

Click here to download a template of my detailed lesson plans for Cycle 1 Week 1. Here is a blank template you can download too.

More Memory Work Practice

During some extra moments this week, here are some other books and activities I do with my kids as time allows:

Here are all the picture books we enjoy during Cycle 1 Week 1:

cycle 1 week 1 picture books with titles and authors listed

Cycle 1 Week 1 Memory Work Activities

Activities to help practice the remaining memory work (you can sign up below download these for free from my resource library):

  • Skip counting activities for counting the 1’s and 2’s this week.
  • Preposition maze (we are learning the definition of a Preposition this week)
  • Latin maze (we are learning about the Noun Cases this week)

Have you gone through the first week of Cycle 1 yet? How did things go? Comment below and tell me about any activities you did or fun books you read.

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