Back to Homeschool 2023: Breakfast + Color Unit
We LOVE kicking off our new homeschool year with something fun! A few weeks ago I shared about some of our back-to-homeschool traditions so if you’re working on navigating these days or want some more ideas, you may want to hop over and read: Traditions: Back-to-Homeschool.
A Little Detour
This year we knew we wanted to gift our kids new hydration backpacks for our first day of homeschool. Last May we were traveling the Southwest and visited the Grand Canyon and Joshua Tree National Park. My sister-in-law’s kids hiked with hydration backpacks while we were carrying our water bottles and since I usually ended up being the designated water bottle holder - I knew we were going to need to invest in something a little more practical. Plus, ever since my kids have been begging for them.
This year we’re working through the Season’s Afield guide (see my 23/24 Curriculum Picks: Family Style Science) and I thought it would be perfect for our back-to-homeschool breakfast to do a nature theme because the backpacks would tie in well and it’d be a big bonus we could use them for some nature hikes. That was my plan all summer (seriously, since May) and then everything changed late last week! I just kept having the feeling that we needed to do a color/art unit first. Which is silly because the Season’s Afield guide has lots of watercoloring in it and we always bring in so much art in our unit studies. I went back and forth and back and forth on whether to stick with my plans, but ultimately decided, I should listen to that little thought. So, I ran with the color unit and then we are planning to settle into Season’s Afield in September. Even just two days into our school year, I know I made the right choice. This unit is going to be so much fun and is a little lighter way to start our year! Plus, Season’s Afield starts right in with a study of autumn and my mind (nor the weather) just isn’t there yet!
Nature Backpacks + Color Unit
For our first day of school, I decorated our homeschool space with lots of art books, a variety of art supplies and materials, and prepped a color workbook for the kids (see below). I ended up putting their backpacks on the back of their chairs which worked out perfectly!
Inside the hydration backpacks I added some additional supplies we’ll be using mostly for science:
New nature logbooks (which we will be using with Season’s Afield)
One visual timer for my 4 year old
I also added whistles and mini flashlights on the outside of their bags
We also have binoculars and a few other nature items we’ll be adding to these. But, I think it all turned out so cute and the kids were so excited when they saw everything. I love to have all their new materials laid out, but this year they’d seen most of what we were planning to do (and even worked in some of their books over the summer) so adding the backpacks and the color workbooks was a fun and simple way to add something new for them. I topped their new supplies off with some Thinking Putty which was definitely a huge hit!
This week we started with the Rainbow Colors University Pack from Amy Robison designs. It was designed as a March party pack, but it is PERFECT because it has a 28 page workbook that goes over color theory, the color wheel, cool + warm colors, color value, color harmonies, color mixing, color psychology, and includes a few science experiments and crafts. In my preschooler’s curriculum, Playing Preschool, (see 23/24: Curriculum Picks: 1st Grade & Prek) there is a two week unit study on colors so I am pulling a few ideas from this for simple activities to do with him too (like fruit loop necklaces). Having these activities prepped and ready on our learning shelf is SO helpful especially when my attention needs to go to helping my other kids.
Finally, we’re also going to be pulling from the Lily & Thistle courses - we have the Watercolor School & her new Around the World art course. I have a feeling we will probably do an art project from the Scandinavia or India units. Both of these have bright colors and I happened to grab a book at the library about the Festival of Colors so I thought it would be fun to bring in a little geography and culture studies here.
We have a good collection of art supplies we keep on hand, but this year I added these paint pens (which we have already used and LOVE), gouache paint (for the L&T course), and these cute rainbow pencils. We got new play-doh which we used the first day as part of learning about the color wheel and next week I’ve got some rainbow rice ready for a sensory bin. If you’re looking for a cute book on color mixing this interactive children’s book is SO fun: Color Blocked.
If you’re looking for any other resources from our school room, I have a full blog post jam packed with lots of links here: Our Homeschool Room.
Breakfast Details
When I decided to go with the color unit - I scratched my original nature themed breakfast plans and went with a simpler art themed breakfast which ended up tying in so well to back-to-school supplies and our unit study. I mostly used items we already had around the house! Here are the details:
Table Decor
Here’s to a BRIGHT homeschool year 2023/2024: I made this and it just took a few minutes to pull a background off google, type it in, and print!
Apple Barrel Paint & old paint brushes
Empty Paint Cans: These are a 1 gallon size. We got ours at Home Depot, but you can also grab them on Amazon.
Placesettings
Trays: I was using our regular art trays for my learning shelf and didn’t have enough for our breakfast so I just used older ones I had from IKEA and added a piece of colored cardstock under them. I love these trays because they’re so light and easy to move around for kids, but unfortunately they aren’t available anymore. If you want to do something similar, I would just use regular art trays like these.
Apple Plates: I just used our normal white dishes and put a disposable apple plate on top. We also used these for last year’s breakfast if you’re looking for some more inspiration.
Ruler Napkin Rings: These are from A Girl and A Glue Gun and they’re available as part of a free download. We’ve used multiple of these printables over the years.
Food: This year we did crepes, bacon, and scrambled eggs. Our crepe recipe is one we use on special days and can be found on this post: Back to Homeschool 2021.
Mini Art Easels & Name Cards: I made their name cards and can’t easily share an editable file, but I just printed on colored card stock. I got the mini easels at Wal-Mart but you can also find them on Amazon.
After we eat breakfast and clean up - we always organize our supplies, get ready and do pictures. The printable pendant flags are from a file no longer available from the Pippi Post shop, but she has an updated one that’s similar and available here. This file also contains a school banner which is similar to the pencil one I get a lot of questions about. (Which is also from Pippi Post, but no longer available.) I also think these pendant flags are super cute!
The night before we started school back up I was getting our weekly focus cards ready and don’t you think this first card is SO appropriate for the first few weeks of school? You can find these over at The GoodNewsBrand. They’re called: All That He Had Made Nature Card Set and HCL10 will get you 10% off.
I hope you all have an amazing year!