Our Morning Basket

Assalam Alaikum and Peace! Today I will be explaining what our Morning Basket looks like. The materials in this basket are suitable for children aged four to five years old. The Morning Basket helps us set up a morning routine in terms of learning. My daughter (I will be referring to her as B) looks forward to go through it everyday because there is always something new in there for her to learn. I have divided our basket into 3 main sections, which I will explain in detail:

1. Islam (30-40 minutes)
   • Duas
   • Arabic Reading
   • Arabic Writing
2. Literacy (30 minutes)
   • Calendar work
   • One New Reading Lesson
   • Reinforcement Through Reading
3. Todays work (1 hour)

1) Islam

Duas (Supplication) (20 minutes)

• We start our day with the Morning Adhkar (Remembrance). The book we use for this is Fortress of the Muslim. I read from it while she just listens and repeats. There are a few duas (supplications) that need to be read thrice so we use the Abacus to stay focused and on track. (Using this method, you can easily avoid the question “How many more times Mama?” 😉 )
• Dua cards. Thank you Allah, Sorry Allah and Please Allah. I got this free pdf a while back from one of the blogs, unfortunately I am unable to find the source. However, I will link the original blog as soon as I find out inshaAllah. I printed and laminated these because I want to incorporate these into our daily life inshaAllah. We absolutely love these cards because it teaches children (and us!) to start our day with gratitude and consciously count our blessings everyday.

Arabic Reading (10 minutes)

Next we read the designated page of Qaida. We use Tajweed Made Easy by The Quran Academy. (It is not available online, however you can find it any local Islamic bookstore in Canada) Another great Qaida that I recommend is from Darrussalam Publications, called Al-Qaa’idah Al-Qur’aaniyyah. We do not proceed to the next page unless B perfects the current page we are at. Her motivation, of course, is getting a sticker on a page she perfects. 🙂 I do not rush it though because I want to keep Arabic reading fun and interesting, and kids have more fun when they progress at their own pace without any pressure.

Arabic writing (10 minutes)

We do not do this everyday, but I try to do it with her at least twice a week. We are currently using Goodword Wipe Clean Book, however, I will be starting Reading and Writing Book with her soon inshaAllah.

2) Literacy

Calendar Work (10 minutes)

I got this idea from 123homeschool4me blog. The calendar printable entails date, day, time, season, weather graphing and so much more. It is completely free and the blog explains how to use it. B absolutely enjoys this.

One New English Lesson (20 minutes)

Teaching B how to read has been my number one goal. I was very lost when I intially started homeschooling but this book “Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons” was a complete game changer and is an absolute must-have if you decide to homeschool. The lessons are short, fun and to the point and also incorporate writing practice.

Reinforcement Through Reading (20 minutes)

To supplement the above book, I recently started The Alphabetti Books by Progressive Phonics. They are absolutely free and B loves the silly stories. The stories reinforce the words learnt in the book “Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons”. The words that the child has to read are in red and the rest of the text of the story is in black, which is read by the parent. I really like this approach as it prevents frustration while reading and the child feels confident that they have read a part of the story. I print two books each week and we go through them for the week until she gains complete confidence in reading her words.

I also have a reading log in which we log all the books we have read so far.

After going through the above two sections, we usually take a snack break and then go to “Today’s work”

3) Todays Work

This is something I change on a weekly basis and recently added to our basket for easier access. We do not necessarily do this part in the morning, however, B looks forward to this the most as there is something new everyday. We cover one unit focusing on a particular topic each month and then I divide up the worksheets, books and crafts into four corresponding weekly sections. I will be posting our Unit based curriculum in a separate post that includes Science, Math, History, Geography, Art and Islamic Studies all intergrated under one major topic to make it easier to teach and also learn. ( 1 hour – includes book reading on the subject, related worksheets/printables and crafts)

That is basically all that we do for homeschooling everday. It takes about 2 hours and then she has the rest of the day for free play. As B is only 5, our main focus is learning how to read Arabic and English and also exploring the World through hands-on activities. I will be introducing more subjects as she grows older inshaAlah.