Small Things With Great Love

Mystery of History, Volume 2, Weeks 1 & 2, (Which Actually Took Us 3 Weeks)

2011-09-23T16:22:00.002-05:00

We are excitedly jumping into our next phase of history, one I've never even been in: the Early Church and Medieval times.

Somehow, we've skipped over this time period. Rose Bud was working through ancient history when she went off to public school. Daisy was small and was lightly going through a little ancient history with us. When Rose Bud was very small, we went through Sonlight's Core 1 and only half-heartedly through Core 2, which contained the medieval period. Somehow it was much more fun to reach American history and we took our sweet time enjoying Cores 3 and 4. Somewhere in there Rose Bud and I (with Daisy tagging along) also did Core 5.

When Rose Bud went to public school, Daisy and Pepper and I tackled Cores 3 and 4 again, enjoying American history all over. I then debated and agonized over doing Core 5. So many wise ones who had gone before discouraged its use by a 4th grader, which Pepper was. So after investing in it and deciding to use it, at the 11th hour I bailed and we went for Core 6, Ancient History.

Well, it wasn't many days after that decision that I decided Mystery of History, which, being a Curriculum Junkie, I already owned was a better fit. And we never looked back.

And now we are beginning MOH2.

So without further ado, here are our first two weeks:
Mystery of History 2

Pentecost and the First Followers of Jesus c. A.D. 29
Saul, Who is Also Called Paul A.D. 31
Paul's Missionary Journeys c. A.D. 46-66
Nero A.D. 37-68
Martyrs of the Early Church c. A.D. 64-257

Read-Alouds (books I read to them)
Stephen, A Soldier of the Cross This book was written in 1896 and republished by Lamplighter Books. Although it is written in archaic language (lots of thees and thous and doest thou) the girls (and I) loved it! It was a great story with an exciting plot intertwining actual characters from the Bible with some fictional go-alongs in a story of how-it-might-have-been. It gave a good overview of what everyday life was like for various levels of society in the deserts of Egypt and in Jerusalem just after Jesus' death.
The Ides of April This very exciting story takes place in A.D. 62 during the time of Nero. It's not related to the Christians of the time, but rather tells the life of a Roman household and its slaves. One slave, having been accused of the murder of his master, has endangered all the slaves of the household. Another slave who has escaped capture endeavors to save them all. I began reading this aloud and then passed it off to the girls to finish. (I can only read so much before my voice gives out!)
The Life of St. Paul by Fosdick This is a Landmark book and thus very easy to read. I could assign it as a reader, however this article highlights some concerns about the author, Harry Emerson Fosdick. These concerns didn't keep us from reading the book. Instead, I chose to do it as a read-aloud so that we could discuss concerns as they came up. The book does point out some interesting ideas about Paul's life which I hadn't realized before. For example, he points out how Jesus was a country boy, growing up in a rural area and being familiar with rural ideas and farming practices. Along with that, the people he preached to were also mainly rural people and this is evident in the illustrations he uses; illustrations about sheep, crops, birds of the field, vineyards. Paul, on the other hand, was a city boy from Tarsus, a booming metropolis. He was well-educated, knew several languages and was a Roman citizen. Hence his illustrations were of things like running the race (a reference to Roman athletics) and such. He seldom mentioned anything related to farming or livestock. In any case, we did notice that there is no mention of Jesus' divinity or the Holy Spirit in the book. Also, in the later chapters, Paul is painted as being concerned about losing the respect and love of the churches, whereas the Biblical Paul would have been concerned with the churches losing love and respect for GOD (not himself). We discussed this discrepancy and pointed out how one needs to be aware of the perspective and world-view of the author whatever one is reading.
(Incidently, here is a list of Landmark books listed chronologically)

On-going Read-Alouds
We are reading each day from the One-Year Chronological Bible (NLT). This is the Bible that got me to finally read through the whole Bible. And I love the readability of the NLT. Whichever version you choose, this is organized chronologically, so we've had Galatians inserted into our Acts of the Apostles already. Readings are short, 15 min. a day. We began with Acts.

Trial and Triumph I have probably too many books about Early Church history, but I am finding, as we read through them, that they each bring something different to our experience. Thus far we have only read about Polycarp and Blandina in this book, but both came to us in nice, short, story-format chapters. Sometimes it's nice just to have something easy to read.

In that same vein, we are reading from Foxe: Voice of the Martyrs. This version is published by Voice of the Martyrs organization. This book tells the stories of the apostles, as well as early martyrs. It has an old-fashioned feel with very old drawings (gory!) throughout.

AND we are reading from Peril and Peace, Volume 1: Chronicles of the Ancient Church. Again, this is more of a story format. However, rather than JUST stories of the martyrs, it also gives the history of the ancient church, such as background of the martyring Roman emperors and what worship in the early church looked like.

Readers

Pepper somehow escaped reading The Bronze Bow, although Daisy had finished it last spring, so Pepper has read that already this fall. Pepper also read The Beast of Lor by Clyde Robert Bulla, about the Romans in early Britain. Daisy read Titus: Comrade of the Cross, which is a prequel to Stephen listed above. It was too challenging for Pepper, but Daisy enjoyed it, in spite of its 32 chapters and the 5 days I gave her to read it! Both girls also paged through The Roman Colosseum by Elizabeth Mann when we read about Nero.

Other Media

"Prisoner for Christ," from Adventures in Odyssey Bible Eyewitness (CD#3) told the story of Onesimus, the slave of Philemon (of Philemon in the Bible). Twice Freed also tells the story, but the girls deemed the book, "boring."

They've been working through the Drive Thru History series and watched episodes from Greece and the Word DVD which touched on the travels of Paul.

And we love the Diana Waring CDs! This year we are listening to the Romans, Reformers and Revolutionaries set. For these two weeks, we are listening to Digging Deeper, Disc 1: The Exploding Church and What in the World's Going On Here? Disc 1, Track 2: 1st century Church & Emperors.

Maps and Timeline

We are combing the map exercises in MOH2 with our MapTrek maps. And we use the Homeschool in the Woods timeline figures on our timeline. We add the figures suggested in MOH and any others that we've read about for the week.

Rosie's Walk

2011-06-16T11:06:00.000-05:00

During our Read-Aloud time I....read aloud to Sunshine. The first book I chose was Rosie's Walk and he's been obsessed with it for two weeks. Each day I throw in a new story, but every day he also wants Rosie's Walk.

He's actually always been that way, latching on to a book and having us read it day after day until we can hardly stand it.

Anyway, his latest love is Rosie's Walk, so I thought I'd throw in some fun extras for him.

We watched this Scholastic video on YouTube:

I printed this book to make. The link downloads the pdf of the book. I think we'll make the book to practice reading the words (he already read this out loud to me one day, just to shake things up). I think we'll also use a copy of this to work on the position words (prepositions) and he can move Rosie over, under, around, etc.

We didn't do this, but here are discussion and activity ideas for reading the book.

If you had older children you wanted to incorporate into the lesson, you could do these higher-level sequencing activities.

We'll do these activities until he loses interest in this book. Then we'll find a new obsession for him.

1st Grade Summer School

2011-06-16T10:35:00.000-05:00

Sunshine has been in public school this past year for kindergarten. The plan is also for him to go to public school for 1st grade. He still needs speech services pretty intensely.

However, HE thinks he will be homeschooling. Every time I mention school in fall he mildly says, "No, Mom. I homeschooling!"

Ok.

So I promised him we'd homeschool this summer and he's been LOVING it! We have a little schedule with a chart and stickers to mark each subject we accomplish. He's very motivated by stickers and prizes (thank you public school!)

Every morning he is sitting at the dining room table with his binder and his books out.

So far, he hasn't be the least bit interested in any of the workbooks I have, which is fine, I guess. Hands-on, living learning is better anyway. I may have some kindergartenish workbooks for sale later this summer!

Our schedule consists of:

Calendar
Maps
Phonics/Reading
Math
Bible
Read-Alouds
Speech
Electives (one a day: Science, Nature Journal, Art, Music, Workbooks)

I went to Target and picked up a few things I thought he'd like for prizes: Flip-Flops and a tiny pot with seeds from the dollar spot, new watercolors, markers and colored pencils, gum (his very favorite thing in all the world). He also wants his own camera, so I'm thinking of a cheap digital camera for an end-of-summer prize. (he excitedly told someone how at the end of summer homeschool he was getting a camera and a phone! Uh, no, not a phone, sir!)

He's already earned one prize and for his first reward he picked.... (drumroll) the pot to plant marigolds! REALLY. Of all the things in the box, I'd have pegged that for last. huh. Next on his list of desires are the flip-flops. Another surprise.

He's also scheduled for (rather, he's been "invited" to (ie: targeted for extra help)) public school summer school for 5 weeks, but if this keeps going so well, I'm thinking of having him skip it. He's intense with this and we're spending about 2 hours at it, but it beats driving him in twice a morning every day. We'll see.

Not Getting Any School Done

2011-03-15T15:26:00.000-05:00

Here Pepper is reciting her "lesson" about George Washington in their one-room (outdoor) schoolhouse.

Only problem is that we are studying ancient WORLD history.

It's beautiful outside here (about 50!) and the kids keep oozing away from the school table and slipping outside to play. After lunch they got all dressed up in their "outfits" and gathered a string full of books and went outside to play (wait for it)... School.

At their "desks"

I guess it's the least I can allow after they've been cooped up inside for 4.5 months.

Daisy is doing her recitations:

Wheels for Noah

2011-03-02T09:44:00.002-06:00

Noah is the son of a fellow homeschooling family, the Estes, who own Hands and Hearts, the company that makes the awesome hands-on history kits. We own a bunch of these kits and they are great. Hands and Hearts just got great news that he Consumer Product Safety Commission voted to extend the stay of enforcement on the CPSIA through December 31 of this year. If you recall, the gov't was requiring extensive testing on all small toys and parts used in toys, even in educational kits. For small businesses, this would require an enormous cost for the testing and it threatened to put H&H out of business. Their business HAS suffered, but it's good news that they can continue to sell their fun kits.

The Estes are parents to 8 children, one of whom has a progressive genetic mitochondrial disease. I have followed 4 yo Noah's story for, well, 4 years and he is an incredible little boy, in spite of his major health issues. Recently they were able to get a wheel chair for him since mitochondrial disease makes kids super tired. In his wheelchair, Noah is able to get himself around the house to play in short bursts and to be with his family where ever they are, rather than having to just rest on the couch.

The Estes have a 15 passenger van to transport their family, but because of the type of wheelchair Noah has (it doesn't fold flat like a typical limited-use wheelchair) their isn't room for the chair AND all of their family in the van. Some of their blog readers and friends are hosting a fundraiser to help the family raise money for a transit bus. This vehicle will have room for Noah's chair (and will have a lift! It takes 2-3 adults to lift the chair into their current van!) and the whole family.

Please click on the picture of Noah to go to their online auction and support this wonderful family! There are all sorts of neat products and homeschool items there. If you aren't interested in any of the items, consider making a donation.

This family is such a blessing to everyone around them. They have shared the love of Jesus, through Noah's trials, on their blog, in person at hospitals or just around town with him. They have an incredible faith in the goodness of God and his plan for Noah in spite of the pain and suffering he faces here on earth, and they are not shy about sharing it. God is surely using this little boy and his story to further His kingdom in a big way.

The online auction will start Wednesday, March 2 and end Saturday, March 5 at 10 PM Eastern. All items are FREE SHIPPING with the donors paying the shipping to the winners.

A Spelling Alternative...Sort of

2010-12-10T09:41:00.001-06:00

I'm posting as part of Ordinary Time's Homeschool Resource Link-Up.

I have one not-so-natural speller (and so far, 3 VERY intuitive spellers). For this one child, spelling just isn't there. We've tried various spelling programs and most successful has been Sequential Spelling. However, this year we've decided to take a break from that and I pulled out my unused copy of Vocabulary Vine. (read the review in this link at Rainbow Resource)

It's a roots program teaching both Greek and Latin roots. Over the course of 36 weeks, at 3 roots a week, students will learn 108 roots (you do the math!!).

Students make their own root cards using blank index cards and Daisy does this program completely independently. The root and the definition are given for the day and then about 5 words using the root are given. On the root card, students choose 3 of those derivatives and define them using what they've learned about the day's (and past) root definitions. The definitions are always blatantly obvious and some thinking (and a little stretching) might be necessary to see how the definition of the root relates to the meaning of the word using it.

She said yesterday, when I asked Banana Boy if he'd taken his antibiotics, "I know what that means!!!!"

My hope in using this with my non-intuitive speller, is that by breaking the words down into their roots and parts, she'll begin to see the patterns, learn the spellings of the roots and be able to put it all together to spell longer, more complicated words (without fear!).

A Little Math Practice

2010-11-17T09:29:00.001-06:00

Banana Boy has begun adding in columns without carrying. His math book only had one page of problems, so I made up extra pages in the same style, only using family members and other objects. For now I kept all the problems the same, which really doesn't build his word problem solving skills, but he still needed to focus on physically setting the problem up and writing it correctly, so I was fine with that.

So one of today's problems was:

Banana Boy ate 178 M & Ms. Dad ate 21 more than he. How many M & Ms did Dad eat?

The next problem was:

After eating 178 M & Ms, Banana Boy was really sick but he had 611 M & Ms left. How many did he have at first?

After he had solved all the problems, I brought out the 2 lb. bag of M & Ms from the cupboard (because the reality is Dad DOES love M & Ms) and poured a big pile out onto the table. We decided to see what 178 M & Ms really looks like.

In the process, Banana Boy got all sorts of practice counting to 20 by twos and practice counting by 20s and practice narrowing down his groups as he got closer to 178. He made 5 piles of 20. Then more piles of 20 until he had 60 more. Then he knew he needed a pile of 10. And finally, 8 more.

2, 4, 6, 8, 10...

This is what 178 M & Ms looks like!

This is what I look like after I've eaten 178 M & Ms.

And no, the pile he actually got to eat was not the pile of 178!

World History Projects

2010-10-27T11:12:00.000-05:00

Here are some random world history projects we've done this year. Along with Sonlight's Core 1, Banana Boy is using Handle on the Arts core 1 go-along. It schedules in hands-on projects with the core.

First off, regarding Handle on the Arts.... I like it. No, really, I do. A part of me balks at paying $19.99 for projects I could come up with myself. And I tried this. You can get the table of contents for free from HotA. I searched and found most of the crafts online and copied and pasted them into a Word document. I spent about 4 hours gathering the first 12. I enjoy this. But after a point, I decided that it was just worth it to spend the $20.

And I'm glad I did. While I could have done a better job collecting the projects with GOOD directions (sometimes HotA instructions are a little lacking), by purchasing the curriculum (which comes as an instant download), I got the SCHEDULE to go along with Core 1 (could have done this myself, but it would have taken forever!) and the ART STUDIES, which I didn't realize were a part of this.

The art studies are my favorite part! Could I have put this together? Yes. But why reinvent the wheel? (there's not a project on that, incidentally) So far we've had a color picture of cave art with questions to go along with it, pointing out elements of the painting. We've also looked at the Battle Standard of Ur up close and personal.

Additionally, there is a lapbook of Egyptian architecture. This IS available as a free download from the site, so you could take advantage of it without the purchase.

So, for $20, I got all the hands-on activities with directions and materials lists, plus the schedule, plus the art studies, plus I saved myself hours and hours (AND HOURS) of time putting it together myself. I think it was a worthwhile purchase! Plus the activities are suitable for the girls, as well. In fact, most of the time, they all do them together.

Archaelogical Dig--suggested in HotA, but this one was entirely of their own volition. They were playing up in the orchard one day and someone spotted a bone. Then another. They all began digging and soon they had a wagonload of raccoon bones. At least two coons, we figure. Why were they there? Who knows!

Ancient Cave Painting--suggested in HotA. We modified it to the shower because our bathroom has no windows and we could make it completely dark. It was hard to draw by torchlight!

Aboriginal Dot painting-- Suggested in HotA. The kangaroo outline is available online. Under the supply list, click on "click here for printables"

Making felt--suggested in HotA

Cheesehenge. Daisy's own creation.

They made henges out of every available material for about two days after reading about Stonehenge. We watched part of the National Geographic documentary "Stonehenge Decoded" on Netflix instant play.

Ancient Egypt

2010-10-22T11:51:00.000-05:00

We've been steadily moving through Mystery of History, the curriculum we're using to study ancient history. It's Biblically-based and divided into short chapters. A week consists of a pre-test, 3 chapters and a post-test, plus timeline figures (not included, although directions for making them are), maps (included, although we are using MapTrek) and extra reading. I think I'll put up our weekly lessons because, even though there are TONS of MOH schedules out there, I think it always helps to look at someone else's to see what they are doing. I also love to see what new resources ~~I need to add~~ are out there.

So right now we're continuing to move through history while doing some long-term projects on Egypt. Pepper is going to be doing History Pockets Ancient Civilizations, the Egypt pocket. Daisy is making a travel brochure about Ancient Egypt (you might want to sign up for her tour package once you see it!)

We made mummified oranges and a green pepper from Neferchichi.com. There is tons to explore here if you are studying Ancient Egypt. We haven't even begun to scratch the surface of the resources here.

Anyway, here they sprinkling natron over the dead Pharaoh Pepperiti.

Here are all 3 pharoahs: Pharaoh Pepperiti, King Pulphaman I, and King Frufru I. Those are their internal organs drying out in the packets.

Daisy did some Egyptian math --most gladly, I may add. She was thrilled to take a break from her regular math and even though there was some research involved, she enjoyed it. Most of it was just the right level for her--just challenging enough. A few I had to help her with. I printed out the pages, rather than having her fill them in online. The links to the "answers" are on the above page, below the links to the problems.

Pepper attempted some Egyptian wall art from Artistic Pursuits I today, but became frustrated. Not sure if she'll continue with it or not.

And now we're going on a field trip/picnic to look at a local archaeological dig.

Praying for India

2010-10-15T11:14:00.001-05:00

Sonlight Curriculum, which we use, is currently sponsoring a program called My Passport to India (Choose the video you'd like to watch from the tiny panels above the main video box). It's a 5-week multi-media learning experience about India via video. A pastor named Chris, from the US, visited India and filmed his experiences visiting children's Bible clubs all over India. Mission India is the organization working there and, partnered with Sonlight, they've made this program available. Kids here in America are encouraged to save up change to donate to the program while they learn more about India and the Bible clubs reaching kids with Christ. Sonlight is also going to match the first $167,000 raised by students.

So we signed up. The kids have enjoyed watching the videos and reading Chris's travel diary. They received passports and stickers in the mail which they fill out each time they watch a new installment of the program.

Coincidentally, my mom also invited us to hear a gentleman who has worked in India the past 9 years speak at her church. One of her former pastors is a colleague of this man and so we were already familiar with the program. It was exciting to see his slides of their work and hear how many people they are teaching and reaching with the gospel. One statistic he mentioned was that they currently have 90 seminarians! He said many organizations would be grateful for 1 or 2 with interest in becoming pastors. And they have NINETY! (with 30 already graduated).

October 2010 - World Missions/India from WELS Streams on Vimeo.

I was really struck by the quote in the WELS video above that there are millions of gods in India, none of whom forgive sins.

If you'd like an excellent FREE curriculum to learn more about India, check out Voice of the Martyrs Kids of Courage. You do need to sign up to access it. It's a download, so you can print just what you want. I planned to use it last year when we were going to do SL's Core 5, and still will, whenever we get around to that.

The population of India has topped 1.2 BILLION people. Please pray for the people of India to hear the gospel and learn of the hope of eternal salvation. There are many wonderful organizations working in India toward that end. These are just two of them.

Field Trips

2010-10-15T10:42:00.000-05:00

We've been trying to take some field trips this fall, now that Sunshine is in PS kindergarten and things at home are, um... easier! (he is doing WONDERFULLY, btw).

At first we were going to visit the "Milwaukee Museum" as my kids call it. We buy a membership each year because it's a good deal for us. Not only is it paid for by two visits of our (large) family, you get discounts or free admission on other museums as well. We haven't used any of these yet, but we plan to.

After some discussion of desired field trips, however, we determined that we'd rather go to the Milwaukee Zoo instead while the weather was nice. I checked into memberships online (because after checking into admission fees and parking, it was going to set us back $55 for ONE VISIT!). So I bought a membership for $65. We went to the zoo (saving $44) and were able to park for free on the street (if you get there early enough--saving $10 or $11) and we had a great time. Because of the membership, we knew we could go again anytime within the next year, so we were able to see the zoo at a leisurely pace and even quit when we got tired, even though we hadn't seen everything!

Hyena laughs are contagious!

Daisy, I don't think that it's wise to take that from him!

Pepper kisses the lioness

Look! Cave drawings just like we made!

A couple of weeks later, on another beautiful Fall day, we visited the International Crane Foundation. I've always wanted to go there, the kids were game AND admission was free with our Milwaukee Zoo membership pass! FREE! This is the only place in the world which houses all 15 species of cranes. Their breeding program targets the very endangered whooping crane, with great success. We read about the history of their breeding program, meet the 15 species of cranes, and enjoyed a walk through the tallgrass prairie.

Check out our wingspans!

Grey Crowned Crane of Africa

(makes me think of the Crowned Crane, Savannah, from WeeBee Tunes!)

Future trips on our list include the Missisippi River Museum, and the NEW Zoo, both free or discounted with our Zoo pass, the Milwaukee Public Museum, the state capitol in Madison, and selected museums in Chicago (a larger undertaking--who likes to drive in Chicago?? :P ) We also plan to visit some art museums and see some shows at the Overture Center in Madison.

Happy field tripping to us!

Tuesday Teatime

2010-10-08T10:01:00.000-05:00

In Bravewriter fashion, we have begun Tuesday Teatimes and they have proved to be HUGELY popular! We haven't missed a one so far.

Each Tuesday, someone (usually Daisy) volunteers to bake something and at 2pm, we set the table with a table cloth, flowers and the good china. I make the tea and everyone brings a poem to tea.

We serve the tea and snacks using our best manners and then, one at a time, we share the poem we've brought.

I gathered all of the poetry books we own (and which we've very seldom used in 15 years of homeschooling!) onto one shelf. One week, Banana Boy even wrote an original poem and brought it to share.

So, like never before, we are enjoying poetry on a regular basis. The kids enjoy choosing a poem to share. I get to share some of my favorites. We're sampling many different authors and types of poetry.

And the tea is good, too!

Hey, they took away my blog design!

2010-10-08T09:25:00.000-05:00

The blog template I was using was from Cutest Blog on the Block, but apparently, they don't keep the designs indefinitely, because when I came here today, my background was missing!

Temporarily (which may become indefinitely) I've inserted some pink stuff from Blogger, but prepare for my blog to be ugly for a while.

Friday Art

2010-09-09T09:38:00.000-05:00

We are studying world history this year. Daisy and Pepper are doing Mystery of History and Banana Boy is doing Sonlight's Core 1.

Along with Core 1, I have added a craft/art package called Hands-On History for Core 1 from Handle on the Arts. The first week's project was to do a cave painting. The curriculum came with a printable art print of a cave painting with which you do a mini art-study. We talked about the animals we saw in the painting and some of the elements the artist used when making the painting.

Then we got to make our own cave paintings!

Banana Boy and Pepper are here in the cave. The wall is not very smooth, nor is it even. It slopes downward and has some big bumps. They brought along a hide to sit on and two torches so they could see.

Pepper's painting

Banana Boy's painting

One of the wonderful things about Mystery of History is how it ties Bible history in with world history so you get the whole picture. We've been reading about Jubal and Tubal-Cain. Their story illustrates that early man was not just a grunting caveman, but and intelligent being who lived in a civilization with the leisure time for music and the skills and wisdom for metal-work.

So while we study cave art, we don't by any means believe that all early people lived in caves. Certainly, some of them did. This project at least gave us an appreciation for how uncomfortable it is to draw in a cave in the dark! Early man was a determined guy!

Doin' a 180 (or a 90 or a 270...I Don't Know)

2010-07-01T15:33:00.000-05:00

Remember a couple of posts ago (which was really a couple of months ago) how I posted we'd be doing an around-the-world study and Core 5's Eastern Hemisphere?

Well, people go on and on over at the SL Forums about how difficult this SL year is and how you shouldn't do it with kids under 10 and how kids get so much more from it when they are older, yadda, yadda.

I was pretty secure in my choice to do it anyway with Daisy (who will be 12) and Pepper (who will be 9-turning-10) and to do my own travelling-around-the-world thing with Banana Boy. We've Sonlighted all along, which is a major factor in it being successful with a younger-than-average child (such as Pepper). She's used to the format, the reading, the discussions.

But she's not an eager reader of books she considers too hard for her. Or books she considers not interesting (meaning not full of puppies or ponies or kittens or child detectives solving mysteries). And Core 5 is full of not-interesting-to-Pepper books.

So in a prime example of wishy-washy, second-guessing (and over-use of the hyphen) curriculum-hopping, we're shelving Core 5 for now.

Instead---take a deep breath----I'm abandoning Sonlight. Sort of.

There. I said it.

Now I've always considered myself a die-hard Sonlighter, even though in actuality, I use SL pretty LOOSELY. I own all the SL cores up through 6. I have all the catalogs back through 1998. (I think I even have a 1996)

I love SL. I love what they stand for. I love the books they choose. I love that it's all planned out and shipped in a box right to me.

But I'm a grass is greener kind of girl and I just can't HELP messing with it. Er, I mean, Tweaking.

So, my plan was to do Core 6 World History and use Mystery of History instead of Story of the World (which I just can't stand. I've tried to use it. I've tried to like it. It. Annoys. Me. I don't like her style. And then when people throw in the accuracy issues... I'm just done. If you want to buy my SOTW collection, it's for sale.)

I have a schedule I put together when I did this same thing with Rose Bud several years ago, using MOH and Core 6. Looking over it this summer, I realized it's not Core 6. It's not SL. It's MOH and many of the great books SL suggests (and many great books suggested by other curriculums).

So, reluctantly, I admitted to myself that I would not be using Core 6 this fall. And I won't be using Core 7 next year. In fact, I'm going to do MOH for the next 3 years with the girls. They WON'T BE USING SONLIGHT. (insert moment of silence)

After that, I'd like to come back to Core 5. We'll have to see, as Daisy will be in 9th grade. If I've learned nothing else, it's not to even bother to plan ahead. Three years from now, I'll have all new ideas.

Anyway, I AM going to do Core 1 World History with Banana Boy as written, out of the IG, open and go. NO TWEAKING! I do like Hillyer's Child's History of the World. I used that with Rose Bud long, long ago.

Ok. I might tweak a little. I hate the Usborne World History. But other than that. NO TWEAKING!

Funny, how it all works out. I've never liked SL's science and this year we are completing Science 5. I've always used SL's Cores and this year we'll be switching to MOH. I feel a bit like a traitor. It was Jimmie, who actually gave me the courage to say out loud what I was wanting to do on the inside. Thanks, Jimmie!

Summer Days

2010-06-25T15:46:00.000-05:00

Summer is here and we are enjoying it. The pool is up and the kids are swimming every day. Rose Bud will be going to camp soon. I'm having to mow the lawn about every 5 1/2 days with all the rain we've been getting.

And summer school is happening.

Actually, we've been at summer school since the beginning of May. We finished up Sonlight's Core 4 and packed it away. We made up our summer schedule which involves keeping up with math and writing in some way, finishing up any subjects that didn't quite get finished and SCIENCE!

Science: the bane of many homeschoolers' existence. Why is it that so many hsers neglect this subject, myself included? We've never finished a science curriculum in this house. Many years we've done only a smattering.

The kids like it. I don't mind the reading. I think it's the experiments. I know my frustration is that so often they don't work. You gather all the stuff together (substituting with a creative idea for that ONE item you don't have in the house) and the kids are left wondering how come the experiments never turn out.

On the docket for fall, however, was Sonlight's Science 5: The Human Body. I did complete a chunk of this with Rose Bud many years ago. The kids were excited.

Then I had the bright idea to do it this summer and get it out of the way.

So I purchased the few new pieces SL had added since we last did it along with a new instructor's guide (1/2 price, since I'd purchased one previously). And I added Apologia's Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology. Why? I don't know. I have yet to be successful with any of this series. We own Botany and Flying Things. Maybe my kids were too young when we tried them before.

So I don't know why I felt the need to spend money on yet another book in this series. Only I did. And we love it! It really would be excellent as a stand alone, but we are using it as a complement to SL's Science 5 and it is working beautifully.

We read through the SL readings in one or two days. The third day we read the corresponding chapter in Apologia. The kids are also making their insides using the pieces from My Body, so they color and cut out livers and intestines and brains and hearts. They glue them down on the life-size models we traced of their bodies on newsroll end paper I got for a dollar from our local newspaper printer years ago. We also do a few of the simpler experiments from the various books.

At this rate, we are able to go through about 3 weeks worth of the SL schedule in 2 weeks. I'm hoping to be able to finish the first 18 weeks this summer, assign the next 6 weeks as independent reading and then work through the History of Medicine book in the fall.

Banana Boy is doing the human body as well, but I made up a seperate schedule for him using books I had on hand. These include The BFC Young Book of the Body (a used-book purchase I got YEARS ago) which is our spine. We are following the topics in order of this book. We also read from DK's Picturepedia Your Body on the same topic (another long ago garage sale purchase). For experiments we use Play and Find Out: Human Body (rather preschoolish, but we don't read the text. I just use it for experiment ideas), and Healthy Me, Sense-Abilities, and Watch Me Grow for more experiments. I'm actually managing to keep his schedule simple and use books I already had on hand. I'm so proud of me! LOL

Indonesia for Youngers -- Go-Along with Core 5

2010-04-21T15:21:00.000-05:00

I've been working on plans for Banana Boy to go along with Sonlight's Core 5 for next year. He'll be a 2nd grader and I just want to do a country study with him. I'm trying REALLY HARD to keep it simple--always a challenge for me! So here's what I've got going so far.

I'm trying not to spend any money on this (or at least, very little), so I'm looking for free resources online and utilizing things I have on hand. There is nothing special about the books I've chosen, except that I already own them.

Spine: Mission Friends-Indonesia
Children Just Like Me
Lion Storyteller Bedtime Book (SL Core P4/5)
Lion Storyteller Book of Animal Tales
Animal Friends from Around the World (Dover)
From Akebu to Zapotec (SL Core 1)

Spend one week on Indonesia:

Monday
Map from Mission Friends
Cooking from Mission Friends: Make Pisang Goreng
Folktales: Lion Storyteller Book of Animal Tales “The Clever Mouse Deer” and “The Wonderful Bird”; Lion Storyteller Bedtime Book “The Mouse Deer’s Wisdom”; Gift of the Crocodile: An Indonesian Cinderella I haven't read this yet, but it is possible to find a Cinderella story from many cultures and I thought it would be fun to compare them. I'll be including one from as many countries as I can.

Tuesday
Flag from Mission Friends or Crayola
Language from Mission Friends (phrases and counting to 5)
National Symbol Krakotoa (OR geographical features: volcano and archipelago)

Wednesday

Beliefs from Mission Friends (also do Shadow Puppet Nativity from Mission Friends)
Prayer Needs read Mission Friends; also From Akebu to Zapotec: Osing people
Clothes read Children Just Like Me: Subaedah

Thursday

Music Gamelan Music and Gamelan Music; sing "Jesus Loves Me" from Mission Friends; Indonesian National Anthem
Crafts from Mission Friends: Batik and Smells of Indonesia (mace, nutmeg, coffee, etc.)

Friday

Games from Mission Friends: play Gamet Orang or Gajah or Badminton; Traditional Indonesian Children's Games
Animals Komodo Dragons and/or Orangutans
visit zoo
Print a collector's card Komodo Dragon Orangutan
Coloring page from Dover's Animal Friends From Around the World (#9 Orangutan)
Passport Stamp Passports and stamps are available to download for free from many sites
Mission Friends stamps only, but passports can be ordered
Time for Kids download and print
GC Kidz Club click on the passport. You need to order this passport, but you can get as many as you need and they are very nice. This is the one we will be using.

Extra Mission Friends activities:
Vocabulary words
Word search
Crossword Puzzle

Other activities I may have Pepper do:
GeoScribe Geography Terms: Archipelago and Volcano
Narrate the Cinderella story or
Make a chart to compare and contrast Cinderella stories

Internet links:
Balinese Shadow Puppets on YouTube
Javanese Shadow Puppets on YouTube
How to wear an Indonesian men's sarong
Traditional women's dress: the kebaya
In-depth explanation of batik

A Story, A Story!

2010-04-21T14:16:00.000-05:00

Daisy wrote this lovely little story today.

Her writing prompt was, "Jonah had always wanted a dog, but there was something strange about the little puppy sitting on his doorstep..."

she continued (without any help):

"He ran into the house and found some scraps from lunch to feed to the puppy. It ate and ate.

All of a sudden, the puppy started growing. It grew 1 foot tall then 2 feet then 3 feet. He thought it would never stop growing. When it finally stopped growing, it was 5 feet tall!

He had no idea what he would do with a 5 foot tall dog. He noticed it was panting so he decided to try giving it some water. But where would he ever get so much water?

He decided to bring it to the swimming pool. It drank and drank. Then it started shrinking. First 1 foot, then two feet. It finally stopped at its normal 1 foot height.

He decided to keep the puppy and he named it Giant. Whenever someone asks why a tiny dog is called Giant, all he has to do is give Giant a bowl of scraps and they understand. He always carries scraps and water, just in case!"

1, 2, 3!

2010-03-12T14:14:00.000-06:00

Sunshine has begun working in his new "school book," Counting With Numbers, part of Rod & Staff's preschool series.

He had been working through the 1st book in the series for about 2 years now and FINALLY finished that one. He has an attention span at least a year behind his age, likely because his family age is only about 2 1/2, and prior to now he had not been interested in academic work of any kind.

Which is fine by me. I've never been a preschool-pusher. Ok, yes, I was when RoseBud was little, but that was because I didn't know any better. I learned my lesson with her.

Anyway, he has finished the 1st book, Adventures with Books and is now in the counting book. And surprisingly, he's working very well! The first two pages had him tracing the numeral 1 and counting one object. He could already count, with one-to-one correspondence up to four objects reliably and sometimes 5. And he could make a reasonably straight line, so this first section, learning "one" was easy for him.

The second page spread jumped right into the number "two" and this was a little trickier, but he persevered through it and even began writing some 2's on his own (without having to trace them!).

I brought out my old preschool-standby favorite, "Comprehensive Curriculum of Basic Skills, Preschool" which I've always picked up at Sam's or Costco for $5.95 and found him the corresponding numeral pages. He did some more practice with ones and twos.

And now he's up to 3. "Around the tree, around the tree, this is how we make a 3," is the rhyme in Counting with Numbers and he's making lovely little 3's!

He astonished me the other day in the car by counting up to 11 correctly!

And this boy just LOVES books! I'd forgotten how much fun it was to read to a preschooler. Banana Boy has never been a book boy. Sing to him, yes! Read to him, not interested.

Sunshine has worn out our voices reading all the My First Little House books about "Lawla and Mary." He has them all memorized and if you change a word, he'll let you know.

His latest passion is Richard Scarry. We began with Richard Scarry's Mother Goose, which he called his "kitty book" because of the big cat on the cover. Now he has discovered that we own almost every Richard Scarry book ever known to man and we are reading through them. Needless to say, he really enjoyed Cars and Trucks and Things That Go (one of my very favorite books from MY childhood. We are on our 3rd copy in this house. Sadly, they don't seem to hold up well) Can YOU find Goldbug on every spread?

We do our reading before naptime. It seems to be the only dedicated time I can carve out EVERY day to read to him without interruptions. We try to read one storybook, one poetry book (focusing on Mother Goose right now) and the Bible.

We are reading the Rhyme Bible For Toddlers together and are going through it for the second time.

And for science, he obsessively watches Sid the Science Kid.

There you have it: my accidental preschool curriculum. All my past planning was wasted time. It just goes to show that no two kids are the same. I don't think I've done anything even remotely similar for any two of my five kids.

Live and learn...

Beginning to Plan for Next Year

2010-03-03T14:09:00.001-06:00

Starting to lay out plans for next fall. Daisy will be in 6th grade, Pepper in 4th and Banana Boy in 2nd. Sunshine will go to public school kindergarten and Rose Bud will be a Freshman in PS.

For Daisy and Pepper: Sonlight Core 5

I'm excited to go through this core again. It was fun and interesting to read about so many cultures so "foreign" to us. We'll be studying countries in the 10/40 Window such as the South Pacific, Australia, China, Japan, Korea, Russia, India, the Middle East and in Africa.

For Banana Boy, I think I'm going to use a combination of Mission Friends country packets and Voice of the Martyrs Bold Believers series. Both sets are available as free downloads and will provide a nice framework for a simple country study from a Christian perspective.

(in case the Mission Friends link doesn't work, Google "Lutheran Church Missouri Synod Mission Friends" and you should bring the correct page right up.)

If anyone knows of any other similar resources, I'd love to know about them!

Daisy will also be doing:
Teaching Textbooks 7 for math
Sonlight LA 4 grammar and writing (yes, we're a year behind)
Spanish for Children and
Rosetta Stone Spanish
Sonlight Science 5
Piano lessons
Art class
AWANA and working through Luther's Small Catechism

Pepper will do:
Singapore Math 4
Sonlight LA 4 grammar
6-Trait Daily Writing grade 3 (or maybe 4)
Let's Learn Spanish grades 2, 3 & 4 (depending how far we get) and
KidSpeak Spanish and
Hola Amigos Spanish
AWANA
Art at home
Science....ah science. Yuck, I hate teaching it. The kids love it. Maybe will find something for Pepper and BB to do together.

Banana Boy will be in:
Singapore Math 2 and
Miquon Math (probably Blue & Green)
6-Trait Daily Writing grade 2
KidSpeak Spanish and
Hola Amigos Spanish
AWANA
Art at home
Science--see Pepper

My goal: Keeping it SIMPLE! (never has happened yet!)

New Math

2010-03-03T13:43:00.000-06:00

Daisy has finished Singapore 6 and begun Teaching Textbooks 7. We got a good deal on it from a friend who was finished with it.

So far, so good. She likes working on the computer and does her computations on scratch paper before entering the answers into the computer. She looked over the topics and pronounced them easy-looking, which is good. She's only in 5th grade and this is 7th grade math, so easy will be ok. She can use the review before hitting Algebra. And if it takes her a little longer, that will be all right, too.

Beginning, Middle and End

2010-03-03T09:10:00.000-06:00

Today Banana Boy's writing assignment was to write a story with a beginning, a middle and an end. (the focus of this is organizing a story).

Here is his story, more remarkable for what happens in the story (which is true, btw) than for his writing prowess...

"I was chewing my flaverful gum. I was playing with it. I got it stuck in my hair. Daisy had to cut the gum."

A testament to Daisy's ability to think on her feet, since I was not home at the time (ran Sunshine to preschool).

Back on Track

2010-02-24T14:06:00.000-06:00

Now that I'm back from my trip, we are fully back on track with school. We've finished our Canada/Olympics study, with the exception of filling in the medals charts.

We are back into Sonlight Core 4 and are on, ummm.... Week 13. Well, that's the first week that we have entirely completed. We are jumping around a bit and going at our own pace in the read-alouds, so we're ahead in Caddie Woodlawn. Pepper needs to read about Thomas Edison. We listened to Old Yeller twice already, the last time being about 2 years ago and the girls don't want to hear it again, so we'll skip that. It's not a book I can read aloud (it's actually scheduled as a reader, for them to read to themselves) so we've always listened to it on CD. I hate sobbing while I'm reading aloud.

Daisy has read all the Core 4 readers months and months ago in her quest for "something to read, Mom!" Pepper, a more reluctant reader, is going to be plowing through a pile of them in the next week or so.

It's not that she CAN'T read them. She's an excellent reader. She just CHOOSES the more fluffy stuff. Pony Pals (gag) for instance, are her latest passion and she can read two a day. I gave her the stack she needs to read Monday and she's already blown through The Toothpaste Millionaire (took less than a day) and We'll Race You, Henry Ford.

So in her pile, still to be read, are George Washington Carver, Thomas Edison, Helen Keller and Shoes For Everyone.

Pepper just walked into the room where Daisy is busily (and happily) making electrical circuits for science and muttered under her breath, "I hate science experiments." This on the heels of Banana Boy, who stomped through the room shouting, "I NEVER get to do anything FUN! I NEVER get to do experiments!!!"

I offered Pepper the chance to trade with BB (even though TOPS Electricity is really too hard for him) and she jumped at it. His response to her: "SURE! But then you have to finish my puzzles." (Lauri crepe rubber preschool puzzles).

However, once Pepper discovered that today's experiment involved burning up tiny pieces of steel wool, she was all over it. Now she is determinedly completing her work sheet. Daisy, who has finished the sheet, is burning up more wires.

Olympic/Canada Projects

2010-02-24T13:26:00.001-06:00

Pepper made a TV to display what she learned about Canada and the Winter Olympics. We used a kleenex box (well, ok, Target brand facial tissue, if you want to avoid trademark infringement) and I made "screens" on half-sheets of paper. She drew or wrote her information in each screen and then we taped them all end-to-end and rolled them up on dowels. You turn the dowels to advance the screens. It turned out very cute!

Pepper proudly shows off her TV

The Canadian flag

Ancient Greek Government (the line of guys in the bottom left corner are standing in line to vote in their democracy!)

Ever wanted to see inside a TV?

The ends of the screen-strip are taped to the dowels. We poked a small hole, just big enough for the dowels in the top of the box. The bottom end of each dowel sits inside a large paper clip taped to the inside bottom of the box. This keeps the dowels straight and in place and keeps the screen roll near the front of the box.

Here is Banana Boy's not-quite-finished lapbook:

"Canada and the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games"

Canada/British Columbia section

Olympic section (a little sparse)

Individual sports. BB wrote a little about each sport inside the little books.

Daisy made a similar lapbook, but of course put much more time and effort into it.

Ancient Olympics section. Booklets are a combination of the two lapbook kits mentioned here.

Modern Olympics section. It includes a calendar of the dates of the 2010 Olympics, a map of the torch relay, a tri-fold brochure of British Columbia, a booklet about the torch, the Canadian flag, a chart showing distances from our area to former Olympic host cities, a booklet about the opening ceremonies, an Olympic acrostic poem, a medal count, map of participating countries and a report on an outstanding Canadian. Inside shots of some of the booklets are below.

Medal-winning countries in selected events

Olympics and Canada

2010-02-18T14:06:00.002-06:00

Part of Sonlight Core 4 includes a study of Canada. I think it is scheduled near the end of the year, but when I began to plan for studying the Olympics, I had an aha! moment and pulled out the Canada book to tie in.

So we've been making lapbooks. We've learned about Canada using Sonlight's book A Unit About Canada.

This has been a very nice study. We were fairly choosey about which pages we did. I copied off many of the pages with fill-in-the-blank answers and after we'd read about the topic, I had either Daisy or Pepper do the writing while everyone chimed in with the answers. I didn't feel it was necessary, nor productive, to have each one complete their own sheet. Between the reading, the discussion and the worksheet, I think they all got a good grounding in the topics. I also had whomever hadn't filled out the sheet check it over for accuracy.

This book was also nice in that I was able to find activities within suitable for Daisy, Pepper AND Banana Boy. He enjoyed the maps. We also did some extensions with him about tides when we read about the world's highest tides in the Bay of Fundy. He chose to read about Michael J. Fox when they each chose an "Outstanding Canadian" to report on. Why would he know MJF? Mr. GT and the kids are movie addicts on the weekends when I am at work, and they've seen all the Back to the Future movies!

After a general overview of Canada, we focused in on British Columbia because that's where the 2010 Winter Olympics are, in Vancouver. There's a page in the book with 6 different province-study topics and each of them took two. We checked out a bunch of books from the library on BC and the kids set to work investigating. Daisy and Pepper were able to find answers to their questions and record notes pretty well on their own. BB and I worked together to explore natural resources, crops and manufacturing and food, sports and attractions. He made a little book about logging with coloring pages I found on the internet and colored a picture of salmon for his lapbook. I think I'll have him do a hockey page, too.

Finally, for the Olympics study, I bought two lapbooks from CurrClick. CurrClick is a wonderful place to buy e-books and instant download lapbooking sets. They have a nice selection of freebies and often have sales, plus they carry products from many different companies. If you get on their weekly newsletter mailing list, you get a new freebie each week and it's a good way to sample each company's product. I've definitely found I don't like all lapbooking kits. Some companies are much more to my taste than others.

We used A Journey Through Learning's 2010 Winter Olympics lapbook and Live N Learn's Winter Olympics lapbook. AJTL's lapbook was a nice fit for Banana Boy, with much simpler, broader activities. LnL's kit contained very specific and deep projects exploring the olympics and was a good match for Daisy's skills. Pepper worked a bit from both and I selected just the projects and booklets we needed and tossed the rest.

If you are considering purchasing either, the Live N Learn kit is not year-specific and could be used as-is over again for another Winter Olympics. The Journey Through Learning set is specific to the 2010 Olympics, but only in a few places (mascots, themes, map of the torch trek). Much of it could be used again another time and it's on sale right now for only $3.75! It would be a great value to purchase now and use again next time. You could adapt the year-specific activities to the new olympics fairly easily with a little internet research.

A few other online things I collected from www.activityvillage.co.uk

An Olympic acrostic and a Distance to Travel worksheet

I'll post pictures of the lapbooks when we have them finished--hopefully that will be by tomorrow, since Grandma and Grandpa are coming!

I Was Going to Make Them Come Down and Do School

2010-02-18T12:57:00.001-06:00

after lunch. Daisy has some things in her Olympic folder to work on. I was going to read Caddie Woodlawn to them.

But when I went up find them, they were in the attic and Daisy was reading The Boxcar Children to Pepper and Banana Boy.

ah, homeschooling..... :D

Just Like That, She's Multiplying

2009-12-18T15:12:00.000-06:00

So Pepper, who cried all morning (and for the last 3 months, for that matter) showed her multiplication pictures to her dad. And because explaining something to someone else is the surest way to know it yourself, she now KNOWS all the facts for which we drew pictures.

From the kitchen, where they are rolling truffles, she calls to me, "Mom? What's 8 x 8?"

"You know that one!"

"Oh, 64! I made 66 mint truffles!"

And she's cracking up because I caught her KNOWING her multiplication facts.

Just like that, she's multiplying AND using it in real life.

Finished the Civil War

2009-12-18T14:34:00.002-06:00

We finished the Civil War a bit ago. The girls made lapbooks from History Pockets: Civil War. I shrunk the printables from this book to make smaller-sized booklets to use in their lapbooks.

Our favorite Civil War resources?

Across Five Aprils

We listened to this book on audio, rather than me read it. I have a hard time reading dialect aloud. It is available from iTunes or audible.com. This book is the (roughly) true story of the author's grandfather who was a boy of 12 or 14 when the Civil War began. He remained on the farm while his older brothers went off to war and the story chronicles the war through all five Aprils, 1861-1865. It's a wonderful, moving story that captures you and gives a fabulous overview of the war through the eyes of Jethro and his family.

We also listened to Bull Run on audio (also purchased from iTunes). LOVE this book! I prefer the audio version of this book because of the format of the story. It consists of about 15 characters, each speaking in his own chapter. The characters vary between male & female, North & South, slave & free, rich and poor, soldier and civilian. All meet in some way at the battle of Bull Run and through their collective perspective, you experience that battle. LOVE this book!

Besides listening to the audio version, which offers a different voice for each character, we also make a chart of the characters' names, their affiliation (north or south), a few words about their story (who they are) and their role at Bull Run. This book can be a little confusing because of the number of characters, but the audio and the chart help us to keep it straight.

We read Lincoln: A Photobiography and a few Cornerstones of American History books.

To celebrate the end of our Civil War unit, we took a day-trip to Springfield, IL to visit the Lincoln Museum and his home there.

Lincoln's Home is a national park site and is a free tour.

The Lincoln Museum is part of his presidential library. If you are within driving distance of this museum, I encourage you to go there! It is a wonderful, interactive museum that traces Lincoln's life from his early log cabin days through his time in Springfield, the White House and to his death. There are two really great holographic movies, lots of realistic wax (I think they are silicon nowadays) figures, a coverage of slavery and the Civil War, and actual items that belonged to the Lincolns. The cost is $10 for adults and $6 for kids, but it seemed worth it to us.

We had actually visited this museum on our vacation to St. Louis two years ago and the kids were STILL talking about going here. Since they had such fond memories of it, I thought it would be fun to revisit it now that that period in history was "explained" in their minds. They liked it just as well the second time.

Also in Springfield are Lincoln's tomb, where he and his family are buried and the village of New Salem where Lincoln lived and worked before he became an esteemed lawyer. We didn't visit those two places on this trip. (We saw his tomb 2 years ago) If you can't visit the tomb in person, you can take this photo tour.

Friday Art

2009-12-18T14:01:00.001-06:00

Catching up on some Friday Art.

This project was to color something in a surprising way. The girls really had fun with this one and it was actually HARD to choose the colors you weren't "supposed to."

This next project took us about 2 months. The girls began the paintings way back in September, I think, with a cool watercolor wash and a warm wash (not pictured) They had to dry, which put us all off track. The next step was to print leaves of the opposite temperature (warm on cool and cool on warm) onto the background.

By the time we were ready to print the leaves, there was snow on the ground. Luckily I had purchased some foam leaves in a bin one time. Four different leaves each in three sizes makes for a nice printing activity! In the first two photographs, if you look carefully, you can see the foam leaves lying on the picture in the position the girls have planned out. They are in the process of painting (or touching up) the first leaf.

Here is the finished product

At this point in the book, Daisy got annoyed with art and quit. So Pepper sponged this "cool" snowman and got to mix her paints, to boot.

The next exercise was to paint this "cool" tree. To be honest, I drew the tree (she wouldn't), but she colored it (after I demonstrated) and she painted it. When she was finished, it made her cry because her tree (which was supposed to resist the watercolor due to the crayon) had turned all blue and she hated it. For the record, Rose Bud thought it was awesome!

So, there you have it. This fall's Friday Art!

My Little Musicians

2009-12-18T13:06:00.002-06:00

Daisy has been giving Banana Boy piano lessons. She even puts a book on the back of his hand to keep his hand still and make his fingers do all the work.

Banana Boy got a microphone and guitar for his birthday. There have been LOTS of shows and concerts ever since. One night, there was even a church service complete with worship band and children's sermon.

Daisy and BB spend a lot of time composing and choreographing things. They make a good team and both can play by ear. I can't even list for you the number of songs they can play on the piano that each has picked out by ear. Banana Boy, especially, is gifted at this and for him, it's a necessary skill since he can't read music.

In addition to the piano, they are both constantly messing with: the recorder, the guitar (I caught Daisy "borrowing" her brother's new guitar and the Teach Yourself book that came with it), hand bells, accordian (we have a toy one that plays surprisingly nice music), and various rhythm instruments.

Here is a little treat for you from today.

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Conquering Multiplication Without Any Effort

2009-12-18T12:46:00.000-06:00

In new developments, Pepper has been spending her days shedding tears over math.

Wait! That's not new. That's the same thing she does everyday!

In new developments, I was a GOOD mom/teacher today and took steps to help her learn in the way she does best (ie: not with a workbook or anything that requires any effort at all)

I reminded myself that the reason I homeschool is so that I can meet the unique learning challenges of each child. I tend to focus on how much work that is (times 4 kids!) and just resort to workbooks.

So anyway, while stuck on her "times eights" I quickly sketched out a funny picture for her.

Try not to focus on how smelly the party looks. It's supposed to be confetti.

Seeing how delighted she was with this idea (read: she stopped wailing and only sobbed quietly) I sketched out some more.

This one I actually borrowed from my very favorite multiplication games site.

I used the 8x8 that is featured on the cover of the book.

If you would rather not think of your own mnemonics, then I encourage you to visit this site and buy one of their books. They offer two different books, both of which use a picture/story and offer lessons plans etc. I've not purchased either book, so I can only tell you what I've read on the website. Also on this website are tons of resources to use in making your own unit on the multiplication tables, such as worksheets and drill tests.

Another similar resource is Times Tales

If all you need is work on a few of the facts, you could just make your own little stories. Pepper has times through the fours down pat. Fives she'll master quickly if she thinks about it a little bit. Sixes she knows from the 100 Sheep Skip Counting CD. Nines she's using a nine trick. So it's just sevens and eights she is really stuck on, and then, only the uppers.

Here are the rest that I made today.

Right away when I told her it was dirty food, she said, "Oh, 32!!" Yay! Pepper!
In case you can't tell from my prize-winning drawing, the eights are crabby and dirty and the ham and peas (you DID know that was ham and peas, right?) have dirt on them.

Maybe you'll want to buy the books!

Best new educational toy ever

2009-12-10T13:00:00.002-06:00

For St. Nick, which is really our Christmas present time, Daisy & Pepper got a SnapCircuits kit. I love it, they love it!

We've been working through the Tops Electricity book and we're about halfway. We do one lesson a week. Daisy is pretty independent, at 11, and can complete most of the lesson herself. Pepper has become more independent as we've moved through the book and only needs minimal assistance.

They've learned about positive and negative, circuits, resistance, series & parallel, and switches.

As a fun addition to that study, I thought they'd enjoy the Snap Circuits set. Again, Daisy is almost completely independent with it. Pepper, at almost 9, is doing the beginning projects herself after some instruction from Daisy.

Banana Boy, who is too young for the Tops book, enjoyed making a couple of projects from the Snap Circuits set with Dad yesterday.

Daisy & Saffron work on their first project

Daisy shows Pepper the flying fan project

Come on, fan!

Whoo! There it goes!

Electric Cat

Banana Boy's 2nd Science Unit (Backtracking here)

2009-10-28T12:59:00.003-05:00

I mentioned in the Safari post that the African Savanna was BB's 3rd science unit. I don't think I posted about his Space unit.

It also, was fairly low key. He worked through a packet I made him from LearningPage.com. You can get an idea of the pages from the Space Gallery page. If you are a member (free, just sign up), you have access to all of the theme pages. They have units on Zoo animals, dinosaurs, the ocean, space, and insects. There are complete lesson plans for a unit, including book suggestions and a giant wall mural you can print and make.

In the past, I have used these plans (with Rose Bud when she was in Kindergarten), but this time, I just pulled out selected pages from the science, language arts and math sections. I also chose from a variety of grade levels from K-2, based on his skills (in other words, I didn't use all the first grade math pages, but just those I thought he could use practice on and I also added in a few K and 2nd grade math pages).

I also made him some little booklets from the Giant Science Resource Book by Evan-Moor and from Evan-Moor's ScienceWorks for Kids: Exploring Space.

I didn't use the whole unit from the space book, but just limited it to a few lessons on the sun and the planets, since that was BB's main focus and interest. I'm (in my old age) getting much better about not overplanning units and adding in every possible resource in the universe. I figure he has a lot of years left to learn about the way the Earth tilts on its axis. The kid just wanted to know about the planets.

So he filled out some mini-books, colored some planets, unscrambled their names and memorized the Solar System song from Audio Memory's Geography Songs. Oh, and we watched Ms. Frizzle about 10 times!

Math Cat

2009-10-28T12:57:00.004-05:00

Safari Unit

2009-10-28T12:46:00.005-05:00

Banana Boy's 3rd science unit was the African Savanna. This one was pretty informal and he watched a lot of movies. Some of our favorites were
Mama Mirabelle's Home Movies
Wildebeest: The Great African Migration (you can read my review of this movie at Amazon)
and some National Geographic movies.

We also read the One Small Square: African Savanna

I promised him (foolishly) that he could make a diorama of the savanna when he was done. This would have been a great and fun project for the girls, who love to draw from Draw Write Now books. BB, however, spends a lot of time looking at this book, making some marks with a pencil, then crumpling the paper, throwing it at the wall and stomping around the room.

So one morning, we made a very quicky diorama, with Mom doing much of the work. Now BB is happy to have his African scene and he took it up to the attic where he adds the little plastic African animals from the drawer to his scene.

Journal Cat

2009-10-21T11:36:00.002-05:00

Grammar Cat

2009-10-21T11:26:00.002-05:00

Bible Study

2009-09-14T10:29:00.005-05:00

For our Bible study this year, I have printed out pages from Bible Scribe.

Banana Boy is doing Bible stories and we are using the Bible Scribe sheets as our outline. Here is our schedule:
Monday: I read the story from The Egermeier Bible
Tuesday: BB reads the story to me from the Beginner's Bible
Wednesday: I read the story from the Jesus Storybook Bible
Thursday: BB draws a picture on his Bible Scribe sheet (his choice how he wants to illustrate the story
Friday: BB copies a Bible verse from the story on his sheet and dictates to me the story in his own words. The copywork goes on the lined portion of the sheet and the dictation in the "ribbon."

The girls are doing something similar, only we are doing a verse study. We are using the Bible Scribe New Testament Scripture packet.

We read from the Egermeir Bible, Pepper's NLT Bible, Daisy's NIV Bible and then the girls illustrate, copy the verse and write the meaning in their own words.

Bird Study Lapbook

2009-09-14T10:07:00.005-05:00

Here is the culmination of Banana Boy's bird unit. We made a lapbook together and I think he did a great job!

The photo makes it a little hard to read. It is called "All About Birds." BB chose the title himself.He drew a robin, a red-winged blackbird and a cardinal flying (if you click on the picture, you can see them better)

Here is the inside.

His bird-watching journal. It says, "What I saw: 'a blak bird. it was big.'"

His booklet titled, "What is a Bird?"

I love the picture for "Birds are warm-blooded." He drew a penguin walking in a snowstorm (keeping itself warm with its warm blood).

Resources for Bird Unit

Next up: The Solar System.

They Close Their Eyes And Just Breathe

2009-09-09T08:03:00.003-05:00

If you read just one post from Sarah's Blog, please read this one. (This is the one I want you to read)

Rose Bud and I are going to India in January to help out at Sarah's homes and we are SO excited!

I have to admit when I first heard about Leslie's trip to India, I was mostly--selfishly--excited just to go to India. The "missions" part of it was really an excuse for me to go back. I looked at Sarah's blog and all the photos of her kids and I didn't really want to go "there."

Why is it that we have that kind of reaction to the handicapped? They are humans, they are children. But they look different. Is the feeling based on previous interactions we've had with real people who looked "funny," made strange noises, whom we couldn't understand? What makes it so hard for us to treat them as we treat any non-handicapped person?

But....it didn't take long for me, reading Sarah's blog on a daily basis, to catch hold of her wonderful attitude, her compassion and love and enthusiasm for these children and their possibilities.

When you read her blog everyday, you get to know the children by name. You learn their strengths and gifts, their personalities and their needs. You learn that they are human and they are just children. They look different, but they have hearts just like ours.

Sarah absolutely has a God-given gift for what she is doing. Her heart is 100% for the children.

Please read the post I linked above. Please feel the love Sarah has for all God's children. Please pray for her ministry and for our trip. And please read some more of her blog and meet all the children we will be meeting when we go.

I can't wait to hold them and love them, play with them and teach them, share their joy and their tears. KNOW them. They are human. They are GOD's children.

Growing Seeds

2009-09-08T11:04:00.005-05:00

I bought these neato-mosquito containers at Oriental Trading Company about two years ago. This week, while cleaning out the school closet I decided it was high time we used them. The girls ran for their stash of seeds and they soaked them in warm water overnight. Each did two different beans, a pea and corn. Then we folded paper towel and dropped a seed in on each side of the paper towel. We fit four seeds in the container this way. The paper towel keeps the seed in place and soaks up moisture for it.

They only took about a week to grow all lush and green

What I love about the containers is that you can see the seed as it sprouts and grows. Not a very good picture of the roots here, but you get the idea.

The very sad part of our experiment, which had Pepper in tears, is that our cat thought we planted these greens for HIM. He has chomped off the tops of all of them.

Next experiment: Growing cat grass....

Friday Art: Rainbows (and a family portrait)

2009-09-08T10:54:00.003-05:00

We are still plugging along in our book, Using Color in Your Art. This week's assignment was to imagine what is at the end of the rainbow--in other words, what does the rainbow "do" where it hits the earth?

In the example, the child colored all the flowers at the end of the rainbow in rainbow colors. I chose to make the water the rainbow "touched" spread out in rainbow colors.

So did the girls. The other part of the assignment was to paint the sky in a wash and then dab it with a papertowel to remove some of the color and make clouds.

Here is Pepper's painting.

Banana Boy's grass turned all rainbowey.

Daisy's rainbow

And finally, the family portrait, drawn by Sunshine. Isn't this cute?! It's the first time he's drawn people and I love it! I'm the big one.

More Spelling Resources

2009-09-02T15:59:00.002-05:00

Here is a website listing lots of low-tech (no computer needed) ideas for practicing spelling words. There are also some websites listed where you can do creative things with your words like create mp3s from them and listen to them, animate them and more. I haven't checked out all the links, so proceed with caution. Wordle is pretty neat!

Lastly, if you are looking for something very simple, Scholastic has a Spelling Wizard that allows you to enter 10 words, then creates either an unscramble puzzle or a wordsearch.

Website Review: spellingcity.com

2009-09-02T14:49:00.005-05:00

Another online spelling practice website review (see post below). This is for Spelling City

Enter your word list as individual words or in a list separated by commas. As far as I can tell, your list is not saved from one visit to the next as at kidsspell.com unless you create a personal homepage for this purpose (homepage provided by the website). This site has more spelling-related games, and the games are more puzzles than arcade-style. Some of the games are printable and handwriting practice sheets, using your list, are available to print.

Teach me: choose a spelling word from a drop down list of your words. The word is spelled by a variety of female voices and each letter appears in a box as it is spelled. Kids will see and hear the word spelled. The word is used in context in a sentence and the word is repeated once more. Kids must choose each of the words from the drop-down menu to have it "taught."

Play a Game: a variety of games are offered and some are printable so you can take them offline.

Word Search: chooses 8 of your list words and puts them into a fairly tricky word search. The words are forward and backward, up and down and diagonal and the filler letters are many duplicates of letters in your word, so it's a challenging puzzle. It's fun to click and drag the little red circle around your word. Also printable. Customizable by easy/hard, long game/short game and timed or not.

Match It: This game asks you to match by connecting a line between a spelling word (list of 10) and a sentence using the word. Two issues I had with this game a)it is really practicing vocabulary, not spelling (which is fine if that is your goal) and b) the sentences, because they are computer-generated, are sometimes very weird.

examples: word: ally sentence: The ally volunteered at many homeless shelters (isn't an ally someone who is on your side?)

word: lullaby sentence: She whistled a lullaby (who WHISTLES a lullaby???)

word: supply sentence: Can you supply me in an hour? (with what, cocaine?)

I got four wrong out of 10 in this game! (although I did get the lullaby correct!)

HangMouse: As in hangman, spelling word displayed in dashes with the alphabet below. Correct guesses get the mouse a tidbit of cheese, incorrect wakes the cat up just a little more each time.

This game is fine. If you play it to success, you do practice spelling your word. However, it is much more fun to wake the cat with incorrect guesses! Not printable.

Alphabetize: alphabetize 10 of your words by clicking them in order and moving them to the other box.

Provides practice with and familiarity with the word list, as well as alphabetizing practice. I had one out of order and was able to click and drag it to its correct spot before submitting my list, so I got 100%. Printable.

Unscramble: One word is presented in scrambled form. User drags the letters, in the correct order, into the box below to unscramble the word.

I like this game! The user needs to be able to spell the word correctly to get a right answer. It provides good spelling practice in dragging the letters correctly to the box. Letters can be easily rearranged if they've been placed in the wrong order. A pleasant sprinkle of stars and some gentle applause greet you when you are correct. The only tricky thing is that each letter has its own "space" in the box. I began placing them over one spot and then ran out of room in the box for the last letter. I had to drag each one over one place (there is nothing to show the spaces, the letters just bounce into their spot when you drop them. Not a huge deal)

Audio Word Match: Typical memory game where you choose two tiles and if they match they disappear, if not, they flip back over. The word is spoken and read when you choose it.

Not spelling, but good for familiarity with the words. Audio and visual reinforcement. It's always fun to play Memory.

Which Word?: Same silly sentences as before only now there is a choice of four of your words below. Click on the correct word.

I didn't like the sentence before, don't like them now.
One of my sentences: The dog will _____ the walkers. Choices: multiply, spy, horrify, satisfy YOU fill in the blank.

Missing Letter: Choose from four letters to fill in the blank in the word. Only these weren't my words. Not sure where this rogue word list came from.

Sentence Unscramble: Same terrible sentences, only now scrambled.

dog will the horrify walkers Ick.

Crossword: Makes a crossword grid using your words. To get the clue, hover your mouse over the word. No numbers are used in the grid, just arrows showing whether the word goes across or down. The crossword is not traditional in the sense that many nonsense words are made by placing your words next to each other--somewhat confusing.

Guess what the clues are? You should be familiar with which word goes in the nonsensical sentence by this point in the game. I would not ask my child to navigate this confusing game.

Test Me! Provides a box for each word, a button labeled "Say it" which says just the word and a button labeled "sentence" which gives you the word in the sentence. Using the tab key after entering each word automatically says the word. I couldn't get the page to load on my Mac after I hit Check Me, so I'm not sure how it presents the scores. According to the verbage on the home page, once the test is completed, the student can print a report, retake the whole test or retake just the words they missed.

Other than the doofy sentences generated for your words, I like this site much better than kidsspell. I feel like the games are much better for practicing actual spelling of the word list. I would explore the homepage feature for the saving of lists. If you chose not to go that route, I would type the words into Word, separated by commas, and then each time you came to the website, at least you could just copy and paste your list in quickly.

I think I'll have Daisy try a few of these games.

Website Review: kidsspell.com

2009-09-02T10:37:00.005-05:00

Daisy has come upon a difficult spelling list, so I went looking for an online site to help her practice her spelling word. The first one I tried was www.kidsspell.com. It was easy to enter her list. I just typed each word, followed by a comma, in the box, then hit enter. I was able to name her list and the list is given a unique url so I can access it any time. The list remains there forever. You just need to remember to bookmark the url. I copied it and pasted it into a Word document.

I was mostly disappointed with the games, however. In a nutshell, they didn't give a child an opportunity to practice the word in a variety of ways, and many of the arcade-style games were frustrating to play. Some of the others moved SO slowly, it really was a waste of time to sit and wait. Completing one game with an entire list of 20 or so words might take 40 minutes!

Here is a review of each game.

Spellasaurus: letters from your spelling word drop down and you must click on them in order before they reach the bottom and the dino eats them.

When I clicked the letters nothing happened. Could be a function of my Mac, but all the other games on the site worked for me.

Spellify 500: drive your racecar over the letters in the road in order and spell your word

The letters appear very infrequently. The first time I played I was 1/4 out of time before my first letter appeared. If you hit the wall, the car stops and you have to get up to speed again. If you drive over a wrong letter (most frustrating of all) all the letters you have collected disappear and you have to start over. A high speed seems essential to success in this game, but not being used to video games, I couldn't keep up with the keys. A frustrating game.

Cast a Spell: tap the letters in a spelling word in order with the wizard's wand

The letters fly all over at a very high speed and are difficult to catch with the tiny wand. The spelling list is displayed to the right, but nothing indicates which word you are spelling. You are basically trying to unscramble the moving letters. Nothing indicates that you have completed a word from the list. I think the list is just for reference, but is not extremely helpful.

Letter Drop: click on the falling letters in order and spell a word from your list before the screen fills up to the top with unused letter blocks (think tetris without the shapes)

The first two letters to fall were y and f, and none of my spelling words began with those. The third letter was s, so I clicked that. Now my choices of words from my list to spell were narrowed to spy, solidify or satisfy. Spy was at the top of my list so I waited for a p to drop. Never saw one. After a few seconds of watching letters drop, I realized I could have been spelling solidify, but now no more o's were dropping. I chose an a to try for satisfy, but never got a t. This is way too hard for even my 5th grader to try to guess which of 20 spelling words to shoot for.

Missing Letter Match: 6 spelling words are listed on buttons at the top, each missing one letter. 6 or more letters are zipping around at the bottom. Click a letter and drag it to the correct word from which it is missing.

This was one of the more promising games. It was easy to play and be successful. At success, an annoying star made an annoyingly nasal "Yay!" The print is very tiny (as in all of these games). Ok, but I didn't feel it was going to make a big impact in practicing the words.

Scramblers: Your spelling word is listed at the top. A little gremlin is building a zigzaggy tunnel to the surface, one letter at a time. Click on the letters he outputs, in order, and spell your word before he reaches the surface.

This game best practices spelling the word correctly. It is very slow. He outputs a lot of random letters before you get the ones you need, but it is easy to click the letters, you can take them from anywhere in the tunnel (even way back at the beginning) and it helps children actually spell their word. The correct spelling is at the top of the page, so they aren't spelling from memory, but it is reinforcing.

Spelloons: Balloons, each with a word, float gently down the screen. Click on the balloons containing correctly spelled words to keep them afloat. Let the incorrectly spelled words float to the bottom to pop on the spikes.

Fine, except that in my second game I was up to 7 balloons, all incorrectly spelled. They drop very slowly and that is a long time for a child to stare at an incorrectly-spelled spelling word! I want my kids to look at the word spelled CORRECTLY!

The Spellariums: Spaceships with a spelling word, one letter missing, are attacking. Use the arrow keys to choose a missle (they shoot straight up), then type the correct letter using your keyboard and press the space bar to fire.

I thought I wouldn't like this, but once I figured out how to play, it was, not fun, but at least not frustrating. Kids have to figure out which letter is missing, then type it, choose the correct missle that will hit the target and fire. I was successful almost every time. The targets are nice and wide (I'm thinking 8 & 10 yo GIRLS here with no gaming experience!) Again, this only practices filling in one missing letter.

Maybe for fun, I'd let her use one game, one time to practice a list, but in general, this site is not worth our time.

Our "First" Day

2009-09-01T15:32:00.007-05:00

And here's our homeschool crew. They hate when I make them pose in the sun. Those flowers were just so pretty and there's not that much color in the gardens right now.

Banana Boy is mad because he's not going to public school. This from a boy who, just the other night, made me promise never, never, never to send him away for school again. Whatever. After this picture, he and his little attitude had a hiatus on his bed until he could think of three GOOD reasons to homeschool. Lesson 1 for the day: Look for the positive.

Here is Sunshine playing nicely for 5 minutes on his school mats. I have to deliniate a space or he's everywhere he's not supposed to be--like an anti-Visa.

For his school today, he chose from about 5 trays I set up for him. The first tray he chose was his snack. I let him cut open the wrapper with a scissors. Good fine-motor skills work, right? The next time I turned around, he was cutting his granola bar (one of those breakfast bar-like a giant fig newton things) into pieces with the scissors. sigh.

Next he washed and dried the tray in a sink of soapy water under strict instructions not to wash any of the other dishes on the counter. That went ok.

Next tray was the pompons you see above. This remains a popular activity with him. He was supposed to pick them all up with that scissorsy bug catcher thing, but he was lining them all up and naming them after friends. Hey, it kept him busy for about 7 min.

Next tray was a shape sorter. He wanted me to sit down with him and play, and the girls were busy with some independent work, so I did. I was surprised to see that he recognized the clover-shaped piece and knew he'd already put it in. He opened the lid to show me. We talked through the names of all the shapes. He knows circle, square, star, clover, diamond and triangle. AFter he put them all in, I gave him instructions to put them in a certain way, which made my little control freak mad. After a bit of fruitless negotiating and some firmness on my part, he finally complied. Obeying instructions was that lesson.

When BB was done with his school, I set to work with the girls on A Child's Geography, a new book we're trying out. Maybe they'll be too old for it, but the first chapter seemed a little yawn to me. I guess they were impressed by the facts, which Voskamp neatly put into understandable comparisons for a child. For example, when she talked about the enormity of the circumference of the Earth, she compared it to the child walking 10 hrs/day, covering 22 miles/day. It would take almost 3 years to walk the circumference of the Earth at the equator!

The exercise we chose to complete asked the kids to draw their house (teeny) then their street, town, state, country, continent and the Earth. The girls found two slates in a pile of stuff I was organizing and are insistent on doing all their work on slates this year. Here is Pepper's work.

Notes about what we read:

Pepper's World:

(photo hopefully to come soon. I can't get it to rotate!)

Back to school!

2009-09-01T15:26:00.003-05:00

Here's our crew on the first day of school. Well, it's the first day of public school. We've been homeschooling all summer.

Lined up in order of age (except for Sunshine who burst into tears as we tried to take the first photo and had to be bribed with peanut butter cups) are

Banana Boy, age 6, grade 1
Little Hey, age 7, grade 1
Pepper, age 8, grade 3
Layley Hey, age 9, grade 4
Daisy, age 10, grade 5
Sunshine, age 4, preschool
Jay Hey, age 13, grade 8
Rose Bud, age 13 (but almost 14, MOM!), grade 8

1st Grade Bird Unit resources

2009-08-19T21:13:00.006-05:00

Two Evan-Moor resources for the lapbook (I used these because it was what I had on my shelves)

Giant Science Resource Book: Grades 1-6
Life Cycle of a Chicken, Bird Watching Record form and How an Egg Hatches

Animals With Backbones (Scienceworks for Kids Grade 1-3)
Bird Nests & Flightless Birds

Usborne Beginners Eggs & Chicks

Usborne First Encyclopedia of Animals, section on birds

Birds Do the Strangest Things

Kickin' Off the New School Year: Birds

2009-08-19T20:46:00.006-05:00

Oh, cool. I have been successful at something homeschooling!

I've been messing around with Banana Boy's science curriculum forever (think: all summer) and yesterday, I finally just grabbed some books and decided to make it simple.

Me? Simple! Ha, that never happens in homeschool planning.

I collected some bird books (I decided now is the time to study birds) and some reproducibles and made some copies. Today I hauled all the kids off to Staples to buy fun new paper.

Then I came home and set up a lapbook.

Now, I've tried lapbooks with the girls and they are really lukewarm over them. Pepper basically hates them. Daisy will putter with hers on and off. RoseBud wouldn't ever touch one with a ten-foot pole.

But Banana Boy, who spent a year in public school Kindergarten, has been groomed to enjoy worksheets.

I began with the brilliant idea to make all the books AND plot out exactly what to put into them before I let him see it. With the girls, I've always tried to invent the wheel as we went along and they got frustrated waiting for me to tell them what to put in a book, decide what kind of book and make the little book.

HELLO! If you buy a pre-made lapbook kit, they've already done all that for you. Kid colors, kid writes, kid cuts out, kid maybe folds a little and kid glues book in.

So, I made and outline of the info I wanted him to learn, cut and folded all the little books and laid them out in the folder. (Do you have no idea whatsoever what I'm talking about? Look HERE.)

THEN I showed it to him. "Look, BB. For science, we're going to learn about birds and you're going to make this folder. See, in this little book, you'll write about what makes a bird a bird. In this book, you'll glue these little pictures about how an egg hatches." And onward and upward.

His little eyes lit up and he began to jump up and down. "Can we start NOW? Can I make it?"

And so, seizing the moment, I sat Sunshine and him down on the couch with me and we read our first book. Sunshine, for all his hyperactivity and gnat-like attention span, LOVES to be read to, AND he listens to the book!

At the end of the book is a glossary. The very first thing BB wanted to do was write down his Bird Words. He carefully wrote each and every word from the glossary onto the feather shapes I had made and then threaded each one, upside-down (so they would be right when flipped over) onto the brad. He was also careful to follow the blue-yellow pattern of the feathers.

Did I mention all this was happening around 6:30 pm after dinner?

Look how cute he is when he cuts!

He completed two and half mini-books for his folder before he lost interest.

I think I've found a winner for this child!

Bookworms All

2009-08-17T22:00:00.004-05:00

I love this picture of a lazy summer morning at our house.

Rose Bud was a bookworm because she discovered she loved reading.
Daisy came to it late, but once she could read, she never stopped.
Pepper is a voracious bibliovore.
Banana Boy didn't know that you might NOT want to be a bookworm. It's just what you do around here.
And Sunshine? Well, monkey see, monkey do. (He's reading "I Am a Baby Elephant" BTW. At least he's holding it right side up!)

(and for the record, I think Rose Bud was at a sleepover or something, or she'd have been in the thick of it, too.)

101 Uses for Pattern Blocks

2009-08-17T21:53:00.004-05:00

Heavenly Angles

2009-08-17T21:37:00.003-05:00

Did you know all the angles in a triangle add up to 180 degrees?

Daisy didn't know this either, so I set out to show her.

First you need a triangle. Mark each of the angles so you will know WHICH of them belong to your triangle. The marks are the curvy little lines in each corner (and I should have marked them with one, two and three lines respectively to show that they are different measures. But I didn't)

Did you see the straight lines in the first picture. Well cut off each corner of your triangle on the straight lines.

Now, like a puzzle, fit the 3 corners from your triangle together (you might need to click on the picture to blow it up so you can see this better). All the corners should point the same way and touch. Keep an eye on the angles you marked earlier.

Do you notice what happens? When the three corners are fit together, they form a straight line. Every time! (We tried out 3 different triangles to check this) Guess how many degrees are in a straight line? Yup. 180. Therefore, the three corners of a triangle add up to 180.

How is this useful? Well, if you know the measures of two of the angles, you can find the measure of the third. Ta Da!

It also comes in handy when finding the measures of angles in other shapes such as rectangles, parallelograms (I love to spell that word!) and when working with angles and parallel lines.

Did I mention that I got 100% on every test in high school geometry and finished the class with an A+?

Anyone have any proofs I can work out???????

Wish List

2009-08-17T20:16:00.006-05:00

Ooh, I love a new school year and I love to plan it out.

Implementing it---that's a whole different ball of wax.

But for now I am in the planning stage and it's all fun and games.

I've been pouring over my favorite homeschool suppliers and came across two fun new items that I would love to have.

Composers Lapbook

How cute is this folder? It's arranged like an orchestra. See the conductor there in the front? And all the instruments are tucked into their little pockets.

I'm also looking at the Civil War Time Travelers CD. I'm torn about this one. I have two of their other Time Travelers CDs and we used some of the projects from them, but not as many as I'd have liked for the price. I also already own the Civil War History Pockets and looking at the topics, I see many of the same in both sets. Granted, there is much, much more in the Time Travelers CD, but why not NOT use what I already own instead of spending more money to not use something else.

There. I talked myself out of it.

Yet, if I could find it for $5, I think I'd snap it up....

So basically, we'll be working through Sonlight Core 4 this year with the girls. Banana Boy is going to hang out and maybe listen in a little. I might read through The American Story with him. Not sure. I haven't ended up loving that book as much as I wanted to either. In story-length and illustrations it appears to be for young children, but then some of the language/vocabulary/concepts seem way up there. I guess I'll have to give it another shot to see.

For science I was all set to use Real Science 4 Kids: Chemistry. It will be too much for Banana Boy, so I ordered the updated parts of Sonlight Science K for him. This mostly consisted of the Usborne books I didn't already own. I have the old SL Science K from when Rose Bud was small.

AND since I was doing a SL order ( I had a $25 coupon) I also picked up most of the parts of Science 4. We have the microscope from years and years ago when SL offered it at an incredible price around Christmas. I never used Science 4 with Rose Bud, though, so I didn't have many of the books. It's been mostly revamped anyway, so I bought the new Usborne books that are included.

I have to say, The Story of Inventions has been a HUGE hit. Both girls have been gently spatting over who gets to read it and as soon as one puts it down, the other snaps it up. Rose Bud has read it, too. I read through a couple of the articles and it ranks up there as one of the nicest Usborne books I've ever read. The articles and text are easy to read, interesting and not as discombobulated as some Usborne books tend to be.

We're sticking with Singapore for math. Daisy will begin the 6th grade book next week. Pepper just began the 3rd grade book and BB is working through the 1st grade book.

For grammar, I'm typing up the worksheets from the old Sonlight LA 3, back when the grammar was good! Rose Bud, of course, used up the worksheets, but I still have the answer keys, so I'm retyping the worksheets and will use them with both Daisy and Pepper this year. The grammar instruction was so thorough and so wonderful and Sonlight has changed the format so much, that I want the girls to benefit from this, as well.

We are also continuing with Rod & Staff English. Daisy is skimming through the 4th grade book with the goal of working thoroughly through the grade 5 book later this year. Right now she is mostly working only the Review sections and skipping the main lessons and exercises. Pepper will begin the grade 3 book this fall.

Both girls are also continuing in Sequential Spelling. Daisy should begin book 2 sometime in September. Pepper is about half-way through book 1.

For spelling and phonics, Banana Boy will continue in Explode the Code. In 13 years of homeschooling, SL Language Arts has never done it for us before 3rd grade. I have tried, and I have tried and then I have tried some more, and we have yet to complete a full year of SL LA before 3rd. After 3rd, yes, the old LA was FABULOUS!

Language Arts-wise, my kids have done well doing just Explode the Code and (heh, I just accidentally typed "Explode the COD." snort) reading a lot. For those who have been strong readers by 2nd grade, we've also begun the R & S English book.

Anyway...this will be our main thrust and what I hope to get to every day. I'll share in another post the extras I hope to throw in.

Homeschool Grammar

2009-07-29T14:53:00.004-05:00

Daisy was working on her R&S grammar book, practicing statements, questions and commands. The Rod & Staff books are published for Mennonite classrooms. One of the exercises was to write down 3 commands her teacher might give her.

Rose Bud pipes up matter-of-factly from the next room, "Sit down. Stop crying. Get out your books."

Homeschool at Grandma's

2009-07-08T10:16:00.009-05:00

Every year we seem to not get any school done in July. We really ought to just take the month off. Last week, the three girls were at camp. This week, we made a road-trip to Grandma and Grandpa's.

Even so, I love to see the kids learning things, just because it's what we do. They like it.

Here are some snippets...

Banana Boy reading "Days Go By" for three hours in the car. "I think he's going to be a bookworm, too," says Daisy. Who needs a reading curriculum?

"He really IS learning him to drive out there!" says Grandma.
"Teaching," states Daisy. "You LEARN what someone TEACHES you." Who needs a grammar curriculum? Or a driving curriculum, for that matter!

We visited Heritage Hill yesterday and the three middles were thrilled to visit yet another living history site. Last week, Mr. GT took them to Stonefield Village, hoping to kill an hour before they had to pick the girls up at camp. After more than 2 hours, he couldn't get them to leave!

The kids had a great time exploring the Belgian farm, the print shop, Fort Howard and the early French settlement of La Baye where we saw the Ostensorium! "Oh! ......Ooh! ....That's the..... Pepper, what is that? Remember?"Who needs a history curriculum?

Pepper practiced map skills by navigating us through the park using the brochure map. Who needs a geography curriculum?

On the way home, we hiked the half-mile to the statue of Jean Nicolet. Who needs a PE curriculum?

Tuesday night, we played Golf (the card game) with Grandma and Grandpa. Banana Boy enjoyed counting up our points. Who needs a math curriculum?

Daisy has been continuing her bird study, finding new and different birds at Granpa's house than there are at home. Pepper has accumulated some new items for their museum--more bird eggs, a new snake skin and a stick. Who need a science curriculum?

And they've all been riding bikes like crazy. For some reason, it is more fun to ride the hodge-podge collection of old bikes at Grandma and Grandpa's house than at home. Pepper's bike has springs under the seat (remember those?) Sunshine has an old tricycle. There is even a three-wheeler adult bike (see the photo in my header). Did I mention not needing a PE curriculum?

Clown School

2009-06-17T23:44:00.002-05:00

All fun and games, all the time.

Portage

2009-05-26T20:35:00.007-05:00

Today the girls and I took a field trip to Portage, the city built around the 1.4 mile land-hike between the Fox River and the Wisconsin River.

We began our day with a stop at the Mackenzie Center, a nature education center adminstered by the DNR. What a gem! I had never been here, but the girls and I loved it!

As we walked in, Daisy , looking up through the forested area asked, "How do you know if a maple tree is a Sugar Maple?"

Ever quick on my feet, I answered, "Why, you just look at its nametag, of course!"
The girls were very intrigued by the rocks from which the welcome center was built. They all came from local fields and were the diverse rocks I grew up with--granite, basalt, sandstone, schist. Around here, all they know is the yellow flint-type rock we have. How did all these rocks come to the local fields, you ask? Why, the glaciers thoughtfully brought them!

Next up was the wildlife exhibits. And unexpected perk of this field trip (we hadn't planned on stopping here, really) was to see all the wildlife that once roamed an unsettled Wisconsin.

There were bison and deer.

Wolves.

Coyotes (not pictured) and cougars.

Yay! A turkey vulture!

Owls, hawks and an eagle. See the eagle's nest? It's huge!

The most social badger we've ever seen.

There was also a bobcat, fisher, porcupine, raccoon, gray and red foxes, a skunk, a possum. At each display was a little plaque with an imprint of the animal's footprint. The girls were delighted by these and checked out each one.
All of the animals were either injured or captive-born and are unable to survive in the wild. While it looks like conditions are not optimal (small cage settings with cement floors), the cages were clean and all the animals looked healthy.

One of the wardens actually showed up to do some cleaning while we were there and answered a bunch of questions for us. I was curious to know how long the animals lived there and surprisingly, many of them had outlived their in-the-wild lifespan at this center already. Overall, the place was well-done.

In another area of the center, there was a real 120 year old log cabin being used to house a logging display. There was a display of the maple syrup process and a huge ancient log (almost 300 years old from the time it was a seedling!)

The girls found this rebar wigwam. It was messy, so immediately they set out to sweep it clean with branches they found.

Our next stop was in Portage at the Surgeon's Quarters, the only remaining building of Fort Winnebago. It's located at the exit point of the Fox River at the portage. Marquette and Joliet were here.

It's a nice little tour, filled with amazingly old and wonderful things. My favorite was a beautiful sampler in PRISTINE condition made by a 12 yo girl in 1802!

We also visited the Indian Agent house where we had a nice, private tour by a nice homeschooling mom (she was the docent of the day). My favorite thing about this place (we were here with Rose Bud when she studied WI history) is the 200 year old elm tree in front of the house. When we arrived, the tree doctor was just delivering the estimate for the tree's triennial (is that the word? Every three years) IV treatment to prevent Dutch Elm disease. The tree's 2 siblings have already died from it, but this one remains spectacular and healthy! Here is a nice pdf telling the story of the Kinzies, the Indian Agent house (scroll down) and the Elms.

A nice bit of Wisconsin history can be found in the book Wau-bun, written by Juliette Kinzie in 1832 of her life at Fort Winnebago and as the wife of the Indian agent at Portage. It is considered the earliest written history of this part of Wisconsin.

Science: Birds

2009-05-25T07:03:00.005-05:00

If you're reading the new posts from the top, start here: Science: Snakes

Our new property is blessed with birds of all kinds: Robins, Red-Winged Blackbirds, Grackles, Bluebirds, Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks, Baltimore Orioles, Chipping Sparrows, Barn Swallows and Mourning Doves, to name a few.

We are also blessed with evergreen trees. Little ones. Christmas tree sized. In fact, one lovely specimen will become our Christmas tree next winter.

Anyway, Rose Bud loves to nose about wearing her scarf. Last weekend she went nosing about for bird nests. So far she (and Daisy) have found 3 robin nests and two chipping sparrow nests.

We've already watched one robin's nest hatch, grow up and fly away. It was built on an old wooden step-ladder leaning against the chicken coop, so it was super easy for the kids to see into. This one had 3 eggs, only two of which hatched. (the last egg is still in there----ewww!) Another nest was WAAAY up in a hole in our big tree. The third robin nest is in a big pine tree by the driveway.

Last night, one of the baby pine robins flopped himself out of the nest. It's just about ready to fly, so it wasn't any terrible crisis. But the kids were so interested to follow it on it's adventure. It hopped and flapped its way around the house. At one point, they lost it in the flower bed and so gave up. But later, Rose Bud saw it again from her bedroom window and they all watched it hop to the safety of a bush near the original next where the mom finally brought it something to eat.

The Chipping Sparrow nests are so tiny! Their nests are both in very little pine trees. One has four teeny tiny naked birds with just a bit of silly fluff on their heads. The other nest had four tiny eggs.Here she is, chipping madly at us while we photograph her eggs.

The barn swallows have been desperately trying to set up residence in the (drumroll....) barn, but have been foiled repeatedly by Mr. GT. He likes to keep the door shut. I think they're finding a crack to sneak in, but I get his point. They do make a mess.

The orioles had two nests here last year. Once the the foliage has come out, the nests are almost impossible to find unless you know exactly where they are. But in the winter you can see the little sling nests hanging out at the tips of their branches. We think we've found their new nest by watching where they fly in the big tree.

The bluebirds, we hope, are nesting in the bluebird house, although we fear it is actually the Red-Wing Blackbirds. In any case, nest or no, the bluebirds insist on remaining in our yard. Lucky for us.

At this new place, we miss the Indigo buntings and the cardinals, the nuthatches and chickadees. But in their place, we are enjoying the bluebirds and the barn swallows.

Oh yeah, and then there are the vultures. The raccoons seem unable to cross the road and remain alive around here and being out in the open, the turkey vultures make short work of them. It's fun to drive around the curve in the road and come upon two huge vultures picking at the carcass. Mmmmm!

Next up, pollen and another dead thing.

Science

2009-05-25T06:35:00.006-05:00

We have been hitting science hard around here. In fact, it's pretty much all the kids have been doing lately.

You do remember they are, um, unschooled for science, right?

They are ALL having a blast poking around here and nosing around there exploring the world outside.

Here are some of the highlights:

SNAKES
It started with Kerala, Nonny's dog barking her head off one day. Banana Boy ran up the hill to see why and discovered Kerala had found a snake. A big one. A really big one. Probably this one: Fox Snake (Pine Snake) By the time Mom got up there, it had slithered away. Drat! I never get to see snakes!

It took about 2 weeks, but Friday, Mr. GT called out "SNAKE!" He had almost just run it over with the wheelbarrow coming back from the garden. It too, slithered off into the grass. Mrs. GT, determined to get a glimpse, went marching up the hill and nosed around.

"SNAKE!!" she yelled, and everyone came running. Mr. GT took one look and said, disgustedly, "That's not my snake."

It was, in fact, a whole NEW snake. Mrs. GT had found a Brown Snake (DeKay's Snake). Cool! I found my own snake! When it had had enough of us all peering at it, it slipped under the daylilies. Pepper tried to spread them apart to see it again. We call her Pepper-No-Fear.

Saturday (the NEXT day), Rose Bud called out, "SNAKE!" She had found another fox snake, in the front yard this time. It was also much smaller than the first one.

Two hours later, Mr. GT yelled out, "SNAKE!" He had one in the garage. It zipped out to hide under a pine tree. We think this was the same fox snake as the front-yard snake.

Rose Bud and I went shopping. When we came home, we had just missed a giant fox snake. Daisy had seen it winding through the grass from her upstairs bedroom window, so they all came out to look at it. That one disappeared into the flower bed (look out, Nonny!) and could have been the original up-the-hill giant snake.

Towards evening, Mr. GT again hollered, "SNAKE!" (how come HE always finds them?????). He had a little one on the cement under his trailer.

Oh, and then there was the dead Northern Red-Belly snake. Rose Bud was nosing around in the mud made by the backhoe with her bare feet (you'd think she'd learn!) and found this tiny little snake that had been killed by the diggers. Sunshine enjoyed carrying this one around, all stiff from the sun, draped over a stick.

Up next, Birds.

Being a Pioneer in Wisconsin

2009-05-11T11:55:00.005-05:00

We're moving into the time in Wisconsin where there is much more to read. We've crossed the 1800 threshold and we're reading about pioneer families. There are so many wonderful stories that take place in Wisconsin.

Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder Everyone knows Laura, right? Well, she lived in the town of Pepin, WI around 1875.

First Farm in the Valley (and sequels) by Anne Pellowski This is a WONDERFUL series, based on the author's own family who were of Polish descent and lived near Dodge, WI (Winona, MN was the nearest large town) beginnning in the 1870's. Each book in the series is about a different little girl in a succeeding generation of the same family. They are wonderfully descriptive and charming, much like the Little House series. Here is a link to a better review than I can write.

Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brinks Everyone knows Caddie, too, right? Caddie was also a real person and the stories handed down in her family about her adventures are retold in this book by her granddaughter. Caddie lived in Dunn County, WI in 1864.

On the other side of the state, Laura's Ma, Caroline lived in Brookfield, WI, near Milwaukee. Her adventures are told in the Caroline Series of books by Celia Wilkins.

The Journey of Emilie tells the story of the hard life of a girl who emigrated to Sheboygan, WI from Germany in 1855. It's not a terribly well-written story, it's part of a series called The Immigrants' Chronicles, a fairly page-mill series, but it shows the hardships of immigrant life.

We also found Pioneer Girl: The Early Life of Frances Willard by Clara Ingram Judson is a story written in 1935 about a family who moves from Ohio west to Janesville, WI. It is a charming little story with wonderful old-fashioned illustrations by Genevieve Foster

Please Pray for Noah

2009-05-08T09:17:00.001-05:00

Please pray for sweet little Noah now. He is very, very sick.

I have been following his blog a long time. His parents own a homeschool company from which I bought things many times.

They all need your prayers now.

To the Farm!

2009-05-05T16:16:00.003-05:00

By Banana Boy

On my field trip, I went to a farm and I saw cows. It was scary when we saw the cows when they were milking. But it was cute when we saw the kittens and baby calves.

At the end I got to eat 3 cutted string cheese in half.

We got to feed the big cows. We fed them hay.

We got to feed the calves. I fed them with a bottle. In the bottle was milk. Max, Brennan and Abi and I fed the baby calf with one bottle. It was really hard because the calf was pushing the bottle against my stomach. I petted it.

When we saw the milking cows, a cow was pooping and it sprayed on my lip.

The End.

Field Trip!

2009-05-04T21:40:00.004-05:00

Hurry! The train is coming!Wyalusing State Park. The train is crossing the Wisconsin River. From this bluff, you can see the confluence of the Wisconsin and Mississippi Rivers.
Plaque commemorating the spot (below this bluff) where Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet first entered the Mississippi River from the Wisconsin River.
Next stop was Villa Louis in Prairie du Chien. We WERE the tour group, so we had a very private and special tour. The tour guide even let us have an up close peek in several rooms.

After the tour of the house, we went to the Fur Trade Museum. The girls got to see a felt beaver hat -- the real thing! The displays reiterated everything we have read about this time and we got to see a "trading post" and they had fun spotting all the trade goods inside. There were displays showing the the life of the Navtive American changed because of the fur trade.
It was also so cool to touch a real beaver pelt.
Villa Louis is located on St. Feriole island, so after the Fur Trade Museum, was crossed the road to play in the Mississippi River.
It was only at 11 feet.
The kids had fun finding shells on the shore. How many interesting little shelled animals live in the river!
Homeschooling. Where you can take a field trip to see what you've been reading about.

Update to "The Monsters"

2009-05-04T20:20:00.004-05:00

Last time in "The Monsters"....

The plan to distract the monsters with a play was unsuccessful. They were entertained, but not frightened away.

Plan 2 was hatched and the idea was to put the monsters to sleep with a song.

and now, The Title is "The Monsters" continued:

I know. Let's make them asleep. Good idea, but how will we do that? I know, let's do a song. We can do a lullaby: "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star."

More creativity

2009-04-29T14:45:00.003-05:00

My wonderful children are so creative. Here's a note I found on the floor, a conversation between Nonny and Daisy.

to: Nonnny
We are eating muddy snow.

I thought all the snow melted already!?

We saved some in the freezer and now we went outside to get some mud.

But will the mud taste yucky?

No! We flavered it with lots of suger!

But just thinking about eating mud makes me feel sick! What if there is a worm in the mud?

Worms are very tasty!

I'm afraid I don't think so.

Chickens and birds eat worms. Why don't you like them?

I'm no feathered friend.

Do you like ants and beetles?

No way, Jose!

I don't ether.

I'm glad to hear that.

The Title is "The Monsters"

2009-04-29T14:10:00.004-05:00

One of the things they do better in public school than I do is teach the literary elements. Banana Boy can read the words "Illustrated By" and knows what they mean. Before he reads a book, he reads the title on the cover, the title on the title page and the names of the author and illustrator. He's very serious about all this.

He spent 45 minutes yesterday with one of his little notebooks. An idea had popped into his head and he was all inspired to write it down.

Listen to my story, Mom!

The Title is "The Monsters."

I was walking and suddenly I saw monsters. I was scared. We thought of a plan. The plan was, we distract

(at this point he came and found me to ask "What is that word when you want someone to go away?"
I'm all like, "huh?"
"You know," he said, "I think it's 'extract.'"
I'm thinking to myself, extract. Extract. Go away. Huh? Finally it dawns on me that he wants DIStract. Aha.)
The plan was, we distract them.

He reads me the story out loud. Each time he reads it, he says, "The Title is 'The Monsters.'" It cracks me up every time.

I prompt him now. How are you going to distract them? He thinks a bit, then frantically scribbles.

He reads it out loud again.

The Title is "The Monsters"
I was walking and suddenly I saw monsters. I was scared. We thought of a plan. The plan was, we distract them. We are going to do a play.

At this point, I'm just beaming! What a clever boy! I think it's a riot that they will distract the monsters with a play.

I had to go to work then, but when I got up this morning, I tracked down his notebook to see the end.

The Title is "The Monsters"
I was walking and suddenly I saw monsters. I was scared. We thought of a plan. The plan was, we distract them. We are going to do a play. I think they will like it if we do The Three Little Pigs! Yes! Yes! Let's do it! They did the play. The monsters like it. But how do we escape? Oh, quick, make a plan. Plan 2. what plan can we make? I know. Let's make them asleep. Good idea, but how will we do that? I know, let's do a song.

Apparently it's "To be continued....."

Exploring Wisconsin

2009-04-28T15:18:00.003-05:00

We've just finished this book, an exciting story about a very dedicated Jesuit missionary who was at heart an explorer. Together with Louis Joliet, he was the first white man to portage between the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers and find where the Wisconsin meets the Mississippi. They sailed all the way down the Mississippi to the Arkansas River where they turned back. Their discovery, as far as white explorers go, is really under-appreciated and overshadowed by the story of Lewis and Clark.

The territory Marquette and Joliet explored was so far in the wilderness, at the time, that very few Indians they encountered had even had any first-hand experience there. Their trek was done in birchbark canoes (two of them) with nine men (M & J included) The technology was so much more primitive at the time than what Lewis and Clark had at their disposal.

At any rate, it was an amazing discovery in their time and opened the west to settlement and further exploration.

The book was written by Jim Kjelgaard (of adventure dog story fame) in 1951 and, I would imagine, is largely based on the journals of Pere Marquette. We had some good discussion of the attitudes toward the Indian people demonstrated in the book.

As the story is primarily about the adventures of the Jesuit missionary, the Indians are referred to as "savages," child-like, in need of protection, unintelligent, wasteful, violent and more. We talked about bias, opinion and perspective.

Also, as the book was written in the early 1950s, it is not sanitized as to the missionary's work and we were able to have many good discussions about how the Jesuits were attempting to convert the Indians and whether their methods were successful or not.

It is not a very PC book, but it gives a good look at the hardships under which the French lived at the time and a glimpse into the life of a Jesuit priest in the new world. Historical fiction is always more fun to read than boring PC textbooks.

Plus it's a part of our Wisconsin history!

Friday Art

2009-04-24T10:37:00.006-05:00

Today's lesson from Using Color in Your Art was to paint a still life of fruit. Here is the fruit.

Here is Daisy drawing, er, erasing her picture. She used pastels (Nupastels, to be exact) for her picture.

This is Pepper working on her fruit bowl using watercolors.

Sunshine used these handy-dandy Elmer's (as in glue) paintbrushes, which I didn't think I really liked, but in actuality, I now love! They were perfect for him. He put together a little blue with his yellow and made green and the bristles washed out perfectly when he was done. The paint is in the handle and he didn't go overboard with the squeezing out of the paint.

Screw This!

2009-04-23T10:20:00.005-05:00

Sunshine's Easter present was this super-duper-schmooper (I hate when Sid the Science Kid says that--do any real kids talk like that???) drill set. I saw it on Amazon and it got great reviews.

Let me say, that for once, a toy is living up to its expectations!

First of all, ALL the kids love it and if it is out, they can't keep their hands off of it, from Daisy down to Sunshine.

It is as sturdy as everyone says in the Amazon reviews.

It was easy for Sunshine to figure out but challenging and interesting enough for him to keep playing with.

It is playable at so many levels. Sunshine just screws the screws in and unscrews them. Banana boy experiments with all the different bits. Pepper and Daisy use the pattern cards and also make their own patterns. They have also been trying to teach Sunshine to make patterns.

Oh, Sunshine DID, on his own, unscrew them by color for a while. In other words, he unscrewed all the greens, then all the reds. Then I think he got bored and did the rest randomly.

I love this toy!

Ouch! I just went over to Amazon to get the link and it is selling for $38 now! I only paid $28. Watch for deals!

Bug Catching

2009-04-23T10:14:00.003-05:00

I was snuggling Sunshine before school this morning and he was playing with his bug catcher. He kept picking up the cage with the scissor-catcher thingy. Suddenly, I realized how good he was with the scissor-catcher thingy and I had the bright idea to get him some "bugs" to catch. Perfect fine-motor work!

He was thrilled to catch all these "bugs" and put them in the cage.

I think we can add this to his Tray Work list!

In case you can't tell from the photo, he is "catching" pompons.

Friday Art

2009-04-23T10:01:00.004-05:00

Our most recent Friday Art project in Using Color in Your Art was to make the color wheel and then build a picture around it.

We had to draw the circles using a compass and then use a protractor to divide the circles into 6 pie sections. If you haven't studied the color wheel, you'll notice that the three primary colors: red, blue and yellow alternate sections. Between them are the three secondary colors, green, orange and purple. And if you look closely, you'll see that each secondary color is between the two primary colors which mix together to make it.

Daisy and Pepper chose to make color wheel snowmen.

Banana Boy made a flower.

Sunshine just experimented with a little purple.

Friday Art

2009-04-06T14:35:00.005-05:00

Today's lesson from Using Color in Your Art was to do a "wash" using watercolors. The project was to make an underwater scene. Here the girls are painting their fish and seaweed and below you can see their experiments in washes. We never did get around to a finished project. I brought down the lincoln logs to keep Sunshine busy and the girls immediately abandoned art for construction.

Sunshine's Tray Work

2009-04-06T14:18:00.004-05:00

Here is Sunshine's first day with Tray Work (a la Tot Trays)

He put wooden sticks through the holes in a spice container (5 stars! said Sunshine)
We made this very special "Monkey Bow" headband ourselves!

He painted with water colors (Fun! and I'm good at rinsing my brush, said Sunshine)

We played a matching/vocabulary game (I like when Mommy plays WITH me, said Sunshine)

He didn't really say any of those things. He doesn't talk that much. But he was thinking them in his head.

For the matching game, we laid the cards out in a grid FACE UP (I would have chosen to use way fewer cards, but he was helping me lay them out and insisted we use them all). Then he and I took turns finding matches. Not that intellectually challenging, but a good way for him to get the hang of choosing two cards and understanding that they need to match, then putting them in our own piles. Maybe next week we'll try the more classic Concentration/Memory with the cards face down. With way fewer cards.

Winter Promise

2009-03-28T12:56:00.001-05:00

I've decided I don't like this curriculum. It is just not a good fit for us.

I've decided I don't like
American Story 1
Animals & Their Worlds
I'm Ready to Learn

I hate looking at those guides on my shelf every day.

hint.

My Unconventional Book Sale

2009-03-28T12:47:00.002-05:00

Ok, I have two boxes ready to go. At this point I'm really only selling to people I "know" (which might include you)

Email me at sandwich@gmail.com if you'd like me to send you a copy of the list. It's in a Word document. There is some great stuff and some cheap stuff.

Itty Bitty Bookworm Curriculum Giveaway

2009-03-27T15:21:00.004-05:00

Ok, last year I posted about the Brightly Beaming curriculum for preschoolers.

Today I discovered a new preschool curriculum, Itty-Bitty Bookworm.

This is so cool! I can't wait to try it out with Sunshine. It is a literature-based curriculum with hands-on, very organized and very doable. I also think it's more age-appropriate that Brightly Beaming. At least for Sunshine, who is not a typical 4 yo.

Since I haven't used it yet, I'll let you read about it for yourself at Itty-Bitty Bookworm or you can read the stellar review at Homeschool Creations.

Oh, did I mention the best part? Homeschool Creations is GIVING AWAY one full year of this curriculum (a $300 value) so bop on over there and check it out before April 2.

Oh, did I mention the second-best part? Look at how CUTE these worms are!

Itty-Bitty Bookworm's logo

What I Might Put in the Boxes

2009-03-18T16:52:00.004-05:00

And as long as I'm thinking about it, I'm going to brainstorm my own list of things I can put in Banana Boy's boxes

Explode the Code

Singapore Math

Flashmaster

Computer time

Snack

Jumping on Mini Tramp

Mommy, It's a Renoir folders

Take it to Your Seat Geography Folders

Science minibooks

Books for him to read to me

Books for him to read alone

Books for me to read to him

Activity he can play with Sunshine

Playdough

Handwriting Without Tears activities

Tangram Animals

Animal sorting (little animals with cards like reptile, mammal)

Puzzles, especially GeoPuzzles

Journal writing

Story starters

Measuring activities

Board game with someone

Math Wrap-Ups

Art projects

Painting

Color By Number

Dot to Dots

AWANA practice

Bible to read

Wedgit cards to complete

Cards to play War

Play outside time

Movie to watch

GeoSafari Laptop and cards

Draw Write Now

Ed Emberley Drawing book

Choretime (as a minibreak between school activities)

I bet I can think of way more....

Gonna Hop on the Workbox Bandwagon!

2009-03-18T15:25:00.004-05:00

I was just thinking of posting to some homeschooling boards this morning about ideas for organizing Banana Boy's day next fall.

I am terrible about accountability and it's very easy for me to lose the kids when we get off track. The phone rings and they all wander away. We have to leave to go pick up Sunshine and we never get back to school for the rest of the day. Someone has something hard, begins to cry and it gets shelved until next week. They avoid (read: "forget" ) to do something they don't really enjoy and suddenly, we haven't done Spanish or written in journals for 5 weeks.

You know just what I mean, right? Right?

So, I was looking for a very obvious, very organized way to chart what Banana Boy has and has not done for the day/week/month. I've made oodles of schedules and charts and I just don't check up on them to see if the kids are checking off what they've done.

Lo, and behold, I travel to my new favorite homeschool blog, 1+1+1=1, and there are workboxes. She posted about them earlier in the week with a promise to give more details. Got 'em.

So I can't give you any details about them yet, as I haven't tried them, but you can look for yourself as to what's involved. All I can say is I. Am. Excited!

Sue Patrick's Workbox System or, Where to Get the Book

Walking By the Way (on the sidebar on the right, scroll to "Wonderful Workboxes" She has several posts about them and this way you can find them all including What to Put in Workboxes.)

Joyful Mother of Six and more posts #1 #2 #3 #4 #5

Color Me Orange An idea for doing it in a space-saving way with multiple children (I was just thinking, this would be great for the girls, too, but where to put all those bins???) more Color Me Orange posts on workboxes #1 #2

Our Lifesong (using workboxes in a tiny apartment and what to do with the completed boxes and materials)

Ginger Snap Shots

Wisconsin's First People or Who Needs A Textbook?

2009-03-17T10:17:00.007-05:00

Today we read about Wisconsin's first people. There were several different groups that archaeologists break into

Paleo-Indians

Archaic Indians

Woodland Peoples

Mississippians

Oneota

Paleo-Indians

Everything you wanted to know about them and more!

More everything you wanted to know

Even More!

Solve the Mammoth Mystery

Mammoth History in Kenosha County

Kenosha Public Museum FREE Field Trip! See the Schaefer Mammoth and check out dioramas on Wisconsin history

Field Trip! Visit the Boaz Mastadon and here

Archaic Indians

Missisippi Valley Archaeology Center on Archaic Tradition Don't forget to check out all the links down the side

Article on the Archaic Tradition.

Pictures of Archaic spearpoints

Field Trip! Visit an Archaic site

Woodland Tradition

This site is really all you need

From the Milwaukee Public Museum

Woodland effigy mounds

Field Trip! Visit Wisconsin effigy mounds

Mississippians

Milwaukee Public Museum artifact collection (check out the other links at the top to read more about Aztalan)

More about the Mississippians

Field Trip! Visit the Aztalan site

and walk inside an Aztalan house at the Wisconsin Historical Museum

Oneota

About the Oneotas

Oneota Pottery

Field Trip! See rock carvings and paintings

Carrie and The Crazy Quilt

2009-03-13T10:40:00.005-05:00

Carrie and The Crazy Quilt -- a nice little book about the Peshtigo Fire, of which there is very little historical fiction available. Not Newbery Honor material, but an exciting story that gave the girls a good sense of that event in our history.

And the best news! There are two sequels, Carrie and the Apple Pie and Carrie and Boarding House. Yay!

As you can see, we will be jumping around history a bit, but in the end we'll hopefully have a good picture of our state's history.

Welcome to Wisconsin!

2009-03-11T15:39:00.006-05:00

We just couldn't take one more minute of plain old American History and we've prematurely jumped into our Wisconsin history studies!

Here are the materials we're using:

Wisconsin: Our State, Our Story This is the new 4th grade Wisconsin history textbook. We got it from the library. Luckily, there are 35 copies, so we should be able to keep renewing it/checking it out until we're done.

A Journey Through Learning's My State Lapbook This is the first lapbook I've ever purchased. I looked through a lot of free resources and many other state lapbooks at CurrClick before deciding on this one. Not that this one is the best out there, but it best met OUR needs. The girls have already begun their lapbooks. One thing I really like about this particular kit, and something we discovered AFTER we began putting it together, is that there is plenty of "white space" between the booklets, which means we are able to place them closer than they are mapped out in the instructions and we will then have room to add some of our own booklets (we've already made two maps about Wisconsin's topography and glaciation which we will add.)

Right now we're reading and really enjoying Wisconsin Forest Tales It's historical fiction about the history of Wisconsin forests from Indian times to logging (our favorite story so far!) to the Peshtigo fire (children's fiction on this topic is VERY sparse) to homesteading, Dutch Elm disease to school forests.

Some fun little trivial things we've done

Found and colored Wisconsin on our world map

Drew the line for 90 degrees W longitude and 45 degrees N latitude. Guess where they cross! Wisconsin is right smack in the very center of the Northern/Western hemispheres!!! How cool is that!

We ate two apples, one cut into the northern and southern hemisphers and one cut into the western and eastern hemispheres

We found all the interesting places in Wisconsin like where dad and mom went to college, where Grandma and Grandpa live, what route we take to Grandma and Grandpa's house, where Auntie lives.

Today we were reading that some of the white pines growing in northern Wisconsin in the early 1800s were bigger than the arms of THREE MEN around! We made a circle with our arms, Daisy, Pepper and I and THAT was a pretty big tree!

We explored the "glaciers and glacial features" in our yard (the melting snowbanks

We made moraines and till on the carpet using a sheet of paper (the glacier) and the Bananagram tiles.

We watched the first few parts of Sesquecentennial Wisconsin Stories If you have RealPlayer you can watch this in 6-8 min. segments.

15 Miles on the Erie Canal

2009-03-06T13:32:00.004-06:00

We are almost finished with this portion of American History we'll call Core 3 (and I mean that loosely, since we've really not followed Core 3 at all)

Recently we did a little trek down the Erie Canal.

We read The Amazing, Impossible Erie Canal and i found it to be a fairly annoying book. I really thought i would like it better, but something about all the extra text in the pictures bugged me. Necessary, I suppose, to illustrate the building of a canal which takes place over time AND space, but it annoyed me nonetheless. Maybe next time we'll stick with Sonlight's Erie Canal book.

Online, we found some cool resources

The Boss singing that song we all learned in music class so many years ago. At this site, you get the lyrics, The Boss singing it (scroll down to the player on the right), and yes, you get the whole song! and you can even download a ringtone (I didn't)

If you want to do a driving tour of the Erie Canal today, go here (well, really, you need to go to New York, but if you click there, it will give you a map and directions!)

Who needs a book? This site has all the history, all the songs, all the pictures and all the information you could ever want about the Erie Canal.

And last, but not least, this site has more postcards, more music and a virtual tour of the Erie Canal throughout history (via postcards)

Really, I might just sell my whole library. The interactiveness of the internet amazes me. I think it's so cool to listen not only read about something in history, but to also then listen to music and look at photographs, play games, solve puzzles. All the work is done for me.

Me and Google, homeschooling the Buds together.

It's a Bird! It's a Plane! It's a Foodie Blog!

2009-03-06T13:07:00.004-06:00

Because I don't have enough to do, here's a recipe (or two) I want to share with you.

Unstuffed Pepper Soup (adapted from Taste of Home's recipe by the same name)

2 lbs ground beef
4 peppers of various colors (I used 2 green, 1 red a yellow and an orange, and yes, that equals 5)
1 large onion
4 large cloves garlic, minced

Brown together in a dutch oven.

Meanwhile, cook according to package directions (but without the meat)
1 package Zatarain's Dirty Rice

When meat is brown and vegetables are nearly tender, add

1 quart jar homemade tomato soup or 2 cans condensed tomato soup

2 cans diced tomatoes (I used tomatoes with garlic and onion)

1 or two beef boullion cubes

Water to the consistency you like

Yes, I skipped the mushrooms. I love mushrooms, but they just seemed weird in this recipe. Plus, only dh and I eat this (not one kid will eat peppers) and if I put mushrooms in, then it would just be ME eating this huge vat of soup.

Add the rice to the soup. Yum!

Oh, and as promised, here is the second recipe. Run, don't walk to your stove and make this. Mmm, mmm, mmm! And, because I can't leave well enough alone, I made this with chicken and added a few diced sun-dried tomatoes.

Justin is Mathtacular!

2009-03-06T11:43:00.006-06:00

We just got volumes 2 & 3 of Mathtacular in our new Sonlight box. I put it in this morning and the kids were glued to the TV. Not that they aren't glued to the TV whatever is on. The other day, Daisy watched the history of the sewer systems in America's 10 largest cities (not kidding. This was on PBS at 11 am)

I guess it's good they are so interested in learning.

Anyway, they were loving Justin doing his mathy thing on the new DVD.

And something Justin did inspired Pepper to get out the Base Ten blocks, which she normally abhors. Well, she abhors them if I get them out for her to use in solving a math problem.

If she can unschool with them, apparently she loves them.

And what, you ask, was Sunshine doing during all this? Well, sometimes he was trying to knock over these creations. But then I got out some Tray Work for him and he did SO well! I was so proud of him. He mostly followed directions, kept the water in the cups, well, at least in the tray, well, at least on the towel. And he poured for 30 minutes!!!

Hopefully, this is something I can keep doing with him for next year as he will only be in school two days a week. yay, Sunshine!

Multiplication for a Friend

2009-03-06T11:22:00.006-06:00

Here are some multiplication links I promised a friend. Enjoy!

Times Tales (from the website) Times Tales is a creative, innovative mnemonic-basedprogram that makes it fun and easy to memorize the upper multiplication facts. Times Tales uses cute, simple stories to provide students with a "memory peg", allowing them to quickly recall otherwise abstract facts

Timez Attack Video game that teaches multiplication facts. Explore the castle, fight the ogres (or whatever they are). There is a free demo available for download that does most of what the purchased version does. I think you get a better variety of monsters to fight in the purchased version, among other things.

Multiplication.comMy girls LOVE this site. Fun, simple video games that drill multiplication facts. Their favorite is Fairy Fun. If I had one complaint, it's that the answer seems to usually be in only two of the four places you can choose. Not as random as I'd like, but fine. You can choose which facts to work on (perfect for Pepper who is only learning 2s and 3s right now and Daisy who needs extra work on 7s)

100 Sheep Skip Counting CD

The sixes is our favorite song!!!

Schoolhouse Rock Remember the multiplication songs from when you were a kid? Figure 8s were my favorite. And the hide and seek one.

One more: Roll n Multiply Math Bingo, only more fun!

Chaos

2009-02-17T14:52:00.004-06:00

We've moved. We're moved. We're unpacked. Well, my family is unpacked. I have a problem with unpacking. It overwhelms me. My clothes is still in boxes and laundry baskets. (but I know where it all is!)

And our library is a disaster. I have the shelves. I have the baskets (ask me about the GREAT deals I got on baskets at SERRV last week!!!) I have my stuff in boxes in the room. The baskets are even on the shelves (see, Honey? I made progress today!!!). This is a disappointment to the cat, BTW. Maple has declared all the baskets his. Even the cutlery baskets. How you can sleep with one foot in each section and your gut over the divider is beyond me, but then I'm not a cat.

Anywho.

We ARE doing school. The girls, who unlike me, do not have an unpacking problem, packed their school benches into a concise box and then promptly unpacked it back into their benches upon arrival in the new house. Thus, they are able to do school. We're even reading. I found Daniel Boone and we've finished that book.

Next on tap is the Erie Canal. Oh, after we finish America Travels.

I think I threw some markers in a cutlery basket today. Problem is, that's not really where I want them. I'm not sure where I really want anything. THAT'S the problem.

Anyone want to come over and help me organize and decompress?

I Open My Hand

2009-02-02T12:20:00.009-06:00

With our move, I'm finally biting the bullet and clearing out books we seldom use.

I am a self-confessed book-a-holic. A Bibliovore. I have a small addiction. And now I have an even smaller library in my new house, so some things have got to go.

My biggest obstacle is thinking that "Maybe one of the younger kids will use this someday."

Well, true.

They might.

They HAVE!

I have materials I am very successfully using with Daisy and Pepper that RoseBud had no interest in. I recognize that the boys may not be the same kind of learners that the girls are. They may well require different methods and different materials.

Does that justify my holding on to stuff we have never touched? Just. Open. The. Hand. Let it go.

Does it justify holding on to "deals" I bought when RoseBud was an infant (ok, a toddler) which have now been reprinted twice? Just. Open. The. Hand.

Have I not learned which materials work best for me and for the kids? Mainly for me. If I can't use it, it's unlikely they will get to use it. Too crafty, too much planning, too advanced, too wordy, makes the kids cry when they see it, yada yada. Just. Open. The. Hand.

And with the increasing amount of stuff on the internet, I'm finding I just don't use books in the same way I did as a kid. Like today's earlier post on the Star-Spangled Banner, for instance. There are so many cool resources out there. Granted, I am still a hard-copy paper kind of girl. I like to have it in my hand and page through it. But for storage purposes, I'm all for hosting it on someone else's server! Just. Open. The. Hand.

So today I begin to loosen my grip, begin to open my hand. Let it go.

Oh, Say Can You See

2009-02-02T11:44:00.006-06:00

Today we read about the War of 1812 and the Star-Spangled Banner (the song and the flag).

The girls were thrilled because they remember when we were at the National Museum of American History in 2006 and SAW the Star-Spangled Banner. It was still under renovation at that time and we saw it on its rollers in the lab. Very cool. They always say, "Is that that big flag we saw that they were sewing on?"

Here are our flag connections for the day:

We were awed to compare the size of the real Star-Spangled Banner to our house. Our kitchen/dining/living room is 18 x 40 (ish) The flag is 32 X 40! Whoa!

The Star-Spangled Banner at the NMAH

Be sure to play the quiz game and collect the 14 stars to earn your certificate on SSB trivia! We got them all correct.

Last night we were watching a rerun of Antiques Roadshow in Texas and a flag collector there, when asked if there were any flags he did not have that he WOULD like, (he had over 600!!!) said, "the Star-Spangled Banner!" (can you believe I found the clip! Is there NOTHING that is not on the internet????)

I sang all three "popular" verses of the SSB to the girls this morning. (I'll spare you a demonstration) The third verse is little known and seldom sung (but I bet you know verses 1, 2 & 4, don't you! I hope you at least know verse 1)

Enter a SSB singing contest sponsored by the NMAH on YouTube

Listen to the original English drinking song from which the melody for the SSB was taken!

Check out a rendering of the Star-Spangled Banner by one of my favorite illustrators, Peter Spier.

The Latest

2009-01-28T10:41:00.003-06:00

Daisy has been having trouble seeing, so she had to get glasses

Here the girls are giving and receiving spelling words. Daisy is 100 lessons farther than Pepper (although Pepper can spell most of Daisy's words!), so they took turns reading each other their spelling words.

Pepper is beginning to multiply. Here she is buzzing about her multiplication bees! I drew flowers, each with a product in the center. The bees had the factors (I know there is a complicated math word to describe those but I'm too lazy to look it up and I never liked it anyway. Who needs addends and divisors and dividends and multiplicands and rubber bands and so on. 5 times 4 is 20. The end.) Anyhoo.... she had to match the right bees to the right flower. She loved that activity!

The Most Common Presidential First Name

2009-01-28T10:24:00.004-06:00

is.....

not Barak.

It is actually James. There were 6 presidents thus far whose first name was James.

Second place? John and William tie with four each.

George has 3

Franklin 2

Andrew 2

What president was elected to 4 terms?

What president served 2 non-consecutive terms?

What president gave the longest inaugural speech and served the shortest term? (if you paid attention to the inauguration, you caught this little bit of trivia)

How many presidents have been impeached?

Who was the fattest president?

What president was never elected as either vice president or president?

How many father/son presidents were there?

How many presidents were assassinated?

Who was the first Black president? (you'd better not get this wrong, unless you've been living under a rock somewhere in the jungle!)

Do You Like My New Header?

2009-01-19T11:48:00.003-06:00

I made it myself!

The background is from The Cutest Blog on the Net (click on the little blue box in the upper lefthand corner for a link) and there are directions there for making your own background and header.

Yay me!

Chana Masala--This is to die for!

2009-01-19T10:19:00.004-06:00

In case my one blog reader wanted to try this dish my kids couldn't get enough of, here is the recipe.

Chana Masala

2 cups cooked chick peas (canned, drained, or cooked yourself)

1 t. tamarind concentrate

2 T. oil

1/2 t. cumin seeds

1 large onion, thinly sliced in half rings

2 (or more) garlic cloves, crushed

1 inch piece fresh root ginger, grated

1 fresh green chili, finely chopped (I left this out, although I do like it)

1 t. ground cumin

1 t. ground coriander

1/4 t. ground turmeric (I use about a tsp. I love turmeric)

1/2 t. salt, or to taste

8 oz. tomatoes, peeled and finely chopped (I used 16 oz. tomato sauce--I like it saucy)

1/2 t. garam masala

chopped fresh chilies and chopped onion to garnish

No fancy photos on my blog. Here are the directions

Heat the oil in a large heavy pan and fry the cumin seeds for 2 minutes until they splutter. Add the onion, garlic, ginger and chili and fry for 5 minutes.

Stir in the cumin and coriander with the turmeric and salt and fry for 3-4 minutes. Add the chopped tomatoes (sauce). Bring to the boil and them simmer for 5 minutes.

Drain the chickpeas and add to the tomato mixture together with the garam masala and tamarind. Cover and simmer gently for about 15 minutes. Garnish with the chopped chilies and onion before serving.

Serve over rice or with hot naan.

Couldn't be easier! And it tastes even better the next day.

There. I feel better now that I've shared that. I hate to post such a delicious-looking picture and leave y'all to search the net for a recipe.

phew!

Free to a Good Home

2009-01-19T09:43:00.001-06:00

1985 World Book Encyclopedia Set, Like New, a little dusty. Tan and brown.

I'm guessing you'll want to be a local friend to take these!

Memorize the Presidents

2009-01-14T13:15:00.004-06:00

Found here

George Washington leads them, the great and the true.
John Adams succeeds him and Jefferson, too.
Madison follows, and fifth comes Monroe,
with John Quincy Adams and Jackson below.

The term of Van Buren to Harrison's leads;
Tyler, Polk, Taylor, then Fillmore succeeds.
Pierce and Buchanan, and Lincoln in turn,
is followed by Johnson and Grant we discern.

Hayes, Garfield, and Arthur, and Cleveland we score.
Then, Harrison is followed by Cleveland once more.
Then, comes McKinley and the full dinner pail,
and one called "Teddy" who to Cuba, did sail.

William Taft his government began
and Woodrow Wilson, a marvelous man;
Harding, Coolidge are next in the rhyme.
Then, Hoover and the people had a very hard time.

F.D.R. was great in both peace and war;
Truman was striving for what we were fighting for.
The former General Eisenhower
brought the Republicans back to power.

John Kennedy's victory in the race
was for the New Frontier in the "Age of Space."
Lyndon Johnson led the people -- the free and the brave,
with a goal to achieve and a country to save.

Nixon swore to uphold our creed
of liberty, life and every man's need,
but by Nixon these rules were ignored.
So, to take his place was President Ford.

Then, came Carter with a cheery smile
to run our country "Southern Style."
Then, Carter's smile left his face,
and Reagan came to take his place.

"Dutch" stayed two terms, and Bush filled his station,
bringing with him a "kinder, gentler nation."
However, only one term did George H. W. Bush fill
when along came Clinton, known as Bill.

Eight years of great economic changes took place,
but Clinton's impeachment brought him disgrace.
The new millenium arrived with a close election.
The Electoral College chose George W. Bush as its Presidential selection.

A song from YouTube

Using silly names to help you remember

More Underground Railroad Resources

2009-01-14T10:59:00.004-06:00

Harriet Tubman and the Freedom Train

Two Tickets To Freedom: The True Story of Ellen and William Craft, Fugitive Slaves

President of the Underground Railroad: A Story about Levi Coffin

Escape From Slavery: Five Journeys to Freedom

Freedom Train: The Story of Harriet Tubman

A Day in the Life-January

2009-01-14T09:33:00.009-06:00

I wake to my usual alarm clock--Banana Boy screaming at Sunshine over something. Neither boy is dressed. Wrastle BB into his clothes and tell him 5 times to go brush his teeth and go to the bathroom. Tame his wild hair. He asks me today if he has girl-hair (he's been growing it out "to his ankles"). I say no, it is boy-hair. Well, the kids at school have been telling him it is girl-hair. Would you like to cut it, then? Yes! Now! After school, I tell him.

Wrastle Sunshine into HIS clothes and convince him it would be a good idea to p[oop on the potty and not in his diaper.

Try to convince Rose Bud that she should let me drive her to the bus stop since the wind chill is 35 below. She leaves on foot.

Get BB dressed for the outside world and into the van. Leave Daisy in charge of getting Sunshine dressed for his bus.

Pull out of the driveway and turn up the hill to the bus stop. Spin wheels on the icy road and go nowhere as the bus turns the corner and picks up RoseBud. Drive BB next door (downhill) to get on the bus with the neighbors. Back the van to the bottom of the hill so I can get back up to our driveway.

Put Sunshine happily on his little bus (the school van) He LOVES school and riding his little bus.

Make coffee and listen to Daisy say her AWANA verses. Encourage Pepper to practice hers. Argue with Pepper that she should practice her review verses even though she hasn't heard back from her missionary yet.

Start rice in the rice cooker for my breakfast. Stir the chick peas I soaked last night and am cooking this morning. Decide Chana Masala would go really well with my rice.

While making the Chana Masala, check Daisy's math and help Pepper with her math. Pepper started out excited this morning since it was more measuring and using the scale, but quickly got herself frustrated by the fact that it was different today (grams) than yesterday (kilograms). Once she lets herself get frustrated, she shuts down and won't accept any new information or help. Got her through the lesson and she moved off to the couch to weep over her difficult life.

Listened to Daisy do her grammar and read her her spelling words. Got her started with her writing topic for the day. Did I already say how we do this? I have slips of paper in a cup with a topic on each. The girls pick a topic and then label their page with the topic and the date. Then we set the timer for 5 minutes and they write anything they want related to the topic. They aren't supposed to worry about spelling or penmanship or punctuation, just get the ideas out. Today they picked the topic of Banana Boy.

While Daisy wrote, I snuggled Pepper on the couch.

Rice and Chana Masala were done, so I got to have breakfast. The girls got themselves each a bowl of rice for snack. I suggested they try the chick peas and they both went wild over how good they were.

I suggested Pepper just write five sentences instead of for five minutes. She thought that was a great idea and happily went off to write about her brother.

Both girls had more rice and chickpeas.

Daisy finished up her president for the week (John Adams) and begged to begin Thomas Jefferson.

Pepper decided doing her spelling list with the Bananagrams tiles would be awesome! Hey, we have to change it up once in a while.

Now they are going to play Bananagrams while I read our latest book, The Last Safe House to them.

This is another great book. It actually includes information on all the topics we've touched on so far, including the Slave Trade, abolitionists, plantation life, etc. It doesn't go into as much depth as we have, but this book on its own would be an excellent way to just touch on the subject, espeially for a 1st or 2nd grader. One of the activities in this book was to make gingerbread cookies. The girls were all over that and except for creaming in the egg with the butter and sugar, they did it all themselves!

Life on a Plantation

2009-01-08T11:26:00.007-06:00

This week we've been reading the chapter in A Kid's Guide to African American History on life on a plantation. The girls haven't wanted to do any crafts or eat grits and collard greens, but we have read through everything and had lots of good discussion.

Here are the books we used:

Life on a Plantation

The Strength of These Arms: Life in the Slave Quarters

And the girls' personal favorite Uncle Remus: The Complete Tales (of Brer Rabbit)

We're also going to listen to some songs such as Blue-Tail Fly (you can listen to an easy-to-understand version here and read the words in heavy dialect and not-so heavy),

Pick a Bale of Cotton (YouTube video of Leadbelly singing --skip the comments discussion)

and Swing Low, Sweet Chariot. (this is a beautiful acapella version which downloaded automatically into my iTunes. There is a link here to the Wikipedia article on this song also.)

Next week we'll investigate the abolitionists, Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad.

Pepper Gets Excited About School

2009-01-08T08:15:00.004-06:00

Pepper is cavorting about this morning doing her math. Why? She is measuring.

She started out rustling through the broom closet for a meter stick. Strangely, our meter stick is 91 cm long.

Next she found some shiny gold ribbon and made a meter string.

She had to check whether she (her height), her armspan, her desk (this one was funny because it's our dining room table) all were longer or shorter than a meter.

Then she had to estimate the length of the chalkboard (our whiteboard) and the classroom and measure.

The next page switched over to centimeters and she had to estimate and then measure her math book, her pencil, eraser, a drinking straw.

She studied each item carefully and studied the ruler. She's a good estimator! She was within a centimeter each time.

Next she needed a glass of water to drink with her straw.

Next she had to drink with her straw through each of her fangs.

Next she had to find her meter string. "Oh, Meter String, where are you??? Where have you gone??" she sang.

She's currently working on her 4th or 5th page, cheerfully.

"I'm going to measure things that are a meter when I'm done!" she just informed me.

Go, Pepper.