Weeks 5 & 6

After reflecting on the last couple weeks I am amazed at the amount of school we managed to accomplish with everything else going on- doctor appointments, extended family visiting, and the biggest interruption was a fire that started not far from us on a National Guard base and we almost had to evacuate our home! Whew!

Field Trips & Activities

Thanksgiving Point: Farm Days- This is a favorite place for my younger girls so we go all the time.  They love riding on the ponies and feeding the ducks.  While we were there I also had A work on passing off some requirements for Bear Scouts. 

Liberty Girls/Knights of Freedom- A and N both had their book clubs.  A finished reading Benjamin Franklin by the D'Aulaire's and started the Landmark Books' Meet George Washington.  N and I finished reading Josephina Learns a Lesson.  My friend who is the leader for N's Liberty Girls group needed some extra help so all the kids came along - we learned how to card wool and got to see and touch all the tools used, and the girls made a fabric cover for a memory book. 

Scouts & Activity Days- A is getting new leaders in his scout den so he hasn't had any den meetings for a couple weeks and pack meeting was cancelled because half the cub scouts were still evacuated from the fire zone.  They are all back home now so it should be rescheduled soon.  And I completely forgot about Nyah's Activity Days after reminding myself about it a half an hour before it started.  Oy. 

Art Class- It was also my turn to volunteer at the kids' art class.  They studied The Seine at Asnieres (The Skiff) by Renoir and did a color mixing project.  And all the kids wanted to paint when we came home so we did.  Mess mess mess :).

Thanksgiving Point: Star Party- A, N, and I went to a star gazing party hosted at the Thanksgiving Point Gardens.  We saw Venus, Jupiter, and identified several constellations- Big Dipper, Little Dipper, Summer Triangle, Cassiopeia.  Mostly we had a lot of fun.  And hot fudge sundaes on the way home :).

 School

Old Testament- We read chapters 18-21, and the kids completed pages 57-64 in their journals. 

Habit Training- Still working on making "good bathroom habits" habits.  (Its best to spend 6 weeks or more cementing a habit before focusing on the next habit. Slow and steady . . . )

Math- We completed chapter 10 and worked on chapter 11.  They need some more practice with the chapter 11 concepts (estimating, adding, and regrouping 100's) before we move on.  We are also doing a schedule change with math.  We were doing it as one of the first things, but we tend to have a lot of interruptions from the little girls during this time, so I'm moving it to nap time in the afternoon.  And to mix things up (and have fun) I showed the kids how to play Sudoku.  They love it. 

Science- Finished chapter 3 on Mercury.  And went back to our basic format of me reading and the kids narrating back to me instead of trying to follow the lesson plans in the notebooking journals.  No more busy work.  They enjoyed the activity suggestion - dropping objects of different sizes and weights into flour to make craters. 

History- I decided I wanted to keep our history in the Revolutionary War/Founding Fathers time period for now.  We started reading Landmark Books' The American Revolution and continued reading George Washington by the D'Aulaires. 

Geography- Minn of the Mississippi is moving down the Mississippi.  We read 2 more chapters and filled in more states and capitals, and the Minnesota River on our maps. 

Nature Study- Finished up the challenges we were working on and started a couple more.  Raccoons and Skunks will be fast because its unlikely we'll be able to observe any (even though we have spotted a skunk in our neighborhood before).  We did a challenge on the signs of Autumn and will be starting the other Autumn challenges soon. 

 Literature - We read The Nutcracker and Swan Lake from the book of ballet stories.  And lots of library books. 

Artist Study- A picked Apple Vendor (La Marchande de pommes), 1890 for our fridge this week.  We read a couple library books about Renoir:  Renoir and the Boy with the Long Hair by Wendy Wax and Pierre-Auguste Renoir: Painting That Smile by True Kelley. 

Composer Study- Listening to The Story of Tchaikovsky, Tchaikovsky Discovers America, and Naxos CDs. 

P.E.- Swimming while the weather is still wonderful!!



Autumn Series - Signs of Autumn

Outdoor Hour Challenge - Signs of Autumn

For this challenge I handed my kids the camera and told them to each find and take pictures of 4 signs of Autumn.  They had a good time searching and sharing.

A's-

Leaves turning yellow

Leaves getting ready to fall

Flowers closing/dying

Leaves falling

N's-

Dry grass

Dry leaves

 Leaves turning orange

 Falling leaves



Summer Series #11 - Queen Anne's Lace

Outdoor Hour Challenge - Summer Series - #11 Year-Long Study: Queen Anne's Lace

We have not seen any Queen Anne's Lace in our outdoor adventures. Because this is going to be a year-long study and I want the wildflower to be easy for us to observe, I had my kids pick a wildflower growing in our yard to study.

N picked a Delphinium plant

A picked a Burgundy Gaillardia

We decided to finally try out these art kits we got for Christmas (!!!).

Kids hard at work

N's -

A's -

It will be interesting to see how these wildflowers change during the different seasons!

Summer Series #10 Grasshoppers, Crickets, & Katydids

Outdoor Hour Challenge - Summer Series #10 - Grasshoppers, Crickets, & Katydids

A couple weeks ago we looked through our field guides and discussed these insects. Then we spent the last couple weeks searching for one of them! We finally succeeded in finding this grasshopper on our sunflowers. We put him in a jar to take a closer look at him and then let him go. Some of the other bugs we found while we were searching:

Stink Bugs

Praying Mantis' are everywhere in our neighborhood

We also found this mystery beetle we haven't identified yet.

During our outside time we have also listened for these insect calls. The kids have been really excited to hear a sound they recognize and follow it to see if they can find the insect making the noise.

Summer Series #8 Moths

Outdoor Hour Challenge - Summer Series #8 - Moths

After looking through our field guides at several kinds of moths and having a brief discussion about them, my kids worked on their nature journals. My kids decided to create their own wing patterns for the moths they drew. We had a couple dead moths to examine up close.
A's Journal-

N's journal-

We looked back at a past journal entry where we had discussed the moth's anatomy and life cycle.

And we spent a couple evenings watching moths outside - flying around lights and flowers in our yard.

Summer Series #6 Frogs

Outdoor Hour Challenge - Summer Series - #6 Frogs

We have been working on several challenges the last few weeks hoping to find some creatures to examine up close. For frogs we spent time discussing them and the kids decided they wanted to draw the frog life cycle in their journals.

N's-

A's-

We didn't have any luck finding some in the great outdoors so we took a trip to the local pet store. The picture below is of fire-bellied toads - all the frogs were hiding. However, the kids did enjoy being to identify the anatomy of the toads - and making the connection that frogs and toads are closely related.

Weeks 3 & 4

The last couple weeks have really centered around a number of field trips we have been taking, and not so much at our sit down school work, which is one thing I love about homeschooling.

Field Trips & Activities-
Thanksgiving Point dinosaur museum has a NASA exhibit about exploring light and outer space. We had so much fun experimenting with all the exhibits.

Hogle Zoo - for Labor Day we went to the zoo, enjoyed all the animals who were out, rode the carousel and train, and had a fabulous time together.

Hikes - in addition to a few nature walks close to home, we ventured further away to attempt to hike Ensign Peak. We didn't make it very far but certainly had an adventure.

Ice Skating - A and N had the last couple of lessons and passed level 3. Our whole family goes during their lessons and skates, walks on the track, or plays on the bleachers.

Art Class - The kids had their first art appreciation class - it was simple and short and they loved it.

Book Clubs - N and I finished reading Meet Josephina just in time for her Liberty Girl club activity. They went to one of the leader's homestead and had lots of fun washing clothes, seeing goats and other animals, made a wrap, climbed trees - N came home beaming! She also did a short presentation on the book. A's Kinghts of Freedom club meeting went great - he was elected President/King and did a short presentation about a lego masterpiece he was working on.

Baby S's 2 month check up - on this day things just worked out so I needed to take everyone with me to S's doctor appointment. Oh it is amazing how exhausting and long an hour can be!! But they helped me answer the doctor's questions, asked him plenty of their own questions, and skedaddled to the waiting room when it was time for immunizations.

Boys Scouts & Activity Days - in addition to passing off a few things at home, A was able to attend the cub-o-ree for our area and had a great time rock climbing and passing off more things. He is halfway to earning his Bear. N played basketball with the girls in her Activity days group.

School-

Old Testament - We read 4 more chapters from the scripture stories and the kids completed pages 44 -56 in their Discover the Old Testament journals.

Habit Training - Continued with bathroom habits, repentance, and speaking politely. Sometimes it feels like we aren't progressing or even back sliding some, but then somone will astound me and I know we are headed in the right direction.

Math - Completed chapters 8 and 9, and worked on math facts review. These chapters were a lot simpler than the few before it so we were able to keep moving forward and review for N.

Science - We finished chapter 2 on the Sun. Exploring Creation with Astronomy has started to feel horribly like a textbook, which it is, and the journals are getting a little too busy-work for me and the kids, which sometimes they are. Trying to decide how we will continue.

History - We finished watching the Liberty Kids episodes, wrapped up our timeline and history journals as well. We have been reading George Washington by the D'Aulaires and will finish it soon. We will probably jump back into The Story of the World where we left off last year (not sure where that is off the top of my head).

Geography - We read 2 chapters of Minn of the Mississippi and added more information to our maps. We also pulled out the maps a couple times during other subjects such as History, Composer Study and Artist Study.

Nature Study - We have been working on 3 Outdoor Hour Challenges, but haven't found any live examples to study in the wild - frogs, crickets, grasshoppers, katydids, and moths. So we will probably just wrap these up and we will be armed with the information when we come across these creatures in the future.

Literature - Tyger Tyger became a little too much for all of us. Yeah. We will probably revisit it and finish it in the future, but for now we've turned it into the library. To fill in while we wait for the next audiobook we've requested we are reading The Random House Book of Stories from the Ballet stories Tchaikovsky composed music for - Nutcracker, Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty.

Artist Study - After finishing Van Gogh we had a week before our art appreciation classes started so we revisited Monet to have A and N copy one of his paintings. We forgot to do this at the end of our Money study. The second week we started Renoir - we did Mademoiselle Jeanne Durand-Ruel, 1876 - picked by N for the fridge and On the Terrace at art class.

Composer Study - We have been listening to Tchaikovsky Discovers America, The Story of Swan Lake, and several Naxos CD selections. I love easy subjects.

Preschool - I failed to include this in our last post, mostly because we don't do any specific curriculum for preschool. I alternate my time between my older kids and younger kids. When I'm with the younger kids we do things like getting dress and brushing hair, making beds, playing and cleaning up, reading books, riding bikes outside, etc. Living life!!