What Have We Been Up To ?

Despite my intentions to write weekly I just don't seem to get it done. I think it has now been three weeks since I wrote last, but here are a few highlights.

One of the selections in daughters literature book is the Phantom Tollbooth in a drama format.She has loved the movie since she was really small, but has never read the book. So she was very excited when she ran across this selection in her book. We decided to skip ahead to it and have been reading through it the last two weeks. We had to recruit little brother to read with us ans there are so many parts. Thankfully he reads well so he can do it with us and I think he is enjoying it as well. Because they were familiar with the movie they knew what the story would bring, so I had them draw a map featuring the places in the story before we started reading. We have completed reading the script, but have some analysis to do yet. I also plan to include some background about the author as well as make our own lapbook.

In history we have been talking about Ancient India and China. So far we have mainly just read, but I am hoping to do some projects and activities this next week. Both Daughter and Son enjoyed hearing and reading about the Terra Cotta Army.One activity Daughter did was try her hand at Chinese calligraphy. She didn't use paint or brushes, just pencil, but had fun with it.

Earlier this month we went to the homeschool class at our library. The theme was the human heart and heart health. They reviewed how the heart works, thought about exercise and its benefit to the heart, made a simple model of blood flow in the heart as well as using a stethoscope to listen to their heart.

On a different note, I have started reviewing again with a brand new review team, Mosaic Reviews. Mosaic Reviews is a great group of people, some whom I already know from other things I have done online and other people I look forward to getting to know. This is a sister program to Homeschool Mosaics, for which I am privileged to write a monthly column. I have already received several nice products to use and review. The first reviews will be posted shortly.

Hopefully in another week I will have some more interesting activities to share. In the meantime we'll keep plugging away and looking forward to spring.

A Hodge Podge of Activities

Well its been several weeks of good intentions for writing here, but it hasn't happened.

But even though I haven't written, I have taken some pictures so I'll share them and briefly explain them.


The first pictures is a sample of cookies my 11 year old daughter made. When we go to the library I insist each of my children pick out a minimum of 1 fiction and 1 non fiction book each. One week Daughter picked out a cookbook,decided she wanted to make something and picked out cookies. They are a simplified version of Black and Whites. She made these pretty independently. I helped her find a couple supplies and with melting the chocolate. They were quite tasty.

Both of the children have been interested in the Solar System and Space, but Son seems to have a longer lasting, greater interest. He has been studying constellations for science lately. One day they both decided to make a picture of the solar system. They simple put together 4 sheets of black construction paper and used a variety of art supplies to make the planets, asteroid belt, and stars.  Although they don't show up to well in the picture there are clusters of stars in each of the four corners of the large picture. These stars of made from Glow-in-the-Dark fabric paint. (The only glow in the dark material they could find at home.) While it is faint, they do glow somewhat when the light is first turned off.

Another fun activity around here has been playing/experimenting with the Snap Circuits set they received for Christmas from an Uncle. I am not sure, but I think the project pictured is a flying saucer type project. The ride discs spins while the motor is on and when it turns off the disc lifted up and flies off a short distance. They are both enjoying all the projects, but the first time they did this the end was a very neat surprise. Needless, to say Snap Circuits has been used quite a bit since Christmas.

Last week we also spent several hours one day at the local history museum for their homeschool day with the theme of The Civil War. This included a couple one person theater productions and two classes learning how to read and interpret primary source documents. One focused on written documents and the other on maps, photos etc. Craft time featured the opportunity to make banners or pennants similar to Regimental Flags from the war. Attendees also had the opportunity to view the special exhibit about the Civil War. Many of the events explored the unique situation of Missouri during the war. Part of the reason for that was the governor left his office and joined one side and a good portion of the rest of the state went to the other side.


For read alouds we are working our way through one of the volumes of the My Book House collection. I happened across these on the sale table at our library shortly before Christmas. I had heard about them before and so when they showed up there I grabbed them. Even though a couple of the volumes are below my childrens' interest level, we have been enjoying many stories.


Daughter has finished her Chemistry course so I want to share some of her projects in a separate post.

Where Does the Time Go?

I realized tonight it has been over a month since I last wrote. I had no idea it had been that long. My how time flies.

Briefly (and the best I can remember) these are some of the things we have been up to.

In both November and December we went to the Homeschool class at our library. November was all about the election process. The children had the opportunity to make a button to wear proclaiming they are future voters, they made a lapbook and even had the opportunity to vote in a election for best dessert. Th elibrarian had chosen the two candidates; cookies and brownies earlier. The children were then given the opportunity to decide which one they wanted to campaign for. Then in small groups they had to come up with several reasons to vote for their candidate and share them with the whole group. As a special treat the children were given a brownie or cookie snack.

 
Decembers' theme was optical illusions. After a brief discussion defining optical illusions the children experimented with several illusions at various stations. Among the projects they experienced were making a flip book, arrows with the ends pointing the opposite direction to prove the center part is the same length, taking to similar pictures, cutting them into strips and reassembling them by interspersing the strips with each other. Then by tilting is sideways they would only see one picture at a time.


At home in December we  kept up or regular schedule for several weeks, then spent more time on Christmas themed activities. One of these was completing the Christmas Around the World lapbook. This project pack had a lot of information and activities in it, but we also read several books along with it. These are pictures of the completed lapbook.
 

I discovered several Little House on The Prairie Christmas Anthologies at our library so we enjoyed stories from them for a read aloud throughout the month.

December was also very busy with music. Both children had the opportunity to play Christmas piano music in public settings on several occasions throughout the month.  They each played several pieces as prelude music for our church's children's Christmas program. Daughter also had the honor and privilege of accompanying the children when they sang "Away in a Manger" during the program. Even though I am biased, I do have to say she did a good job.

Both of the children decorated these mini gingerbread houses from a kit. After I made the icing Daughter put the houses together herself before decorating them. She was generous and let her brother decorate two of them.

I guess that is about all the news from our house for this month. See you in 2013.