Goings on at school this week...

I love homeschooling my children! I know I have said it on at least 50 different occasions on this blog, but I really do. Brick and mortar schools were very tedious for this hands on learner, I have always liked to "do" rather than "listen". (And it has caused various trials in my life, but that is another post full of funny stories at my expense - so don't expect it to pop up soon!) With that in mind any time I can show my kids rather than tell my kids I try to run with the opportunity.

So this week in our hands-on school we studied all about Rome. The kids talked about being a Roman soldier and the comforts they could not enjoy while out protecting the vast Roman border! So our lunch for one of the days was eating like a Roman soldier - translation- eating a meat and potato meal with no utensils!

I cooked up potatoes, tomatoes, and ground beef together then served it with a tortilla. It was a good meal, but very messy! We really like utensils!

We even had to stave off a wild beast to protect our lunch (well, just our persistent kitty - but they had fun pretending!)

We ended up having one who cried "Uncle" and went inside and returned with a fork! (Don't you love their little stocking feet - they love these shoe/sock things!)

To continue on our Roman adventure we talked about the Roman buildings, roads, and other such wonders. We discussed how advanced they were for ancient times. It led us to try our hand at Roman architecture! We made our own Roman pillars out of sugar cookie dough! It was a fun project and they had fun shaping, decorating, and eating it!

I had to snag a little extra dough to make hubby and I a little treat too! However, I didn't think that I needed to shape them into the pillars of Rome and despite not being historically accurate they were GOOD!

We also had a lot of fun with science this week. We spent a lot of time talking about plants and how God made the little seeds to know exactly which way to grow, even when it is all covered up in the dark soil! We did a neat experiment that showed the effects of gravity on a plants root system!

I'm not sure what the girls are doing in this picture. They look a little like the "mad scientists" complete with croquet mallets!Everyone was excited when the little roots started to show themselves today! Gravity makes the roots grow down! In a couple of days we will turn the jar over and watch what the roots do when they are growing the wrong way!

Next week in History we are studying the Celts. The kids are reading (or being read) Beowulf according to their age level and in science we are going to start studying the Classification system and ....well, I'll just have to show you next week!

Have a happy weekend!

Allergies....

We have been sniffling and sniffling in this new environment. During the evening news we await for the air quality report to see just what culprits have been causing us such havoc. Mold, pollen, rag weed, oak take your pick! We have stocked up on Z.ytec and C.lariten and other such aids, they seem to keep the kleenex at bay, better on some days than others. We do not know exactly which allergens to blame for each of our sinus trouble, but we did discover a particular troublesome one for our 6 year old DD.

It seems that for her, she has a terrible reaction to EFFORT!

Oh, I myself have had such horrid allergic reactions to the same culprit. It rears its ugly head with such terrible side effects such as procrastination and laziness. I guess I can only blame my genes for the yucky allergy.

The discovery came about 10 AM this morning, (though I must say I have had my suspicions for awhile) I asked her quite benignly to please write out her 2's skip counting to 20! She giggled and laughed and doodled with her pencil. She looked on as her sister did a 2 minute multiplication drill and as I explained what sound W says to her other sister. When I looked back over her work she had written 2, 4, 22, 48, 100. So I thought "hmmm....she misunderstood my directions" so I explained myself again and went over to help my son with his reading assignment. 5 minutes later I returned to see her looking longingly out the window at the trees blowing and the empty, lonely swing dancing in the breeze.

I know that feeling well, it plagued me for most of 3rd grade, so I allowed a 15 minute recess, but immediatley after we were going to return to our 2's and just for reinforcement I made her skip count by 2's to 20 before soaring to the clouds on her blue swing. She said it perfectly without even the slightest hesitation in the teens. Out she ran, free at last.

15 minutes later she ran in the door with the tell-tale puppy dog smell of a wonderful romp out of doors. Again I placed her paper in front of her and TWELVE minutes later she had produced the 10 numerals that had eluded her earlier. GOOD we were done with math now on to bible study....

her verse was too long for her to say... there were too many words on the page of her reader...she was too little to remember who George Washington was...tears smudged her drawing of the ladybug we were working on...

Her allergen, effort, was just off the chart and the only cure was the blue swing that could easily reach the elephant shaped clouds. So off she ran with her ponytail bouncing with each stride...I want to be 6 again! Atleast at 6 there is a still a chance to outgrow the allergy, I thought as I walked past the sink full of breakfast dishes.

A great children's bible study....

We study the bible daily as a subject in our homeschool. I found a really great resource to help me in our bible study. It is free, it is accessible on the net, and the kids enjoy it - that was a winner for me. It can be found here. From what I can tell all the scripture is from the New King James Version and I like that. While the curriculum does not give a script to tell the story (we use a children's bible and a NKJV to explain the passage) it does give you resources to enhance the learning and (most important for me) a chronological order to present the material in. (Check out the study before you read the rest or it won't make a lot of sense.)


This is what our daily bible study looks like:

We take 2 days to study each lesson. On day one we turn over the cover sheet and copy the memory verse, then I read them the story out of a children's bible while they color the coloring page, (this is to help the understanding for my smaller children). Then we break up into 2 groups.

My oldest 2 children grab their bibles and answer the questions on the fill in the blank page and my 6yo works with me on it, while my 3yo finishes coloring or sits in my lap. After everyone has finished the assignment we come back together and go over the answers.

Next we review our memory verses and I use this system. (Check it out it really works)

On day 2 I read the story out of the NKJV and then we work on our crossword puzzle breaking up into the groups mentioned above and again we finish up with our memory work and prayer.

After we have finished up a story we keep the title page and 2 other pages of their choice and punch holes in it and keep it in their bible notebook.

This has been a great study that has worked really well for our family. For more WFMW ideas check them out for the last time at Rocks In My Dryer.

So how DO you occupy all those kids????

So for the last couple of days we have had to care for extra kids and keeping them busy was the best method to combat homesickness, cousin drama, and all sorts of other mischief! Here are 2 of my favorite things we came across!

Well, first off we stumbled across a blessing at Michael's. They have these really great models for kids for $1.00! They have about 16 different models to choose from, Papa (my father in law) donated $20.00 to the model cause, probably so we would get out of his store and quit eating all the Hagen Daz! So we mossied over to Michael's and each kid got to chose 3 models! This kept them busy for quite awhile, however the glue that came with it was sorry so I let them use my mini glue gun to assemble the pieces! It was a wonderful project and I thank God for letting us discover something reasonable to help me keep them busy!

I loved the covered wagons! However, the most popular were the sailboats which didn't make it into the photos!

Another idea that we did was to hit the Salvation Army. They have all sorts of outdated electronics just begging for little kids with screw drivers to take apart! So we marched in, all 6 of us and my pregnant belly too and went to discover some treasures - there were treasures aplenty but, they wanted around $10.00 for each! Dear hubby would not be very happy if we were $60.00 lighter for stuff to take apart - so I did what any respectable teacher would do and went to the manager and explained what I wanted to do and she said, "Oh that area really needs to be cleaned out - lets see what we can find!" So we went over again and came away with an old cassette player from the 80's, an alarm clock, a 35 mm camera, a VCR, and a telephone - for $8.00! We were all very happy and we set to work when we came home with screw drivers, a mallet, electrical tape, wire cutters/strippers, & a pair of pliers! It was great fun!

The tape recorder in mid demolition!

The tape recorders guts - minus the speaker!

The VCR guts (note the scissors we used to cut off the cord - before giving it to them to play with, if we didn't I was sure someone would try to plug it in while disassembled!)

The telephone and its insides!

The kids used their electronic finds and had so much fun discovering new things. Hubby taught them about positive and negative wires and they used a 9V battery to make the phones bell ring and they used the speaker from the phone and the tape recorder to make Morris code and had a great game of spies! However, the boys were most pleased when they realized if you held the positive wire onto the positive terminal it made a sound very similar to passing gas - which elicited REPEATED belly laughter!

The girls however decided to make a robot that could talk! They used a very old repeater from a very old baby doll that would repeat ANYTHING it heard! (I was happy to let the girls disassemble the doll - it was eerily like CHUCKIE!) So Daddy helped them wire the apparatus and they duck taped it into an oatmeal box and thus they created a robot!

Can you see all 7 eyes from the robot they lovingly plagiarised named Wall-een!

I think Daddy enjoyed this project very much! I think it made him feel a bit MacGyver-ish! Although his life didn't depend on wiring a bomb from a VCR and a tape recorder, but the glint was in his eye!

My sweet nephew is now home recovering and went home with a pic line to continue IV antibiotics, but at least he is home! So today ended our kid duty as they packed up to go home and lovingly embrace their brother. Thanks for all of the prayers!

First Grade 2008....day 2

Today in first grade we had a substitute. Big sister read with 6yo dd and helped her with her geography. Luckily mom was able to get reading and math done before heading to the couch with a horrible sick headache! Hopefully tomorrow will be much better, but in the meantime her substitute loved her and was so exceedingly patient I couldn't have hoped for better!

Because of my horrendous head pounding I didn't get around to taking pictures, but I wanted to showcase our math today. We have used Singapore exclusively and I heart it! It is a wonderful curriculum for the younger years! It really teaches the kids to think and to systematically work out the problems in their head. The draw backs there isn't a readily available teachers manual, although I do believe in recent years someone has come up with a solutions guide. Another drawback would depend on the type of math student you are teaching. 2 of my kids have had great success with Singapore and are able to pick it up in no time and do the math for the most part in their head. However, I have one student that doesn't understand math. She gets the concepts but the basic relationships escape her and Singapore isn't so good for her because she needs a lot of repetitiveness to grasp a concept, something that Singapore can't provide.

6 yo DD is using Singapore level 1A right now. She really enjoys her math and that makes me happy! See you tomorrow for day 2 of first grade.

First Grade 2008....

but, before we delve into what this years first grade looks like, I will first enlighten you at what my Labor Day looked like! It looks like this every year as organizing the school supplies is right up on my list next to a root canal!

Art supplies!

Science and puzzles galore!

Excess school supplies (perhaps we should say excessive!)

The "after" picture - all put away in the supply closet!

The "excessive" supplies!

I look at these pictures and shudder, I promise myself every fall that I WILL NOT attend a used curriculum sale this spring and I WILL WALK on by, sauntering confidently past the .10 cent glue and crayons! I will survive back to school supplies - who am I kidding - I heart school supplies!

So back to first grade! Today 6 yo DD embarked on first grade! It was a fun day and I will showcase one subject each day. Today I wanted to start off with Geography/Social Studies. We are learning the 7 continents and the 4 oceans. I have a worksheet packet that I found off of Enchanted Learning.com. We also used the Geography CD from AudioMemory and it is one of our favorites! (If you want more information on AudioMemory they have many videos on YouTube. I'm particularly fond of their parts of speech songs.)

Sweet first grader with a map of the continents.

So what are my other kids doing during first grade time? I'm so glad you asked....

Oldest and youngest dear daughters are hanging out together!

Dear son is using his computer time!

So that is day one of first grade. See you tomorrow for day two!

Preschool 2008....day 5

So this is the last post for my chronicle of preschool life. It has been a fun week and I can see some of the sweet benefits of this undisturbed time together! Next week I would like to do a week of first grade and show some of our fun activities in our study time together. If for nothing else than to encourage those who aren't quite sure how homeschool works or to showcase a new tactic for the more well versed on the subject. I love peeks into others school day and I have enjoyed sharing ours.

So now for day 5 of preschool. We had a fun playtime with some good friends and my sweet preschooler had a tea party with a friend. After the friends went home we read our book for the week and worked a few puzzles, but tea time took the honors of the best event for the day.

So let me know what your preschool looks like or some of your favorite preschool activities and I will see you next week with a peek into first grade. Have a wonderful labor day!

Preschool 2008...day 4

otherwise known as "Thank Goodness Today is OVER!

We had a very busy day and if it wasn't for wanting to chronicle a week worth of preschool I would have scrapped it all together. Sometimes in homeschool life, life happens!

We started our day with an optometrist apt for 3 kids, 2 of which ended up in glasses. We arrived at 9:15 and got home about 1:00! It was quite an adventure, complete with 3 year old emphatically telling the eye Dr. that "she DID NOT like the dark!"

I was very tired by the time we came home and sweet hubby had to dash off to work, but he was so wonderful to go to the appointment with me! I was so grateful to have him there, I don't like making any kind of medical decision without him and I knew that it was going to be an expensive day so I needed him there.

So we ate a quick bite and rested for a moment, then it was off to pick up glasses and Tae Kwon Do! When I got home I was overtired but sweet hubby got kids tucked in for me!

Anyway, back to preschool. Our schedule for the day was gone and I just decided it would be a preschool day for everyone! So we went outside for a nature study.

I love the Bottle Brush tree in the backyard!

The roses are beautiful, I especially love the bee on the outside of the flower!

Dear son liked the fronds, he wore his shades to protect his dilated eyes.

Dear daughter took protecting her dilated eyes to a new level with shades, a hat, and an umbrella!

She also over estimated my instructions for a rather large leaf. However the large palm frond was very neat to look at up close!

One of our leaf rubbings and my sweet preschooler examining a leaf!

My sweet kids with their new glasses! They look so cute and too grown up!

Preschool 2008....day three

Today was day 3 of our first week of preschool. Today's main activity for our 30 minute time was homemade play dough.

Homemade Play Dough Recipe

2 cups white flour

1/2 cup salt2 cups water

2 tablespoons oil

1/4 cup cream of tartar

A couple of drops of peppermint extract (nice smell!)

Mix all ingredients in a sauce pan. Cook and stir over low/medium heat until play dough is completely formed and no longer sticky. Let cool then store in an airtight container. This is my favorite recipe for play dough it lasts for a very long time. I buy my cream of tartar in bulk so the 1/4 cup doesn't bother me, nor is it that expensive, but if you are using the small jar from the grocery store it drives the cost of this recipe up quite a bit! You can also tint your dough any color you would like with a few drops of food coloring, but in my experience this stains hands and not really worth it in my book.

We used our play dough to learn how to roll snakes and balls. We built a few snowmen and some napping snakes that were wrapped up into a coil. It was fun!

Then we wrapped up our day with a few of our regular activities and clean up! All of this in 30 minutes!

It really is nice to have one on one time with my preschooler. It seems that in day to day life she has had to make a lot of compromises being shuttled here and there to wait for this child or that to finish this activity or that. I like doing something just for her, because sometimes it is just too easy not do it!

Preschool 2008...day one (and two)

I have avoided preschool for awhile now, but alas 3 year old is ready to start and I'm, well:

BUSY!

However, school must go on! So we have worked out a really great schedule that demands more of my time, but at the end of the day I'm satisfied and content with our day and not stressed and regretful that things didn't get done. So I have added preschool to this years line up and day one, Monday, was great.

We read this wonderful book:

And we used some finger-paints to learn that yellow and blue make green. *

(Sorry I didn't get a before picture, only one after we attacked the paints! Also, pretend like you don't see the laundry drying on the railing or the library books that weren't put away - OK, thanks!)

So while sweet 3year old and I are busy with preschool time what are my older kids doing you want to know? Well, I'm glad you asked:

They are giving Kessie, Tweetie, and Oreo some much needed love and attention! Our preschool time is slated to take 30 minutes, so I set the timer for 10 minutes and every time the timer goes off they switch animals! (Just a note: Oreo doesn't really appreciate her picture taken - ever!)

So today was day 2 and I had planned to play with green play doh, but I forgot to make a batch last night so we made banana chocolate chip bread instead! It was yummy!

So that is our version of preschool and I must say it has really been fun for me, I think sweet 3 year old enjoys it too! Check back tomorrow for a great play doh recipe and day 3 of preschool!

*A note about finger paint. When I was a new mom I would go to Target and pay $5.00 for a couple of tubs of finger paint. Inevitably the first time it was used the colors were all mixed up and quite a mess; plus it didn't have much paint in it to begin with. Well, somewhere along the way I learned to make it myself and it only costs about .15 cents to make. When we are done I toss it and make a new batch next time I want to use it. So there is no storage issue and a bigger plus is that it makes my table incredibly clean! I linked above to my new favorite recipes! Enjoy!

We are off...

to the races! I hope that everyone comes back this happy,

especially since my sweet dear son is 8 today!

You don't want to know...

what is cooking in my oven right now! However, because I'm nice I will tell you anyway. Not a dark delicious cake - how I wish it was! No, it is a Pinewood Derby car. Tomorrow is our 2nd annual homeschool family race! Pictures and results to follow!

Waxing poetic...but not mathematic!

So I'm a language-arts girl, I always have been and by the looks of it - always will be.

I'm a language-arts girl who homeschools her children.

Her children need more than language-arts.

Especially her 10 year old language-arts daughter.

Has anyone ever heard of or tried the online math program Aleks?

The non mathematical ones need to know!

Thanks!

Just checking in...

I'm just popping in to say 'HELLO!" We have hit our busy part of the year. We have books to finish up to turn in to our ISP for school so they can tell the state "they learned something this year!" I have to finish up attendance sheets (seriously - I keep trying to figure out how they could possibly be absent, but as of yet I keep coming up with all present and accounted for! Maybe they should ask if the teacher is present!) Everything is trying to be all wrapped up with a nice pretty bow so that we homeschoolers can be presented in a nice tidy little package! He he he....

Bridge Building 101...

our homeschool park day has just held its first bridge building competition! It was so tedious fun to build a bridge with school glue and Popsicle sticks and absolutely nothing else! Some of the bridges that my children designed for Mom to help them build were amazing and I would have been super magician Mom if I could have pulled it off, but alas, I'm merely a Mom and will have to save my super status for my grand parenting days!

We finally agreed that perhaps a simpler version would be more reasonable and the gluing began. To my kids more glue = STRONGER BRIDGE! To me more glue = days of peeling glue off of everything in the area: dining room table - my fingers - the carpet!

Round 1 tested the bridges up to 90 lbs. If they held they will go on to round 2.

2yo DD was a little apprehensive about all of that gluing and those Popsicle sticks! Every time she saw a stick she said, "Who ate sicle? I want sicle too! I want a wed sicle!" I begged asked sweetly if DH would please bring home a box of Popsicles so I could stop explaining that some Popsicle sticks are sold in 1000 piece boxes. When I showed her the box all she could say was, "WHERE ARE THE POP.SIC.LES????"

The day of the contest came and when it was my kids turn they started placing weights in the bucket that was suspended from our bridge! We were all a little nervous as we had seen the destruction of quite a few bridges already! Let me tell you, it is hard to build something to be tested to failure! Every time we started to hear a popping noise from a bridge being tested, some Mom would hide her eyes and think ALL THAT WORK!!!!

As each weight was placed 2 yo and I got a little nervous!

At one point she just couldn't watch anymore!

When the bridge held, we let out a sigh of RELIEF!

Three proud engineers!

One relieved 2 yo

One relieved Momma, ya know, "I'm just happy for them!"

And we are now anxiously awaiting round 2! Except that my feelings about the bridge have slightly altered. Now if it smashes to smithereens all I will think is, "YIPPEE, I can have my counter space back!!!"