colors, Moses, bivalves/univalves & Pocahontas

I've had a bit of trouble lately with C disrupting K's work, begging to do "skool," too.  An idea came to me on Monday.  I would call C to the table first to do her "school" and then maybe she would be content to go play while K did her school?!?!

It worked for Monday!  She colored YELLOW on a sun, daffodil, lemon & moon.  She was so proud of her work!

She begged to do "math" so I had her count 1-3 bears on number cards and then we moved them around the table to pretend they were boats.

K enjoyed finding baby "Moses" in his basket.

D's science (Bigger U4/D3) about Bivalves & Univalves.  I am very proud of the amount of writing he's doing lately (without complaining)!  He stumped his daddy when he asked him to tell the difference between mollusks that are bivalves & univalves after dinner.  :)

Below is his Indian blanket art project (Bigger U4/D4) where he had to fold the paper in half and then mirror the lines on each side of the fold.  He began with a VERY complicated pattern and then realized it was hard to copy so he made the ones near the outer edges of the paper easier. :)

K's movement for the "sun" when she was telling me what things plants need to grow!

She begged me to take a video...so I'd call out & show the card "sun" or "air" or "dirt" or "rain" and she'd have to do the motion.

K's math using her pink number line and a teddy bear counter to figure out subtraction problems.  :) She's doing fantastic in math (*shock!* to think I was trying to stall her from advancing in 1A!)

On Tuesday, D finished the book, Stone Fox, for his 10 day Adventure genre book for DITHOR (Draw into the Heart of Reading). I was in tears as he read the last chapter. D's eyes were misty, too.  :)

Warning ***book spoiler***  The boy in the story, Willy, competes in a dogsled race to earn $500 to pay the taxes on his Grandfather's farm (he's ill) so they don't lose it.   His dog, Searchlight, is the only dog pulling Willy's sled.  Searchlight's heart gives out just before the finish line and the dog dies instantly. ;(  The Indian man, Stone Fox, racing behind Willy with 5 dogs pulling his sled stops (he was favored to win the race).  Stone Fox draws a line in the snow and says he'll shoot any other sled team that crosses it as other racers catch up to where Willy stopped.  Stone Fox allows Willy to carry his dog across the finish line to win. 

C's "school" today - the color GREEN!  The big kids told her she used "yellow" again but I assured them it's a bright, light green since we pulled out all the shades of green when C began her paper today. She just chose to color with the very lightest one.  :)

K opted to draw/color pics of all the plagues we talked about today (LHFHG U4/D5).  She did a great job - we read a day ahead to learn about the 10th plague to complete this project today.

D drawing a "wigwam" for the "Pocahontas" entry on his timeline.  I was intrigued by what we learned about Pocahontas.  I'm so glad they haven't watched Disney's version (personal preference on my part) because it would have ruined the REAL story of Pocahontas for them.

He also had to complete an acrostic of POCAHONTAS' name for his history notebook.  I re-read the portions of the history book we've read the past few days.  I'd stop every few sentences and ask D what he could write about Pocahontas.  t took a little time to come up with phrases for the O's.  D did a good job and didn't give up!

D completed his "ADVENTURE" genre introduction today (a day early).  He had to roll the die and I would make a "wrong buzzer" sound or a "ding" depending on the number rolled.  A "ding" meant he had the correct number for the character.  Then he'd go on to the setting and finally the problem.

He wrote "Peter" and "Norway" and "Rescue Gold" at the bottom of his paper and discovered our book is SNOW TREASURE!  I'm excited about the book because it's based on a true story!  :o)

Egypt, East to West & Snow!

We began Unit 4 on Thursday in LHFHG & Bigger...

K enjoyed painting her Egyptian collar (a.k.a. paper plate) with bright colors - she even mixed red/blue to make her own purple paint!

The finished collar being modeled a few hours later once all of the paint was dry! :)  She even wore it again today when we were reading about Joseph.

D added to his timeline for his Biography (George Rogers Clark)...this was supposed to be a dog caught under a tree limb...he told me it looked like a worm.  Sadly, he chose to make it in marker not pencil.  Lesson learned?  Maybe?!

He also added these pictures to the timeline - on the left, George & Grandfather talking though it looks like the Grandfather is in a bathtub (D's words - not mine!).  HA!  On the right - George riding a horse and finding his friend Tom.  We discussed how to draw correct horse legs...not four legs really spread out over a bunch of horse, but two legs close together.  You can see some wide legs have been erased.  :)

The bartering/trading activity that I very much-anticipated D loving, he did not.   I had made a special trip to the bulk candy section of a store I rarely shop, so I could get candy he liked in small amounts without spending a fortune.  He didn't want to trade anything, didn't want to eat any of the candy and didn't want to save it.  He gets in these "I don't want it" moods sometimes for attention or just to be different, I don't know, but it ruins the activity for himself. :(  I had invited K to join us at the beginning of the activity and she LOVED it - she and I enjoyed trading mints/chocolate chips for flavored Tootsie rolls and gumballs so all was not lost. :)

We then read the Ox Cart Man and D really enjoyed it - go figure!  He was even telling daddy last night when sheep are sheared (April - as the book said).

This morning we played in the SNOW!

K's chosen stuffed friends for her family activity to go with the story of Joseph forgiving his brothers...she picked the Panda for Daddy, Hello Kitty for D (good thing he wasn't in the room at the time), her dolls for me and herself, the lamb in a tutu for C.  :)

D's science notebook page had a lot of writing, but he did a great job.  I helped him label the invertebrates but he did the drawings, coloring & other words on the page.  ;)

With his geography today he had to travel north & south and then east & west around the globe.  I explained how east/west never meet...you can go east forever and keep going!  I was reminded of the verse/song that says our sins are as far as the east is from the west!  D's eyes were big...he got it as his finger circled the globe going east and east and east or west and west and west and it never meets!  Our sins are gone! 

Ps. 103:12 "As far as the east is from the west,

so far has he removed our transgressions from us."

He's eating the crackers - being silly for the camera!

 The "world" out of paper & graham crackers with the oceans labeled.

smelling & drawing

Wow!  Wednesday already!  Here's what we've been up to the last 3 days...

Monday - K had fun "smelling" & "guessing" various spices/baking items that went along with the story of Jacob/Esau (LHFHG U3/D4) since Esau smelled amazing soup and swapped his birthright for it.

She loved it!

(excuse her outfit...it was her own dress-up outfit including a white tank top, lea she wore like backpack straps & pink skirt - she is creative!)

Smelling garlic...

D watching what happens to cornmeal when he added water to the tilted pan (Bigger U3/D4).  This was to show what happens to the river - source, riverbed, riverbank, mouth and went along with what we read for history that day & Henry Hudson.

When we did this activity he remember the other year about the river/toothpick labels - yeah, it sticks in his mind!  :)

We made Tuesday our holiday/school day off this week.  :o)

Wednesday - K punched holes in black paper to show her name!  Sorry for the blur - had to take my flash off to show the light coming through and it always makes everything blurry since I'm not a great photographer.

D's timeline today (Bigger U3/D5)...John Smith & Henry Hudson added.  I love his whale!

His history notebook project today was drawing a map.  He titled it, "Not the way to India" as the explorers originally thought the James River would take them.  :)

 He drew his map from this picture in the book...

teddy bears & sugar sand

K is halfway through Unit 3 of LHFHG and loving it!  She begs to do school FIRST each morning!

I was talking to my husband the other evening, telling him that I am happy I began LHFHG now and not last August.  I've seen major improvements in her listening skills with the book, The Adventures of Reddy Fox, since we restarted HOD in mid-December.  I'm afraid if we began in August, it might not be such a good fit for her as it is now.  God knew!  :)

Last night at dinner, she shut off the dining room lights and showed us her star/flashlight science activity from yesterday (Unit 3/Day 2) and even told Daddy her Bible story about Abraham!  

She is doing subtraction in math (Singapore 1A) right now - she loves these little bear counters and so today she made up little bear stories to go with each of her subtraction problems.  This picture shows 8 bears in a family with 4 bears doing school upstairs while 4 bears play downstairs (sounds familiar to how we school in our home)! 

We have only a few bigger bears and so she uses them as the "Daddy" & "Mommy" in her stories. :)  It makes math fun and she really understands it!

D enjoyed his science experiment today (Bigger Unit 3/Day 3) figuring out what causes changes on the seashore.  Below he's blowing the sugar (sand) across the dish to show the effect of wind on the seashore.  He also discovered it tastes really good! ;o)

Now he's adding "rain" to the sand...

Finally, he added the "ocean" to the pan and made waves to see what happens to the shore.

 His notebooking page...(his guess was water & people affect the shore...only partially right)

One of his vocabulary cards from today was "explorer" - 

I love that he made a boat "Or" a horse for explorers we're reading about right now in history.   We also talked about explorers today who use deep-sea diving equipment/submarines for the oceans and rockets/space station in space.  I wanted him to realize we had explorers years ago but also today!

saltwater & pictures

We finished Unit 2 of Bigger and LHFHG on Tuesday and began Unit 3 in each guide today.   The kids are doing well.  

D is enjoying  his hymn study and has really loved singing "Holy, Holy, Holy" each day while I play along on  the piano.  We're singing verse 1-3 right now (added 1 verse per week) and it's great to see him excited about the hymns & know hymns!  I love reading the stories behind the songs.

D's science from Tuesday: learn the difference in density between freshwater & saltwater.  Both he and K already knew the egg would float in saltwater...thanks PBS!  ;o)

Mixing in the salt...

It floats!

K learned to fold pants & shirts, then packed her bag & is riding a camel in a silly way imitating people spreading out from Babel.

D's line drawing of a tree from the book on the right.  The drawing is really faint in the picture...sorry!

D's timeline pictures he added today for his biography we're reading (George Rogers Clark) - I love his cute little stick figures!

Check out the deer's tail?!  Ha!  We're definitely not a hunting family. :o)

teddy bear boat & disappearing art project

K's Bible story was Noah today so her science activity was to build a foil boat and load it full of counters until it sunk.  She decided to use teddy bear counters.  

 She got 25 in the boat.  

 When she added #26 the boat began to sink and soon all the bears were "swimming" in the ocean.  :)

 Her foil boat that held 25 bears - I was surprised it held that many!  Those bears are chunky!

To go with her Reddy Fox chapter today she had to write what she does that Reddy can't do (he was shot by Farmer Brown's boy).  After much thought & a bit of discussion, she decided to write "kneel."  I then drew Reddy for her to color.  She added a bandaid to his hurt leg.  Miss Creative had to COLOR the bandaid "striped" so it was a fun one for Reddy. :)

D's art project was a flop...I must have read something wrong.

He drew a fish on the back of wax paper trying to get the wax to come off on the white construction paper.  Then he wet the paper and painted 3 colors of water colors (I actually bought REAL water color paints as they are amazing compared to the Crayola ones.)  It was very disappointing to him that his fish showed up for a second and then disappeared.  (I should have just made him draw it with white crayon.)

He was supposed to press crumpled saran wrap over top the paint then remove it so it would appear "under water" but it didn't work as the paint dried too fast.

I asked if he wanted to do it over, but he didn't - it was too close to lunchtime. ;o)

The fish should be in the middle of the blue...

I loved the vibrant COLOR though!

It's all fun & games!

D had a bit of complaining this morning as we were sitting at the table doing his math.  He told me he wished school didn't take so long (obviously getting back to HOD activities & notebooking) takes him a little longer than the Sonlight/FIAR that we did earlier in the school year.  He finished up his math and cursive and then I had him use his new Nerf gun to review his memory verse.  His attitude changed immediately saying, "I LOVE SCHOOL!"  Ha!  :)

I had lined up the words of his verse (out of order) using stick-tack & tiny paper cups across the couch.

 He took his best aim to knock down the cups in the order of the verse...He had to keep saying the verse over & over again, especially when he wouldn't get the word knocked over in 5 discs (he had to reload his gun).  It was great review - only he didn't realize it! :)

 Almost done...two words left!

He enjoyed working on his vocabulary words today.  His dictionary skills are improving - we've been focusing on using the guide words at the top of the page to find exactly what page the word will be on...it tricks him a little but he's getting it!  (I do realize we could use dictionary dot com but I want him to know how to use a real dictionary!)

K LOVES LHFHG!  Today she created this art project (bright crayons on white paper, dark crayon on top and then toothpick etching of a heart).   She chose to put sunflowers in her heart.  I do believe that is what is in her heart - she's always cheerful & happy (except when tired). This went along with her Bible story today about Cain/Abel.  We focused on our heart condition as God looks at the heart just like He did with Cain/Abel.

We did D's science discovery/experiment after lunch today.  He used a clothespin, tweezers & pliers (bird beaks) to pick up popcorn kernals, raisins and cheerios (bird food - insects, small creatures etc) at the beach (oatmeal).

D's notebooking page that went with his science is in the pic below.  All on his own, he drew little circles above/beside each instrument (bird beak) to show the best way it was used.  His conclusion:  "My guess is good."  We will be working on writing better conclusions, but he was right.  He remembered a similar activity he did like this last year in Beyond.