Sometimes, when it is really cold outside, a flower can make all the difference. This was taken yesterday at the zoo. There might be more to post...
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
A little sunshine
Sometimes, when it is really cold outside, a flower can make all the difference. This was taken yesterday at the zoo. There might be more to post...
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Our Classroom Today--February 8, 2011
It was bitterly cold again today. -10 F (-23 C). Windchill? -25 F (-31C). I don't like it when it is this cold. And I like to think that as a homeschooler, I don't HAVE to go out in this kind of weather. But sometimes, well, we go out anyway.
After waffling on whether or not it would be a good idea to go, we made our way to the zoo to meet our Tuesday friends. As we were pulling into the parking lot, T called to inform us that it was "French Day" at the zoo, and there were 500 people inside. Oh boy. The programming was scheduled to end at 12:30, however, and it was already 11:30, so we decided to tough it out.
It was crowded. It was noisy. It was...I want to say "a zoo!" You get the idea. We met our friends in the dolphin area, where we normally meet. But I could hardly find them there! We thought it might be quieter in the stadium, so up we went. Um, no, not quieter. But we watched the now 6 month old baby play, which was fun. And just as the kids were about done, the trainers came out for a training session. They aren't doing shows right now, but they are training the dolphins. It was fun to see some of the new things they are working on!
Then we went to lunch. The cafe was much quieter than the rest of the zoo, given that most school groups eat elsewhere. We took our time and by the time we came out, most of the groups were gone. We hit the animals of the tropics trail at about nap time.
T brought world maps with, so the kids could mark where the animals in the tropics came from. Kiddo and M, who are the oldest 2, loved this. They ended up both going through 2 maps, because they started one way but changed their mind and wanted to go complete the map another way. They had a great time, and learned a bit in the process!
We hit the aquarium on the tropics trail moments before it was time to feed the sharks. Well, at least I was told it was the sharks being fed. All I saw were fish eating.
I call this one "Feeding Frenzy."
We left just before the zoo closed at 4. It was a long, cold, windy walk back to the van, but we made it. Both of the kids fell asleep in the van as we drove home. The cold really wears them out!
Did you have a fun classroom this week?
After waffling on whether or not it would be a good idea to go, we made our way to the zoo to meet our Tuesday friends. As we were pulling into the parking lot, T called to inform us that it was "French Day" at the zoo, and there were 500 people inside. Oh boy. The programming was scheduled to end at 12:30, however, and it was already 11:30, so we decided to tough it out.
It was crowded. It was noisy. It was...I want to say "a zoo!" You get the idea. We met our friends in the dolphin area, where we normally meet. But I could hardly find them there! We thought it might be quieter in the stadium, so up we went. Um, no, not quieter. But we watched the now 6 month old baby play, which was fun. And just as the kids were about done, the trainers came out for a training session. They aren't doing shows right now, but they are training the dolphins. It was fun to see some of the new things they are working on!
Then we went to lunch. The cafe was much quieter than the rest of the zoo, given that most school groups eat elsewhere. We took our time and by the time we came out, most of the groups were gone. We hit the animals of the tropics trail at about nap time.
T brought world maps with, so the kids could mark where the animals in the tropics came from. Kiddo and M, who are the oldest 2, loved this. They ended up both going through 2 maps, because they started one way but changed their mind and wanted to go complete the map another way. They had a great time, and learned a bit in the process!
We hit the aquarium on the tropics trail moments before it was time to feed the sharks. Well, at least I was told it was the sharks being fed. All I saw were fish eating.
I call this one "Feeding Frenzy."
We left just before the zoo closed at 4. It was a long, cold, windy walk back to the van, but we made it. Both of the kids fell asleep in the van as we drove home. The cold really wears them out!
Did you have a fun classroom this week?
Monday, February 7, 2011
Our Classroom Today--February 7, 2011
Our classroom today was a large auditorium where Physics Force was presenting Physics Circus. I have said it before and I am sure I will say it again: we are extremely fortunate to live in a major metropolitan area where the opportunities are nearly endless. This fantastic show is presented for free. Yes, FREE. The only cost was the $5 for parking. And it was worth it. The presentation was engaging and fun. The entire auditorium ooo'd and ahhhhh'd, laughed and squealed. They made this physics stuff FUN!
There were 4 main presenters and 2 assistants. There were 2 retired high school physics teachers (Hank and Jack), one current high school physics teacher (Fred) and one college physics professor who happens to be a rocket scientist (Cindy). I loved the names! Hank, Jack, and Fred? Really? How perfect! I missed the names of the two assistants, but I know one of them will be a teacher by fall.
They talked about--and DEMONSTRATED:
Waves, including sound waves
Nodes, anti-nodes, standing waves, oh my! But they explained it all so well! There was a glow in the dark rope involved, too. Big hit with the kids. In the picture they are playing music on "sewer pipes." They had the whole audience sing "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" along with them. They also had the audience do the wave, a good demonstration of how the wave could move, but the particle stayed put--we did not move sideways at all, but the wave went from one side of the auditorium to the other.
Air Pressure
The picture is of a Magdeburg Swing. There are two plates stuck together by pulling the air out from between them, allowing the air pressure on each side to push on the plates and press them together. He is doing "a little ballet."
The barrel crush is by FAR the most impressive of the demonstrations for air pressure. I have no picture of it--it doesn't lend itself to still photography very well. But you can watch the video of it on this page. It is impressive, but they did a great job of explaining what was happening, making it seem less mysterious.
The Bernoulli Effect
I took high school physics, liked it, and did well in it. I don't remember ever learning this! Watch the video on this page if you want to know how to toilet paper a tree more quickly easily. You'll have to scroll down to the Bernoulli effect section.
Mechanics
That is the classic tablecloth pull, EXPLAINED. There was much talk of friction, the first moment is the most critical because friction is strongest when things are at rest. And yes, he managed to pull the cloth out without spilling a drop of the red liquid.
This is a "giant puffer" used to talk about how gas, mass, and inertia.
Probably the biggest demonstration in the mechanics section is the one entitled "Monkey and Hunter" on this page. Again, not something that photographs well; you'll have to watch the video. It has to do with how gravity acts on objects. Needless to say, watching a man being dropped from a crane while a ball is shot from a canon into his baseball mitt gets quite a reaction from the crowd.
Lots more demonstrations. Lots. But pictures really don't do them justice. You can see many of them here. If you click on the headings, you will get pages with a wealth of information about the "why." Physics isn't hard, at least not when it is explained well!
At the end, they told the adults that physics in the United States is thought to be hard and not understandable. Incidentally, according the presenters, this is not the case in other parts of the world. He had us repeat the following: Physics is Interesting, Understandable, and Fun. Yes it is!
Book Sharing Monday--We Are in a Book!
Do you know Mo?
We love Mo Willems around here, particularly the Elephant and Piggie books. These were some of Kiddo's first FAVORITE books to read. They are quite amusing, which kept Kiddo's interest. Now he likes to read them because they are so funny, and easy. He reads them to his sister and his cousin. We own several of them; this one is the newest addition to the collection. Kutey received it as a Christmas gift.
We Are in a Book is hilarious. I read it standing in the bookstore by myself and laughed out loud. I knew then that it had to be added to our collection. I love how expressive the illustrations are. Willems does not shy away from using visual cues in the text, either. These books are great for teaching expression in reading.
If you have a preschooler or an early reader, Mo Willems Elephant and Piggie books are a must read.
I'm linking to Book Sharing Monday!
*The opinions expressed here are mine. I received nothing in exchange for this review. I simply like the books!
We love Mo Willems around here, particularly the Elephant and Piggie books. These were some of Kiddo's first FAVORITE books to read. They are quite amusing, which kept Kiddo's interest. Now he likes to read them because they are so funny, and easy. He reads them to his sister and his cousin. We own several of them; this one is the newest addition to the collection. Kutey received it as a Christmas gift.
We Are in a Book is hilarious. I read it standing in the bookstore by myself and laughed out loud. I knew then that it had to be added to our collection. I love how expressive the illustrations are. Willems does not shy away from using visual cues in the text, either. These books are great for teaching expression in reading.
If you have a preschooler or an early reader, Mo Willems Elephant and Piggie books are a must read.
I'm linking to Book Sharing Monday!
*The opinions expressed here are mine. I received nothing in exchange for this review. I simply like the books!
Weekend Recap
We had a great weekend.
The kids spent the night at my sister's house on Saturday. The kids adore Auntie J and Uncle V. She doesn't have children of her own, but is the best aunt a kid could have. She is also generally our babysitter of choice. We took them to her house mid-afternoon on Saturday and left them there until a little before the Super Bowl yesterday.
In that time, they went cross-country skiing, ice skating, and sledding! They also baked cookies and played soccer and river rafting on the Kinect. I can barely get that much fun into a whole week! It is no wonder they love Auntie J and Uncle V.
I have no picture of any of this, since I wasn't there. I did get to eat the cookies, and hear the stories. Apparently Kutey is quite the dare-devil. The hill they sled on is quite large, and Kutey insisted on going from the top. Uncle V went with her twice, but then she went on her own. Not to be shown up by his little sister, Kiddo went to the top, too. From what I hear, he would have been content with the half hill, had Kutey not desired more.
We joined them all at Grandpa's house to watch the Super Bowl. We had way more food than we needed, but the company was great, and the game turned out to be pretty good, too! I really did not care who won. I do have to say, however, that if you turn the ball over 4 times, you really shouldn't win a game that big.
While the kids were off having fun, Hubby and I went out on a date! We should do that more often. We went to The King's Speech. Fabulous, fabulous movie. And not just because I like Colin Firth (Mr. Darcy, don't you know). I learned a lot about the history of Great Britain, and it made me want to learn more. It was extremely well-done. I did feel rather old, however. It is entirely possible that we were the youngest people in the theater. After the movie we went to dinner at a Thai restaurant we enjoy, but the kids do not.
We all came home last night ready to begin a new week!
The kids spent the night at my sister's house on Saturday. The kids adore Auntie J and Uncle V. She doesn't have children of her own, but is the best aunt a kid could have. She is also generally our babysitter of choice. We took them to her house mid-afternoon on Saturday and left them there until a little before the Super Bowl yesterday.
In that time, they went cross-country skiing, ice skating, and sledding! They also baked cookies and played soccer and river rafting on the Kinect. I can barely get that much fun into a whole week! It is no wonder they love Auntie J and Uncle V.
I have no picture of any of this, since I wasn't there. I did get to eat the cookies, and hear the stories. Apparently Kutey is quite the dare-devil. The hill they sled on is quite large, and Kutey insisted on going from the top. Uncle V went with her twice, but then she went on her own. Not to be shown up by his little sister, Kiddo went to the top, too. From what I hear, he would have been content with the half hill, had Kutey not desired more.
We joined them all at Grandpa's house to watch the Super Bowl. We had way more food than we needed, but the company was great, and the game turned out to be pretty good, too! I really did not care who won. I do have to say, however, that if you turn the ball over 4 times, you really shouldn't win a game that big.
While the kids were off having fun, Hubby and I went out on a date! We should do that more often. We went to The King's Speech. Fabulous, fabulous movie. And not just because I like Colin Firth (Mr. Darcy, don't you know). I learned a lot about the history of Great Britain, and it made me want to learn more. It was extremely well-done. I did feel rather old, however. It is entirely possible that we were the youngest people in the theater. After the movie we went to dinner at a Thai restaurant we enjoy, but the kids do not.
We all came home last night ready to begin a new week!
Friday, February 4, 2011
Weekly Wrap-up--February 4, 2011
This week was a quiet one. Nice for the first week of February (I am so excited January is behind us!)
Monday was a day care day, so I had three extra kids. I can tell we have all been trapped inside too much. Winter needs to come to an end soon! Or at the very least it needs to warm up a bit so they can be out longer than 15 minutes at a time! We did some crafting, a little dancing, and made it through the day.
Our Tuesday group ended up not happening this week. Two families were a bit under the weather, the other two of us couldn't decide to do something. It was OK, though. I was really trying to keep my kids healthy for the Super Bowl party we are going to this weekend. We worked through math, Explode the Code, and history, charted our daylight for Journey North's Mystery class, and did a lot of pretending to be Harry Potter.
Our only day out of the house was Wednesday. A quick trip to the library turned into an all day thing. It was nice to catch up with my aunt, cousin and my cousin's daughter, though.
Thursday we worked through some science, setting up our carnation and celery experiment. We also checked in on our other two plant experiments. Darn healthy plants! We're still not seeing what we should be seeing. Kiddo did his math and Explode the code, too.
I let the kids run wild on Friday. Well, not really, but I let them have a lot of free time and space. We did a bit of school, but they also played Harry Potter (are you sensing a theme?) and LEGOS. The weather was much better today, too, so they played outside for over an hour. YAY! We also crafted again. More crafts to come next week!
Next week, we'll do our Groundhog study. I'll finally have all the books I was supposed to be able to pick up on Wednesday. Better late than never!
On the curriculum front:
We are linking up to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. Click to see what others did this week!
Monday was a day care day, so I had three extra kids. I can tell we have all been trapped inside too much. Winter needs to come to an end soon! Or at the very least it needs to warm up a bit so they can be out longer than 15 minutes at a time! We did some crafting, a little dancing, and made it through the day.
Our Tuesday group ended up not happening this week. Two families were a bit under the weather, the other two of us couldn't decide to do something. It was OK, though. I was really trying to keep my kids healthy for the Super Bowl party we are going to this weekend. We worked through math, Explode the Code, and history, charted our daylight for Journey North's Mystery class, and did a lot of pretending to be Harry Potter.
Our only day out of the house was Wednesday. A quick trip to the library turned into an all day thing. It was nice to catch up with my aunt, cousin and my cousin's daughter, though.
Thursday we worked through some science, setting up our carnation and celery experiment. We also checked in on our other two plant experiments. Darn healthy plants! We're still not seeing what we should be seeing. Kiddo did his math and Explode the code, too.
I let the kids run wild on Friday. Well, not really, but I let them have a lot of free time and space. We did a bit of school, but they also played Harry Potter (are you sensing a theme?) and LEGOS. The weather was much better today, too, so they played outside for over an hour. YAY! We also crafted again. More crafts to come next week!
Next week, we'll do our Groundhog study. I'll finally have all the books I was supposed to be able to pick up on Wednesday. Better late than never!
On the curriculum front:
- Kiddo started reading a big book last week: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. He is so excited. I am so proud of him. He is enjoying it immensely. That also explains the theme of our week.
- Kiddo completed his math book on Thursday. He requested not to start a new one until next week, which is fine. I hadn't planned to start it until then, anyway!
- Kiddo also completed Explode the Code book 5. He'll start book 5.5 next week, too. He wanted to start new books at the same time, and it worked out perfectly.
- We tried to finish our plant study in R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey-Life 1. We have uncooperative plants, though, so we are still in a holding pattern. It probably won't stop us from moving ahead with animals next week. We're continuing to work out of order. We'll start with vertebrates instead of invertebrates, mostly because I can't get worms, snails, or butterflies right now.
- In history we read Chapter 21 in Story of the World Vol. 1. We covered the Persians, which was fun to read! We were supposed to play "Conquer Mesopotamia," but we never did get around to it. Maybe this weekend?
- This was the first week of Journey North's Mystery Class, too. We managed to record our own daylight for Monday, but we didn't graph the 10 classes today. We'll get to it. I have to figure out how to work it into our weekly routine still.
- Kutey worked on Starfall and did some number work with floor numbers. I have some fun things in store for her before Valentine's Day!
We are linking up to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. Click to see what others did this week!
Valentine's Crafting
This week should have held all things groundhog, in honor of Groundhog's Day, but it wasn't. Wednesday put a wrinkle in all of our plans for the rest of the week. So no Groundhog crafts to share.
We are, however, crafting for Valentine's Day!
I have thought about making these since Christmas. We made trees in December, and while they were good, there were a few things I wanted to do differently. So I was looking forward to making these for Valentine's Day.
I tried them with the extra kids I watch on Mondays. It went OK, but they lost interest quickly. Partly because I turned on music. When you have been trapped inside as much as kids here in Minnesota have over the last month or so, there is a great deal of energy to be released. They wanted to dance instead.
So I tried them again today with just my kids with better results.
I haven't perfected this yet. The problem with the trees had been that they were too rigid to glue together after they were decorated. So this time we glued them together first, but then decorating them was a bit trickier. And we couldn't use glitter-glue, which is a favorite of the kids.
These are fun, whether you decorate them or not, though.
You'll need 4 hearts that are the same size. I made a template you can download here. I printed it on red and pink card stock. You could use white. You could probably use plain paper, though I haven't tried it. I cut out the hearts. The first time I had Kiddo do it, but he doesn't really enjoy precision cutting, so I did it the second time. Kutey glued her second one together with absolutely no assistance from me. She was so proud, and so was I. She very carefully lined the pieces up and put them together perfectly. I have a little trick. I put a little glue in a recycled applesauce cup, then Kutey uses a paintbrush to spread some glue on the paper. I find they get just the right amount of glue this way, and there is less waste!
Fold each heart in half, then glue one half of one heart to one half of another. Glue half of a third heart to the other half of the first heart. Then glue the fourth heart to the unglued side of the second and third hearts. Confused? Here are the pics.
Then I punched a hole in the top and put a piece of yarn through it. We have an open banister in our house, so the idea is to hang the hearts along there; it has been looking a bit bare since we took down the Christmas garland.
We are, however, crafting for Valentine's Day!
I have thought about making these since Christmas. We made trees in December, and while they were good, there were a few things I wanted to do differently. So I was looking forward to making these for Valentine's Day.
I tried them with the extra kids I watch on Mondays. It went OK, but they lost interest quickly. Partly because I turned on music. When you have been trapped inside as much as kids here in Minnesota have over the last month or so, there is a great deal of energy to be released. They wanted to dance instead.
So I tried them again today with just my kids with better results.
I haven't perfected this yet. The problem with the trees had been that they were too rigid to glue together after they were decorated. So this time we glued them together first, but then decorating them was a bit trickier. And we couldn't use glitter-glue, which is a favorite of the kids.
These are fun, whether you decorate them or not, though.
You'll need 4 hearts that are the same size. I made a template you can download here. I printed it on red and pink card stock. You could use white. You could probably use plain paper, though I haven't tried it. I cut out the hearts. The first time I had Kiddo do it, but he doesn't really enjoy precision cutting, so I did it the second time. Kutey glued her second one together with absolutely no assistance from me. She was so proud, and so was I. She very carefully lined the pieces up and put them together perfectly. I have a little trick. I put a little glue in a recycled applesauce cup, then Kutey uses a paintbrush to spread some glue on the paper. I find they get just the right amount of glue this way, and there is less waste!
Fold each heart in half, then glue one half of one heart to one half of another. Glue half of a third heart to the other half of the first heart. Then glue the fourth heart to the unglued side of the second and third hearts. Confused? Here are the pics.
Then I punched a hole in the top and put a piece of yarn through it. We have an open banister in our house, so the idea is to hang the hearts along there; it has been looking a bit bare since we took down the Christmas garland.
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