We just finished a science lab that involved blowing items across the floor with a fan. Fun! Kutey came up with another idea she wanted to test. it involved putting the packing peanuts we had blown across the floor into the cardboard tube we had been using and trying to shoot them into the air...I told her to have at it.
This has led to 45 minutes of experimenting (with no direction from me!) to find the perfect combination to make the project work. Kiddo and Kutey have been trouble shooting, hypothesizing, testing, and ultimately succeeding! Engineering at work. Cost? Almost nothing--empty wrapping paper tubes, empty paper towel tubes, a few Di*ie cups, and packing peanuts. But what they are learning--all on their own--is worth so much more!
This is why I homeschool!
Monday, December 19, 2011
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
You have to love a science curriculum
You have to love a science curriculum that has you make this:
from this:
and this:
in order to explain how these:
were made.
Fudge as an igneous rock. Gotta love it!
from this:
and this:
in order to explain how these:
were made.
Fudge as an igneous rock. Gotta love it!
Saturday, June 4, 2011
You know it's time to clean the bird feeder when...
it's sprouting!
Don't worry, I cleaned it. It was totally disgusting, but I did it. Hope the birdies appreciate it!
Harry Potter LEGOS
Kiddo had a birthday. The main thing on his list? LEGOS. Any LEGOS. But mostly Harry Potter LEGOS. There was a sale a month or so ago, so Kiddo lucked out! He got 4 Harry Potter LEGO sets in 2 days. The Burrow, Quidditch, Hagrid's Hut, and Freeing Dobby. He was thrilled. They have been built since Monday, and played with every day since. They have been set up one way, then another way, then yet another. He has planned the spaces for Hogwarts, Hogwarts Express, and Diagon Alley. Expensive taste!
This was today's set up. For a little while.
This is the inside of Hagrid's Hut. Fun, no?
This is the best brick ever. It lights up! Can't you feel the warmth of the fire?
And please, PLEASE, P.L.E.A.S.E., tell me you have a space in your house that looks like this:
He has a set of three drawers plastic drawers, in addition to 2 large plastic bin (HUGE bins), none of which are in this picture. Why, oh why, oh why, can't the LEGOS make their way back to those boxes? Why must they continue to migrate about my family room, pausing on various flat surfaces long enough to frustrate me?
Truthfully, while it bugs me, I know I will miss it when he no longer leaves LEGOS around. It will mean he has grown up. I just have to remind myself of that every time I step on a rogue LEGO.
This was today's set up. For a little while.
This is the inside of Hagrid's Hut. Fun, no?
This is the best brick ever. It lights up! Can't you feel the warmth of the fire?
And please, PLEASE, P.L.E.A.S.E., tell me you have a space in your house that looks like this:
He has a set of three drawers plastic drawers, in addition to 2 large plastic bin (HUGE bins), none of which are in this picture. Why, oh why, oh why, can't the LEGOS make their way back to those boxes? Why must they continue to migrate about my family room, pausing on various flat surfaces long enough to frustrate me?
Truthfully, while it bugs me, I know I will miss it when he no longer leaves LEGOS around. It will mean he has grown up. I just have to remind myself of that every time I step on a rogue LEGO.
Friday, June 3, 2011
Weekly Wrap-up--June 3, 2011
We had a busy, BUSY weekend, followed but what should have been a busy week. Unfortunately the busy weekend led to illness (seriously, can we just be healthy for a while?!?), so our week became much less busy.
Saturday was Kiddo's birthday, so the day was all about him. We went to the George Washington exhibit at the Minnesota History Center (it closed the next day--just made it!), out to lunch at P*rkins, home for some gifts, LEGO play, and "How to Train Your Dragon," the movie. We had "biggie pancakes" (Swedish pancakes) for dinner followed by marble cupcakes with chocolate frosting and sprinkles. NUM!
Sunday we had a family party for Kiddo. More cake was consumed, more presents opened, and more fun had! And Kiddo got his hair cut. A lot. I think there was more hair on the floor than there was left on his head! But it will be much cooler for summer, which was what he wanted.
Monday was an extended family picnic. My aunt was in town from Florida, so my dad hosted a family picnic. It was so fun to see people I hadn't seen in a while! And the food! Oh the FOOD! 5 kinds of salad and 5 kinds of dessert. Really, I could have gone without a main course!
Tuesday I was feeling just drained. Hubby left for a business trip in the morning, we had been on the go for three days straight, and our regular Tuesday gathering was a bit of a drive away. Normally that doesn't bother me, but this time I just couldn't see it happening. Turns out it was fortuitous, since Kutey started complaining that her throat was sore about noon. I did the "strep or not strep" debate for a while, and settled on not strep when she started to get stuffed up. We managed to get through the school basics, but not much else.
I cancelled our dentist appointments when Kutey started complaining of a sore throat. Not knowing what was going on, I wanted them to be able to fill the spots if possible. That meant Wednesday was a home day, too! We did a few school things, but not much. My sister came out in the evening to stay with the kids so I could attend a Bon Voyage party for my friend A who will be summering in Ireland. My sister also made us dinner. She is a great sister.
We did reading, math, and started science on Thursday before we headed out to hit a couple of garages sales and have lunch with my aunt from Florida at a favorite restaurant. All three of my sisters, my cousin, and my grandmother were also there. After lunch we hit the park with Cousin C (and my sister (his mom) and my other sister). It was a beautiful afternoon, at least until I realized just how tired and whiny my kids had become!
Today (Friday) we stayed in and mostly relaxed. We did a little school, but just the minimum. Kiddo played LEGOS, arranging the Harry Potter sets for the millionth time this week and Kutey gave us lovely dance performances in her dress-up clothes.
Curriculum:
We are linking up to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. Click to see what others did this week!
Saturday was Kiddo's birthday, so the day was all about him. We went to the George Washington exhibit at the Minnesota History Center (it closed the next day--just made it!), out to lunch at P*rkins, home for some gifts, LEGO play, and "How to Train Your Dragon," the movie. We had "biggie pancakes" (Swedish pancakes) for dinner followed by marble cupcakes with chocolate frosting and sprinkles. NUM!
Sunday we had a family party for Kiddo. More cake was consumed, more presents opened, and more fun had! And Kiddo got his hair cut. A lot. I think there was more hair on the floor than there was left on his head! But it will be much cooler for summer, which was what he wanted.
Monday was an extended family picnic. My aunt was in town from Florida, so my dad hosted a family picnic. It was so fun to see people I hadn't seen in a while! And the food! Oh the FOOD! 5 kinds of salad and 5 kinds of dessert. Really, I could have gone without a main course!
Tuesday I was feeling just drained. Hubby left for a business trip in the morning, we had been on the go for three days straight, and our regular Tuesday gathering was a bit of a drive away. Normally that doesn't bother me, but this time I just couldn't see it happening. Turns out it was fortuitous, since Kutey started complaining that her throat was sore about noon. I did the "strep or not strep" debate for a while, and settled on not strep when she started to get stuffed up. We managed to get through the school basics, but not much else.
I cancelled our dentist appointments when Kutey started complaining of a sore throat. Not knowing what was going on, I wanted them to be able to fill the spots if possible. That meant Wednesday was a home day, too! We did a few school things, but not much. My sister came out in the evening to stay with the kids so I could attend a Bon Voyage party for my friend A who will be summering in Ireland. My sister also made us dinner. She is a great sister.
We did reading, math, and started science on Thursday before we headed out to hit a couple of garages sales and have lunch with my aunt from Florida at a favorite restaurant. All three of my sisters, my cousin, and my grandmother were also there. After lunch we hit the park with Cousin C (and my sister (his mom) and my other sister). It was a beautiful afternoon, at least until I realized just how tired and whiny my kids had become!
Today (Friday) we stayed in and mostly relaxed. We did a little school, but just the minimum. Kiddo played LEGOS, arranging the Harry Potter sets for the millionth time this week and Kutey gave us lovely dance performances in her dress-up clothes.
Curriculum:
- Kiddo has one lesson plus the review left in Explode the Code 7. He'll finish that up next week. The slower pace is really working well for him! I probably should have slowed him down, oh, three books ago...
- Kiddo returned to multiplication in math this week. He was very happy about that, until the 4's times table proved trickier than the 2's and 3's. I have had him practicing on our new toy in addition to working the problems in the book. Today he seemed to be getting them better.
- We read Chapter 41: The Attacking Barbarians in Story of the World, Vol. 1. We learned about Attila the Hun, Stilicho, the Visigoths, and the Vandals. We have one chapter left in the book. We still have a few activities to do, but I think we will welcome the end of the book and the break before we start the next book!
- We started learning about Arthropods in R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey--Life, Vol. 1. We are sort of working them all together. The lab for Unit 16-Insects is to raise a caterpillar to butterfly, but I haven't ordered that yet. We'll likely come back to it later in the summer. We did the reading now, though. We'll finish up Unit 17 (arachnids), 18 (crustaceans), and 20 (fish--which is not an arthropod, but now that I have a fish bowl, the pet store will sell me a fish to study) in the next two weeks, spend a week working on our wrap-up book, and start our new curriculum in July sometime!
- Kutey has continued working on 100 Easy Lessons. We'll go back to Starfall some this summer, because she likes it. We'll also be reading books! I am very excited to enter the next phase of reading with her!
- We didn't work much math this week, just what came up in daily activities. I need to find and print off some activities just for math for her.
We are linking up to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. Click to see what others did this week!
Thursday, June 2, 2011
I love garage sales!
Where else can you get all this for less than $17?!?!
30 items. That's less than 60 cents an item!
30 items. That's less than 60 cents an item!
Monday, May 30, 2011
George Washington--History Exhibit
The History Center has had a George Washington Exhibit since February. It was on the calendar a couple of times, but we never made it. So when I realized it was closing I knew exactly what we needed to do for Kiddo's birthday. It didn't take much persuading to get Kiddo on board; I'm pretty sure I had him at "History."
*
There are several halls at the history center. We only made it to one. We have been there a few times now and it seems we can only get to one or two exhibits in a visit. This time, Kiddo and I read every sign, watched every second of every video, did every interactive piece, and saw every inch of the George Washington exhibit. Kutey and Daddy went through much faster than we did, and they still saw everything.
It was a well done, comprehensive exhibit. The life size Washington's were nice, and sort of supposed to be one of the highlights and unique pieces of the exhibit. They were cool, but there were definitely other things kiddo enjoyed more.
All of the high points in Washington's life were touched on. They started at his birth, talked about his days as a surveyor, his early military career, his involvement in the revolution, his presidency, his return to Mount Vernon, and his death. They even had a video regarding Washington's slave ownership. It was quite interesting.
Kiddo was enthralled. He filled in gaps for me, because he has read a great deal about the Revolutionary War (Thanks Magic Tree House!). He did have to ask for a bit of timeline clarification, because Washington served in the military two separate times. When it said he left the military the first time, Kiddo was confused, because none of what he knew of Washington's military career had yet been covered! Once I stated the dates again, however, all was clarified.
There were a couple of things that piqued his curiosity for further study: the Freemasons and spies during the Revolution. There was a fantastic short video about the spies of the war. I admit, I am as interested in learning more as Kiddo is!
We also learned a bit about Mount Vernon. They had a scale model of the estate, which was fun to see given our previous virtual tour of the estate. It really is a massive estate! It was fun to see the model, even if the tidbits you could read were mostly the same as the tidbits on the website. It was good review, right?
They had one live person with early dental tools. Washington had terrible teeth, even though he was good about taking care of them using the practices of the day. The person at the table thought he would stump Kiddo, as he had stumped others before, by asking him what the tooth key was for. Kiddo knew. Not because he had heard what the person said before, but because that is one of the things they show regularly at Fort Snelling. It was also, incidentally, pictured in the display on Washington's false teeth (none of which were not made of wood!), probably 5 feet before you reached the table. All those people who had been previously stumped? Obviously they had not paid much attention to that portion of the display!
We left after 2+ hours of reading. While Kiddo could have read it all, I read quite a bit of it to him, in part to expedite the process and in part because I could start reading to him while there were still people in his way. There were a lot of people there, mostly adults, but a few kids mixed in.
Kiddo loved the whole thing, but I think his favorite parts were seeing how the grist mill worked (they had both a model and a video), the information on espionage during the revolution (a video), the Mount Vernon model, and the quiz at the end. We have now seen the Benjamin Franklin exhibit and the George Washington exhibit at the History Center. I wonder what they will bring in next!
*photos are not allowed inside the exhibit, hence the somewhat boring shots!
*There are several halls at the history center. We only made it to one. We have been there a few times now and it seems we can only get to one or two exhibits in a visit. This time, Kiddo and I read every sign, watched every second of every video, did every interactive piece, and saw every inch of the George Washington exhibit. Kutey and Daddy went through much faster than we did, and they still saw everything.
It was a well done, comprehensive exhibit. The life size Washington's were nice, and sort of supposed to be one of the highlights and unique pieces of the exhibit. They were cool, but there were definitely other things kiddo enjoyed more.
All of the high points in Washington's life were touched on. They started at his birth, talked about his days as a surveyor, his early military career, his involvement in the revolution, his presidency, his return to Mount Vernon, and his death. They even had a video regarding Washington's slave ownership. It was quite interesting.
Kiddo was enthralled. He filled in gaps for me, because he has read a great deal about the Revolutionary War (Thanks Magic Tree House!). He did have to ask for a bit of timeline clarification, because Washington served in the military two separate times. When it said he left the military the first time, Kiddo was confused, because none of what he knew of Washington's military career had yet been covered! Once I stated the dates again, however, all was clarified.
There were a couple of things that piqued his curiosity for further study: the Freemasons and spies during the Revolution. There was a fantastic short video about the spies of the war. I admit, I am as interested in learning more as Kiddo is!
We also learned a bit about Mount Vernon. They had a scale model of the estate, which was fun to see given our previous virtual tour of the estate. It really is a massive estate! It was fun to see the model, even if the tidbits you could read were mostly the same as the tidbits on the website. It was good review, right?
They had one live person with early dental tools. Washington had terrible teeth, even though he was good about taking care of them using the practices of the day. The person at the table thought he would stump Kiddo, as he had stumped others before, by asking him what the tooth key was for. Kiddo knew. Not because he had heard what the person said before, but because that is one of the things they show regularly at Fort Snelling. It was also, incidentally, pictured in the display on Washington's false teeth (none of which were not made of wood!), probably 5 feet before you reached the table. All those people who had been previously stumped? Obviously they had not paid much attention to that portion of the display!
We left after 2+ hours of reading. While Kiddo could have read it all, I read quite a bit of it to him, in part to expedite the process and in part because I could start reading to him while there were still people in his way. There were a lot of people there, mostly adults, but a few kids mixed in.
Kiddo loved the whole thing, but I think his favorite parts were seeing how the grist mill worked (they had both a model and a video), the information on espionage during the revolution (a video), the Mount Vernon model, and the quiz at the end. We have now seen the Benjamin Franklin exhibit and the George Washington exhibit at the History Center. I wonder what they will bring in next!
*photos are not allowed inside the exhibit, hence the somewhat boring shots!
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