Germany

We're finally getting around... the world that is. We've focused a lot on our own country the first half of our school year, with conversations about other countries, this was the first week we did a "study" of a country. We started in Germany, which seemed fitting for us because of family history that goes back to that country. We're at a place in our Creation Studying where we are focusing on God creating man, we're doing fun art work showing our personalities, our 5 senses, our feelings, etc. And now we're transitioning into our family, and family history a little bit. So there ya go, that brings us to Germany.

We painted the flag of Germany today and displayed it with our own country's flag, then included them in our prayers.

We made a family tree to add to our devotional time this week.

We read some Grimm's childrens fairytales, and The Bremen-town Musicians

We had Beethoven (courtesy of Baby Einstein's cd's) blaring in the background. The Bible has a lot to say about music and instruments, so we sampled some of the greats from Germany- Ludwig Van Beethoven, Johann Sebastian Bach, Brahms

We learned about Albert Einstein, and how much math applies to everything like flying into space, or building a computer, I think Kellan has a new hero since he loves math so much.

Young Albert Einstein- Laurence Santrey

Albert Einstein coloring page

And what would a miniature princess like Maren be without the mention of all of the castles in Germany?

Castle Maze

Today wraps up our study of Germany by reading The Dutchess Bakes a Cake- Virginia Kahl and making a German Chocolate cake for a certain (newly) SEVEN year old's birthday party tomorrow. I wonder if she'll be just as excited about saurkraut and potatoes for dinner tonight?

After dinner, we'll watch The Sound of Music (yeah yeah, I know it's Austria. But they speak German. And it's a great movie ;) close enough!)

Winter what-have-you's

We haven't been on a hiatus. Well, much of one anyway :)

In true April fashion, I delusions of grandeur of how much we would get done this past holiday season. Throw in a trip to Utah with the kids that I wasn't planning on per-say, James having a kidney stone attack and in the ER Christmas eve, and all around craziness... I literally just threw all of the planning out the window. Part of homeschooling is to enjoy this fleeting time with my little ones, right? Maren is in 1st grade age range, doing 3rd-4th grade grammar and reading and vocabulary. Kellan is in kindergarten, doing 1st grade Math and science. I'm not worried in the least to throw out several weeks of planning. I want them to accelerate at their own readiness for it instead of being slowed based on a large group, but then again, to slow the pace for the greater good of nurturing family values and qualities is a benefit unsurpassed of why we do homeschool.

We recently had a good snow storm move through our area, a rare and delightful treat. Even though the kids thought we were taking a day off, little did they know that they would be learning about isosceles triangles. Which when folded, and cut, make very feel-good snow day decorations! (instructions here)

And they learned about dimensions, and how folding the paper differently changes it entirely. (instructions here)

So we decorated around the place, for our January theme of winter.

Then today in our Geography time, we reviewed different terrains around the world, and learned how climates are defined. For arts and crafts we made this fun little water bottle cover, and made sure to classify this animal and add it to the list on our wall chart of all of the animals God created.

Using a 16 or 20 oz water or soda bottle, we covered it first with black construction paper. For my kindergartner, drawing and cutting the shapes such as circle, triangle, and oval (the arms) was good fine motor skills for him to work on.

We filled our bottles with hot water and learned how to read a mercury thermometer, my kindergartner made a hypothesis of what would happen if we took the hot water bottles and left them outside in the snow. His hypothesis was right ;) We rechecked with our thermometers. Then we put them in the freezer in preparation for our science discussion tomorrow of how water freezes.

Another lesson on freezing, changing a liquid into a solid, came from making old fashioned candy Little House on the Prairie style by boiling sugar, molasses, and rootbeer extract, then drizzling it in a shallow pan filled with packed snow.

I'm loving KB Teacher's as a supplemental resource for a lot of different worksheets, activities, and ideas to mix up the routine a bit. Check them out!

Clearly, we're enjoying winter around here. Even if I wish I could hibernate through it instead!

Number combinations and Twins

In my house I have two school age children, who are two different types of learners. My daughter is artistic oriented. She loves drawing, coloring, and writing. And she's very good at those things. My son is math oriented. He loves building, solving, and counting, which he also is very good at.

We played a little exercise today during math time, which enaged both of their interests, and can easily be adapted for each child's level of understanding. We took index cards, and on the blank side I drew a black line, and made a group of dots of differing amounts on each half. My 1st grader had more dots to count, my Kindergartener had less dots to count.

(ignore the crooked lines and the less-than-perfect dots, this was made during our discussion, and I knew they would be throw aways, this isn't something you would want to laminate and keep around necessarily. But my compulsive self wanted to make a perfect looking one just for pictures, I've resisted!)

In math this week we've been talking about "twins." (4+3=7 and 3+4=7 ) So on the back of each index card they needed to write the number combinations and figure out the sum, then write the twin as well.

Then I gave them a few blank ones, to write their own combination of numbers, and the math sentences on the back. My daughter, the artistic and creative one, was a bit more ambitious than her skills are capable of, and drew about 86 dots on one side, and 74 dots on the other side, then she became stumped when she couldn't figure out the sum and kept loosing count! We finally agreed that Mom knew what she was talking about, and she ended up settling for a number in the 20's.

My kindergartener dislikes writing with a captial D! But if you give the kid a math game, he will show that he DOES know how to write the numbers, even if his handwriting needs a lot of improvement. Not bad for the second week of school, and the kid who refused to write them independently before today, huh?

(Let's pretend that I know why this picture keeps posting rotated, and I'm just leaving it like this for flare, because I can't figure out why some flip and some don't! Sorry. )

You can also use domino's to write the number combinations, challenge them to figure out the sum. We also used colored popsicle sticks that I got at the dollar store to show two different combinations in each hand, we orally figured out the sum, and then crossed their hands to reverse the number combination, helping them get the idea of "twin" addition facts.

To learn how to write numbers, my son has been practicing his letters on these worksheets, which I made for preschool activities pritint off my own templates from kidzone. I made a binder of beginner words, their names, capital letters, lowercase letters, and numbers, then put them in page protectors. They trace the letters or numbers with dry erase markers so they can be used again and again, and from kid to kid!

After he successfully wrote numbers with a pencil, and wasn't tracing or transition writing them, he felt much more confident in himself, and told me that he prefers a notebook now, he doesn't want to use the preschool workbooks anymore. WIN!

Not two thumbs up...

Two FINGERS up!!

We're doing the USA for most of our Geography and History through the year, from Galloping the Globe, and also a little from Expedition Earth by Erica @ confessions of a homeschooler. As we're just beginning our lessons, it made the most sense to start the kids learning about where they live, their address, and finding it on a globe and atlas.

So today as we expanded our learning about North Carolina to begin studying the states, the state bird is the Cardinal, and we had a fun little activity to go along with it. The poem is originally about just birds, but we said it like this:

Two little cardinals sitting on a hill

One named Jack, one named Jill.

Fly away Jack, fly away Jill.

Come back Jack, come back Jill.

This Kindergartener was definitely more enthusiastic to do his worksheets with his red birds holding his pencil!

And this little guy was occupied for quite awhile too, checking out his red little fingers. I colored his on the front of his fingers, so that every time he grabbed an object, it would catch his attention more, and he'd sit and just stare every time.

We just used washable crayola markers in red on their fingers, and also black to draw 2 eyes and a triangle for the beak. So simple, and so fun.