Friday, January 6, 2012

Our weekly triumphs and accomplishments....

I haven't posted one of these in a while.  We were doing partial school with lots of educational programs thrown in....lots of educational programs.

This week we fell behind a bit because of errands for my mom.  We also had some attention span issues and some mood swing issues too.  It has really been a loooonnnnggg week!!!

But what we did accomplish was:

Science---We learned about the digestive system.  We watched a Bill Nye video on the digestive system.  We had a science experiment on how long our actual digestive system is also.

This is our diagram of the digestive system.  We measured yarn out to show how big it is....and yes there is like 19 feet of thread for the intestines.


History---We are on Chapter 5 of Story of the World Book 1.  So we learned a bit about Ancient Sumeria and that this area is believed to be where Checkers was invented.  So we played a little bit of that!  Lydia picked up on it pretty quick.



US Geography---We learned about Alaska this week.  What a cool week.  We learned about the Iditarod Race, the Northern Lights, why Alaska is called the Land of the Midnight Sun, of course looked at their state symbols and facts.  We watched a couple videos about the state and all it's beauty.  Yes we learned a bit about crab fishing in the Bering area, the glaciers and Mount McKinley, and Juneau being the only State capitol that you cannot technically drive to.  Our state food we made was Native American Fry Bread.  We read about Eskimo Ice cream and decided that was just not something that any of us wanted to actually experience!

Painting their version of the Northern Lights (we watched a couple videos on YouTube about them)



And this was our Fry Bread.  (The last couple pieces got a bit overdone...but still good.)


Math---The boys finished up their Math Mammoth work and will be finishing their Teaching Textbooks and ready to start #4 soon.  Lydia did a really good job on MUS this week.  She is working on adding and counting by 10s.  Yeah!!!  Too bad she hates the music cd from them....wish I would've known that before I  bought it.  Seems like wasted money.  Maybe Caty will like it.

English---Joey and Brayden worked on adjectives this week.  Joey is working on Reading comprehension using Reading Eggspress.  He really likes it and Brayden started asking to use it.  So he is using the trial right now to see if he really likes it.  We will most likely buy 1 year subs for the kids at the end of the trial if they all really like it as much.  Lydia has been using the phonics program since November and I have to say....WOW!!!  She is really picking up on things finally.

Handwriting---Lydia has gone back to Handwriting without Tears for right now.  And the boys were using Homeschool Bits Strange Facts Copywork Cards this week.  They know letter formation, now it's just practicing writing.

Our winter study lead us through why we have winter and a discussion of the seasons.  We have this discussion at the start of each new season.  Sometimes they remember, sometimes not.  But Joey is getting better at telling the facts.  Lydia has picked up on a couple of things and hopefully will remember by summer...I hope.  It's always fun though to get out the globe and flashlight and play around.  The kids love taking turns being the sun so that the "Earth" can revolve around them.  We also talked about why animals hibernate, migrate, and adapt to their environments, also a discussion from fall.  Joey remembered most of the facts.  It was awesome!  We also talked about how to prepare for winter by using the NOAA Winter Weather books.  We will be finishing those books next week.

American Girl---Lydia finished her Josefina memory box and this week we talked about Where she lived, and what their homes were like.  We made tamales and glass bead necklaces.  We will also be working on a weaving project and making a special "mirror" next.  For quilt squares we will be doing ones on food,



 They were yummy...but I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing and forgot to add an oil to my corn meal mix.  Thus my corn meal stuck to the wrapper...a little bit of work for Joe and I to peel the "tamale" out..but pretty tasty anyway!



Today we did a fun project to go with the Veggie Tale movie, It's a Meaningful Life.  A lesson in being content with what we have.....something that seriously needs to be learned in this house.


We also had one of our Korean meals for World Travelers Club.

It was a Beef Stirfry w/ a Korean Veggie Pancake.  (Can I say...yummy!!!)  We fell behind in our Korean projects.  So We will work on them more this week.


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