The Curious, The Missing, and The Creative

Ethan earned his Book-It award this week for October.  His goal was to score a 90% or better on 5 book quizzes.  The books he read were:
Magic School Bus in the Haunted Museum: A Book About Sound
A Chair for My Mother
Chicka-Chicka-Boom-Boom
Madeline
Swimmy
He has also read Magic Tree House: Twister on Tuesday and Tut's Mummy: Lost and Found, scoring 80% on each of those quizzes.  The quizzes help me to determine what reading level he is on so that I can help him choose appropriate reading material.  The last two books listed were a little above his reading level, but they were books he wanted to read.  I'm hoping they stretched his reading ability a little, helping him to grow as a reader.

In science this week we reviewed the properties of matter, the types of energy, and the differences between matter and energy.  Isaac wanted to test water to see if it had weight.  We then determined the volume of water we poured into the bucket and the weight of the water. 

The tooth fairy visited our house this week.  She has made only 1 other visit, and that was when Isaac had 4 teeth pulled to make room for those adult teeth on the bottom to come in.  This was the first time he had a tooth loosen up and come out on its own.  He was beyond excited!

 

Friday we had a little extra time in the afternoon so I pulled out Ethan's tabletop easel.  He loves to paint!  Here is the artist at work.

 

 

Wordless Wednesday - Does water have weight?

Sights, Sounds, and Tastes of Early October

"A wise man will hear and increase learning" Proverbs 1:5
We have been busy learning and growing! In history, we have continued our study of ancient times. Last week we had a great time studying ancient Africa.

making paper bead necklaces

 Anansi the Spider and Cushion

Our African Feast - Chicken with figs and papaya fried rice (Delicious!)

 decorated hands

 

 

This week we studied the Middle Kingdom in Egypt.  We learned about Egypt invading Nubia and the Hyksos invading Egypt.  We learned that the Hyksos were one of the tribes that lived in Canaan when God told Abraham to go there.

 

In science this week, we studied sound.  We learned that sound comes from vibrations. We learned that the faster the vibrations, the higher the frequency of the waves, and the higher the pitch, or note that is produced.  We also talked about how the amplitude affects the loudness of the sound.  We experimented with rubber bands, instruments, and our voices.  We also talked about how sound travels through the air, into our ears, and to our eardrum.  The boys colored a diagram of the ear and we talked about the parts of the ear.  Here are some pictures of them experimenting with their instruments by plucking the different strings and watching the vibrations.

 

In math, Ethan is finishing up addition and subtraction and getting ready to start a unit on shapes.  Isaac is studying measurement and just made a 100 on his test over measuring in centimeters.  Ethan is currently reading Henry and Mudge and Mr. Putter and Tabby.  He has also read Magic Tree House and Magic School Bus books for fun. Isaac is reading Because of Winn-Dixie for school and The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader for fun.

 

There is great excitement in our house for next week.  We will finally get to King Tut in our study of history and the boys have been asking since July when we would get to study him!

"Fall"ing Into A New Routine

I can't believe we've actually worked two days of school into one day and still finished before 4!  We took off yesterday except for math to go see our new princess (my brand new niece), and we are taking off Friday so I can bake and get ready for Isaac's birthday party, so I didn't want to get too far "behind" my own schedule.  Isaac did 2 lessons of grammar, two lessons of spelling, and 2 lessons of handwriting.  We also did math, reading, science, history, Latin, and Spanish!  Normally we alternate science/history and Latin/Spanish.  We still have our read-alouds to do and studying our memory verses, but we can do that tonight, after scouts and soccer.

Every fall our schedule gets crazy busy, as I'm sure a lot of people with children involved in extracurricular activities do.  As a matter of fact, as I write this I am looking at the clock and realizing that I have to take both of the boys to activities in the next couple of hours...and I still have to take the chicken out to thaw for dinner.  I try not to overload our schedule with a ton of activities, but I feel that the boys get something very important out of each of the activities they are in.  They are both in soccer, which my husband and I both agree is very important for teaching them to make physical fitness a part of their daily lives.  They are also in Awana, which is a part of their religious education.  Isaac is also in scouts, which he loves and teaches him a lot of very practical skills.  It just seems like we are out of the house nearly every night at activities.  I keep reminding myself that this is only a season in my life, and that one day I will miss having the boys here to taxi around to different activities!

I am so thankful for the opportunity to be home with my children at this time.  I don't know how long it will last, and I am treasuring every moment.  I am often reminded of just how short our time with our children at home is, and I want to be sure that I am providing them with everything they need from me both as their mother and as their teacher.  At the top of that list are love and time.  I am going to make it a priority to spend as much time as I can with my kids this fall, because I know that the seasons change quickly, and the season that I have with my boys at home will be over far too soon.

Weekly Roundup - August 20-24

Last Saturday, we changed the salt mixture for our chicken mummy.  Here is how it looked when we brushed off the salt that it was in.

On Monday Ethan had a math test, and he made a 100!  He was so excited to get to eat off of the "Made the Grade!" plate again.  Isaac was upset that he didn't have a math test, and begged me to give him one.  I told him that he will have one sometime this week!  Here is Isaac working on his math.

Tuesday Isaac woke up sick, and so we didn't get a lot of schoolwork done.  Ethan did his math and handwriting, and we read 2 chapters in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, our current read-aloud.  We also went outside once Isaac started feeling better and had our science lesson on organizing living things into the Plant or Animal Kingdom.

After our science lesson, the boys wanted to pull out their excavation kits and work on them.  Isaac has a triceratops kit and Ethan has a crystal kit.  I have never seen these two so excited as they get when they start to uncover their "treasure".

Ethan read from Frog and Toad Are Friends and once Isaac started feeling better he did his math lesson and read The Legend of the Bluebonnet.

 

Wednesday was one of those days that seemed to drag on forever,  but we got everything done (even Song School Latin and Salsa Spanish!).  I don't ever have to ask the boys to do either of those.  They love them both.  Isaac sometimes has trouble maintaining his focus during his seatwork.  Well, it's actually more accurate to say that more than once I had to tell him to stop hanging head first out of the chair and do his math!

 

We took a day off on Thursday to spend time with one of the boys' good friends that they have been missing.  It was great to get to spend time with him before he starts back to school next week.  I did have Ethan practice writing his numbers and Isaac do some math in the evening.  We finished reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

 

Friday began with a trip to the doctor for annual checkups.  Both boys are perfectly healthy.  Ethan passed his vision and hearing test.  He is in the 45th percentile for weight and the 49th percentile for height.  Isaac is in the 61st percentile for weight and the 57th percentile for height.  I talked with the doctor a little about Isaac's attention issues, and he agreed with our stance of just waiting to see for now.  He said that a lot of times it is an age/maturity issue and he will grow out of it, but he did give us a couple of options of things we could try if we wanted to see if it helped.  One was Focus Factor, a dietary supplement, and the other was giving him a little coffee or Sunkist in the mornings. 

 

We had an early lunch after we got home, and then we started on our schoolwork.  Isaac took both a math and spelling test, and made a 100 on both.  He also did a lesson in Explode the Code 6.  Ethan did handwriting, reading, and math.  We made a lapbook piece on Sargon for history.  In science, we continued talking about the plant and animal kingdoms, focusing on the difference in how plants and animals obtain energy.  The boys watched an epsiode of Salsa Spanish and Isaac worked on his online history class.  We have a free trial of Veritas Press's Old Testament and Ancient Egypt course.  He has finished 28 lessons and has a 97 in the class.  The free trial will be over soon, but he is enjoying it for now.  Isaac finished the day by reading Prairie School by Avi.

Mummies and Chickens, Oh my!

This week we started what is without a doubt the most anticipated project so far: the chicken mummy.  My boys are having a blast with the mummies, and I often find them reading one of our many books about mummies (Magic Tree House, Tut's Mummy, and too many others to mention!). 

For our mummy, I decided to use a cornish hen.  This was mainly to keep it a smaller project and make it more manageable with the amount of salt, baking soda, and baking powder we are going to be using throughout this project.  Yesterday we washed and dried our hen, then we rinsed it well with rubbing alcohol and dried it again.

Here are the boys reading the instructions and the hen wrapped in paper towel.

We filled a large plastic (zip-close) bag halfway with the mixture of salt, baking soda, baking powder, and cinnamon (to make it smell nice), put the hen in the bag, and then added the rest of the salt mixture.  The salt mixture is to try to get the salt closer to the acidic Natron salt that was used by the ancient Egyptians. I've read that you can also using washing soda.  We sealed the bag, and put it inside another large bag.

Today we checked our mummy and changed the salt mixture, as a lot of moisture had been absorbed into the powder.  This is what our mummy looked like when we brushed off the excess salt mixture.

The only thing we smelled was the cinnamon.  So far, this project has been a lot easier than I expected.  We will check on our mummy again in a couple of days and probably change the salt mixture again at that time.

Weekly Roundup

Last weekend we went on a "field trip" to a local college to watch "Egypt: Secrets of the Mummies" and see the exhibit on Ancient Egypt.  We had a great time, even though the mummies were "gross" according to the boys!  

 They were a little afraid of the sphinx!

 They only needed help with a couple of these, and they were things we hadn't talked about.  They did a great job!

We also went to the Discovery Science Place before eating dinner and finishing up our trip with Ice Age: Continental Drift.  It was an awesome day, and we all loved spending the day out together.

The boys are continuing to do great on their schoolwork, and the rest of the week was pretty normal, except for this:

Our first trip to the ER for stitches.  He did great, and the only time he got really upset was when he found out he needed the stitches.  He's doing fine now.

We got our Baby Mammoth DVD in the mail, so we all watched that on Friday night.  It was very interesting, and we are looking forward to watching Raising the Mammoth soon.