Making Things - April 2012

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new art

Here are a few new things Dd has been working on-

an apple--she painted it later and gave it to me as a birthday present!

Indianapolis Indians Baseball Game

Indianapolis Indians Baseball Game

We went with our LHE co-op group to a baseball game and had a great time!

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Posters for Church

Posters for Church-- I didn't come up with the wording; I just put it down on poster for our group.

Birthday Pix

Birthday Pictures

We cleaned up Dd's room for the party:

Where Dd makes her music:

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SL Week 33 Core 3/D April 9-13th 2012 *our 67th week on this core*

SL Week 33  Core 3/D  April 9-13^th 2012  *our 67^th week on this core*

We had our normal SL IG and added in some extra books.  This week held Dd’s birthday, so we had a fairly light week on our lessons.  Thursday was her b-day and Friday was her birthday party.  Her grandparents drove up and spent the Friday night with us; and left on Saturday.

The books we added in this week:

Read Alouds:

“The Amazing Impossible Erie Canal” by Cheryl Harness

“Daring Cell Defenders” (microquests) by Rebecca L. Johnson

Dd’s Readers:

“Skylark” by Patricia MacLachlan

“High School Musical: Stories from East High #1: Battle of the Bands” by N.B. Grace

“Swiss Family Robinson” *Graphic Novel

Audio:

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

DVD:

Dd received “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader” for her b-day and watched it happily!

The poet for the week was Lawrence Ferlinghetti.  I had never heard of him before; so I learned something new too!

We had a mix-mash of bible—one day we went back and re-read some of our “Leading Little Ones To God” book.  We enjoyed a second bible time with Dh each evening.  We have begun Revelations and it is a little hard to understand that book.

As usual we enjoyed Brain Pop and BrainPop, Jr. most days.  Dd has been keeping her journal each night; very faithfully.  She has also been very keen to play her piano each day; some days 3-4 times in the day!!  It is funny how it comes in waves.  She learned a new song this week; one of my absolute favorites: “Stand Up, Stand Up For Jesus”. 

Cooking/Baking:

Dd and Dh made her birthday cake for the party and two days later they made Lemon Squares together.

Art- She used her small loom to weave a small rectangle out of soft purple yarn; about the size of a potholder.  She finished her last hemp necklace for her b-day party friends.  She made each of the girls (3) their own hemp necklace as a gift for their gift bag.

Math—Teaching Textbooks-lessons 88 & 89.  Math U See- 14  A,B,C,D.  We did our "doubles family & the '8 family' " too.

Language Art:
All About Spelling-Lesson 16 (in progress)
A Reason for Handwriting

We had Aqua Athlete’s on Tuesday.  They got to add the arms and legs together to do the Butterfly Stroke.

Music—Debussy…..ahhhh,  I love Debussy.  Dd is getting a little tired of Debussy.  She says that every song sounds the same.  I don’t agree; but it is interesting to hear her point of view.

Dd also played the piano every day and is really loving it.  Her other interests this week: wove on her small loom with soft purple yarn; she made a hemp necklace for her friend Rachel.  We also went to the library, played basketball in driveway, and she held a wonderful birthday party for her best friends.

SL -Core D-Week 32 "LOW- A" (66th week on this core) April 2-6th, 2012

SL Week 32- a "LOW" (left-over's week)

Hard at work-- IEW--Excellence in Writing

Our Read Aloud this week was FANTASTIC: The Journeyman by Elizabeth Yates.  What a great book! and that is an understatement.  I really loved it.  Yates really captures the feeling of New England.  It felt similiar to Understood Betsy- that same earthy feel.  I will keep this book for as many years as I can!

She was dipping a empty calligraphy pen in her black ink-more fun, I guess!

Dd had a few new books she read this week.  For SL she read "Sarah, Plain and Tall" by Patricia MacLachlan; and some of Skylark (the sequel).  "Meet Cecile" (American Girl Collection) by Deise Lewis Patrick.    "The Call of the Wild-Graphic Novel" by Jack London/Neil Kleid/Alex Nino.  "Amelia Earhart- An American Flying Pioneer" by Cynthia Benjamin.

IEW final draft

The math book I added-In:
"From Simple Shapes to Geometry" by Jerry Pallotta.  We watched some of "Khan Academy" about fractions.  We also watched some "Mathtacular" on fractions too.

Oil pastel of a hot air balloon

Math was 6 lessons from Teaching Textbooks; and 5 lessons from Math U See.

Oil Pastel of a basketball

Excellence In Writing-IEW- This week Dd wrote a paper on Andrew Jackson (kwo, rough draft, and final draft).

We worked on ASIA this week in Geography

Odds:
Reason for Handwriting; BrainPop (M,T,W,Th,F) and BrainPop, Jr. (Monday); First Language Lessons-Lesson 31; A Child's History Into Poetry-Langston Hughes; Landmark History.  We are still working on a few print-out worksheets from the Spectrum Grade 4 Test Prep for the upcoming IOWA test.  More hemp necklaces made.  Geography focus was Asia; we did the maps twice and listened to "Geography Songs" cd.  Dd was definitely feeling artsy this week---she made a bowl out of clay, numerous oil pastels, drawings, hemp necklace, and she has been writing in her journal every night---and don't for get the piano daily...she is on a roll.

Dd making a necklace for a friend

We are also working on some flashcards - some for math (measurements); Grammar (definitions from First Language Lessons; and English From The Roots Up (Greek & Latin).

Here is the close-up of the necklace-hemp & beads

VHS: The Magic School Bus-"Takes Flight".  Maybe all the "flight" stuff at the Children's Museum piqued her back into flight again.  You know, Dd made her own kite last month.  She took it to the backyard and flew it.  I should get a photo of that.  She did it all on her own; I don't know where she thought that whole thing up.

Our activities for the week:  Dd had Swim & Gym on Tuesday.  They didn't get to do the swimming b/c the pool was too busy with the Spring break people.  We invited one of Dd's friends to come home with us so they could play for the rest of the day.  We took her to her soccer practice at 5:45pm.  We played basketball in the driveway a few nights.  We went to the library.  Dd has been really enjoying the piano every day.  She has been figuring out "Jesus Loves Me" without the music; by talking to Giz on the phone.

We fit in some different books for our morning bible study.  We also used our Explorer's  Bible too.  In the evening we had our evening bible study as a family.  Our church has given the congregation a bible devotional for the month.  For us to pray as a church about the possibility of building a new church.  We also read our normally scheduled bible readings.  This week we read from John, Psalms, and Timothy.

Punchinello and the Most Marvelous Gift (New Stories and Products in Max Lucado's) by Max Lucado

The Easter Story by Brian Wildsmith

 The Way Home: A Princess Story by Max Lucado

 

Someone got a haircut--by Momma!

Haircut Today!!!

Hey Everyone-- See my haircut!

Here I hope to post a picture of the clay bowl Dd made this week:



It is for a dog- it has dog paws and a bone.
























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SL Week 32 (65th week on this core) March 26th- 29th, 2012

SL Week 32   Core 3/D  March 26^th-29^th 2012 

 *Week 65 on this Core!

This week we had a normal Sonlight week; and added in some of our own stuff too.
Our Activities this week included Swim and Gym on Tuesday, LHE Co-Op on Thursday—our last class for this semester; and then on Friday we went with our friends to the   Children’s Museum of Indianapolis.

Lego Land (new exhibit) Dd made a plane

The last class in Dd’s Indiana History class was the day she and her group had to show the fort Dd made, perform a skit, and share the homemade cornbread and homemade butter with the rest of the class.

The fort was “Fort Wayne” and Dd did 95% of it on her own.  She spent day after day of her free time working on this project.  She really went to town without any encouragement on my behalf.  I wasn’t going to make this into a big deal; as I could tell the other kids in the class were not doing much for it; and the teacher had no expectation to make it a big deal.  But, Dd really got into it!  I used the hot glue gun to reinforce the sides of the walls and then she used it to glue her soldiers down.  I have pictures already posted for you to see; just scroll down a little farther.  The skit they did was very cool—they were in a “time machine” and went to different times at the fort to tell what all had happened there over the years.  Another girl in the group made the cornbread and another girl made the butter—both with the help of their mom’s.

Friday we went to the Children’s Museum.  We had tickets to go to the Planetarium and watch a show in the dome called “Flight Adventure’s”.  We also had tickets to the “Lily Theater” there to see a play: “Rumplestiltskin”.  It was a unique interpretation of the play and we enjoyed it.  We also went to two new exhibits—one called “Mr. Potato Head” and the other was “Lego World”  I think.  We had a great time!!

Our Read Aloud is: The Journeyman by Elizabeth Yates.  So far this book is great. 

Dd’s “Readers” are:

“Meet Marie-Grace” (American Girl Collection) by Sarah Masters Buckey; and her “fun” book was: “High School Musical-Stories from East High #9 Ringin’ It” by N.B. Grace.  Should I admit that she has been introduced to the “High School Musical” scene by a friend and now she is watching the movies and reading the books with a passion that scares me!! LOL!  I liked it better when her passion was towards Narnia and Star Wars; I am not so sure about HSM things….hmmm.

The books I’ve added-in this week:

“Fraction Action” by Loreen Leedy

“Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Weights and Measures” by Jerry Pallotta

“Money, Money, Money-On United States Paper Currency” by Nancy Winslow Parker




Pictures of FORT WAYNE INDIANA

Mr. Potato Head Exhibit

Star Wars Mr. Potato Heads--cool!

Mr. Potato Head and Friends from the 1960's

Lily Theater: Rumplestiltskin

They didn't let us take pictures during the show...bummer

Planetarium Show: Flight Adventures:

Science fun this week:

Dd did this TOPS experiment last spring; and is repeating many of those exp. again this spring

The milk carton seed growing experiment

This is the outside of the milk carton experiment

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