Cool Grocery Ad Activity for Kids

I am always looking for free ways to do fun activities...I found this one and had to link it to my blog so I wouldn't forget it. Once we start school back after the holidays, we will have to try it!!!

Grocery Ad Activities

Monet Paintings

As we studied France, we learned a good bit about Monet and his impressionist art. The girls tried their hand at a little painting themselves .

Is it really that close to Christmas!

This December seems to have flown by. This past week has been insanely crazy. Chad has been gone all weekend and most of the beginning of this week. He has been singing in the Christmas tour and doing mission work Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. Tonight they are doing their homecoming from their Christmas tour. I have felt like a single mom for sure. Times like this seem to take their toll on both of us. I hate being apart but I know he is giving to the Lord and that makes it worth it.

We have been busy trying to do a few Christmas lessons before we take a break. We didn't do a lapbook this week, but we did a great unit study on the Nutcracker. We have read several different versions of the Nutcracker, so it has been neat to see variance in the different versions of it. I am reading them a longer one now. We are going to see the Christmas Dream put on by Ballet Magnificat. It is a Christian version of the Nutcracker set to the same Tchaikovsky music.

We have learned a great bit about Tchaikovsky, the man and his music. We listened to some of his famous works. There is a great site that teaches about composers (which we also learned what that was) and instruments: www.classicsforkids.com.

We ran into Target yesterday to kill some time between two errands we had to do and the girls saw some nutcrackers on the end display and they were so excited. They wanted to buy one...but we just couldn't fit one more decoration in our house...smile!

We read several books about ballet; the girls loved that! We also did some copywork and dictation out of one of our versions of the Nutcracker. We talked about the author E.T.A. Hoffman, the author of the original Nutcracker and the MouseKing.

We have tried to keep up with some phonics practice and some independent and guided reading even though we have slowed on our general studies.

Today, I had Hannah read numbers to one hundred-spelled out. Then, I had her write some numbers out with the correct spelling.

We've found this great new website called Brainpop Jr. We have been playing with the trial version...and the girls LOVE it. I have to see if we can manage the subscription. It's not too bad if you do it by the month...but we will have to see. Sometimes I just feel like I need something to fill in gaps I may be missing.

This will be our last week of school for a few weeks. Although, we will still be reading and doing some fun things. We have limited our TV viewing so much and I am thrilled about that. The girls are starting to really contribute to the household chores so that takes up some of their time. Hannah has been cleaning out the dishwasher and Mikayla helping to wipe down the table after supper and folding some laundry. I feel like it is so important for them to be apart of life that happens here and see that even on days off, things still need to be done.

We did a few art projects this week. I will put up pictures of these soon. One we did with clear contact paper and tissue paper strips...the other a cute Nutcracker made out of a toliet paper roll.

Enough for now...need to feed our sweet dear one her milk and get her ready for bed!

Ps. She took her first steps last Sunday....not that she is running now...but oh how fun!

Finished with this week's Lapbooks

We finished up our night before Christmas Lapbooks. It has been a busy week for sure! It only gets busier! Here are their finished books. We also made pop up trees. Interesting for sure!


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Mikayla's Night Before Christmas Lapbook

Hannah's Night before Christmas Lapbook

Its Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

Ugggg...I am tired already. From the time we arrived home from Thanksgiving holidays in Tupelo, I have been running. Unpacking, laundry, planning school, keeping up with Christmas gifts, planning for co-op, feeding the babies, Upward's basket ball and cheerleading, Christmas parties, Homeschool meetings, parades to prepare for, I am wiped....I don't ever stop. We'll I guess you can call this a break...blogging!

Autumn is watching her new videos from Baby Signing Time...and lovin them. She is being sucked right in. She was so cute today, when I was on the phone with my Dad, I was telling him how she had started signing milk...then she signed it right after I said it. After months and months....finally!

So we came back home and I had nothing planned yet. So, Sunday night I dove right in to figure out what we would do for December. I decided we would take off doing our regular studying and do some fun theme things. First we started on our Candy Cane Lapbook. We learned about what a legend was and how candy canes were made.

Hannah's Lapbook

Mikayla's Lapbook

We learned some new vocabulary words: invitation, misery, confections, legend, lumber, tailor, gleaming and pure. We also learned about where the candy cane was thought to be first made in Cologne, Germany and about where it was first brought to the US in Wooster, Ohio. So we did a little geography lesson. For our Math, we made a graph with some candy counting.

We also studied the Bible verse Isaiah53:5 : By His stripes, we are healed. They had some copy work, by copying some of Psalms 23. Then we compared how a Shepperd was like Jesus. We talked about alliteration and how it was a repetition of beginning consonant sounds in two or more words or syllables that are close to one another in a sentence.

That was pretty much what we started studying Monday and Tuesday.

Today, we began a Lapbook on the Night Before Christmas by Clement C. Moore. It brought back fond memories of the story of when I was a child being read this book. We talked more about similes and his use of them in the descriptions of Santa Clause. We did some rhyming practice with some of the words in the book. The girls cut out the reindeer pictures and alphabetized them. We talked about how the book was really a poem put into a book with illustrations. We discussed what a couplet was and found some examples in the book. We learned that it wasn't only about having a rhyming ending but also how the rhythm of the sentences needed to be about the same too.

We also took some key words from the night before Christmas and together came up with a story that I wrote while they dictated. They did a great job! We went over more vocabulary words that were in this book as well: Twas, Sugarplums, Nestled, Kerchief, Clatter, Sash, Coursers, Tarnished, Peddler, Droll, Dread, Ere. Some of these words I needed refreshing on...smile!

We also did a picture walk through The Little Drummer Mouse, then read it to see if what we thought the pictures were saying matched the story. We have been skimping on science this week, so we did a science folder that taught them the life cycle of a frog and butterfly. We also made candy pretzels so that has to count for something more than calories right???

We've also been taking off from our regular math books and doing some Christmas worksheets, practicing money and our addition facts.

Tomorrow we will be finishing up our Lapbook with reviewing our vocabulary words, doing a word search, drawing Santa, making a Christmas tree pop-up, doing a story sequence with sentence strips and writing Santa a letter (handwriting) and probably practicing our time.

We also will be preparing for our upcoming co-op that we will be hosting next week. Friday is the big Brandon Christmas parade. The girls are riding a float. They have been practicing for weeks. I am exhausted though.

I better get off and feed my sweet baby girl...she is crawling all over me. I will post the lapbook pictures when I have a breather!

The Ag Museum

Today we went to the Agriculture Museum with our 4-H group. It was nice out today. I think the high was around 74 or so. It was kinda overcast...but great for being outside. We had a blast. The girls got to see: The Cane Mill, The Cotton Gin, The Print Shop, The Blacksmith shop, The Quilting exhibit, the saw mill, they watched someone caning a rocking chair, and got to milk a "fake" cow with utters...fun...fun. Each of the stations had someone there to demonstrate and tell about how each things was used back in the day.

We also went inside the museum. They had a blast in there. They were intrigued by the old timey cars. They loved the model train that was set up in the middle. It was set up like a small scale town with a huge track. The kids followed it all around the track.

The girls got to know some the of the other kids in 4-H. It is so funny to watch children and how quickly they make friends. Strangers in the morning turned to great friends by noon!

The girls wore their pioneer outfits to match the festivities. There were several schools on field trips there today as well. We had several teachers stop all of them to take pictures. They all thought they were adorable.

Mikayla ripped out the hem of her dress before we even got started...but I only let that bother me for about an hour...smile! I wanted to take the dress and sew it right there...but I had to let it go...she could have cared less.

I think the highlight for Hannah was drinking root beer out of a glass bottle...she said, "This is what they drank out of in the old days!" Both the girls insisted on keeping their bottles.

Autumn was a trooper...she LOVES being outside...so I barely heard a peep out of her. She was so kind to keep all poopies to herself until we got home. It was like she knew we were home...b/c we were barely home 10 min...when she decided to go...smile!

By about 12:30...I was exhausted and ready for a nap...we headed home...but I never did get that nap!

Today...our study of Japan continues...

Well, Mikayla has been begging me to make a volcano. And since we've been studying about how Japan is full of mountains that are really old volcanos....it was time...smile! So today we did that. We made the volcano out of homemade playdough. We didn't have enough salt to make it look realistic...but it did the job...the girls loved it! This is where we got the recipe from: http://www.volcanolive.com/model.html

A video of the volcano errupting...we should have darkened the dough so you could see more of the foam...but as you will watch...the girls love it!

We also studied about the 4 main islands that make up Japan. We also looked at some art from Hokusai. They weren't so interested in that...but at least they looked at it!

We finished up the book Chibi. It was a beautiful story of how a town came together over the beauty of a family of ducks.

I have been struggling a bit this week...trying to make everything happen...you know...school (adding more to it...like music appreciation and art appreciation), laundry, keeping up with Autumn and giving her quality time, keeping the house decent (not clean...smile).

I was really challenged last week by one of the homeschool moms in our group to make our studying God Centered....That is my whole reason for homeschooling yet...many days...a complete focus on His word gets pushed to the side. That is kinda me though. My whole world is who Christ is in me...my relationship to Him...but I get sucked into..."the so much to do" mentalality" that I just don't slow down enough for Him to talk to me. That's my prayer...that somehow...I will make HIM first and not my "to do" list for the day...that seems neverending! A challenge indeed.

Anyhow...that's today...

The FireKeeper's Son

Last week...we finished up our S. Korea study by doing a unit study of The Firekeeper's Son by Linda Sue Parks. We talked about how Korea is a peninsula. The unit study was from homeschoolshare.com They have a wealth of info that is great for homeschoolers. And the best part is...it's free!

We used The Firekeeper's Son to discuss science related ideas. We talked about Sang-hee's father when he fell down. He could have possibly sprained his ankle. We talked about different grades of sprains and what it means to sprain your ankle. How it is a stretching or tearing of ligaments. So of course, we had to discuss what a ligament was in relation to bones and such.

We also talked about what it means to break a bone so that lead to studying a little bit about the skeletal system. We read a few books about the body and how its important to take good care of our body by eating healthy and staying active.

For social studies we talked about Sang-hee's temptation not to do his duty in lighting the fire for his father. We expanded on responibility and honoring our parents even when its not something we may want to do. We compared honoring his father to us honoring God when we do things we know is right even if its not something that is our desire.

I told them how parents often know the feelings their children have because we were once children not long ago.

As far as Language Arts, we talked about similies and how it is a comparison that uses like or as. We also discussed personification. I had the girls personify a tree. I also had them personify emotions such as hate, frustration or happiness.

We also explored ways that people communitcate without words.

For a little math lesson, we practiced using ordinal numbers. We played a game online to help them understand more about first, second and third and so forth. The girls had fun with this...they did very well!

We also studied triangles and their names by what length their sides were. I am not sure the completely understood but at least they were introduced to the idea. This is my purpose in most of this study...basic introduction to ideas.

Where does the time go?

We'll it has been almost two weeks since my mom passed away into her eternal life with Jesus and it feels like time has stood still in someways. It is like a mirage. We took last week off of school. I tried to start school this week but with cleaning out the house, packing, and having to prepare somewhere for my grandmother to live...it has been impossible. I realized...this is such a blessing to homeschool. I can wait til we get back home to pick up where we left off.

I am not stuck to some schedule that is unreasonable except my own inner self raging to get back to a routine. For now, we are reading, doing some phonics, some blogging of what we've been reading and practicing our skip counting.

I took the girls to the eye doctor the other day and Hannah was so inquisative. I thought it was beautiful how she was investigating all the machines they were using. She was like a little reporter asking about this and that in the office. She wanted to know how long she had been an eye doctor. I hope she will keep that inquistivness.

The girls have been collecting snails while we have been here in Florida. I thought maybe it would be a good science opportunity for them. We looked them up online and found out many things about them. We printed off some things from enchantedlearning.com and labeled their parts and learned about them. I thought it was pretty interesting that there are snells as large as 30 inches and that their tongues have little teeth on them. Intriguing to say the least.

Maybe we aren't traditionally doing school but they are learning. I am learning.

I can't wait to go home. I miss my home...my bed...my hubby!

www.ReACHE.org

Check out www.ReACHE.org

This is my homeschool group!

Our Curriculum

This year I am teaching my 1st and 2nd graders with many different things.

1. We are starting the day doing our Soapy Notebooks. This is something our church is doing. We read a scripture each day and then journal about what we have read. We "S" write the scripture, "O" observe what we read, "A" apply what we have read to our lives, "P" pray about how we can use God's word to serve Him. "Y" is for why will I be different because of what I have read today?
   
2. I just added (10-1-08) a new writing curriculum that goes along with the First Language Lessons. The Complete Writer: Writing with Ease: Strong Fundamentals. We will be using the workbooks along with them. I want to give them a great baseline to be able to be good writers. Expressing yourself with the beautiful language we have is so very important in our world.
   
   
3. Next, we alternate doing Math and Spelling so that one of them works independently while the other one works with me. We are using Making Math Meaningful this year as well as doing some side activities like drills and critical thinking worksheets. For spelling we are using Building Spelling Skills. This seems to be a great book so far. We also use spellingcity.com to practice our spelling skills.
4. For Handwriting we are using A Reason for Handwriting.
5. We are using The Ordinary Parent's guide to Teaching Reading with my first grader for phonics. It is a classical type program.
   
6. We are using First Language Lessons for their grammar. It is by the same author as the phonics program. I chose to put both of them in the same level to really hammer out the basics of grammar.
   
7. For foreign language, I am teaching them American Sign Language using the Signing Time CD's. I grew up signing and have been an interpreter for eleven years. We are learning one song each week and that usually has about 12 words that they learn in sign.
8. In the afternoon, we do our Geography, History, and Literature curriculum. We are using a unit study called Galloping the Globe. I am very excited about it. We will be learning about the world around us. We will be studying each continent and many countries within each continent. While we are in each country we will be learning about their flag, famous people, authors, celebrations, customs,music, art, food and so on. Right now we are in the introduction learning about the globe and maps and how that will help us know where we are as well as other places. We will be doing many projects with Galloping the Globe and using notebooking to keep our journeys on track and memorable. I bought a ton of books with this book to make sure we covered our bases. I put off buying The Big Book of Books and Activities. However, I decided that it would be worth it to get it.
   
9. The science curriculum will go along with Galloping the Globe. We will be studying the 106 Days of Creation. I bought this from the Simply Charlotte Mason site.
10. For our reading program we will be using Sonlight Language Arts 2 with easy readers and Sonlight Language Arts 2 with chapter books. This will also supplement some of the grammar with extra practice and an introduction to more in depth grammar rules.
11. We will hopefully being doing Art once a week. Although, we may interchange it with classical music every other week. We will be using Art Adventures at Home for our art curriculum. I also have another book called Discovering Great Artist: 150 Art Ideas for learning.
12. We will be doing a co-op every month 3 times a month. The first week will be a lesson, the next will be a field trip related to the lesson and the third week will be just a fun play day for the kids.
13. We will also be doing a group physical education class once a month with our homeschool group. As well as, being involved in some sort of group sport like Upwards, softball, soccer or cheerleading. In addition, we will have many playdays at the park and days of walks and riding scooters and bikes.
14. For Music, the girls will also be taking piano lessons from a friend of mine. I am going to be teaching her daughter ASL while mine are learning piano.
15. I became a member of EnchantedLearning.com and Edhelper.com. This has a plytheria of worksheets and craft ideas.

Most of my curriculum was purchased from RainbowResource.com, Amazon, Ebay, Homeschoolclassifieds.com.

I am hoping our schedule will be 4 days a week for about 4 hours total each day. Of course, these won't be 4 straight hours and I will be twining life lessons within the day even when they don't know they are learning...smile! I want to read aloud to them as much as possible in hopes to hook them on to the love of reading and learning!

In the Beginning!

This is the beginning of our home school journey. I am very excited but know that I have a huge responsibility on me and much work ahead of me. I am excited about teaching my kids and pray that I can remember this is a journey to enjoy not a journey to a specific destination.

My kids are awesome! They have been in the public school for 2 years now. I have bought all my curriculum and still wonder if I got the right things. I know this year will be an adjustment...I just want everything to be a bright spot for them and for me.

We are starting this journey with sadness though. We are facing the death of my Mom so it will be a rocky start for sure but without home school we would not have the flexibility to see her when we need to go.

I hope you enjoy the ride with us!