Family Book Club - The Hobbit

I haven't posted about family book club in a really looong time. I skipped posting about the last club we had at our house for the exciting Nick of Time (Nick McIver Time Adventures)
 book.  That was a good book.  We still want to read The Time Pirate: A Nick McIver Time Adventure (Nick McIver Time Adventures)
 as a family.
(Warning: If you decide to read those books, I think it's best done as a read aloud simply because there are a few harsh words in the text.  As the parent is reading along you can easily edit them out or swap them for a softer version, but I'm not sure I'd put that book in my kids' hands.)

But moving on to tonight's club for The Hobbit.  Our friends,  the M. family hosted and they did a fantastic job (as usual) coming up with fun activities to go along with the book.

First we talked about how greed can really have some terrible consequences, as Thorin taught us.  It can even bring about war and death.  We discussed the ten commandments and the importance of not coveting.

We also had some fun riddles to solve, just the way Bilbo and Gollum did. Some of those riddles were super hard!  I was impressed with the kids.  They were able to get so many of them right.  One that I remember was "what goes up and down hills but always stands still?"  Answer: a road.

Next, we had a fun map making activity.  When the dwarves and Bilbo were staying with Elron they looked at a map with a secret message that could only be seen when held up to the moon. The kids drewmaps on grocery bags and then used q-tips dipped in vaseline to write a secret message.  We turned off the light and used a black light to read the secret message.  Very cool.  We learned that you have to use a fair amount of Vaseline for it to look good under the black light.

This is actually my 2yos shirt which reads I Heart Cats.  But it looked cool under the black light

Next we used modeling clay to make our own versions of Smaug.  The kids even got to encrust the dragon with jewels (glitter, and sequins).

This one was more like a caterpillar.  To each her own.

Bejeweled!

So many cool versions of Smaug

Smooth Smaugh (sans jewels)

We ended with some homemade bread and jam. The kids lined up for seconds and thirds!   I'm sure Bilbo would have appreciated such delicious snacks too. A HUGE thank you to the M. family for such a fun night together.  Their creativity and generosity is inspiring.

I noticed my little Kinderboy struggled just a bit tonight.  First, his strong point is not art.  Even at home it can be tough to engage him in an art project.  (Although, THIS PROJECT was a real hit with him.)
And second, he's a bit of a perfectionist.  He needs plenty of time to get his juices flowing and create his product, regardless of what it is.  That's one reason why I'm so glad I homeschool him. He doesn't have to hurry and finish before the bell rings, or stop working on something because the teacher is moving to a new subject.  At home he always has the freedom to work on something as long as he needs to.  Granted, sometimes those projects are interrupted with trips to the store, or lunch, or some other necessary activity.  But the project is always there.  There are no bells, no "hurry-up-and-finish-you-slow-poke".  Feeling rushed  or pressured to perform like the rest of the group seems to paralyze him and be the source of a lot of self doubt for him. But isn't it great that I know this small part of his personality and can tailor to his needs?  Thank goodness for the freedom to homeschool!

Book Club: A Lion to Guard Us

Our Family book club had another meeting this morning. This time it was at our house and we discussed A Lion to Guard Us.

My kids all really enjoyed this book, as did I. There was SO much to explore in this book and I could've taken a lot of different angles. For time's sake, I had to leave out things like famous places/icons in London, the Bermuda Triangle, island vegetation and wild life, and building a model of Jamestown, VA.

Well in advance of the meeting I asked parents to help their kids create a diorama depicting one of the many settings in this book. Here are the dioramas that my girls did:
This one depicts an island setting with palm trees (above).





Here's another (below) depicting the night the kids were kicked out of Mistress Trippet's house and ended up on the docks at night where they met a crazy woman who wanted to snatch Meg away.

Other settings could include Miss Trippet's house, Dr. Crider's home, the ship, or Jamestown.

So here's how our 1 hour meeting went today:

We started by discussing a few lead in questions from below until we had established the living conditions of the children and their plight in life. Then we made biscuits (the ones Jemmy and Meg may have eaten on the steps with their stew behind a closed door).

Baking Powder Biscuits (makes about 1 dozen)

1/3 cup shortening1

3/4 cups all-purpose flour

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup milk

Heat oven to 450 degrees. Cut shortening into flour, baking powder and salt with pastry blender until mixture resembles fine crumbs. Stir in just enough milk so dough leaves side of bowl and rounds up into a ball. (Too much milk make the dough sticky, not enough makes biscuits dry.)Turn dough onto lightly floured surface. Knead lightly 10 times. Roll 1/2 inch thick. Cut with floured 2-inch biscuit cutter. Place on ungreased cookie sheet about 1 inch apart for crusty sides, touching for soft sides. Bake until golden brown, 10 to 12 minutes. Immediately remove from cookie sheet.

We continued to work our way through the critical thinking questions/activities as we prepared the biscuits. THen while they were baking we had each child present their diorama.

We then held a character vote. I listed 5 main characters on the board and provided each child with a ballot to vote for one of the five as their favorite. We discussed "characters" and the voting process. The ballots included a space to draw a picture of the favorite character. The ballot box was an empty kleenex box.

By then our biscuits were more than ready so we ate and discussed a few more critical thinking questions from below.

I had planned to do the copper polishing experiment, but we ran out of time. Our family did this experiment on our own today instead of our regular science lesson. See below.

Critical Thinking Questions

1. What is the father’s name? Why did James Freebold travel to Virginia? He was a carpenter and they asked him to help build houses in VA. Why did the rest of the family have to stay behind in London? Because VA was a wild place not ready for women and children.
2. Why is the brass lion’s head door knocker important to the Freebold children?
5. Why does Amanda decide to journey to the New World?
6. According to Ellie, why does Mistress Trippett want to keep the Freebold children in her home?
7. Why does Mistress Trippett feel she is entitled to Amanda’s money? Why does Amanda disagree?

Fainting: Read and discuss the following information. Can your student determine the cause of Mistress Trippet’s fainting?

Fainting is a temporary loss of consciousness due to a drop in blood flow to the brain. The episode is brief (lasting less than a couple of minutes) and is followed by rapid and complete recovery. You may feel lightheaded or dizzy before fainting.
When you faint, you not only experience loss of consciousness but also loss of muscle tone and paling of color in your face. You may also feel weak or nauseated just prior to fainting, and you may have the sense that surrounding noises are fading into the background.
Fainting may occur while you are using the bathroom, coughing strenuously, or when you have been standing in one place too long. Fainting can also be related to fear, severe pain, or emotional distress. A sudden drop in blood pressure can cause you to faint. This may happen if you are bleeding or severely dehydrated. It can also happen if you stand up very suddenly from a lying position.
Ask the kids to act out Miss Trippett’s fainting spell.

9. How does Dr. Crider help the children on the night they are chased out of the Trippett house?
10. Why do the children have to travel in the hold of the ship? What are the living conditions in the hold? Dark, crowded, smelly, no place to lie down.
14. Who is it that often carries the lions head and polishes it? (Jemmy). Why do some people aboard the ship think the lion’s head door knocker is made of gold? (Jemmy told the children it was gold because he wanted to show them he had something even more important than their toys).

Copper Cleaning Experiment

While she is sitting in Dr. Cinder’s kitchen, Amanda thinks to polish the copper pots and pans. What is copper and why do copper objects need polished? Copper is a rock found in the ground. It is a kind of metal and looks like a brownish reddish orange rock when it is found. Copper is a good conductor or carrier of heat. Copper is used to make wires, plumbing pipes, doorknobs, faucets and even lamps and jewelry. Copper in small amounts helps plants grow. Copper tarnishes or changes color and looks dirty when it is exposed to air. Did you know pennies have copper in them? They do, and copper pennies, like copper pots and pans tarnish. How do you clean copper? Let’s do some experiments to find out? Our question to answer is What kind of cleaner will work best to clean copper? Create a chart and make a prediction or hypothesis about which cleaner: dish soap and water, vinegar and baking soda, lemon juice, household cleaner or toothpaste, will clean copper best. Then set to work testing your prediction. Results: The lemon juice and vinegar and baking soda should work to clean the penny the best. The acids in the vinegar and lemon juice react with the metal (copper) in the penny and clean the tarnish off.
Alternative: silver polishing.

16. Why do you think the composition of the lion’s head door knocker is so important to the ship’s passengers?
19. What do they find to eat on the island? Eggs, fish, wild pigs (pork) served on leaves. What do they build their houses with? Rocks, Logs, Branches, mud, and palmetto leaves for roofs.
Do you think the children enjoyed living on the island? Why?
20. Describe Mr. Freebold’s condition. Will he be okay?

Family Book Club - Indian in the Cupboard

First, I guess I should welcome myself back to the land of blogging after a nice long vacation. Hope it was a terrific Christmas/New Year for all of you. Lots of things going on here at home while absent from the blogosphere including house guests, toilet floods and plenty of "hanging out". This first week back in the groove was actually very refreshing and I think we're all glad to be back.

Anyway, last night was our turn to host the book club again (this was our fourth club meeting) and I think the meetings are getting better and better.

Here's how our meeting went:

I selected book discussion questions from this site: http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/collateral.jsp?id=1341_type=Book_typeId=886

From there, I could have really dug deep into Iroquois Indian life and explored that in detail. But we only had 60 minutes to work with so I chose to focus on the Three Sisters that formed the base of their diet: beans, corn and squash. I had chosen books from the library with pictures of a three sisters garden and we talked about Omri's lack of experience with squash. I had a butternut squash to show them.

Then, I had the kids put on blindfolds as I passed out samples of each of the three sisters. First I passed out small cups with a bit of corn and invited them all to touch and taste, but not to talk about it outloud. Then we set that aside and repeated the process with beans and squash. Then I asked them to guess which of the 3 sisters they had been fed first, second, and third.

After removing the blindfolds, we took votes to discovere which was the kids' favorite "sister". Turns out it was a tie between the corn and the squash, but I'll have you know I put in a generous amount of brown sugar and butter in the squash. Side note: I served the squash sample in a small cup with a popsicle stick so they wouldn't have to lick it off their fingers.

THat activity doubled as our snack. From there we talked more about the magic of the cupboard and its ability to transport the figures across time. I asked the kids to think about what time they would like to travel to if they could hop in a magic cupboard.

Each child was given an empty cereal box and scisors to create their own magic cupboard. Inside we colored pictures of a time and place that we would each like to visit if we could hop in the magic cupboard and go anywhere. OF course, the cupboard only worked with the magic key, so each child was given a laminated key with a red ribbon tied in it with the word "imagination" written on it. With more time, it would've beenf un to cover the box with paper and decorate it.

They each got a chance to show their magic cupboards to the group and explain the picture inside.

We had a great time and as usual, we are looking forward to the next club meeting!

The Growing Book Club

Here's another fun update on our Family-to-Family book club.

Our friends chose Charlotte's Web to read for our last book club and it was a huge hit with the kids. They also hosted the meeting and planned the most adorable activities for the kids.

We made spiders out of cupcakes and string licorice. The best part were the paper plate webs the kids made (center cut out with holes punched around edge and laced with yarn), complete with words cut from newspaper just like the ones Templeton would have chosen for Charlotte. Very cute. The kids had a blast.

So the word is spreading and we now have a third family joining the book club. They have chosen a really fun book for us to read this time:



And I'm pleased to say that in the last 2 days we had a fourth family join us! It's so terrific to see other families join us in our love of literature. What a fun way to bring families together while teaching children that reading is a life long pursuit for all of us. I couldn't be happier about the way things are turning out!

First Successful Family Book Club Meeting

Well, it took some time to pull it off, but we've had our first family book club meeting. And it was a hit! We had a superb time.

For those of you who may not be aware, we read Stuart Little by E.B. White with a family who has children of similar ages as our own. Then we set a date to meet at our house for a simple book discussion, a craft activity related to the story, and a treat.

The meeting lasted about1.5 hours (but could have been shorter if the adults weren't enjoying themselves so much").

To get the discussion rolling, I shared some information on the author with the kids and then used a few of the questions from this site to further our discussion. IT was great to hear from the kids about how they enjoyed the book and what they thought of it. So fun.

For our craft, we made small beds for Stuart out of Popsicle stix and matchboxes. Here's a look at one of them (unfortunately I didn't get pics of the rest):


I kept the treat very simple since we had just arrived back in town from vacation. We had jello and whipped cream. Doesn't get much easier than that but I think most of us enjoyed it.

Our friends offered to choose a book and host the next month's meeting for us! We'll be continuing on with the same author and reading Charlotte's Web. I'll keep you posted on how that goes.

Orchestra Unit

We're continuing on with our orchestra studies.

First we read

And we also did our Stand Up Orchestra, which is a really cute 3d representation of an orchestra. If you'd like me to email you the PDF I will. Just leave a comment here and I'll send it. Here's a pic:

And thank you to the wonderful blogger at http://www.homescho olblogger. com/joyfulschool /
who posted a terrific series of orchestra lap books at this site:
http://www.squidoo.com/stringfamilyunit

We can't wait to dig into those!

UPDATE on our family book club: The other family that is scheduled for our August book club has settled on Stuart Little .
We've got our copy and we're ready to enjoy another classic.