Book Club: My Side of the Mountain

I had heard that only 12 year old boys enjoy reading My Side of the Mountain, but I must say that our whole book club (none of us have a 12 year old boy) really enjoyed this read. Here's how our meeting went:

1. Go around the circle and share your favorite part.

2 We discussed certain points of interest in the book such as Sam's ability to remain isolated for so long without a search party coming for him!

3. Divide into family teams (we have 3 families in our club) and play Plant Concentration. I made color copies of the plants that were mentioned or drawn in the book (just got images from Google) and glued them onto construction paper squares. On the back of the squares I labelled them A, B, C, etc. I then taped them to a large board. on another board I taped similarly prepared squares with the names of the plants I had selected. On the back of this second set of squares I labelled them 1, 2, 3, etc. The object was to match the name of the plant with the correct picture in a Classic Concentration sort of way. Each family had an answer key to help them.

4. Fashion show! This was a real hit! We discussed Sam's need to create his own clothing while away in the woods for so long and the methods he used for doing this. And while we didn't have any deer skins available, we did have plenty of brown paper sacks from the grocery store. Each family was given the same number of grocery bags, some yarn, tape, scissors, whole punch. Each family was removed to a separate part of the house to work on their own fashion creation using the supplies given. Each family chose a member of the family to model the creation and be a part of the fashion show. So cute!

5. We ended with some pancakes and blueberry jam. No, no acorn flour here. Just hand ground whole wheat flour. They were gobbled right up!

Super fun night!

Vocabulary Practice for Read Aloud Books

I've tried tackling vocabulary from the traditional "Schooly" way with workbooks. I suppose it worked fine enough. But I always found that many of the words were too easy or irrelevant to my daughter's life.

So then I tried using a more organic approach to vocabulary and gleaned my vocab lists from our reading, both silent and read aloud. I would plug these words into spelling city dot com (most of that site is free but you can pay for the extra goodies). Again, that worked for a while, but quickly became tedious and boring for her. She keeps me on my toes, I'll give her that.

Then I tried just giving her a list of our words from reading and then asking her to choose four or five to look up in the dictionary. HOLY MOLY! It was like pulling teeth. She apparently doesn't heart the dictionary just yet.

Well, then I decided to try something new. I'm not sure how this idea came to me, but I'm glad it did because it seems to be working (so far). I wrote each vocab word on an index card with a sharpie. Then I hole punched the upper left corner and put all the cards on a ring. I then read through the words with her several times so she would know how to pronounce them and would recognize them while listening to the book.


I handed her the dictionary (YIKES) and asked her to listen for the words on her cards as I read aloud. When she hears a word from the list, she has the option of writing down her own understanding of the word's meaning given its context in the book, or looking it up in the dictionary. I suggested that she write down the page number that the word appears on in case she wants to go back and read the word in context later.

As we began it was fun, but I quickly realized the dictionary was actually much more of a nuisance than a help. Stopping to look up the words slowed us down and interrupted the flow of our story. It was much more fun and productive to have her infer the meaning from the text and write down her own definition. If she had trouble with this, I would then have her pull out the dictionary. Or if we were anxious to read on, I'd just give her guidance until she arrived at the correct definition. Thus we remained on friendly terms with the dictionary and kept our story rolling.

I should mention that I only give her vocabulary words from a few chapters at a time. I don't give her all the vocab words from the entire book. She'll have several sets of words on separate rings by the time we finish the book.



So far...it's working. I like having the words on separate cards and gathered on rings. I think it will make it easy to have fun review games at the end of the book. I'm envisioning vocabulary memory games or matching games. I like this better than workbooks, straight dictionary work, or resorting to online vocab practice. Asking her to do anything online simply leads to endless dawdling and game playing. ICK!

Better Than Christmas!

Does anyobody else out there love to order curriculum as much as I do? Or am I the only one that gets a long-lived natural high out of selecting the perfect set of studies for each child?
And when it all comes to the door (I'm an online-shopping-kind-of-girl) and I get to open it with the kids and smell that new book smell, and flip through the materials imagining all the great lessons we'll have....AH...it relaly IS better than Christmas.
I love to see the kids eagerly paw through the piles of books and materials to see what lies in store for them in the coming school year. Of course, I have to keep a few surprises up my sleeve, just to keep things interetsing for all of us.

I don't have all my stuff ordered yet. And only a very small portion of it has come to the house so far. But the anticipation is making me giddy. You may be wondering just what curriculum I've selected that is causing all of this "Christmas In July" type joy.

Here's my list for Third Grade Girl:
Lang ARts: Paths of Exploration at geomatters dot com. This looks like fantastic stuff. The rewviews are terrific. I'm ordering because it accomplishes my goal of giving my children a solid understanding and love of American History without beating it over their heads, while at the same time providing a flexible/adjustable and very thorough lang. arts program using living books. I love that it effortlessly creates a portfolio for the student as you go. This actually includes a little science and obviously some history as well.
I'll be supplementing the grammar with G.U.M Drops and spelling with Spelling WOrkout.
Also, at the end of last year someone introduced me to Ignite your Writing, which you can download at CurrClick for ten bucks. It's fantastic! Short,fun, clear writing assignments that my daughter doesn't hate! All for ten bucks.And there's an advanced version also. We'll continue with that next year too.

Math: We used teaching textbooks grade 3 last year. IT started off well, but got very boring for her. Sheresorted to using JUST the book because she got really put off by all the online demos, cheering monkeys, and "silly" games. SO this year we're going the no-nonsense route and using Saxon Math. I got the books used from a local second hand homeschool curriculum store.

First GRade GIrl:
Math: We're nearly done with RIght STart Math level A. I'm sure we'll go on to level B since she's loving the program and doing very well.

Lang ARts: We flew through the K year of Sing Spell,Read,Write and we're now about 1/3 of the way through the first grade portion. We'll keep on chugging there. My only misgivings about this phonics program are the following: I don't like the sequence. Looking ahead, I can see that it is going to really throw a lot at us all at once, while in the beginning we were bored with endless reptition of simple concepts. Also, we don't really "sing" much with this program as the title would seem to indicate.The teacher's manual says to start each lesson with asong, and end each lesson with a game. But so far, only a couple of songs have been introduced (and they all sound alike to me). And the games....where is theinformation on how to play the games and at what point they should be introduced? I find it all a bit confusing. I just kindof make use of the games as I see fit by looking at the materials and guessing where they best fit intomy lessons.BUt Icertainly don't play the same ol' games every time.
If I could choose again, I might go back and do the K12 grade 1 phonics program with her. It worked very well for my oldest, althoughit was very visually bland. I loved their letter tiles, built in review, and predictable, consistent sequence. I disliked their spelling however! I guess you can't have it all, right?

My kids do History, ARt, and Science all together. EVen the preschooler boy.
So here's a quick rundown of those subjects:

Art: Harmony Fine Arts. It's a very Charlotte Mason approach to both art appreciation and art "lessons" as well as music appreciation. Can't wait!

Science: We're doing something new this year. We'll be using Noeo (sp???) Biology Level 2. I think I can tailor it to all ability levels.

History: Wow, we loved Story of the WOrld level 1 so much last year that we only got half way through the book! We spent a lot of time on each chapter. So we'll just pick up where we left off and move on to Book 2 when we're ready.

There you go. Sounds simple enough right? I'll add more later about ideas I have for poetry next year...and I finally have had a successful idea for helping the kids learn vocabulary from our read aloud books. That's for another post as well.

Our First Science Fair

I don't remember being in a science fair as a kid. I did a couple of "academic fairs" and always entered in the Language Arts section, but never did a science project.

I decided to encourage our second grader to attend the Washington State Science and Engineering Fair for several reasons.

First,I felt like we needed a bigger goal to work toward. I wanted to see our daughter make steady, long term progress on a project that required more than 30-60 minutes of her time and effort. Completing large projects is an important skill.

Second, I wanted her to feel part of something larger than our home school.

Third,I wanted to inspire her with the wonderful world of science in a way that our texts really can't.

And fourth, I wanted her to have an outlet for her sometimes competitive nature.

I do feel that all of our objectives were met. She did a fantastic job and even said, "wow,science is fun!" several times throughout the experience. You know how that affects us homeschooling parents. :)

Admittedly, the day of the fair itself was entirely exhausting for our family of six. We all went. My husband left work early and took the ferry over the Puget sound with us to the Bremerton Highschool where the fair was held last week. Our little 7 month old baby probably felt it the most. We left the house at 11:30am and returned home at 11pm. And that was because we left the second session of judging EARLY!!

Still, there is something to be said about sharing these experiences all together. It helps to have the younger ones witness the process and gear themselves up for the day when they can participate too. (I do have feedback for the organizers on the scheduling however....)

If there is a science fairinyour area, I'd strongly encourage you to look into participating. If you can't find one, think about organizing one,even if it's a small affair with just your coop. Need a venue? Check with your local YMCA to see if they can lend you a room for the occasion. You could even do an online science fair! And post all of your projects on a common blog. Why not??

Our daughter placed second in her grade. She felt good about her work. She met some great people, saw some great displays, learned some great study skills, and maybe even learned a little science along the way!

Poetry Tea party

This post is a companion to the previous post. As a new fan of the Brave Writer website/blog, I've decided to implement a monthly poetry tea.

The idea of holding a poetry tea inspired me because I've struggled with finding the right way to introduce my kids to poetry. I wanted them to enjoy poetry most of all, without making it feel like a chore.

You can read all about what a poetry tea party is here:http://www.bravewriter.com/bwl/poetry-teatimes/

Our younger participants repeated lines of previously selected poetry that was whispered in their ears, or showed off pictures of a favorite poem that they had produced. My oldest actually decided to play a piano piece instead of reading her original poetry that she had prepared. The family we invited to share the tea time with us shared some wonderful poems as well.

Next time, however, I think I'll try to put more emphasis on the actual poetry part of tea time, and less emphasis on chit chat during the tea. You know how H.S. moms are. They can't stop talking when they get together. GUILTY!! It's so fun to connect with other moms and I think that our conversations actually overshadowed the poetry part of it just a bit. But we had fun, we enjoyed poetry, we saw our friends and we had a great time setting up the fancy affair. So I'm chalking this up as a total first time success!

Give it a try. It's fun! Then let me know how yours went.

Updated Curriculum Review -Writer's Jungle vs. Trail Gide to Learning

***Scroll down page for my updated opinion of Writer's Jungle.***

I wanted our return to home school to be successful. So I had to do some deep thinking about what was it (other than total sleep deprivation from new baby and the fact that we never got a summer break) that was causing friction in our home school.

I think there was some stress over the grammar/writing/lang. arts part of our curriculum. So during our down time, I did a lot of research on writing curriculum and I asked myself, "What do I really want her to get out of a writing curriculum this year?" Well, the answer surprised me: I don't want her to hate it. That's it. If we could just get beyond hating the task of writing and balking at every little word that is requested to be put on paper, I'd be a much happier mama.

I ordered the Writer's Jungle from Brave Writer.com and I have to say that I'm really pleased with it. The author, Julie B., seems to think the same way I do. But she does such a better job of actually channeling those thoughts into actual writing instruction. It helps that she really is a writer too!

We also subscribed to The Arrow, which is an age appropriate monthly newsletter with copy work and dictation material, as well as some tips for teaching the grammar and literature points in the selection. I'm not sure it's worth the money. She talks quite a bit about copy work and dictation in the manual. I think it's enough information to go on without paying for The Arrow. But if you are looking for a more prepared system for copy work/dictation/grammar/lit then it would be with your while to subscribe.

I would recommend Julie's work to anyone. The only "drawback" (if you can call it that) is the fact that this manual is only written for the parent who will teach writing. It's not actual writing assignments or instruction for the student. So the parent needs to be able to digest the information and apply it to your student's age and circumstance. Some of her recommendations are very concrete and easy to implement. Some of them are just concepts and general attitudes or approaches that may seem vague or difficult to implement. Still, I'm very glad I got it.

Her site/blog has a ton of free information that I LOVE, and I have been slowly working on adding her tips and tricks into our writing curriculum.

UPDATE:  FEB 22, 2013
This happens to be one of my most popular posts, which leads me to believe that many people are taking a look at Writer's Jungle and trying to decide if they should give it a go. So I feel like I need to give you my updated opinion of it.

I never use it anymore. 

Enough said, right?   Why you ask? Well, because it isn't convenient to use.  It's too vague and wishy washy. As the kids grow and their academic needs become more complicated, I find myself trying to balance between PLUG-N-GO curriculum, and organic-interest led curriculum.  More often than not, despite all my good intentions, I need to revert to plug-n-go.   Turns out the Arrow subscription wasn't nearly as useful as I had hoped it would be. And it didn't keep me supplied with enough copy work anyway.

Writer's Jungle is NOT plug-n-go.  In my mind, there's not even a plug.  It's just some ideas (GOOD ONES!) put together to guide your path to creating your own writing lesson plans. Too much work for this busy mama right now.  SO it sits on my shelf. And I still kick myself for paying that much money for it.

There were good things I picked up from reading the manual, like the importance of copy work, and letting children write about what they know a lot about instead of forcing them into a topic. We also enjoyed the poetry tea party idea and the co-operative story writing idea.  There, by writing those 2 sentences I saved you $200.  There are lots of great currics. that incorporate copy work and free writing, however.  My favorite one that I've been using for 2 years now is Trail Guide to Learning.  It's a great balance between ready to go lessons and flexibility for creative lesson planning.




Writers Jungle  might be right for you. But it wasn't for me,  as much as I wanted it to be.

And we are BACK!

Today was our first day of our return to homeschool. And it felt great. Mostly it felt gret because my daughter has now made the choice to be on the journey with me as a partner, rather than an unwilling tagalong. She has looked on the other side of the fence, and decided that the grass really is greener right here at home. Wow. That's pretty much all the validation I ever need.

Experimenting with public school was probalby the healthiest thign we could have done for our homeschool. At first it made me angry, even a little scared, that we were delving into the depths of government run education. But the insight we gained into ourselves, our family, our relationsihp to learning and each other is priceless. Irealize that I'm being vague when referring to the positive effect that this experience has had on our family and our homeschoo. Truth is, there have been so many benefits (not academic) to this experience that, if I was asked, I would certainly recommend that every homeschool family take a break when they feel the need, and just give public school a temporary try. You might be surprised at what you gain.

Teaching Patriotism

I'm not shy about telling my kids how lucky they are to live in such a great land with so many opportunities and blessings. I try to show my passion for politics and love of country in my every day pursuits. I know some parents try not to be "political" in front of the kids so as to allwo them a chance to develop their own policial views. Whhaaaaat? If I don't teach my kids what I believe is correct and true about politics and our sacred duty to uphold the constitution, there are plenty of folks on the other side of the fence that would be HAPPY to brainwash them into their camp.

My mom tells me that when she grew up in California during the 50s and 60s, she believed that government was all good, that government could do no wrong, that there was no such thing as a "bad cop" and that all public officials could be trusted implicitly. Well, guess what...our kids can't afford to grow up like that!

So, while I don't regularly preach politics, I DO make a point to show my patriotism. I had a wonderful opportunity to do just that last night as we read from a great book called (IN THE YEAR OF THE BOAR AND JACKIE ROBINSON)IN THE YEAR OF THE BOAR AND JACKIE ROBINSON BY LORD, BETTE BAO[AUTHOR]Paperback{In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson} on 1986
.

Without spoiling the book for you, it's about a Chinese immigrant family. THe story is told by the young daughter in fifth grade. One day her teacher asks the class why Americans are so in love with baseball. What is it about baseball that Americans so deeply resonate with? No student could think of a good answer. So the teacher lays out this elloquent explanation:

"In our national passtime, each player is a member of a team, but when he comes to bat, he stands alone. One man. Many opportunities. For no matter how far behind, how late in the game, he by himself, can make a difference. He can change what has been. He can make it a new ball game.
"in the life of ournation, each man is a citizen of the United States, but he has the right to pursue his own happiness. For no matter what his race, religion, or creed, be he pauper or president, he has the right to speak his mind, to live as he wishes within the law, to elect our officials and stand for office, to excel. To make a difference. To change what has been. To make a better America.
"And so can you. And so MUST you!"Pg. 92

That is so powerful. I love it. It's why I cry at every game when they sing the national anthem.

My daughters and I had a beautiful conversation about the blessing of freedom and what makes it possible. I was clear about the two things we must do to maintain our freedom. Namely, we must honor God and keep his laws. We must also honor and uphold the Constitution.

My 7yo then piped up and said, "Mom, Obama likes to recycle. So that's good. He does good things." Uh....where is this info coming from? "My teacher told me!"
The look on my face must have said it all, because then she back peddled and said, " I mean, I don't know. I just know that."

Yeah, like I said, if I don't teach, there are PLENTY of others who will.

Experimenting with PUblic School

I've held the "option" of public school over my daughter's head for some time now. I know it's not totally healthy. When I can't think of anything else to motivate her into action, I would let her know that public school was only a phone call away. That was usually enough to get her busy again.

THen one day, we had an argument. It was fairly poignant. It stung on both sides I think. Something inside me went a little cold and I just felt that public school was no longer a threat to keep her in check, but a viable option that needed to be explored. I felt tha tmy stress load with the new baby was ever mounting. I Felt that homeschooling had become less attractive as I felt more and more overwhelmed. It was really hard to monitor behaviour while nursing from the couch or in the baby's room and when I finally got up to discover that the Wii had been on the whole last half hour instead of doing (what ever I asked) I generally would flip out because I was so tired, so sleep deprived, so short on patience.

So, that day, I really did make the phone call. We went down tothe school and I enrolled her. We started classes the next day. I had mixed feelings. I know my 7yo did too. She was excited to see our neighbor boy would be inher class, yet nervous and anxious about the unknonw. KNowing my daughter the way I do, I was sure she woudl love school. I just wasn't sure if I WANTED her to love school.

Well, I was right. When I picked her up on the first day she had the BIGGEST smile you ever saw to go with a red stain mustache that was evidence of a classmate's birthday party. Ugh. I felt like a failure. She loved public school way more than homeschool. I had given it my heart, my all, my soul. And failed. AFter all my strong feelings and convictions about the benefits of homeschooling, here I was having to admit that "government" really could make school more enjoyable for my child. It was a hard pill to swallow.

That was Dec 1 of this year. So she's had 3 weeks of public school. In that shor ttime, we've both learned a lot. Here's what's good to say about the experience thus far:

My daughter has learned to use an alarm clock. I don't have to nag her to get up and do anything. She gets up on her own and is ready for school without any nudging for me. She comes home with a smile! She enjoys her homework. She has made new friends. I have oodles more time. I can focus on my other children rather than squeezing them in between lessons with my oldest. It makes me feel like a better mom. There is more peace at home as we have no arguments over school work anymore. Her teacher is a doll. She really cares and does the best with the resources she has available. So, lots of positives right?

Obviously, I was concnerned about academics. We did second grade lastyear. Putting her into a second grade classroom felt very backward. They tested her at a 4.5 grade reading level, but dont' really have the time/resources to help her progress from that point. She'll be in the "top" group fo course. But that doesn't really mean she'll get the customized education that I'm used to providing her with. Theyactually told me that they stopped the reading test because she had done so well, but the third grade teachers didn't want the second graders moving beyond a certain point before coming into their classes. AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. I had to squelch a big scream when I heard that.

Of course, personally I have a hard time with the school politics, the rig-a-ma-role of having to be part of sucha large system and play by their rules. Being controlled by their schedules, and subject to their policies is hard for a mom who's never experienced that. It feels like I have to just roll over and play dead.

A friend at a Christmas party explained it very well. She said going from homeschool to public school is the same as going from self employed entrepreneur to subservient employee. It's a super hard transition.

Well, my duaghter contineus to enjoy public school. I am trying not to show my distaste for the "big box" education they provide in her presence. HOWEVER....there's been a change, which I will explain more about down the road. But suffice it to say for now, that I think we'll be back at homeschool in February. Details to follow....

Story of the World - Mud Bricks

I've been really bad about posting on this site. Most days I feel like what we're doing is pretty run of the mill and not exciting enough to post here. That and a significant time shortage translate into very few posts.

But, better late than never, I say. So here are a couple of "fun" things we did back in November.

1) Making outdoor art.

And for Story of the World, we went outside to experiment with making mud bricks during our unit on the Indus Valley Civilizations.


We also had a pretty good time making up our own story about what could have possibly happened to the Mojenjo Daro city. I think our version of its disappearance involved alien abdutions.

Science Fun: Acid-Base Indicator with Red Cabbage Juice

I'll be the first to admit that school this year is pretty unexciting. Adding baby #4 to the family 6 weeks ago has taken its toll. And yet I'm still pleased with the progress we're making and the steady pace we're somehow keeping up.

So here's one of the funner things we did last week for science:

We used red cabbage juice as an acid base indicator to test various household liquids. Fun!

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?

Jump Start

Baby #4 (another lovely little girl) will be joining us the week that school officially starts around here. So, I've been tryin go get a jump start on our next school year so that when September comes, I won't feel totally lame for taking some time off with the new baby.

I have to say that this little experiment has really made me consider being a year-round-homeschooler. It was so refreshing to take all of July off. But then as August crept on, I really didn't mind spicing up our slower days with a little schooling here and there. It's been gentle and gradual. If the weather was nice, we played outside. If it wasn't we got more school done. That simple. I like the pace we're at and if we kept it up year round, then there really wouldn't ever be aneed to "cram" or hurry or skip over. We'd just ease our way through all the info as we go through the year. Hm....something to consider.

Anyway, just thought that I'd share some of the stuff we've been working on lately. AFterall, this is something of a photo journal to supplment our portfolio and a great way to log some of our projects.


So here, below, is a model of the Nile River. We're doing Story of the World Book 1. Grass represents crops and it was fun to flood the river to water our crops.

We talked about early writing including Hyrogliphs and Cuneiform. Here are the girls' names written on clay tablets in cuneiform, well one of them.

We're in the process of making a mummified chicken so I'll have pics of that in about 3 weeks.

Here are the models of Cheop's Great Pyramid that we made tonight:

We're LOVING this history program. So fun.

In science, here's our model of a Helium atom: By the way, we are not using K12 online school for science as I had previously planned. We're using Real Science 4 Kids and we've started with the Pre level 1 chemistry. It's fun so far!

For Art, we're doing Great American Artists for kids. I only have 1 pic of the projects we've done so far. We talked about THomas Jefferson's love for arches and architecture. We discussed keystones and then made our own arches with (scented!) playdough.