A Haiku

We are studying knights and Samurai... the Samurai wrote haiku. Here is E's Haiku


Everything was still
Upon the frozen nighttime
Stars were gleaming bright

What do they learn when you aren't teaching...

C has learned to set up a chess board! E plays chess frequently and is participating in a chess club. He has taken part in 3 or 4 mini-tournaments after chess club as well. He then plays at home with Hubby. As a result, C has observed the proper chess setup. A week or so ago she set up a chess board by herself. I second guessed it because it was possible that E had set it up and then run upstairs for something. Last night, I went into the living room to see her pairing all the chess pieces, naming them by name, "here are the bishops" and "here are the knights." Then, a while later, Brady came upstairs to tell me that she had set up the chess board perfectly except she had switched the king and queen... I still do that sometimes!

M has learned to read quite well. I thought she was still in the beginning reader stage and needed phonics books. She has all but refused to read out loud except for scripture reading, so I had no idea of the progress she had made. I used to get the phonics books from the library for her, but she didn't like them so I just let her have books like Frances, Frog and Toad, Little Bear, and Dick and Jane. During rest time, she would go in her room and study a book. She loves pictures, so I figured she mostly looked at the pictures with a little work on the words. Needless to say, she has mostly taught herself to read. Today she brought me Swimmy and announced that she had read it this afternoon. When I asked what it was about, she said, "I will read it to you," then she proceeded to read it to me with little difficulty, decent speed, and a clear voice. I am amazed. She also read me The Pokey Little Puppy the other day. Neither of these books are read very often in our house- thus they weren't memorized. I don't remember the last time I read swimmy out loud. Anyway, I am so proud of her efforts to learn to read. She is quite excited that she knows how to read now.

E is always studying science. He loves science books (and math books) and has taught himself all kinds of things about the human body, physics, chemistry, etc. through reading books like The Usborne Encyclopedia of Science. He sometimes does this during rest time and sometimes during other parts of the day.

It is so nice to see the kids learning things and thinking it is a game!

Pictures

Here are some pictures of our adventures...

When we went to Victoria last month, we visited the Bug Zoo. C was the most adventurous and enjoyed holding many of the bugs. Here she is holding a giant millipede.



M touched the hissing cockroach with a finger and looked at a few being held by someone else, but she did hold the millipede.



E didn't hold many of the bugs, but he did hold the stick bug.



Just the other day we watched a mama duck with 16 ducklings (at least that was what I counted each time I tried to count, but they all move around so much or huddle together that I might have been off by a couple) waddle into our back yard. The kids watched them for a long time as mama lead them around our backyard looking for her way back to her pond. Eventually she left after unsuccessfully leading them to the blackberry patch and chain link fence in the back. They are no longer in our yard.

School on the Road

It has been quite a while since I posted... mostly because our schooling has been a bit different lately partially due to my pregnancy. Anyway, we have enjoyed learning on the road. We have studied elephant seals and visited them, we have been to Victoria, BC and held and observed various insects, been to the butterfly gardens, been to plays, and on top of the Space Needle. We have listened to MANY books on CD and planted a garden. Learning takes on so many forms.

If I were Pharoah-

We went to a play yesterday called Pharoah Serket and the Lost Stone at the Children's Theatre. The scenery was once again phenomenal and the acting was excellent too. I am continually amazed at the special effects that this theatre is able to pull off.

Today I assigned a paper called If I were Pharoah. The idea came from the questions posed to the children at the end of the play by the actors. They asked if the children like to be Pharoah and why or why not. They asked what they thought it would be like.

After doing a web diagram to help get his thoughts in order, he wrote 1 page hand-written on wide ruled paper. This was the paper E wrote (no editing has been done) :

If I were Pharoah-
I would build cities because people need to live there. I would build houses because people need to eat and drink and sleep and work there. I would build colorful bridges for cars and people. at the times there were lots of cars around, I would build a flat, steel, surface with a motor above. It would have a sensor built in the cover, and when it detected cars, it would spin the motor to make the flat, steel, surface up and I would have a road built underneath. When there were lots of people around it would detect people and down that platform would go. And I would paint lovely pictures on the outside and a shading roof on the top followed by another motor that pulled the roof in and off the side when it wasn't sunny.

Computer Games

I am always amazed there seems to be a computer game somewhere on the internet for reviewing various math facts and procedures. E was practicing rounding today and after doing his workbook, I let him play Half-Court Rounding on this site. For him it makes a difference. He also likes to practice his multiplication facts and division facts on multiplication.com.

Children's Museum Science Class

E got to take part in a science class at the Children's Museum. They were studying the Solar System and all the planets. They dressed up and discussed the attributes of each planet. Here is the class picture.

School doesn't stop for vacations

Over Christmas, we toured the Museum of Flight. We boarded the Concorde, sat in the cockpit of a Blackbird, toured a retired Air Force One, and perused WWI flighter planes, tactics, and uniforms. Here are a few pictures from that.









Then we went to OMSI in Portland. We did brain teasers and played in the science play ground. Here are a few pictures from that.

Edventures

I came across a website that utilizes Legos, Knex, and other materials to teach engineering, science, architecture, art, and other things. One of the assignments on the site was to learn about form follows function, proportions, scale, and design. E was assigned to design a pizzaria including an office, kitchen, dining area, bathrooms, exit, storage room, and refrigerator. The tour, in 3 parts because blogspot will only upload 100MB at at time is his creation.

part 1



part 2



part 3