Ancient China Days 4 and 5

Ancient China for Kids- Great Wall information. We found several sites: Build the Wall, Walk the Great Wall of China and The Great Wall

Mahjong Tiles- This is the MSN games version with commercials. This games was invented by the Chinese and it is very addictive. My kids will definitely not be playing this on a regular basis although they really loved it.

Chinese Slat Book Our did not quite turn out like the picture...we ran out of sticks and couldn't find the string.

Silk Processing: We found several websites about silk processing: The Silk Process, Video on the process, History of Silk and a worksheet.

We added to Thursdays work with an art lesson from our art curriculum on Warm and Cool Colors as well as some activities from the book Math Wizardry for Kids.

Friday, we had a Chinese feast with pork fried rice, fried fish, plain rice and fortune cookies. Nothing authentic I'm sure. Just Americanized recipes and Gorton's. We learned this week fortune cookies were invented by an American advertising company but it was fun to include them in the meal.

Disclaimer: We don't really believe fortune cookies tell our future...they are just for fun. We got a good laugh out of most of them. The two above though were actually good advice. A day of worry is worth a week of work and A mentor is someone whose hindsight can become your foresight.


How to Use Chopsticks- our kids have always had a fascination with chopsticks and even have their own pair they use on occasion.

Daniel is actually really good with chopsticks.

Tera practicing with play food before dinner.

Chinese Inventions We made these firework paintings by diluting acrylic paint with water. Then dropping one drop at a time on your paper. With a quick puff of air through a straw blown into the center of drop you create a firework. We experimented to get just the right air pressure and paint consistency.

A China Family Adventure a good site with videos of various aspects of Chinese culture

All About Pandas- Daniel bought a stuffed panda that came with a video so they watched that today while lunch was cooking.

The kids worked on the Silk Road projects from earlier in the week but they are still working on those at the time this is publishing.

Today we also talked about Ancient World Religions--the above linked site Ancient China for Kids has a very short synopsis of each philosophy/religion. We looked at Taoism, Buddhism, Ancestor Worship and Confucious. We talked with the kids about how in each of these philosophy, the trust is in yourself and life is what you make it, instead of trust in Jesus Christ. In the zodiac and use of oracle bones, people are seeking power and knowledge outside of God. I'm so glad that I have something bigger than myself to believe in and place my trust.

It's been a great week in China...we have had lots of fun!

Ancient China- Day 3

The Forbidden City 360 virtual tour
The Forbidden City
The Forbidden City tons of pictures and history

Dynasties of China History of the dynasties and a great chart with the dates when each dynasty ruled. We made a chart and put it in our timeline books.





Michael helping out with the dynasties. :)

Crafts and Artisans in China
Chinese Painting history and examples from the Ming and Song dynasties mostly
Chinese Geography interactive that describes the different geography found in China

Animals inside the Forbidden City

Here are our versions:

Crane
Tortoise
Dragon
Lion
Tera's suffering Crane
Dragon

Did you know the Chinese invented the game of Dominoes?

Ancient China Unit Day 2

Our Shadow Puppet and Stage (an old quilting frame with tissue paper screen)

Ancient China for Kids My kids clicked around this site for almost an hour exploring the different aspects of Ancient China...I assigned certain topics and then let them choose ones of interest.
Playing with Shadows- great online Shadow puppet interactive with video.
Shadow Shapes- Click on the link for a simplified kid-friendly shadow puppet guide.

We have a couple of videos that were great examples of shadow puppetry. One was a Bananas comedy video with Bob Stromberg and the other was a Muppet Show episode featuring Judy Collins.

Silk Road information
Stories from the Silk Road
Model of the Silk Road We haven't gotten to this one yet but it was on the plan for today.

We dabbled with Chinese Calligraphy using a book Daniel picked out for the library. I also found a worksheet on line with two characters they traced and tried to copy. Then I printed out the characters for the numbers 1-10

2010-2011 School Year Curriculum

Our curriculum for the year:

Math: Saxon really works for us. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" I've done Saxon with Daniel the whole time but only the last 3 years with Tera. She likes it so much better than any other curriculum I experimented on her.

Language Arts: Spelling and Handwriting- We use the A Reason For...series and have really enjoyed it, especially the Handwriting. We are finishing up the last few lessons from last year before we get new books. Spelling we are using some things I already have, but will be purchasing new A Reason for Handwriting books. Daniel will start cursive and Tera will continue in the 2nd cursive book.


Reading- We are using Abeka readers to start. Then we will move onto selected chapter books that they have showed an interest in.

Language- I never buy language curriculum. Over the years, I have picked up various random school copies of language curriculums. Each year, I pick a different one that is grade level appropriate and that is what we use.



Social Studies- This year we are focusing our study on the textbook Regions Near and Far that I picked up at the local library book sale. It takes us through US Geography. I am using it as an outline to which I'm adding the study of the 50 states. We are also continuing our pattern from last year of having 4 weeks of "regular" school and then 1 week of "fun" school (to borrow Tera's description.) We will study all our core subjects and extras for the 4 weeks and then on the 5th week have an intensive unit week. This semester we are studying the ancient civilizations during those times.

Science- I am using Lesson Pathways as a guide for our science this year. We have covered life science a great deal in the past few years, but not so much the physical sciences. So we have started the year, studying atoms and will spend a month on electricity. Then move on to magnets, light, force and motion, etc.


Some things I have added this year- These are on a daily basis: Memory work-(memorizing a short Bible passage and poem- 10 minutes a day), Bible (We do a great deal of spiritual training outside of school, but this is the first year I have incorporated an actual Bible curriculum. We are studying the book of Acts with the Nazarene Children's Bible Quizzing material), Instrument Practice (Tera- piano; Daniel- recorder for 15 mins. daily)Other things that rotate on various days of the week: God's World News ( I subscribe to a Christian kids news magazine similar to the Weekly Reader we used to receive in school), Art Lesson/ Nature blog (every other week the kids will do an art lesson on a new program called Creativity Express or write a blog post for their nature blog), Getting together with a group of other homeschoolers for learning activities and fieldtrips, Mind Bender activities (these are Critical Thinking skills exercises), and Math Wall (I have picked 3 words a week from basic math terminology to go over, put in their own words and illustrate. For example, this weeks words were congruent, expanded form and sum. We discussed, wrote in our own words and illustrated)


I have wanted to incorporate the use of a timeline for the last few years, but have never come across a system I felt was right for us. I've decided this year to do a notebook timeline for each of the kids that as we study they can add figures, events, etc. to their individual books. I found the dates divided up into historical periods and printed them out. I then took a composition notebook and pasted the dates on two facing pages. If it doesn't work no big deal, but at least we tried. Organization: Each week the kids have assignment sheets with all their individual work printed out. As they complete them, they highlight it on their sheet. I started this last year and it is such a wonderful thing. They know exactly what they are suppose to be doing and can choose the order in which they finish their work. I also use composition notebooks for each subject so that they can keep all their language, math and spelling work together. This year since I have added some extras, I printed myself an assignment sheet for our "together" work. In the past a messy legal pad was my method. It has been so nice to have a neatly printed sheet to refer to. I also borrowed my friend's idea of a planning notebook. (thanks Sarah) Having everything together in one place is worth the effort and extra work on the front end.



We are barely into this school year, but I know already I'll have to tweak some of these things. But for now these are my grandiose ideas for the school year that I hope will all fall into place.

Unit Week- Vertebrate/Invertebrate and Lewis and Clark

A Happy Bell Pepper

Kandinsky Circle Collage- Daniel

Tera's Collage

This is our unit week. We are studying Invertebrates and Vertebrates and Lewis and Clark. Here is a list of some things we have done this week so far:

• Reviewed the two chapters in our science book and our history chapter.
• Read tons of books: Snails and Slugs, A Picture Book of Lewis and Clark, Hungry Animals, Who Eats What? How We Crossed the West, Sacagawea, Selections from Going Along with Lewis and Clark, Lewis and Clark ad Butterflies, Bugs and Worms
• We are working our way through a biography of Sacagawea
• Did a lunar cycle activity using a table lamp, a larger ball and a smaller ball- representing the sun, earth and moon respectively. This didn't turn out as well as I had hoped
• Reviewed our French Muzzy
• Wrote a riddle about an arthropod
• Played several games that went along with our unit- Carmen Sandiago USA, Zooreeka and Hullaballo.
• Practiced speaking in sign
• Constructed a Kandinksy Circles Art Project found at Deep Space Sparkle Online Art Lessons
• Visited the pet store and classified the animals we saw there into vertebrate/invertebrate categories. The crabs were the only invertebrates we saw.
• Talked about life cycles of frogs and salamanders
• Watch a video on the Lewis and Clark expedition found online at Have Fun With History.
• Discussed the different animals that Lewis and Clark found on their expedition.
• Wrote descriptions of an animal for someone who had never seen them before.
• Colored a map of Lewis and Clark's route
• Drew a map of our yard.

Tomorrow we are having some fellow homeschoolers over for some group activities. We are:

• dissecting a worm (JP's job- I wanted to throw up looking at the little wiggly things)
• A Winter Count- a pictoral calendar
• Delicious Classification- using candy to represent the different groups of vertebrates and invertebrates. Then the kids will make their own creations.
• Zany Classification Game- a two team game on classifying animals.

We finish on Friday with a few more activities. I have been very manic depressive when it comes to blogging so hopefully I'll post some pics later this week on the rest of our unit.

Unit Week

We are trying a new schedule this year. 3 weeks of core subjects- handwriting, spelling, reading, math, and language. 1 week on a science and social studies unit study. Tera and Daniel read material from the textbooks and other books dealing with our subject areas during the 3 weeks prior to the unit. This is our unit week. Above are two of the projects Tera and Daniel have done so far this week- paper weaving and line art drawings of a turtle. I think they turned out well but I also believe I'm missing some of my hair especially from the line drawings.

We are doing a Colonial Life unit this week as well as Classifying Animals unit in Science. We are covering different facets of Colonial Life as well as learning the 13 original colonies and The Preamble. Mostly we are reviewing their reading and having a lot of fun with Colonial life- weaving, a little cross stitching, making butter and other recipes, playing Colonial games, exploring school life in Colonial times and more. We have been reading through the novel Johnny Tremain that is set during the Revolutionary period. It has been a great read so far, and we look forward to finishing it soon. It's hard to read out loud with Michael sometimes, he loves to try and eat books right now.

Our classifying animals study is including a lot of experiments and hands-on activities. We are building spider and insect models, experimenting with ants, testing for living and non-living things and other experiments. We've learned about the different ways to classify animals- (vertebrates vs. invertebrates, warm blooded vs. cold blooded) Yesterday the kids made a model of the spine using spools of thread and a straw.

Of course, we are also doing art projects which we never seem to be able to have time to do at other times. I am hoping this schedule will work well for us this year. It always feels there is not enough time to cover everything so this is my solution for our family.

Curriculum 2009-2010

Tera (3rd grade) and Daniel (2nd grade) each have a folder that keeps their weekly assignment sheets as well any worksheets they are working on. They also keep all their written work in these folders.

Reading- We started this year with Abeka readers but Tera wants to read "living books" this year, so she will begin to check out books from the library to read and write book reports about. Daniel will probably do the same later on this year. My kids read a lot on their own which I am very thankful.

Grammar- This year I started doing Grammar with both kids together. They use the same book that I picked up at a thrift store a few years back. We go over the lesson together, then they each complete the exercises separately.

Handwriting and Spelling- We use A Reason for...curriculum for Handwriting and Spelling. This is the second year for Handwriting but our first experience with the Spelling curriculum. I really like both these books. The handwriting book has four daily lessons with a Scripture verse as the practice work. The spelling books give the kids a lot of different activities to do with their spelling. This is the very first time I have ever bought a Spelling curriculum, I have used list found on the internet in previous years. It is refreshing not to have to come up with the ideas all on my own. The kids especially like it.



Math- We are a Saxon household. It works really well with our kids. Tera is in 65 this year. I am going to try and push Daniel ahead a little this year. He breezes through the exercises so we are hoping to do Math 2 this semester and Math 3 next semester, but I'll let him lead on that.

Social Studies- For social studies I use Bob Jones Heritage Studies 3 as a springboard. Tera and Daniel read the chapter and then I plan a unit on that subject. This semester we are in American history. Some units we are covering are: Colonial America, Lewis and Clark, Westward Expansion and/or Pioneer Days and beginning the Civil War. I am excited about our social studies this year. We hope to do a great deal of hands-on learning. I also pick a book from the Sonlight list that goes along with our unit of study as a read aloud. Right now, we are reading Johnny Tremain. I never read it growing up, so I am enjoying it right along with them.



Science- I use Bob Jones Science 3 as a springboard as well as the Tennessee Standards for Science. Some units we are doing this semester are: Classifying Animals, Birds, and Human Body. We are also studying life cycles and will try our hand at a Live Butterfly Garden. Science in the past has not been as hands-on as I would like, so this year I am trying extra hard to make that happen.