Homeschool Real Life

I just have to share this photo from this summer.  We spent tons of time at Lowe's with our hands full of construction projects.  This picture not only documents that, but shows how my 6 year old CJ looks when he's annoyed.  It makes me want to giggle :).

The Body - A Kindergarten Unit of Study

Today was our final day studying the body in our Kindergarten Homeschool Options class.  Since we only met for 4 times during this unit our focus was primarily on blood and what it does for us and how it helps fight against germs that are everywhere even though we can't see them.  Last week we each had the opportunity to make a hand print on a gelatin petri dish.  Over the week I let the dishes grow at home and today I shared the results with the kids.  They were amazed that that many germs grew and were once on their hands.  We wrote all about it in our journals, pictures included.

 We then reviewed the parts of blood and what the different types of germs (mainly bacteria and viruses) are.  We talked about how the different germs attack our body and make us feel sick and how our white blood cells and antibodies fight against the attack.  Then we brought out the play dough and got to work recreating bacteria, viruses, white blood cells, antibodies and red blood cells.

 We also finished up our body maps which now represent many different organs as well as bones and muscles within our body.  They also show things that are most important to us and how we identify ourselves.  It was a fantastic day of learning.  Next up ... archaeology.

Water Park

This summer we got a pass for our local water and theme park.  Quite honestly I'm not certain if it was worth it or not with the way our summer went (being stuck at home waiting on the construction crew to show up).  But the handful of times that we went the boys LOVED it and had such a great time.  It was fantastic to be able to go with our friends!

Options Kindergarten 10-17

I apologize that it has taken me so long to get this posted!  We had such a fantastic time in kindergarten on Friday.  We kicked off our section of the body unit about germs and had a blast doing it!  We started the day with the great glitter germ experiment.  Adding some glitter to my hand before shaking everyone's hands in the class caused our "germs" to spread everywhere!  We all had germs on us, on the pillows, on the carpet!  The glitter germs were everywhere!  We read a few stories explaining about germs and then we set off writing our own stories about germs.

 We spent plenty of time recreating viruses and bacteria, white and red blood cells, and playing with them to recreate what happens.  There were many white blood cell play dough pieces that "ate" pompom germs!  We had "blood veins" made from red rolls of paper and immediately had the good blood cells attacking the bad germs!

 Using gelatin plates we made handprints of each child and I'm HOPING they turn out fantastic for us to examine our germ growth on Friday.  We painted germs and wrote in our journals about germs as well.

We're continuing our "Body Percussion" unit during music time which encourages stomping, clapping, patting and snapping.  That snapping is hard to do!  In math we worked on counting by 10's and explored base 10 blocks.

We had a fantastic day of learning and I look forward to another great day on Friday!

Honey Harvest 2015

It has been both fun and frustrating having honey bees as "pets".  A couple of years ago when Steven was really excited about the opportunity to have a backyard hive I consented to have them, however I would not participate in any of the beekeeping duties....ever.  Steve now has his sidekick CJ the Jr. Beekeeper.  CJ loves to help with the bees and find out how much honey there is.  We use a method of honey harvest that involves crushing the wax and straining the honey out in quart jars with cheesecloth.  It's a bit messy but effective.

US History Kick Off

During this school year the boys and I are studying US History and geography.  We've been talking about the different places we've visited around the country and the boys are so excited to learn about American History because it involves wars :).  We took the opportunity on the 4th of July to invite our friends over for a backyard camp out and US History Kick Off.  We had a fantastic breakfast together and had a short and overarching history lesson about how the US was started.  We also started learning the national anthem.  It was such a great way to kick off our study for the year. 

Luau!

This summer our homeschool group started a monthly activity with a local nursing home.  Our first activity was a Luau.  It was quite a learning experience for three introverted moms to go to a new place and put on an activity where we didn't know anyone.  It turned out fantastic!  After this experience I realized that CJ would be the most to benefit from going each month.  He talked and talked about how wonderful it was to visit the nursing home and make new friends.  We had big sandbox sensory bins on 6 tables throughout the room that the kids and some of the residents engaged in playing with.  Our goal was to create an environment where the kids could do something so common to them and therefore engage in interaction with people they had never met before.  CJ worked at a table where three women thought he was the cat's meow.  It was so fun to watch their interactions.  We also did a few activities like limbo where the kids got to do it and then we walked the limbo stick around the room and lifted it over the residents who where chair bound to let them participate as well.  We learned a lot and look forward to going every month.