Land - Week 3

 

Continuing our study of land this week, Wendy focused on perspective and

the different parts of landscape art (foreground, middle ground and background)

 

 

 

 

 

Wendy using her hands to show how things that are in the foreground appear larger even if they are really the same size.

 

 

Using their thumbs the kids tried to cover three spools of thread as they looked at them with one eye closed. They discovered they couldn't cover the one in the foreground. They were able to cover a little more of the spool in the middle ground and finally their thumb was able to make the spool in the background completely "disappear".

 

 

 

 

 

Wendy taught us how to break up our page into foreground, middle ground and background with a giant "Z".  

 

 

 

The kids used the chalk to color their papers and then added in a variety of sizes

 (small, medium and large) to the foreground, middle ground and background.

 

 

Artists' hard at work.

 

 

Some of the finished artwork.

Land - week 2

Brandy gave the kids a lesson this week all about the earth, it's layers, mountains, and earthquakes. 

She had a fabulous book with lots of earth facts, pictures, and even pop ups. We learned different ways mountains are formed. 

She spent most of the time talking about earthquakes. This is a website that shows what earthquakes are happening minute by minute. There's a lot going on in Alaska.

She told them about the Richter scale and how it measures the size of the earthquakes. 

Then, she had a earthquake simulator where block houses experienced real earthquakes. The kids are watching to see which structure will stand the best.

The kids got to build their own structures, too. Whose will be able to withstand the earthquake? 

We had a homemade seismograph that showed us how big our earthquakes were.

And don't forget about those under water earthquakes. What happens when we have a typhoon? 

Julie had a rabbit show coming up, so she brought her rabbit along to get some practice... 

The kids got to ask questions and pet it, too.

Land - Week 1

 ^"And God said, 'Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.' And it was so.  God called the dry ground 'land,'..."

It's the first week of day 3 of our Creation Unit. Jenny helped the kids make terrariums out of coke bottles. First we sang our water cycle song.... (tune of She'll Be Coming Around the Mountain")

Then we filled the bottoms of our coke bottles with rocks and soil.

The kids got to pick from a few flower seeds to plant in their terrariums. And then we added water.

Even the babies got to do some. Wait! What babies?? They're getting too big to call them that, now. 

We had our Creation coloring sheets to color. 

And then a fun snack of dirt and worms.... 

Some of them weren't so sure about eating dirt, but it taste yummy when it's made from oreos and chocolate pudding.

This is one of our terrariums after about a week. It worked!!

Konnor had a SUPER lose tooth. After several tries, I got a piece of floss wrapped around it. He told me that he didn't want me to pull it, so I told him I'd just get the floss back off. Well, I lied. I yanked it instead. It came out SOOO easy. He was super pumped to have that sucker out of there. You can even see the adult tooth coming in. 

La la la la....

This was a huge project us mommas got ourselves into, but it turned out way better than we imagined. We spent weeks learning lines, music, and motions. And the kids, too - ha ha. 

One of the local churches graciously let us use one of their facilities to host this musical extravaganza. We invited all the kids' families to come watch. I think the grandmas and grandpas truly enjoyed seeing their babies sing their hearts out.

Our musical had 5 songs that we learned with lines in between each one. Each child got to have a few spoken lines. We had "grumpy" characters and thankful ones to teach them the meaning of Thanksgiving. That's me on the ivories accompanying them.

We had a guest co op join us for our musical, too. This pretend preschool group performed one song all by themselves and then they joined us again for the last one. They were all SOOOOO cute!! They are all about the same age as Ben, so he helped them out.

Each family brought a few dishes and after our musical, we had a delicious pot luck lunch.

We decorated the tables with Mayflowers, pine cone turkeys, some crayons, and coloring sheets.

I know what this guy was thankful for!!

Weather Center

To conclude our sky lessons, we went on a field trip to the local weather center. Hector was so gracious to  give a power point lesson, answer questions, and take us on a little tour of their center. The kids learned about what to do when the roads are flooded and if there is a lightening storm.

They loved it when Hector answer the question incorrectly and his little friend got struck by lightening.

Hector then showed us a weather balloon and explained how it worked. 

One of the kids asked about tornados, and he just happened to have a tornado maker that he pulled out. 

 Everyone got to touch it, too.

Watch out!! Tornado spotted at the Weather Center.

Then, Hector took us into the room where all their information streams to and from. He showed the kids their computers and how they send out signals to the city. 

Thanks, Hector. We loved our weather lesson. 

Sky - Week 5

Theresa did this week's lesson about sky scrapers. What a fun idea! First, she gave the kids some sky scraping vocabulary and rules of the sky scrappers. 

Notice how none of the kids are sitting next to a sibling and that the boys and girls are segregated? 

We pretended her door was a sky scraper and talked about everything it must have in order to considered a sky scraper.

Then, she passed out pictures of different buildings a we voted weither we thought it was a sky scraper or not.

Then, we built our own sky scrapers out of mega blocks. First, we discussed which would be the best base to start with. 

 Each team was giving a different base and then set to work building.

The babies even got involved in this activity.

And lastly, we tried building sky scrapers out of marshmellows and toothpicks. It's harder than it looks. Remember those strong triangles.

We might just have some engineers in this bunch.

Sky - Week 4

The pictures from today are missing most of the girls from our group due to doctor's appointments and another not feeling well. :( Part of life, but still a bummer. 

Wendy taught our sky/art lesson today. She started off by reviewing the kids on the color wheel and the two sides it contains...Warm and Cool Colors. After a short review she had them place paint chips on the correct side of the color wheel.

After that she showed us a variety of pictures and paintings that either had primarily warm or primarily cool colors and had the kids tell her which on it was. There was one photo that we all thought was really awesome with both warm and cool colors.

We moved to the table for the next activity creating a warm and cool color window. There were a variety of colors for the kids to choose from. They tore pieces off and glue it on one side or the other creating a "cool" window pane and a "warm" window pane.

Wendy had us do another project with chalk pastels. There were puzzle pieces with a "C" or "W" to indicate if they should use a warm or cool color. The kids used a color(s) from the correct palette to add to their puzzle piece, then the used their hands to blend them and cover the piece. 

There was a little mess involved... their hands and noses aren't normally that color, I promise. :)

Here are the beautiful works of art they created when we got them all put together. 

(please pardon the blurriness of the warm color tree...I was trying to hold back my 16 month old from attacking it...real life here people)

I think it was a tie on which one everyone liked best.

Wendy had the kids come sit down to read a story about the artist Degas. I'm not sure what they were looking at in the particular picture. (possibly because I was distracted by my youngest son walking up behind them, sucking on a hand soap bottle...remember...real life). Anyway, their faces crack me up. Any idea what you were showing them here Wendy? 

Here are what the miniature homeschoolers were doing during the lesson. Kara was even reading to them, so sweet. Thanks Brandy for keeping up with them today!