Sunday, October 30, 2011

Slime, Journaling, Intro to Art Lessons, Research Continues, And Oh Yeah Halloween!!

                 A sneak peek into next week.




                                                           

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Weekly Wrap Up: October 24-28,2011

This was a week that totally flew by. The weather was very cold this week, so more time was spent indoors, I don't really know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Living in Michigan you learn not to plan activities according to the weather. It could be sunny and temperatures in the 70's next day it could be snow in the twenties. Well here are some photos of the children while working.

 In Social Studies/History we learned about the Plains Indians and how resourceful the buffalo was to them. In the picture they are categorizing items that they wrote that the Plains Indians may have used the buffalo for.


In Science we are learning about our sense organs we were able to learn about the nose and the mouth. An interesting fact that they learned was one of the reasons we may have a runny nose is that your cilia is beating slower than usual. Now everytime a child had a runny nose they say " You need a tissue your cilia is beating slow" LOL. Who thought science could be so humorous. They also learned  the different parts of the tongue where taste can de discovered.
                                                                             
                                 Refining our sense of smell with the smelling bottles.


                                                The Taste Experiment


                                                             
Dj independently researching the Bison. He is looking for Why the Bison is endangered ? Of course there is much more information he will find in order to completely answer this question.



  Here is some information that he was able to record on paper.


  First work with sentence diagramming. This work came from Montessori Print Shop


    Multiplication Chart #2. This work also came from Montessori Print Shop.


                                                              Place Value work.

     
                     Place Value with Golden Beads               
                                                        
                                                                          
We had a field trip to the Pumpkin Patch. DJ was thrilled to see a star in an apple (sigh) I never been successful with cutting the apple to make this happen! Looks so easy, but not so much for me.                                                                  

Ken enjoyed looking at these items on the field trip. Ken says she needs a washing board this size now. I  asked why , she said so can wash her own undergarments. IT'S ON THE WAY!! (seriously).



The kids attend an afterschool program and they came home with these apple pockets. They ran out of time so they sent them home with the kids to pop in the oven. The afterschool program is at the local community center and they love to be able to play with kids their own age. They go twice a week, and I love that it is afterschool.


 They signed up this week for a homeschool swim class at the YMCA. They love it!!

     
  My favorite photo of the week. They wanted some more skittles so to encourage me to offer more skittles, they decided to try to convert fractions to decimals to complete the graph. The oldest stepped in to help.

                                                                            
  A natural consequence! These two decided to write their names on the chairs.
      

Well this wrap ups our week. I am linking this post to Weekly Wraps hosted by weird,unsocialized homeschoolers and Montessori Monday hosted by One Hook Wonder and Living Montessori Now.                                                                                                                               

Friday, October 28, 2011

A Boy And A Lesson Plan

DJ has been really enjoying his new reading book Sign Of The Beaver by Elizabeth George Speare. He is now into the book where Matt the twelve year old White boy befriends a younger Indian boy named Attean. Now Atteans' father asks Matt if he could teach Attean to read. Attean is reluctant to learn the "White Man's language" so Matt has to come up with different ways to gain Atteans' interest in learning how to read.

Moving Beyond The Page the curriculum that we also use suggest different activities to do while reading the book. The activities are chosen chapter by chapter. One activity that DJ chose was to create a lesson plan to teach someone how to learn the letters abc.


                                                               The Lesson Plan


                                                         Preparing materials needed


                                                                      Materials

                                                                            
  DJ started his lesson by presenting the sandpaper letter a to the preschoolers.


 This is DJ explaining to his students how they are to complete their seat work.


Helping the children with their lesson with Ken as his teachers' assistant.



  I loved that DJ offered encouraging words along the way, and received a few high fives from his amazing students.


Here is an example of what one of his students accomplished from his lesson.


 This activity turned out better than expected. I thought DJ was just going to complete the written activity, he made this work his own by actually putting his lesson plan in action!! Maybe a future educator in the making:)



                                                                          

                                                                             

                                                                         

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Poetry Reading

Ken read her poetry book in front of some preschoolers yesterday. She did a fantastic job in keeping their interest with her own poetry writings. Kens' articulation has improved drastically. She read with great expression and fluency. Ken also created a real wholesome atomosphere, she made the children some cookies to snack on while she read to them (smart move). The younger ones enjoyed her performance and requested more, more ( not just for the cookies:)


  Preparing for her Meet The Poet debut, making the cookies.


                  Greeting her participants.


                 Reading selections from her poetry book.

              
                             The pleased and wonderful audience.
                                                              

                                                         The Proud Poet


Kens' poetry study was roughly about six weeks. Below are the books she used as her text for learning about poetry. My America A Poetry Atlas of the United States selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins, R is for Rhyme A Poetry Alphabet written by Judy Young, and Love That Dog a novel by Sharon Creech. All of books were very good reads, Ken says her favorite one was Love That Dog.

                                                                                                                                                            

                                                                         
                                                                     

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Place Value Work

Ken has declared math one of her favorite subjects!! If you only knew what this meant the world would be clapping for this girl. Ken is still struggling a bit with place value so I set up a few works to help with understanding that will eventually lead to mastery. This work I hope will continue to boost her self esteem in the area and keep motivating her to want to learn more math since this is the subject area that she struggles most with.

 This work came straight from a mini bullentin board set. Ken will place the cards in groups of millions, thousands, and units.  Ken will use the number cards to build a number.






                  This is another build a number work.


                                       A close up of the board.



 With this work I also have a recording sheet available that will allow her to monitor her understanding of the work. I apologize for not being able to link back to the original source. I usually add the blog or source to my favorites list so I can be able to track back to the source. If you know who shared this please let me know so I can link back. If this is your work I apologize and I will link back.

                                                                         
 I am linking this post to Math Monday hosted by love2learn2day.                                                          

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Sense Organs, Place Value And Beginning Research


                    A Sneak Peek Into Next Week.....




I hope everyone has a great school week. I know proper planning and organizing helps me to at least anticipate a successful week.

                                                         Happy Schooling!!