Wild Explorers - Elk Badge

The kids are working on earning their Elk Badge in their Wild Explorers Club.

Their assignment last week:

PICK UP GARBAGE AT AN OUTDOOR AREA NEAR YOU
"Caring for others is also about caring for the environment around you. This week, find a safe place away from traffic and clean up the trash others have left behind. You'll need a plastic garbage bag along with gloves. Bring your family or friends along to make it fun and safe. You are becoming a "Trash Warrior!"


We headed off to a local park and the kids spent half an hour picking up trash.

 Once they were done, they played for a bit in the park.

It was pretty hot and muggy out so our trip was short, but they had fun!

History

Cait and I started the American Girl girl series last week. We completed the first book and she loved it! We are now working our way through the second book.

She began working on her lapbook.

We mapped out where the Native Americans lived during that time and labeled it on the map.

To better understand Kaya's life, we will be studying Native Americans. Caitlin completed the first Native American unit from History Pockets: Native Americans.

After reading about the Inuit tribe, she labeled the map with her "shelter stamp", showing where the Inuit mostly lived. With each new tribe we learn about, she will be adding their shelter stamp to the appropriate spot.

She is working on a comparison chart of the Native Americans we will be learning about. We will compare and contrast the clothing, food, and shelter of each tribe we study. She filled in the Inuit portion.

She is also working on a Native American picture dictionary. 

Finally, she cut, colored, and glued together her history pocket on the Inuit tribe.

We've been reading about the Nez Perce tribe and Chief Joseph.

 Caitlin did an activity on Chief Joseph on Brain Pop Jr.

She learned new vocabulary words that helped her better understand what she was reading in the books.

 She also created a picture of Chief Joseph, delivering a message to people today.

Jayden has been working hard in history as well. His work involves a lot of independent reading, answering questions, fun writing assignments, and map work. In order for me to feel somewhat in the loop with his history, he reads to me from his books.

 Last week he learned about Africa and it's neighbors. He read about the struggle Africans faced to keep their land from being invaded by Dutch farmers known as Boers, who were in search of a different place to live after the British seized their land. 

 He also read about David Livingstone and his fight to end the slave trade.

 One of his assignments included writing a journal entry from Livingstone's perspective.

 Finally, he had to label his map and work on filling in what the map key said.

Science

Last week we started Chemistry. (Jayden decided he wants to do it with us in addition to his other science class.)

They got to be "chemistry detectives", looking for chemicals in everyday things. They started by listing chemicals they have heard of and chemicals they haven't heard of from cereal boxes.

They listed 4 chemicals in things they use everyday (they chose to check their toothpaste and mouthwash), and two chemicals that are dangerous (we found these chemicals in household cleaning products). They also learned that all things are made of chemicals, the definition of chemistry, a chemist, and a hypothesis.

Our second experiment involved understanding the difference between physical tests and chemical tests.

For the physical test they observed the look, smell, and feel of vinegar, baby powder, and baking soda before recording them on their lab sheet.

Next we moved on to the chemical test, using the same vinegar, baby powder, and baking soda, to see how they reacted with water, oil, and acid (vinegar). 

We also tried the experiments with food coloring to get a better idea of how well things did or didn't dissolve. 

And finally, in his online science class, Jayden spent this week learning about the scientific method and the metric system.

First week of school

Our first day of school started off with Caitlin learning to tie her sneakers. Up until now she never really had shoes with laces so that skill slipped through the cracks. Juan taught her how to tie her laces in two minutes!

Jayden started Teaching Textbooks this week. His first assignment was reviewing roman numerals.

Caitlin has been flying through her lessons. They are also a review. She finished her first unit quiz.

We read Wonder for Teatime Tuesday this week. Of course we baked cookies and made tea to go with it.

 They both started swim this week too. Talk about exhaustion afterward!

Afterward we had our Wild Explorers Club meeting. This week we had to help a child in need. We met as a group and shared what each family would do in order to complete this assignment. Our group leader will be hosting a pool party and the kids will sell lemonade. All of the proceeds will be donated to charity. Each family coming will be donating a bag of groceries to be given to a local food pantry. After our group discussion, we read the book Beatrice's Goat,which is a true story about a how the lives of a poor African family drastically changed after receiving a goat.

This has been a very busy week!

End of August

Helllllllllllllllllooooooooooooooooooooooo September! We've dipped into the new school year slowly, and plan on going in full force by Monday.

Book club starts meeting again this month. We are really excited, especially with the book chosen this time. We are reading "Wonder" by R.J. Palacio. It's a wonderful novel written about a boy, August, born with a facial deformity. He was homeschooled until 5th grade, when it was decided that he would attend school. We are only about 1/3 of the way through the book but it has opened up a great dialogue on how August must feel while trying to adjust to no longer being homeschooled, being the new kid in school, and dealing with everyone thinking he is so different from them based on his appearance.

Tying in our book club with Language Arts, we are using Bravewriter's Arrow with our novel.

Our general schedule with Bravewriter is: 

Monday- copywork, which includes an excerpt from a part of the book, as well as going over the spelling and grammar we see in the excerpt

Tuesday- Teatime Tuesday, which includes copying down a poem unrelated to our novel, reading poetry, having tea (iced or hot), or hot cocoa, and a treat

Wednesday- Reverse/French dictation. Reverse dictation is when I type up Monday's excerpt but leave out punctuation, misspell words, and/or use improper grammar. Then they have to rewrite the sentences correctly. French dictation is when I type up Monday's excerpt but I leave blank spaces for words that they have to fill in while I read the passage to them. They prefer reverse dictation because they like finding my "mistakes"

Thursday- Dictation, which is just me reading the same passage to them that they've been working on, and they have to copy it, remembering how to write it properly

Friday- Freewrite Friday, where they can write about whatever they want! Last Friday Caitlin wrote a letter from our dog Lucy's perspective to Cait. Jayden started a story about Lego's and wars. 

Jayden completed his first full module in Spanish and is doing great. He just finished an oral exam with his teacher. He was so nervous despite knowing the material, but he got 100%!

He is working through his science and so far, one week into it, really likes it. He has also decided that he wants to work on Chemistry if he is available when I am teaching it Caitlin.

This little lady is finishing up her second week of her new spelling curriculum and is doing very well. She loves when I make up crazy sentences for her spelling words during her pretest.

Summer is coming to a close. Bring on the fall and the cool weather!!!