Monthly Archive: February 2010
This post is best viewed here. I’ve added pictures and updated this post!! World Biomes Pin Map – Rain Forest, Desert, Savanna, Tundra and More I obtained permission to use the world biomes map and legend that I used to create our pin map. I went ahead and made downloadable pages for you to use. It is three pages long. The first page is the World Biomes Map and Legend,...
The river bed is normally dry. It has been pouring down rain for days (this is not common in our desert climate!!!) I actually love this kind of weather and made it a point to take the dog out for a good run today! Unfortunately, I suspect sports will be canceled this week! (LD plays T-ball and I play soccer.) We’ll still have the indoor activities (Kindergym for ED, dance/ballet...
LD was very excited to catch this grasshopper. Up until now, we’ve only ever seen them at the Desert Park (zoo). Sorry, I don’t remember what they’re called!
Someone shared this wonderful link to an article on the benefits of teaching kids cursive writing http://www.donpotter.net/PDF/Cursive%20First.pdf Also, if you need a homeschool id (for teachers or for students) card, you can make one (free) at the homeschool buyer’s co-op. I need to update ours before we go on travel and thought I’d mention it here in case you hadn’t heard about them. The homeschool id card was beneficial when...
Last week we did a sorting activity on solids, liquids and gases. This activity was actually quite challenging for them, so we’ll have to repeat it a number of times in the near future. After they sorted the cards together (with help from me), we ran around the house and collected one example of each and presented it to the others. Click on the link to see more details about...
The kids were anxious to try these sheets out. DD saw me working on them last night and asked to do it this morning (she can recognize the numbers if I tell her what to look for, but doesn’t know about skip counting per se). This brought LD over and we spent quite a while doing the sheets together. I hope someone else enjoys them too.
I couldn’t find activity sheets exactly like Iwas looking for, so I made a few of my own.These sheets are for introducing skip countingfrom 3 to 36. The child simply connects thenumbers in order. I laminated the sheets sothat we can repeat them from time to time. (Sorryabout the poor quality of the photos, it was late!) By the way, I decided not to upload the chameleonpage where they simply...
Homemade Graham Crackers:I’ve been making our own graham crackers for a coupleof months. While they can made to look very authentic,I’ve recently been putting the dough into a large rectangularloaf in the fridge. Then I cut slices and bake them on asilcone baking sheet whenever we want them. Here is the graham cracker recipe if you’re interested. Here are a couple household hints you may or may notknow about. Getting...
It feels like I haven’t talked about LD’s math in a while.We worked quite a bit with our Right Start Mathcurriculum last week. Here are some things we reviewed today (using other resources): Above: Place Value to the hundreds (with a heart theme thatwe had for Valentine’s Day) Below: Number Family’s Games (These have been a hugehit with LD! Today we did 9s and 12s. Then we stoppedbecause ED was...
ED has been pouring with a pitcher since she was about 18 months old; she’s practiced with water, beans, rice, beads and so forth. In fact, she pours her own milk into her cereal every morning with the little pitcher you see in the bottom picture. One skill that is very diificult for her is to start/stop pouring. So, here are a couple of pictures of her using different types...
Here are the trays ready for our Monday morningscience center. All the various experiments lead towards the final M&M;color mixing experiment. There were about four differentmini-experiments leading up to that. I’ll talk about thatmore in the next posting.
Experiment 1:Add a teaspoonful of sugar to water. Stir. Observe. What happens when you add sugar to water? What happens when you add several more teaspoons? Experiment 2:Cut (or bite) an M&M; in half. What do you see? We talked about the three layers —the outer layer which was coloreda small thin layer of white (more of the sugar-outer coating)chocolate Experiment 3: Pour water into a white screw top lid....
Experiment 4: (above) Take drops of food dye/water and drop two colors ontoa piece of coffee filter. What happens when the followingcolors mix?red-yellowblue-redblue-green, etc. Experiment 5: (below) Pour water into a white screw top lid. Add four M&Ms;,one each of red, yellow, green and blue. Make a prediction. What do you think will happen whenthe colors meet? Observe. **When the colors meet, they will form a solid line (atleast at...
This week I have some new games ready for DD. DD is reading simple words, but doesn’t quite have the patience to read Bob Books (or the equivalent); yet, she is beyond simple letter-sound activities. I’ve been trying to find simple word games to play with her. I found some lovely cards at Kelly’s Kindergarten that appeal to DD. I printed out the “Cinderella’s Ball” cards and “Sight Word Memory”...