Our Week: Japan, Mercury, and lots of Activities

Our activities kept us busy this week. It seems like we're going to be really busy for the next several weeks. Molly has a cold, but so far it isn't slowing her down any. It's now passed through all of us except Colin. He has a big week next week so hopefully it will skip him.

History & Five in a Row
History this week was about Japan and Korea. We focused on Japan and did the Five in a Row book, Grandfather's Journey, to go along with it. We read lots of books on Japan, found Japan on the map, did some origami, talked about Japanese food (particularly sushi), and learned abut celebrations. We also briefly talked about the U.S. and Japan's part in World  War II. To finish up the week, we stopped by the Grand Asia Market. See this post for more about what we did.

Astronomy
We started learning about Mercury. We learned about its temperature, lack of atmosphere, rotation and revolution, size, and craters.
The kids dropped small rocks into a bowl of flour to help them see how asteroids could leave craters on Mercury.

Everything Else
On Monday we met with our public speaking group. I think I mentioned this before. One of the moms has a book with ideas so we choose one and then get together to let the kids do it. This week they chose an inanimate object and then described what it was like to be the object without saying what they were. Then everyone tried to guess the object.
Tuesday we had a First Lego League meeting. We have a mock tournament next week so the boys are working on getting ready for that.
Colin got to go see his favorite hockey team practice Wednesday. He was very excited about that. After practice, he was able to see a few of the players and get autographs. He had roller hockey practice on Thursday. Today there was baseball practice.

The girls had lots of fun at the park while waiting for Colin to finish baseball.

Check out Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers to see what other homeschoolers are up to this week.