St. Patrick's Day

We had a fun St. Patrick's Day. We've been learning about the holiday and Ireland all week and I'll have another post about that soon.

The kids woke up to green milk again this year. The leprechauns got into the box of Lucky Charms we had and scattered them all over the kitchen counter. Once again, the kids found gold chocolate coins scattered all over the house during the day that they figure the leprechauns must have dropped when they realized they weren't real gold. Molly was really into finding them this year and kept searching all over. We also had a fun themed lunch.

Kids with leprechauns they made

Girls showing the chocolate coins they have left

On Saturday, we went to a St. Patrick's Day parade for the first time. It was really fun. Molly said it was the longest parade ever though. It lasted for 1 1/2 hours.

Our Week: Jupiter, Joan of Arc, War of the Roses, and Art

Art

I'm starting with art because I'm so happy we actually did a real art lesson from Artistic Pursuits. It's been a long time since we did art that didn't just go with something else we're studying. Here are the kids' pictures made using watercolor crayons.

Top: Colin                 Left: Molly                Right: Caleigh

History

We managed to get through two chapters in SOTW this week. We started by learning about the Hundred Years War between England and France. We also learned about Joan of Arc and read some books about her. Then we read about the War of the Roses and how the English throne kept going back and forth between the two groups. Finally we learned about the mysterious disappearance of King Edward V, who was sent to the Tower of London by Richard III.
Colin also finished The Door in the Wall that he started reading last week even though he complained about it and said he didn't like it.

The girls made a pop out Tower of London card. The front says: Where did Richard III put young King Edward V? Then you open it up to see the Tower of London pop out.
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Science

This week we learned all about the largest planet in our solar system, Jupiter. Some of the things we learned about were its size, how it is like the sun, the Great Red Spot, its moons, what it is made of, why it has stripes, how long its rotation and revolution take, and the spacecraft called Galileo.

We also made a hurricane in a bottle. All the kids liked this, especially Caleigh. She keeps coming back and doing it over and over and has asked to keep it.

We decided to take it apart and add some blue food coloring to be able to see it better.

Everything Else

Colin had Robotics Club this week. The boys worked on getting the robot to recognize black lines, first having it stop when it reached one and then having it follow the lines. The girls played dress up with their friend during that time. Too bad I didn't think to take a picture of them.

Colin also had a hockey game. He's the goalie and did a great job. The parents on the other team were even talking about how well he was playing.

The kids also started a basketball skills class this week. They worked on passing, dribbling, and some shooting (mostly layups).


Chad has been sick all week and now Molly is coughing with a runny nose. I'm hoping she feels better quickly and the rest of us don't get it. The weather this weekend is supposed to be really nice so I'd like for us to be able to get out. I'm hoping we'll make it to a St. Patrick's Day parade and festival happening tomorrow.

Lucky

It's that time of year when I try to evaluate whether homeschooling is still the best choice for our family and for each of my kids. I am also researching curriculum for next year and trying to figure out what changes we should make. It's the time when I find that I second guess myself and worry that it's not enough.

Today we were reading books when Molly noticed through the window some kids who live down the street walking home from the school bus. She was so funny and said, "I can't believe they make kids go to school in the rain." Then she asked why they didn't just stay home like she does. I told her most kids have to go to school and she said, "I guess we're just lucky." I said, "Yes, we are."  I love that girl and I never know how she knows just when I need a little enouragement.

Snow in Kentucky

We were surprised to see snow when we got up on our last morning in Kentucky. We've only had snow once this year so it was nice to see except that we had to drive home in it. The roads in KY weren't bad, but they were in Virginia. There were times we couldn't even see the road and some cars were sliding all over the place.

The snow was pretty to see on the mountains, but I sure am glad to be home where it looks more like spring.

Our Short Week: The Plague and Dr. Seuss

We only had regular school Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday this week. We were able to get quite a bit done in those three days though.

History

This week we learned all about the plague. We learned where it started, how it spread, what caused it, how many people died, and the impact it had. I was surprised by how the girls got into this topic. They said it was the best chapter of the whole year. They asked lots of questions and were really good at answering the review questions I asked them. I guess you never know what they'll like.
I had Colin use the lapbook from Homeschool Share for his notebook.

Science

We continued learning about comets and also read about asteroids and meterors. We didn't do a project this week.

The kids also started planting their own garden. They chose all the stuff they want to plant, went to the store with my husband to get it all, and helped him do all the work. So far they've planted cabbage, lettuce, onions, potatoes, carrots, and some herbs. They have plans for a few more things during the next couple months.

Dr. Seuss

On Wednesday, we celebrated Dr. Seuss' birthday by reading lots of his books, making cupcakes, having green eggs and ham, and making hats. I have a whole post about all the fun we had here.

Everything Else

This week was play week for the Robotics Club. We all met at a park and the kids had a great time running around and playing.

This was a short week for us because we're leaving today (Thursday ) to go to Kentucky to visit family for the weekend.



Girls ready to go



Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss

We did a little celebrating today for Dr. Seuss' birthday.

Aren't they adorable?

Molly has been reading The Cat in the Hat this week.

Cupcakes to represent Cat in the Hat and Thing 1 and Thing 2

I showed Caleigh how to do the first one and she did all the rest



Molly decorating her cupcake



Green eggs and ham (hubby wouldn't let me color the ham though)
Pink juice for the pink ink in One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

Molly making silly faces with her Cat in the Hat hat

Katy and the Big Snow

I've been collecting books for this study for a while and watching the weather forecast in the hopes we could do it when it snowed. Unfortunately, the only snow we've had was during Christmas break. We've had spring-like weather the last couple weeks so I gave up on snow and decided to go ahead.

Here are some of the many snow books we read during the week.

In addtion to reading Snowflake Bentley, we watched this video about Wilson Bentley.
To go along with reading Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening, we watched this where you can hear Robert Frost recite the poem. For fun, we also watched this version from The Muppet Show.
The Story of Snow: The Science of Winter's Wonder by Mark Cassino was good in helping the kids understand about the different types of snow crystals, how they're formed, their size, and why each of them is different.
The kids really liked Snow Globe Family, which was a book we hadn't read before.


When you read about snow, you have to make coffee filter snowflakes. Molly said she thought this would be boring, but then it was fun. It didn't really hold Colin's interest though. He made one and left. The girls made a huge stack.

We also made crystal snowflakes. Here are the girls with their snowflakes made from pipe cleaners and string.

We put boiling water and borax in a jar and then added food coloring.

After mixing it all together, put the snowflake in the jar. The snowflake is hanging from a popsicle stick.

After a few hours, they looked like this.

We also made snow themed food.

Meatloaf and mashed potatoes snowman

Snowball cookies

Tortilla snowflakes

I made each of the kids 3 circle pancakes. Then they had mini M&Ms, marshmallows, chocolate chips, and sprinkles to decorate them.

We learned about responsibility, running a city, stop signs, snow, blizzards, and what makes snowflakes unique. The kids made their own snow similes to review from when they learned what similes were during our study of Owl Moon. I reviewed compound words with Caleigh. We also reviewed compass roses and directions.

Our Week: Turks, Comets, and Katy and the Big Snow

This week we started trying to get school started earlier. I am not a morning person and the girls sleep pretty late. Colin is always up earlier than we are. I want to get up earlier and get started with Colin. We've been getting much closer to my target time to start and it's making the day go much smoother. Now I just need to keep it up.

History

This week we learned about the Ottoman Empire. We read that some Turks would travel around entertaining with stories, songs, and dancing bears. So we made our own dancing bears.

We also learned how the Turks were able to defeat the people of Constantinople to take the city, which they renamed Istanbul. One of the things they did was to build a huge cannon.

This is the cannon Colin made following the directions in the SOTW activity guide.

Colin thought the cannon needed a little improvement so he built a Lego cover for it.

Here is the ball getting ready to be shot out of the cannon.

We also learned about Suleiman the Magnificent, who put together one set of laws for everyone to follow.

Astronomy

We learned all about comets this week. One of the things we learned is that comets are called dirty snowballs. We used cotton balls, glue, and sand to make a model of a comet's head.

We made a small ball with the cotton, put some drops of glue on it, and sprinkled it with sand to make the nucleus.

We put the nucleus inside a larger piece of cotton and rolled it into a ball. Then we put on the drops of glue and sprinkled sand again.

Model of comet's head

We read about the parts of a comet, a comet's orbit, and some famous comets. We also read Maria's Comet inspired by Maria Mitchell, America's first woman astronomer.

We also watched the coverage and the launch of space shuttle Discovery on Thursday.

Five in a Row Unit Study

Our Five in a Row book this week was Katy and the Big Snow. I've been planning it for a while waiting for some snow, but I finally decided the snow isn't coming so we went ahead and did it. We still studied snow, read lots of snow books, made paper snowflakes, had snow themed food, and made crystal snowflakes. We also did activities from the FIAR books, Snowflake Bentley and Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening. I'll have more details of what we did in a separate post soon.