Week of feb 18th

This week was full of shapes, patterns, games, crafts, and busy hands. My goal this week was to have more hands on and less "programme" stuff.
I found it challenging to get my brain to work creativity right now but pinterest and non- pregnant friends are great resources!

For bible we have been working on our character study and have decided to make our very own family character tree to represent each of the traits we study. This week we finished up on self control and are now working on Diligence.

Math: 

We are so blessed to have access to Brain pop Jr. We use it alot! It has great activity, videos, games in all different subjects. This week my ds did some shapes and patterns, learning about AB, ABB, ABC patterns. I tried to do our math all with games this week, we played X & O's, we made pizzas and played around with some fractions, he seem to understand it and we covered whole, half, and quarters.

I have a lovely friend that made my little ds some busy bags to help me spend some one on one time with my older ds, so I decided to use the clothespins number wheel to teach some addition and subtraction to my older ds. I would right out a equation and he would have to find and place the answer on the wheel as quickly as possible. He enjoyed it.

As for Science we read a magic school bus book all about electricity we talked about what we use electricity in our house for and how it gets to our house. We talked about why we need to save electricity.

Our "what will I wear today" work sheets. 

This week we were able to witness and observe an amazing current event the meteorite that landed in Russia. We watch you tube videos about the meteorite and learnt about sonic booms.

For reading this week we used Raz kids, some bottle cap words and good old fashion hang man. Last year when hs was only an idea, I started saving my bottle caps off of everything. I had a huge bag full of caps that I had no idea what I would be use them for. Finally I found a use...I put letters on them and we use them for our word building game. We took turns building our own words. I can't believe how far my ds has come in 6 months. He can build his own words, recognize vowels, sound out all the letters, and remember simple sight words! Moments like this make me realize that even though I felt disorganized and frustrated with the "programs" I had choose this year. He is really learning stuff and I have been there to witness it :)

Week of Feb 11

Good Sunday night evening to you, my intention this evening was to lay in bed, start my blog early so that I could actually get to sleep at a decent time tonight..b/ I am trying to make up for the sleep I have lost with working late hours and children waking up at 3am convinced it's time to be awake.
But little did I know 5 mins after my Dh left for hockey tonight my youngest would start screaming and crying..complaining about his cheek..(I'm thinking it's his ear???? cause I can't even imagine what he's done to the inside of his cheek to make him wail like he has tonight).
Nonetheless, he is sitting here keeping me company as I write and figure out my plan for school this week...which starts tomorrow:)
I like to be prepared for things, for my days, I like to have an idea of what's for supper in the am so I am not scrabbling to get something together at 4:30pm. I like to know what we are doing for school in the morning (my personality :) and I have picked our curriculum this year so really I can do whatever I feel like..somedays I love having that freedom..somedays I feel completely lost.
I have been looking into what next year may look like and some other programs as I am not completely sold on the ones I had for this year. I feel like we have gotten to a point where we are doing a lot of book work fortunately my DS likes book work but I want there to be more hands on and more creative play, more exploring.. these are somethings I want to bring back this spring.

As for our week, we had a short week due to a long weekend and we took the time to enjoy our family and do some fun family activities within the community.

I found this really simple character study on a blog that I read, Confessions of a homeschooler. Which is what we have been doing for some character studying. This website has fantastic homeschool ideas, recipes, honest blog entries and another homeschool resources.

http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/blog/2011/11/10-days-of-character-studies-day-9.html

Day 2: this character study was fun, we used water and red food colouring. We talked about us being the clear "pure" water b/c of Jesus cleansing us by his actions on the cross. The red food dye was representing the sin in our lives and how one little (drop) sin can affect our whole body and life.

We used kidshealth.org to learn about the nervous system..it has lots of simple ways to explain parts of our nervous system.

My DS has been reading some of our level 1 readers from the library with help, he has enjoyed reading books with themes he's interested in.
He made his leader at Awanas a book to show his appreciating on leader appreciation night and gave it to him along with some min eggs!!

My DS has had some really sweet/kind moments this past week, helping his brother clean up a mess that was really big, offering to help is brother turn on the lights before he even asked, holding the door for ladies at the local bakery. Moments like these I need to cherish, to remember to thank God for all his goodness in their lives. You get to see what you have been working so hard towards, strong, independent, kind hearted, empathic, obedient to the holy spirit, strong spirited, happy little boys of God!!!
Thank you Lord, for everything you are doing and have done in our little boys lives, in our lives, and our family.

Coffee filter tie-dye and shape painting. 

Week of Feb 4th

Hello to those who stop by and read my jabber of our week, this week was full of some fun moments.

We are still fighting off sickness in our house but managed to make it to all of our extra curricular stuff as well as a bit more. The boys needed to get out not to mention I did as well. It is funny how quickly cabin fever can set in in the winter, with sick kids, and homeschooling. We all needed to get better and have some interaction with the outside world this week, which I am delighted to proclaim we did. We enjoyed our crazy busy week with gymnastics, dance, volleyball for me, Awanas, the gym, swimming, family day events at the events centre and even some skating at a local rink. It was a active week but a good time.  

Skating with friends.

Bible was a interesting topic this week, we started talking about evolution and creation and the two different opinions. We talked about what we believe (he knew what he believed!- Proud momma :)

We talked about what the big bang was and how it differs from what God did. We talked about tolerance and what it means to be respectful of others different opinions. 

He continues to enjoy and participated in Awanas practicing his verses and achieving little gems and shares. 

As for Math this week we did more addition and combining tens up to 100 then number recognition up to 100. 

This week for social studies we made mini books for grandpa (cause he needs something to read as he's recovering from knee surgery ;0). Then read a book about postal workers and learnt about the postal process. We went to post office, put stamps on them and mailed them off. 

We also watched you tube videos and discussed what chinese new year is as his Nana & Papa live in Hong Kong and it's something that is happening right now in the world. 

We watched a Neat chinese dragon dance  

Science- 

We read about the ear drum and our eyes for science, I found this great resource at the library that has simple experiments about the human body for children. 

This was our ear drum experiment, we had a plastic bag over a mason jar with rice on it. We had taken a heavy spoon and a cookie sheet then hit it hard near the jar. The "sound waves" (molecules) made the rice jump. It was comparable to the noise we hear and how our ear drums vibrate with sound waves.

We also spent some time on brain pop Jr, which I love! we watched videos about bullying, anger, and the food chain. 

I started a comprehension book for my son, for when we read out of our lesson book (there are no pictures). I know that he reads it to accomplish it but I want to spark some creativity with the reading. 

So he draws a picture about the story that he had just read and builds comprehension as well. 

I am excited for my DS, I got some level 1 readers from the library on our last visit. We sat down and he read most of Foxy Fox!!!! I am so excited for him, he felt so accomplished! 

Watching the Zamboni with friends. 

This week I asked my son what part of the human body he wanted to learn about (as he loves it)

He said the Nervous system!! I can't even believe he knows what the nervous system is and that he is actually interested in it. So I guess I better find some things we can do for that. Wow, he keeps me on my toes!! 

Week of 28th...week of SICKNESS!!!

Our week was short but not all that sweet. My ds was so sick, he laid on the couch and watched movies, read stories, and coughed and coughed!

For bible this week we continue to work on our thankful books, as well as learnt about missionaries..what they do, where they live and what it means to be called by God to be a missionary. We picked a missionary from one of our favorite churches in Redding Cal, and researched about her. Her name is Tracey Evans, she is a missionary in Mozambique, Africa. We watched her bio on youtube and learnt about what she doing across the world, building schools, hospitals and she has done this for over 30 years. She is a wonderful lady and we decided we would pray for her and the mission God has her on.

We played and made up our own dice games for math this week. Ds really impressed me thinking of his own rules and even the game.

For science we talked a bit more on plants and figured out how they get water.

The boys went on a scavenger hunt in the back yard and enjoyed every bit of it even if it is cold. 

Practicing printing. 

Trying to do some art while sick..not all that fun! 

Here's to a better week :)