It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like...
Christmas! The past 3 weeks have flown. The thing about December that gets me is that the weekends are more packed than the weekdays. School has been flowing along relatively well. Sure, we've had the occasional party, or morning out Christmas shopping, but the weekends! That's when the real activity happens. Anyway, Anastasia has enjoyed 3 nice story units in Kindergarten and Tristan is doing well on his second grade work.
The first story: You Are Special, Max Lucado. This one I pulled off the shelf the week after Thanksgiving because our books hadn't come in over the holiday week. The children enjoyed this story and I was able to help them understand the allegory and the deeper meaning of the story. Anastasia did some copy work and a coloring page related to the theme. Ana is joining Tristan for Math lessons; more on that later.
The second story Anastasia enjoyed: Warm as Wool, Scott Russell Sanders. This is a wonderful, true, story of a pioneer family making life for themselves against all odds in the west of America. Betsy had her heart set on owning sheep, and this story tells how she realized that dream.
We learned about sheep, made some sheep crafts, and added and subtracted cotton balls. We learned about Conestoga wagons and used our imaginations.
The third story we read was, Climbing Kansas Mountains, George Shannon. This is the story about a boy seeing the world in a new way, while having a day out with his dad.
We read this story last week and we learned about wheat. Since I mill wheat and bake bread, I was able to be very hands on with this science lesson. Anastasia made a beautiful piece of artwork that incorporated wheat berries. We reviewed metaphor and simile and enjoyed the details in the illustrations- Sam's hair is the color of wheat, the opening picture of the book is a Meadowlark and the picture on the back cover is a sunflower, etc. We learned about Kansas, and Ana learned to map Kansas- right between the Mississippi river and the Rocky Mountains. She also mapped a few of the more famous mountain peaks around the world and we learned about mountains. The definition given in the story is "a high quiet view." That was a good starting point.
Tristan has been loving The Story of the World, Volume 1, by Susan Wise Bauer, read by Jim Weiss.
I am pairing this with Draw and Write Through History, Creation through Jonah, Carylee Gressman and Map Trek by Terri Johnson. I purchased the Map Trek curriculum, but otherwise all resources are from the library.
Tristan just moved to the next Saxon Math book, and because Saxon is a circular curriculum the first lessons are reviewing concepts previously learned. I have asked Anastasia to join us for these Math lessons. She is learning new material, and Tristan is able to help her understand the difficult/new concepts. This is a great way for him to review. It's been a blast. Tristan still needs work remembering his facts. We are working on the subtraction facts right now. I would like him to be a bit sharper before we move forward with the multiplication facts.
Both children are enjoying their touch-typing lessons as well as Code.org.
Other books we enjoyed the past 3 weeks:
If You Travelled West in a Covered Wagon, Ellen Levine
Angelina's Christmas, Katherine Holabird
Bread Comes to Life, George Levenson
Living on a Mountain, Ellen Labrecque
What is a Mountain, Chris Avertis
Discover My World, Mountain, Ron Hirshi
Lakes and Rivers: A Freshwater Web of Life, Phillip Johansson
Hubert Invents the Wheel, Claire and Monty Montgomery (A funny fictional story about Mesopotamia. Some inappropriate content- bar girls, psychic, witchcraft. Reading aloud I was able to skim over the bad stuff and stick to the interesting story, but I would not recommend this story, entertaining though it was.
The Silver Chair, C. S. Lewis
Mummies Unwrapped, Kimberly Weinberger
Ancient China, Jacqueline Bell, Richard Levey (Who knew that the best preserved mummy was actually found in China?)
The Trail of Tears, Alan Pierce
The Story of the Silkworm, Richard Sobol (Focuses on silk made in Thailand, but it is still an informative book with great photographs.)
Mummies, Secrets of the Dead, Richard Raleigh
Pinduli, Janell Cannon
The first story: You Are Special, Max Lucado. This one I pulled off the shelf the week after Thanksgiving because our books hadn't come in over the holiday week. The children enjoyed this story and I was able to help them understand the allegory and the deeper meaning of the story. Anastasia did some copy work and a coloring page related to the theme. Ana is joining Tristan for Math lessons; more on that later.
The second story Anastasia enjoyed: Warm as Wool, Scott Russell Sanders. This is a wonderful, true, story of a pioneer family making life for themselves against all odds in the west of America. Betsy had her heart set on owning sheep, and this story tells how she realized that dream.
We learned about sheep, made some sheep crafts, and added and subtracted cotton balls. We learned about Conestoga wagons and used our imaginations.
The third story we read was, Climbing Kansas Mountains, George Shannon. This is the story about a boy seeing the world in a new way, while having a day out with his dad.
We read this story last week and we learned about wheat. Since I mill wheat and bake bread, I was able to be very hands on with this science lesson. Anastasia made a beautiful piece of artwork that incorporated wheat berries. We reviewed metaphor and simile and enjoyed the details in the illustrations- Sam's hair is the color of wheat, the opening picture of the book is a Meadowlark and the picture on the back cover is a sunflower, etc. We learned about Kansas, and Ana learned to map Kansas- right between the Mississippi river and the Rocky Mountains. She also mapped a few of the more famous mountain peaks around the world and we learned about mountains. The definition given in the story is "a high quiet view." That was a good starting point. Tristan has been loving The Story of the World, Volume 1, by Susan Wise Bauer, read by Jim Weiss.
I am pairing this with Draw and Write Through History, Creation through Jonah, Carylee Gressman and Map Trek by Terri Johnson. I purchased the Map Trek curriculum, but otherwise all resources are from the library.
Tristan just moved to the next Saxon Math book, and because Saxon is a circular curriculum the first lessons are reviewing concepts previously learned. I have asked Anastasia to join us for these Math lessons. She is learning new material, and Tristan is able to help her understand the difficult/new concepts. This is a great way for him to review. It's been a blast. Tristan still needs work remembering his facts. We are working on the subtraction facts right now. I would like him to be a bit sharper before we move forward with the multiplication facts.
Both children are enjoying their touch-typing lessons as well as Code.org.
Other books we enjoyed the past 3 weeks:
If You Travelled West in a Covered Wagon, Ellen Levine
Angelina's Christmas, Katherine Holabird
Bread Comes to Life, George Levenson
Living on a Mountain, Ellen Labrecque
What is a Mountain, Chris Avertis
Discover My World, Mountain, Ron Hirshi
Lakes and Rivers: A Freshwater Web of Life, Phillip Johansson
Hubert Invents the Wheel, Claire and Monty Montgomery (A funny fictional story about Mesopotamia. Some inappropriate content- bar girls, psychic, witchcraft. Reading aloud I was able to skim over the bad stuff and stick to the interesting story, but I would not recommend this story, entertaining though it was.
The Silver Chair, C. S. Lewis
Mummies Unwrapped, Kimberly Weinberger
Ancient China, Jacqueline Bell, Richard Levey (Who knew that the best preserved mummy was actually found in China?)
The Trail of Tears, Alan Pierce
The Story of the Silkworm, Richard Sobol (Focuses on silk made in Thailand, but it is still an informative book with great photographs.)
Mummies, Secrets of the Dead, Richard Raleigh
Pinduli, Janell Cannon
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