Adventures in U.S. History Week 3

We had another fun week of adventures! We learned about Jamestown, came up with a chant to help us memorize Matthew 1:21, and learned more about air!

Jesus means the Lord saves

We learned last week that the name Jesus means the Lord saves, and this week we learned that if we say we belong to Jesus we should live like Jesus would. I gave Miss M a bracelet from when I was a little girl with the letters WWJD? on it. Little Guy wanted to know: "Why is there a mystery on it?" which is what he calls question marks.

On Tuesday we did an experiment with a cup of water and a piece of cardboard.

We were afraid it wouldn't work, but it did! I queried on Facebook whether it is really air pressure that keeps the cardboard in place and my uncle responded: "In order for the water to come out of the cup, air has to get in. A hole anywhere into the cup would allow air in, which would then cause the system to collapse. But as long as it's sealed, the air pressure from all sides keeps the cardboard in place." Fascinating! And so much fun!

Miss M spends 15 minutes every day with the Book Basket!

Book basket time is occasionally met with some grumbling, but once she delves into the books, she often doesn't want to quit when the timer goes off! I love book basket time because I have 15 minutes to do some housework -- switch the laundry, run the vacuum, or put the dishes away -- or sometimes just cuddle Little Guy who has usually been off playing happily on his own.

Miss M is loving her Tagalog lessons on the computer. She's still a little too shy to use the phrases she's learning when she talks to her grandparents, but she'll get there! She at least overcame her trepidation enough to speak into the microphone and get 100% on one of her lessons!

Screen shot: Rosetta Stone Tagalog lesson

Miss M nearly knocked my socks off as we got started with Spelling Power this week. I knew she was a good speller, advanced for her age. (Keep in mind she's only six and would be in kindergarten now if I had sent her to public school). But I never expected her to test into the program at the sixth grade level! WOW! I'm so thankful that we're homeschooling and can take it all in stride and place her where she needs to be without any unnecessary drama.

Setting up the Cricut and cutting out the letters J-E-S-U-S might have been the highlight of Miss M's week. She had a million-and-one questions about how it all worked. I let her push the buttons and use the tiny spatula to lift the letters from the sticky mat.

Then she grated some peeled crayons and we made a Jesus window poster.

We sprinkled crayon bits between two pieces of waxed paper and arranged the letters in the middle. Then I ironed it all between some blank newsprint and made a pretty melted-crayon picture!

Friday we took our nature walk into the woods, just Miss M and I. Most of the snow has melted, but everything still looks dull and dead -- no signs of spring yet!

We saw some deer again and lots of animal prints! These raccoon prints led right down into a ravine.

Miss M found a bug! She observed it and sketched it, and when we got home she identified it as a Common Green Shield Bug. Then she typed it up and added it to her nature journal!

It was a wonderful week! Next week is going to be a little different schedule for us since we have some activities going on that are atypical. It'll be interesting to see how the interruptions to our status quo affect our lessons.

Come see our previous adventures:

Week 1, Week 2

The rest of our adventures:

Week 4, Week 5, Week 6,

Week 7, Week 8, Week 9, Week 10, Week 11, Week 12

Week 14, Week 15, Week 16, Week 17, Week 18, Week 19,

Week 20, Week 21, Week 22, Week 23, Week 24, Week 25,

Week 26

MFW ECC: What's different this time around?

I am so excited to go through Exploring Countries and Cultures again. The last time my kids were so little -- 3rd grade and Kindergarten. And now they are in 5th and 8th grades! They have grown so much over the past five years. As I began to think about our plan for this year, I realized two things: 1) my gifted eldest child remembers just about everything we covered in ECC the first time, and 2) my younger one hasn't had many of the basics that ECC covers. So I was faced with a dilemma -- how do I adjust ECC to suit the very different needs of both children? How do I shift the focus for my 8th grader to aspects of ECC that she hadn't spent time on before (such as types of governments, imports and exports, etc.) while also taking my younger child through the more foundational information that he missed when he was just a kindergartener? ECC is designed to be parent-led, family learning, with a supplement for 7th and 8th grade. But I came to the conclusion that I need to deco...

Review: Seed Starting by Gary Emmett (an ebook)

As I've already confessed, I am a plant murderer . I have, however, had marginal success with container gardening. The past year or two I started seedlings with my dad, which means the kids and I dropped a few seeds in pots and my dad cared for them. Once they were established outside, I was able to keep them alive long enough to harvest a few peppers and tomatoes and have a pretty pot of flowers on my doorstep. (At least until a horrid heat-wave and drought came along and killed them all; it's hard to keep containers well-watered when it's that hot!) In spite of the 10+ inches of snow on the ground right now, it's time to think about starting seeds again and I figure if I'm ever going to develop a green thumb, I better start educating myself! That is why I jumped at the opportunity to read Gary Emmett's book Seed Starting: The First Step to Gardening . (affiliate link) Available for your Kindle or Kindle app from Amazon. Currently priced at $2...

No More Quiet Time

I have always thought it sounded trite to speak of “falling in love with Jesus.” But trite or not, isn’t that what I want for my children? To learn to “love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). With that in mind, and having run across this blog post on Pinterest several months ago, I created a morning devotion basket for the kids and I to use. You see, up till now, I would typically find time to read the Bible and pray away from my children. Away from distraction, away from the demands of dust and dirty dishes, and away from the 437 questions a four-year-old asks every day. Then I realized I was doing them a major disservice by disallowing them to see me in the Word regularly. If I want them to love the Lord God, then I must show them how I love the Lord my God! Our new routine is to wake up in the morning, prepare a simple breakfast — usually cold cereal for the kids, toast and tea for me — and sit d...

CHRISTEPHI

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