Geography Project Presentation + Happy Halloween!

Zoey's choice for her Geography project this time around was to create a portfolio board and present an oral presentation covering fashion trends in the United States. She also created a quiz for her audience to complete.

We are wrapping up our current studies of North America and this fits in with that and incorporates something that she is interested in as well. She created a little red "runway" of sorts for her Barbie dolls that were in different styled clothing and took pictures of them all on the runway sharing the category their clothing style fit in to.

She is a very good speaker and she did an excellent job. She also shared some of her clothing that fit into each category of dress that she spoke about as well. You could tell that she had done her research as she knew what it was she was talking about and could field my questions when I asked her several. It was a fun project that she completely did on her own since I've been busy these past several days with library programming and Halloween festivities etc. through my job working at the library.

Sunday we finished up reading the book Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech. Zoey cried and was pretty upset upon finishing it up because it was so sad. She's a pretty emotional and empathetic kiddo. She doesn't choose to read books that she knows will be sad so this was hard. We had a good talk about it though and I'm so glad we read it. So many important things to ponder over with that book. So many gifts to be had from it.

Hoping to press pause on our geography curriculum and start in on our election studies tomorrow!

And because it's Halloween...here are some silly photos of Zoey as a mad scientist!

Happy Halloween!!

P.S. In case you have some candy in the house that you would like to get rid of, why not try one of these leftover candy science experiments?

Busy Week!

This past week has been super busy for us. I had some additional programming to take care of at the library (where I work part-time as our community's youth services librarian). Extra work for me meant for mostly independent work for Zoey and the feeling of less school over all (with the exception of math and reading which she diligently worked on moving forward with). I kind of feel like this was a bum week for us, our first this year. That said, I'm trying not to feel too badly about things because one of our area public schools had Wed-Fri off this week. We're a bit "behind" where I thought we would be at this point but will use this next week to get back to where I want to be. I guess the beauty of homeschooling is having true flexibility! 

One of her new favorite books that she's reading for science lately is this one...

She is continuing to really enjoy Guest Hollow's Human Anatomy studies. I am too, it's content rich, includes many different ways of reaching the learner and for me, it's laid out so clearly that we can just pretty much open and go and if I need materials I can seek them out in advance and feel ready for whatever is coming next. Super awesome.

For geography, literature and reading we are hoping to wrap up her current study of North America and the two books that she is reading Walk Two Moons and Navigating Early. She is also wrapping up her project on Fashion in the U.S. (her choice geography project).

After starting in on Writing with Skill I think we're backing away from it again and going to stick with the copywork, dictation, and narration suggested that's written into the Build Your Library curriculum as well as incorporating some of Brave Writer into the mix. Zoey is finding it (WWS) dry and repetitive and I am too. When I look ahead and see that it appears to be more of the same, just presented in different ways, I think it would make for a very long and perhaps not joyous year of outlining, outlining and more outlining.

Some things that I'm excited about that are coming up...

We're planning on wrapping up our current studies upon finishing up our books next week and moving into a study of the election process. Mostly using books, online resources, and some electoral maps I've found online. All of the books we're using I found through the library. Yay!

Upon finishing our mini election unit study we're (so excitedly!!!) going to move into a month long study of Winter Holidays around the World. Zoey is so pumped about this and so am I. This will be our rebel act of homeschooling this year I think (haha!). We're making it fun! It will fit into our geography studies nicely and also allow for us to ease into the holidays ourselves. That's the idea anyways. I am finding the books that we'll be using through Thrift Books and it's a mix of non-fiction chapter books and picture books featured around the Winter Solstice, Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and the Chinese New Year celebrations. I'll be using a mix of BYL's Unit Study and other things, beefing it up a bit with other resources so that it's a bit meatier.

So, that's what's up in our corner of the world lately...lots that we're doing and even more that we're planning.

This Week...

This past weekend Zoey volunteered to help out at her third birthday party through her dance company...this is the second one that she's walked away with a tip afterwards. I think this taste of financial greatness has been a good one for her. It's just enough for her to perk up at the idea of "working" at something other than her schoolwork or housework/chores. I can see her mind thinking ahead to possible part-time jobs that she could have in the near future, which is fun to see. 

This week we are talking about muscles, joints, and tendons in science. One of our activities today was to have her do some tasks "thumbless" by taping her thumbs down. She did some writing, cutting, sweeping, tied shoes and made a cup of hot chocolate all without her thumbs. It was pretty tricky! She also made a model of a long bone and discovered that her skeleton is estimated at weighing just 16 pounds!!!

In geography we are still talking about North America and she had to choose to do another independent project. She chose to do one on fashion in the United States. We got some supplies for her project today and she's really excited to get started in on it. Some interesting books that she is reading currently are Material World: A Global Family Portrait and Hungry Planet: What the World Eats...both really shed light on the places that she is learning about. Her reader for geography currently is Navigating Early by Clare Vanderpool. My...this book is a good read! We are taking turns reading the chapters aloud to one another and today we were both in tears! 

We are also reading the book Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech and wow...wow...WOW! I can't say enough good things about this book. I can't believe that I haven't read this book already in my lifetime, perhaps I should be embarrassed about that? We are actually listening to the audio book before bed every night and I find myself thinking about things from the story the next day. Rolling them around, savoring them. This is a goosebumps kind of book. At least for me. :) One that I know will stick with her and I both, long after the story is over. 

This is about where we are at in the book right now and this particular quote hit me and left me thinking and my heart aching a bit actually, if I'm being honest...

"As I walked home, I thought about the message. In the course of a lifetime, what does it matter? I said it over and over. I wondered about the mysterious messenger, and I thought about all the things in the course of a lifetime that would not matter. I did not think cheerleading tryouts would matter, but I was not so sure about yelling at your mother. I was certain, however, that if your mother left, it would be something that mattered in the whole long course of your lifetime."

Photo credit Journal Prompts

I'm so excited about the books that we are reading this year...it's just so amazing, this journey we both are on. 

We've started in on Writing with Skill for some "official" writing...I kind of am still in test mode here with this curriculum, but so far, so good it seems. It's starting out with having her work on narrative summaries which is kind of boring but important. She's wordy like me so it's hard to pare things down to the bare minimum when summarizing! I'm still working on incorporating Brave Writer into the mix of things too which really isn't that difficult so far. 

This week and next week I have some library programming that will pull some of my attention away from schooling but it shouldn't be too difficult to manage seeing that it's Halloween stuff for the most part and is programming that Zoey and her friends will be able to participate in as well. 

If I'm being honest, things are going swimmingly so far...I find myself having these moments of pure joy when I think that we are homeschooling. I want to shout it out to someone, share our excitement, but really don't know if there is someone that would "get it" at this point. We'll just continue to go on being secretly thrilled with life for now. 

Our First Poetry Tea!

Feeling inspired to implement the Brave Writer philosophy and practices into our homeschooling routine...we're starting slowly to navigate these waters. Yesterday marked our first Poetry Teatime and it was absolutely lovely! 

It was a cold and dreary day, perfect for putting on a kettle of hot water for tea and to enjoy some baked treats along with some poetry reading with my girl. 

We made it special by getting out a tablecloth, some pretty teacups and teapot (that belonged to my grandmother). We lit a candle and set out some other little pretties about to make our table complete.

We LOVED our first poetry teatime! I know that we'll be looking forward to this weekly happening now for sure. For some reason I was nervous initially to take this on...having done it yesterday though and it being a success, I can't wait for our next poetry tea! I'm already thinking ahead about having some themed ones relating to holidays or specific poets, etc. 

Just another reason to love homeschooling!

Naked Egg Experiment!

Another fun experiment that we did this week while studying about the skeletal system was the Naked Egg Experiment. SO FUN! We let an egg (regular, not hard boiled!) soak in vinegar for one day. Zoey removed the egg from the vinegar and rinsed it under water and the shell just rinsed away...

leaving a gelatinous, rubbery egg with no shell!

Super cool experiment! We are going to now put it in a cup of water and it's supposed to expand, showing osmosis...this experiment was showing how the acid from the vinegar removed the calcium carbonate from the hard egg shell. It was to show what acid can do to the enamel on teeth.

2 CH3COOH + CaCO3 = Ca(CH3COOH)2 + H2O + CO2
Acetic acid + Calcium carbonate = Calcium acetate + Water + Carbon dioxide

Bend-y Bones!

So this week in science we've been covering the skeletal system...everything bones! It's been a fun unit with lots of manipulatives and experiments. One of Zoey's experiments was to soak a bone in vinegar (an acid) and to see what happened.

The vinegar ended up pulling out the calcium from the bone and thus made the bones rubbery and bendable! Definitely not as strong. We let our chicken bones soak for two days...the small bones were completely bendable and the larger leg bone was soft and bendable on the ends. We think that had we kept it soaking for one more day it too would have been completely bendable like the smaller bones.

This was a super fun experiment and showed just how important calcium is to bones!

Meet Mr. Bones

For science this week Zoey also put together a skeleton we have lovingly given the name Mr. Bones to...we've decided he'll be perfect Halloween decor too! After putting him all together she wrote the names of the bones on him and we have him on display in the school room for now.

 Zoey was impressed with his size.

She also put together a simple mobile showing the carpals, metacarpals and phalanges in the hands and the tarsals, metatarsals and phalanges in the feet.

To say that we are LOVING Guest Hollow's anatomy curriculum so far would be an understatement! It's really engaging in all the right ways. Surprisingly to me, she is also enjoying reading the book Blood, Bones, and Body Bits. I had originally shared with her that she could skip it if she wanted because to my quick perusal, it looked a bit over the top silly to me...but, she loves it and now that I've looked more closely at it, I have to say it is pretty cool after all.

Science Studies This Week

For science this year we're studying human anatomy with health and survival skills mixed in later in the year. This week we've moved into talking about the skeletal system and while this little plastic model isn't specific to just the skeletal system, Zoey went ahead and did a little investigating by way of dissection of this model. It is pretty cool and is something she can reassemble and do over and over as many times as she wants.

A book came with the model and takes you through the human body, bit by bit, as you dissect and investigate.

It also has an organ-izer for all of your body parts...haha!

A fun little hands on project to throw into the mix this week. We'll be doing this again as we talk about other parts of the body I am sure.

Right now we have it on her science table downstairs in the school room so she can look it over anytime she wants.

Skeletal System - Unit Links for Zoey

[This post is content for Zoey to utilize while working independently this week.]

Brain Pop! Skeleton
Brain Pop! Human Body Structure movie
Brain Pop! Broken Bones
Bones and Skeletal System movie
Skeleton game or Learn the Skeletal System
Brain Games Episode 1 (you can watch this at the library online OR we can watch it at home together)

Our September Homeschool Hours!

Okay...we're first time homeschoolers here, so I may be going a wee bit overboard with my recording of hours and with my expectations overall, etc. All that said, I'm super happy to have figured out that our first month of homeschooling gave us 139 hours to record for the state! Woo-hoo!! Way to go Zoey and way to go mama!! Wisconsin requires 875 hours of instruction throughout the school year. We are well on our way and I feel like it's pretty safe to say we're going to go over that required number.

Did it feel like 139 hours? Yes, pretty sure it did. For both Zoey and I. :)  She mentioned to me at the end of last week that she feels like she's done more in this one month than in the last three years of public school. YIKES! I will just say, we had a little chat about that and we're both planning on adjusting our expectations a bit to meet in the middle a little better. That said, do I think we may have over-done things here and there? Yes, especially on those first few days...I might be learning to lighten up just a smidge. Did I record everything...as in every-little-thing? Yes, I did! I am counting any library programs, activities, free reading, dance classes, hikes, etc. that she takes part in. It all counts, so I'm counting it! Were most of our recorded hours actual school "work" hours? YES!

We're feeling like we may have hit a little bit of a groove I think and I have to say, it feels good. This week is exciting because we're starting in on some new topics and new books. In Science we're moving into learning about the skeletal system and in Geography we're talking about North America and Zoey will be starting in on reading Hungry Planet: What the World Eats and Material World: A Global Family Portrait. These will both be spines that she refers to as she travels around the world, along with her book Geography of the World. We are reading the book titled, Navigating Early together and discussing it starting this month and for Literature she is starting to read the book Walk Two Moons.

Homeschool Happenings for the Last Week of September

Some of the things accomplished last week...

Geography //

Zoey started in on and completed a geography project in which she created a travel brochure for those wishing to learn more about visiting Alaska.

She prepared a Canadian meal from scratch for her family...Maple Chicken, Wild Rice w/ Mushrooms and a Blueberry Crisp.

She finished up working on a smaller project dealing with graphing place name origins of towns and villages within a state of her choosing, in the US. She chose Wisconsin.

She also worked on some map work locating different places and water masses on the map of North America.

Literature & Writing //

She finished up working on a writing project relating to the finishing up of our reading of A Wrinkle in Time.

Art //

She recently worked on drawing up her own map (she chose to draw up a treasure map) tying into her geography studies of mapmaking and mapmakers. She did a leaf etching of a maple leaf and is currently working on a pencil sketch of a moose (also tying into Canada/North America studies).

World Religions //

Started reading the book In the Beginning: Creation Stories from Around the World (which she is finding really interesting).

Science //

Consisted mostly of reading this past week along with some internet research. She learned about Dolly the Sheep in her wrapping up of studying genetics and cloning.