Cool Dad Homeschooling Moments...

Sorry for the blogging delay! It's been a busy MOPS week...or I should say a busy week catching up on life after a busy MOPS week. Hopefully, I'm back in the groove.

So, Dan brought home some temperature probes from work. They are one time use boxes that come with a chemical that must be kept above freezing. So there is a chart inside that records the temperature during the trip. When it arrives, Dan cracks open the case to see if the temp dipped below freezing. If it has, they return the chemical.

One day a whole bunch of boxes arrived with the detectors but only one needed to be opened so Dan brought the rest home for the kids.

It runs on a battery.

Here's where the temperature is recorded.

Here's the coil which is a bi-metal strip (no I didn't know that, but E10 remembered and he just told me...see a good lesson!)

Dan heats up the bi-metal strip to show the kids how it will move. The strip has two metals in it and one wants to expand more than the other. Since it can't go anywhere like it normally does (being attached to the other metal) it puts more curl in the coil. This moves a plastic thing attached to the scratch paper and it makes marks. And that is how it records the temperature! Again, E10 just provided that review.

The kids put these boxes in a few places around the house- one went in the attic, one in the freezer and one in the frig. They opened them up to check out the readings.
The one in the middle shows you how they are all rolled up before you pull them to check on them. Click on the picture below and see if you can figure out which one is which!

The kids decided to move them again so one is in the car, one is in our basement, and the last one is in the boys' room.

Another fine adventure in what Dad thinks is cool for the homeschool!

Math Journaling

Once upon a time...

Shonda asked to hear more about our math journals. It's been a while ago now, but I'm ready to answer! The idea of writing in math has been around a long time. When I was still a classroom teacher in Maryland in the 90s it was all the rage and math teachers were trying to figure out how to manage it.

Since my kids enjoy math puzzles and like to try and figure out longer problems or hands on problems or just otherwise interesting problems outside of their math workbooks, I thought I'd try out the math journal.

I was further inspired by and article in The Old Schoolhouse Magazine back in February- when I became enthralled while flying to Denver. The article is from the Winter 2008-2009 issue and is entitled, Mind-Mannered Math No More. The author, Cheryl Bastarache, explains how she organizes a math journal for her kids. Actually, that issue had several math articles another one I enjoyed was about Integrating Math into Everyday Life. I find we talk a lot about how to solve everyday problems as we go about our day. For example, the day I made the bubble solution we needed 2.5 quarts of water. I told the kids that 4 cups equaled a quart. I-6 said we'd need 8 cups then. When told him we actually needed another half quart he replied, without missing a beat, that it would mean 10 cups. This would make a fine math journal entry!

You have to make a choice about what kind of notebook you will use for a math journal. You can use bound notebooks, three prong folders, or a loose leaf binder with dividers. I like the flexibility of the binder so that's what we've gone with. Mrs. Bastarache suggests the following sections within the journal:

• copywork- lists like days of the week using StartWrite or math quotations which she says you can Google.
• research-facts from math biographies, history of math or other topics of interest- her family studied the history of the calendar, the history of the Canadian dollar (she's Canadian), and early calculators. They've also done the mathematics of cartography, tessellations, probability, and genetics. They've used lots of creative methods to share the research like lapbooks, skits, comics, etc.
• challenges- puzzles, games and anything that requires them to think beyond where they are right now. The key is to make sure they explain how they got an answer.
• responses- this could be answers to open-ended questions, making up their own problems with solutions, and logs about math literature
• fun stuff- puzzles from magazines, printouts from computer games, sketches of answers to domino problems, and work from the Roddles book or pattern block activities, or even making their own math games.
  

R8's math journal- She's been working from Math for Girls- this was a problem about hair

She had to figure use doll measurements and her own measurements to decide whether or not if she was the size of her doll if the doll's clothes would fit her. Turns out no! This was all about proportion.

Measuring her own proportions

Another source for math journaling

This was a great activity on understanding when to multiply and divide.

I found the April Math Calendar at Homeschool Math Blog.Looking forward to when the May calendar is posted!

A math puzzle for E10 from the book The Junior Big Book of Games published by Games Magazine. Remember that one? I used to use this puzzle book for my skills classes back in the day.

This is where E10 does his Life of Fred math so far. This is a superb little program that is all about well Fred. You HAVE to get your hands on Fred. Make sure to visit the website and read all about Fred. Both of my older kids sat down and read the whole of Fred when it arrived. It's all about a 5yo boy who teaches at Kittens University and how he wants to buy a bike.

Math webites and blogs to check out:

• Homeschool Math
• Homeschool Math Blog
• Let's Play Math
• Critical Thinking Puzzles- a puzzle each day. Sweet.

We use Horizons Math as our math curriculum. It's thorough, visually pleasing and cheap. There is a lot out there for math. I don't plan to change things now. We are invested with Horizons having all the teacher materials through grade 6.

I have to bend and stretch Horizons to make it fit every child. However, it does provide our core program. I wonder if I can be brave in the future...brave enough to make math journaling the main piece of the curriculum. First I think I'll get I-6 started on one and see what he can do.

Fractions

The other day I worked on fractions with R8. She had to name the fractions pictured and then order them from greatest to least. She did it correctly but couldn't explain why. So, told her that as the denominator gets bigger the fraction gets smaller...confused look. So, I pulled out the fraction pieces.

Then it was easier to see!

The Strawberry Pincushion!

Is finished! R8 has been working on her pincushion- a place for the pins she uses in her sewing projects. She pretty well did the whole thing by herself and she did a terrific job.

She wasted no time in getting those pins in there...

This is the book we used for the project. In typical Klutz style, it comes with what you need to do each project.

Next up we are working on a bag for her American Girl dolls. It's a fleece bag which is lined with a contrasting color. We are early on pinning the pattern to the fabric, but I will update as we go along.

The bag is a machine project and I like her to have a hand sewing project going so she is choosing up the next one. She might go with the Buggabug pies. We'll see. Each day her sewing is in one of her workboxes so she spends time on her sewing daily.

R8 is a very talented seamstress for her age. She and I will be going to a quilting group at church starting in May. I can't wait to finish the first one! We are both very excited.

WorkBox Update

Thanks to my pal Cindy, I was able to complete the fourth rack. We've been at it ever since. I'm not sure we've gotten up to the 12 boxes just yet, but I am sure we will.

The kids love them and as long as they are loaded on time, we are good to go every day.

This method definitely keeps a homeschooling mom on her toes!

Stay tuned for some adventures from the boxes this week.

Introducing Email at Blog, She Wrote

Lately, I've been getting the hint that maybe I should give readers the chance to contact me by email...I love email.

So...

My handsome husband, avid blog reader, and rockin' IT guy has just made arrangements for me to receive blog email!

It's in my right hand side bar, but I wanted to make sure I brought it to everyone's attention.

Feel free to drop a line at blogshewrote(at)twcny.rr.com. I'd love to hear from you!

The Garden Party

On Thursday we went on another field trip into our little village. The library was co-sponsoring a Garden Party with the Cooperative Extension. I only found out about it a few days ahead of time, but I'm so glad we went. It was a spectacular day for this time of the spring in NY and we had a great walk down to the firehall where the party was to be held. Take a look at some of the fun things we did.

There was a mural for the kids to draw on. I-6 is drawing his version of a flower.

All the kids go to plant lots of veggies...

J3 could NOT get enough of planting the seeds.

I-6 and R8 went to the sprout table before the others- they got a good look at bunches of seeds when they put together their sprout kits.

The Sprouts. This is about a four day growth. The kids are anxious to try this out. Question: Will they really eat them?

E10 and J3 put a sprout kit together as a team. J3 has a thing for radish seeds. Yes, the sprouts are spicy too!

Another mural- this time they got to make a collage from seed catalogs.

The Haul. I had prepared to take home a few potted plants in a dishpan. We ended up with a whole flat of plants!! What you have to picture is me carrying this flat up a hill for a 1.5 mile walk back to our house! Along with the backpack on my back carrying a my Canon Digital Rebel and the library books.

In addition to the fun pictured above, the kids got to make several more garden crafts AND the Cooperative Extension did a presentation for the parents. I was able to bring home a big packet of information on gardening which I think will helpful to me just starting out.

What did we plant?

• radishes
• pumpkins- lots of pumpkins
• carrots
• sunflowers- yes more...
• tomatoes- several varieties
• marigolds
• sweet peas

Plus we brought home mixed lettuce seed and more marigold seeds to plant. If all of our seedlings make it until Memorial Day, then I don't think we'll buy much more. I did pick up some lupine seeds, cucumber seeds, big tomato seeds, and some pepper seeds that we haven't planted yet.

We just split the flat up and watered them today using a spray bottle with J3 thinks is the coolest. They are in our basement (which is actually very sunny). Wish us luck!!

Science Center Field Trip

We have a terrific local science center where we are members and it's always fun to pop in there when we can. It's a favorite place for our 3yo because of the water table for preschoolers. Last Wednesday they were having a seed program for kids because it was spring break for the public schools. Of course we had to attend!

I-6 uses the tweezers to dissect a lima bean.

His turned out so well. It was easy to see all the seed parts that will become the bean plant.

Besides planting a sunflower, the kids made a bean book. This clever little bean model will become a part of our botany notebook.

Of course there are other exhibits to visit. One favorite is the dam table. Based on progress here, I informed the townspeople down stream to evacuate!

There is a discovery room where you can take out activity boxes. The kids love being in there. This is a box full of magnets that J3 and I played with.

R8 likes the spinner box.

Each box shows the contents and has multiple sets of directions and materials. There are all kinds of boxes relating to the different areas of science. They even have boxes for preschoolers.

We visited the earthquake table. You have to try and build a stable structure and when you press a button and move a dial you can see how your building stands up to an earthquake.

We met long time friends of ours at a pizza place for lunch and then enjoyed the afternoon at the center. A great field trip!

Very Silly Sentences

One of the items in I-6's Easter basket was the Very Silly Sentences game. I wasn't sure how this would be different from the other DK word games we have, but it looked like it had some more going on. It sure does!

You get to move around the board using a multi-faceted die and use the spinner to see what part of speech you get to pick from the piles. As you go around the board you build your sentence. I-6 did a great job reading all his words. This is a very nice game that we all enjoyed.

This is a sideways close up of the sentences we were building. This game will provide a lot of fun reading times!

This one will be showing up in the workboxes from time to time that is for sure.

Play Dough

J3 loves his play dough! He plays at least once a day. Everyday he has a workbox full of play dough fun. We have a lot of play dough tools. A lot. Every once in a while I rotate the tools so we don't have them all out at once. Recently, I went through the tools and the play doh in our boxes in the craft closet and I got rid of old play doh and switched out some tools. That was productive!

I pulled out the alphabet shapes that you can use with play doughs. What a great preschool item! I bought these at Discount School Supply, but they no longer have them. I know that craft stores sell the Wilson cookie cutters in large bins that have letters in them. We have those too for use in the kitchen of course.

I love the mat. I only wish it had all the letters on it. We had a grand time making the letters and talking about them. This will be nice to have on hand as J3 plays with his favorite play dough.

For inquiring minds, no I do not make my own play dough. I have done it and to be honest I don't like the texture and Play Doh is so inexpensive it doesn't seem worth the time and effort.

More Gardening Books

I wanted to share some other resources I've come across for studying plants. Our kit from Delta Education arrived on Thursday and I haven't had the chance to check it out a whole lot. We spent this past week enjoying some great field trips with a plant theme. I'm eager to share them with you. Stay tuned!

This nature book is for kids ages 4 to 7 and has some simple activities in it. There are activities on both plants and animals. I love the way she outlines an activity and then follows it up with a So Now We Know section. Ms. VanCleave's books for older kids do the same thing. She makes sure you know why something happens.

This book has experiments you can do with plants. It's part of the series Janice VanCleave has out on science fair projects. We may use this one to show examples of a concept we talk about or I may give E10 the challenge of doing some of these to further investigate something.

This DK book is for kids and teaches you about growing various foods and how to cook and enjoy them. There are fantastic photos (it is DK after all) and some fun tips. As we get started with the planting and growing we will keep this one in mind.

Another fun gardening with kids resource I found at our local library. Lots of gardening projects in here along with puzzles, recipes, crafts and gardening themed reading lists

I'm really ready to go here! This past week was spring break for the local schools and we were able to take advantage of some field trips related to our unit. The kids are very excited. We may get a chance to start preparing the ground in our garden beds. It's still too early to plant anything here- except for maybe peas. Memorial Day is our safe bet. Until then I have some seeds to get going. More on that later...

I Caught the Bug...

Have you seen the cute felt patterns at Buggabugs? She has some cute stuff on there. Lots of folks at FIAR have been using these in the workboxes.

We'll see how this pattern goes, but I'm interested in the grocery patterns and the veggie patterns- the veggies would be so nice for our gardening unit.

I'll be sure to post some updates as we get this project rolling. Felt food seems to be all the rage. R8 and I think this is a really cute project for a 4-H Fair entry this summer. Yes?

Easter

Finally getting around to putting up our Easter photos...these are snippets from the whole week. On Palm Sunday we went to visit former neighbors and friends of the family who moved about an hour away or so. What a fun time we had!

On Saturday morning we went to an Easter breakfast at our church. Wow! It was really packed out and there was a great egg hunt for the kids. We had a nice time and when we got home it was still really early so we had a day of working and playing outside. Dan made a window sill for our dining room and I stripped a window I've been working on as a gift. That was the day of the Cherry Bomb too. It was cold but it was a good day!

On Easter Sunday the kids did their Easter basket scavenger hunts and then we went to church. Our dinner did not turn as planned whatsoever, but we did end up with ham. I was hoping for braised ribs...

J3 had a grand time coloring eggs. He just dyed them over and over. He didn't care he only had four to work with!

I-6 was very patient and got some really deep colors.

Mr. D tries his hand at a tie dyed egg- a technique highly criticized by his wife. Notice he protects his hands from the delicate procedure.

The kids follow and elaborate scavenger hunt to find their Easter baskets. R8's basket was in the oven this year. She found an American Girl felt craft book and some felt along with some much needed white Sculpey which reminds me that she has some Sculpey creations to share.

E10 found a new game- Castle Keep, a Scrabble dictionary which he adores (so look out competition), and a Scrabble puzzle book

I-6 found his basket in the dryer and in it was a reading game, a Star Wars book, and a timer bookmark. We made sure to tape the back of it since that battery door is lame. I'm just sayin'. If you haven't seen this before they time kids while they read. They can time up or down and there is a clock with an alarm. It's all very cool. R8 loves hers. The kids got these at Christmas one year and the resident toddler proceeded to pop all the batteries out. There was only one working left. Now I'm inspired to seek them out and replace their batteries.

J3 is all about his bubble gun. All about it. He also found a Curious George book and The Runaway Bunny on CD.

Some of you might remember the carnage from last year involving store bought bubbles. So, J3 knew he could do bubbles with a bubble gun and of course I need to keep up with the homemade bubble solution. No bubbles near the mouth J3! Since that day he has spent most of the week outdoors blowing bubbles. Indeed.