Little Ninos Pizzeria- Making Pizza!

I8 and J5 finished up a unit on Little Nino's pizzeria which involved making pizza. Of course. I8 loves to help in the kitchen and this was no exception. He and I worked alone on this for the most part. We used a pizza acitivty kit to get us started and did a little experiment with our yeast. Unfortunately, the yeast were not super vibrant and the experiment flopped a bit. So, when it was time to make the dough, we used some yeast we had on hand instead.

Our yeast was not up for making big bubbles. I think they were tired.

Kneading was a bit of trouble- very sticky dough, but he had fun anyway. During his 4H presentation on making dough, this fingers really got stuck but he held it together.

He let it rise and punched it down!

Everyone loves to roll out the dough- still loving my new 2/3 sheet pans. Use them ALL the time.

Ready for the oven!

I think we need to bake the dough a touch before adding the toppings, then we'd have a blonder pizza in the end. This was a fun project which turned into a presentation for I8.

I8 used these pictures on his poster for the 4-H public presentation he did on making pizza and pizza dough. He did an excellent job even though there were a few mis-haps along the way. Next year he is going to do something less complex. On the whole though, he did really well. Great job I8!

Little Nino's Pizzeria: Nutrition

J5 and I8 worked on a food pyramid activity two weeks ago. We did lots of pizza science and nutrition with  this book. I cut up a grocery flyer and had them sort out the food into their categories. Have you seen the newest food pyramid? They don't even label the stuff you aren't supposed to eat anymore...and see the guy running up the side? That's to remind us to have better eating- one step at a time. I rather like the "four food groups" death chart I grew up with...

This worksheet link takes you to a set of sheets that help your student to determine his own habits from the day before. It's a pretty interesting exercise and raises awareness of proper portions.

Food Pyramid Worksheet

We had a great time with this unit. I'm thinking of all sorts of ways I can use the grocery flyers! In the kids' notebooks, we stored these in library pockets labeled with each food group.

Homonyms...or is it Homophone?

I8 was working with some homonyms the other day. That name might be old school, but I'm sticking with it. I used the matching game from Homeschool Share to print out these cards. The pizzas give the kids a clue as to how many words they need to look for.

After the break (we are taking two weeks of from school- though I'll still be catching up on my blogging during this time), we will try out some things from the All About Homophones book I received from All About Spelling.

In my mind, not mastering the homophones at some level, is a spelling deal-breaker. So, we do these with some regularity around here in our grammar work.

Little Ninos Pizzeria- Art Focus

J5 and I8 have been doing a FIAR study of Little Ninos Pizzeria. We are taking a break for the Christmas holiday for the next two weeks, but I will report on what we've done so far. The illustrations in the book are reminiscent of the artist Henry Matisse so we took a look at some more of his work.

This Usborne Art Treasury has a lot of fun projects inside based on the work of various art masters. In fact, J5 already knew about Henry Matisse from his Art with the Masters class at co-op.

We learned that Matisse was a painter who began to collage with bright colors as he became ill and could not see well. When we start up again in January, we'll do the project associated with Matisse.

We also have the Usborne Book of Art to use as a reference. Sure enough we found another famous collage called The Snail.

Little Nino's Pizzeria

Well the scrapbook craze is on these days and I thought we'd try it out. I think the pages turned out pretty well. The kids are doing this as their notebook for each book instead of a lapbook or other type of notebooking. Maybe it's a phase, but I was thinking of trying out a portfolio of the kid's work anyway and this way they are constructing it as we go. We'll still have work in regular notebooks, but assignments that grab the attention of the viewer or the kids really like or would really be fun to look at in the future will go in these. Plus, it's a place to put pictures of them having fun as well. So far they really enjoy the process and that's what it's all about too.

Good thing our kids love glue!! The best part of LNP? Making and eating pizza of course! We also had fun creating art like that of Matisse and his fauvism. Check our their renditions below!