Sunday, April 15, 2012

Spring is here!

Still playing catch up, sorry this one is short....We spent a week on Spring and all the activities and weather that accompany it.
Our Spring nomenclature cards. We used these to talk about some of the things that happen in the Spring time, as well as matching.

One of our kite activities, plus we flew a kite...only I forgot to take pictures  ;p

We made a wind sock out of construction paper and tissue paper to watch how the wind blows.

Spring cleaning patterns from 2 teaching mommies. We also talked about what it means to spring clean. B wasn't really thrilled with this idea.

Weather was another one of our topics for Spring -
Size sequence from 2 teaching mommies.

Counting raindrops activities also from 2 teaching mommies.

Our tornado in a bottle. B spent hours playing with this, watching the funnel, putting in the 'debre'. He loves funnels, he has to watch any draining water go down...so there was no doubt this would be a hit too. While the funnel isn't as grand as the picture on the box, it does show how a funnel begins to form and makes learning about a tornado not so scary.


Travel and school


Since I'm so far behind with post, I figured I would post about one of the reasons why I'm so behind. Travel / Vacation
Typically vacation is a time to relax and forget about school, but not with our homeschooling family, it's another great way to learn about all kinds of things. 

We kept this USA map on one wall of our RV with an arrow of where we started and our destination. Each time we stopped we'd show B where we were and how much closer we were to our stopping point.

This little book has the states and capitols, it is meant for older children but it has such simple, colorful images of each state that were nice to show B each state individually.

Another book also meant for older children, it has the licence plate for each state with all the states information listed on the back...great for mom ;) Plus it was a great find at a thrift store for .50c!

This is a simple outline of the states, slipped into a plastic sleeve. I had planned to use this as a playdoh mat, to outline each state we went through; but B was much more into the activity below.

Yep a workbook. I try to stay away from a lot of workbook style activities, but on the road they are the easiest. This was a brand new book with about 65 pages, we easily went through half in a about two hours. I used these little post-it flag markers instead of a pen, because they are easier but I get the added benefit of being able to reuse the book or a specific lesson later. B loved the little flags, he liked picking which color he would use with each activity.

Another one of our activities, from 2 teaching mommies, matching lower and upper case letters. I had planned to use a pen for this activity but B insisted on the 'flags' again.

Along the way and at our destination we did a little exploring too...
We came face to face with a very inquisitive gorilla in Arkansas. Even better was B read the word 'zoo'.  Driving to the surprise B spotted the entrance sign and said, 'hey that said zoo!' 'Z-O-O'....no pictures, just the word zoo. Um, reading maybe coming faster than I expected ;)

In Louisville, we got to watch feeding time with a Jaguar.

We also went with family to the Louisville Slugger factory...sorry no photos allowed inside :(


B practicing his baseball.

A highlight of our trip, not only visiting family but meeting Great Grandma.
B found a best friend in a few seconds as you can see from the picture, he still talks about her.

Our science lesson after a night of hail storms....an RV is not a fun place to be if it's going to hail!

Ok, so we didn't stop here, but we were going to unfortunately the weather had different ideas. Have you every been...let me know how it was.

Watching the world go by in the RV...there were so many beautiful farms along the way. B has been really into farms and wants to milk a cow, some day we'll find one.

We even got to watch a crop duster plane...they are crazy fliers.


 
Hope you enjoyed our little adventure away, we did!

Friday, April 6, 2012

President's Day

I am SO behind on posting, between life, school, illnesses, travel, and everything else blogging was not my main focus. So the next few post will be quick and simple & forgive me if I don't link or list where I got what, because at this point - I have no idea. If it's you, let me know & I'll give you credit for it. ;)


We spent two weeks learning about the Presidents, nothing too deep just a few simple activities...
Popsicle flag puzzle

P is for Penny


Flip book on Abraham Lincoln.


Abraham Lincoln paper bag puppet.


Outline of P in pennies. 2teachingmommies


A heads & tails game where we counted how many times our pennies landed on either their head or tails.


File folder game made using images from Microsoft clip art.

 
Q is for Quarter.


Outline of Q in quarters. (see link above)


Cherry tree - First color by number activity, which B did quiet well at.


Counting the cherries on the tree.


We also spent time examining the penny, quarter, dollar and five dollar bills.

 
Some of the Presidential books we read...
John, Paul, George and Ben



A Picture Book of George Washington - Presidents Day Books for Kids

The Story of Abraham Lincoln

A Picture Book of Abraham Lincoln - Presidents Day Books for Kids