Glorious Flight Five in a Row

This row will be our longest stretched out row I think.  Its not a long row but we have had a crazy begin of homeschool year.  Last week trying to get in the swing of our new work and outside activities we only did 3 days of school.  This coming week we are going away on Thursday as a family but Steve and I are going away Tuesday as a couple just for the night so only a day or so schooling there.  But this is what homeschooling for us is all about flexibility.  The family vacation will be a mixture of fun and educational fun.

The Glorious Flight

We rowed this book a long time ago.  But a field trip came up that will go along perfectly with it so here we are rowing it again.  Just picking up different points from it.

I have 2 science kits on flying and air pressure.  So we started with that.  

The first kit we started is the Magic school bus kit.  

She started with some simple experiments like blowing air between to suspended ping pong balls to see how air pressure makes them move.  Then we made 4 paper planes all a little different one with no folded wings, one with no weight, the next with a small paper clip and the last with a large paper clip, It was to see which one flew the furthest. How changing the plane effected the flight.  Then we made another plane and used scissors to make flaps on the wings to control where the plane goes.  Its fun.  

We also talked about consequences to our actions and making amends for doing something even when its an accident.  Like in the story the Dad ran into the cart and knocked everything out.  They all ended up in the cafe and the dad paid.  So even when we do something wrong even by accident its always right to make amends.  

We will continue this row next week and then have the field trip to the airplane museum the following week.

the love of a good curriculum

Samantha and I really love Five in a Row.  We enjoy it.  We both learn new things all the time because of it.  But the biggest reason I love it is its instilled a love of good books in Samantha, the love of reading.  Here she is on a Sunday afternoon reading a book.  We bought a few new books at the Dollar book store and a library sale.  Ok I puchased about 14 new books at the book sale and maybe 4 from the book store.   Yes my name is Jennifer and I have a problem I love books and buy many often.  BUT I always buy them at an amazing price no more then $1 each often less then that.

My husband said to me the other day he thinks we have too many books.  A person can never have too many books.  Silly man.  

Build a Bear

So Samantha has always wanted a build a bear.

This summer I promised her one.

We haven't had time to get there.

Last Friday build a bear had a special $5 bears.

Wow I didn't realize how big of a line it would be we waited for what seems like forever.

But Samantha got her bear. 

Here she is making the bear making it special making a wish

Here is her bear. Its name at build a bear is Hazelnut not sure if Samantha is keeping its name.  I all can say she was so happy to be getting this bear. It was so special.

First day of school

First Day of School

It started with our fun scavenger hunt to find all the cool and fun school supplies

Then we did the traditional first day of school pictures

Then we actually did some school work.  We got through almost all the subjects.  We went shopping for some supplies.  Then we went for our traditional Ihop meal.  Normally its in the morning but this day didn't start out normal.  I usually take the first day of school off from work but I couldn't this time.  So we had breakfast for supper

.  

She thought it was funny that I said she was drinking her strawberry shake like it was an IV life line she did

So overall the day was a great success.  

A slight change in curriculum

I decided to take a break from Rod and Staff this year for grammar.  

My daughter has a good handle on diagramming sentences.  

So I decided on trying Fix it Grammar. 

It looks interesting.  

We are starting it today. 

The rest stays the same.  

Information

This was shared on the Five in a Row facebook page and I thought I would pass it along here.  

kiddie records  is a list of stories for your child to listen to.  Samantha loves audio books. I usually have them playing in the car or at bed time.  I enjoy it as reading out loud to your child is good for them but I love when I get to just listen too.  

I post about some of the books we do for FIAR and listed a show we watch Travel with kids and I was really sad to realize they no longer have it on hulu.  Its something I have used for geography when we are rowing a FIAR book to help her see what the other country looks like.  You can still access some of the episodes on Amazon Prime.  But we don't have Amazon Prime. 

If you click on any  of my links and they don't work please let me know so I can fix them or delete them.  Thank you

Family Fun Night at Heritage State Park

I love that the city is trying to do things for families this summer from movie nights to fun activities.  The city built a splash pad for the kids 3 new playgrounds in the last couple of years.  The nice new bike path.  

We went as a last minute decision to the Family Fun Night at Heritage State Park down on the waterfront.  It was hot, humid and rainy.  We weren't even sure they were still holding it.  I am glad we went we had so much fun.  

There was dancing to old time music,  games of yesteryear and crafts for the kids.  They also had their summer display of Fall River History.    Fall River was once a major textile city.  We had the leading number of Spindles in Leading Textile Centers         

I love when we can have fun and add some history to our lives.  

The history of our great city

The history of wool, cotton, knitting and textiles (this would have gone along great with many of the Five in a Row books)

Some fun for the kids,  Learning to tie nautical knots, Writing our name out in nautical flags, old time game fun.  This had the kids going for a long time.  To think with all the electronics we have kids really do enjoy playing simple games.  

The family photo

A Real American Girl

With the start of the new school year the first thing we will be studying in history will be Native American's.  Then on to other early American history.  We are excited for this.  I have been looking at places to go to further our studies.  

 A few weekends ago I took Samantha to a cultural fair.  There were people from all over with all their crafts.  I was specifically looking for Native American booths.  We found an amazing artist. Her paintings were beautiful and way out of our price range.  We bought a copy of one.  I asked her if there was a story behind the picture.  She tells me its her daughter.  Then goes onto tell me how her daughter was the American Girl paper doll in the Nov, Dec 1998 issue of the American Girl Magazine and featured in the magazine.   I wish they still did that in the magazines.  Her name is Jacqueline Moorehead.  I have tried to find a picture of the full doll but so far I haven't been successful.  

Here she is in the magazine

Here she is in her mothers painting.

American Girl asked her to be the model for the Kaya Doll her mom said that she had thought about doing it but then she thought it was creepy to have people playing with you as a doll.  

I bought Samantha that doll above and a visual as we learn.  I also bought the box set of the Kaya books.  She has read almost all of them long before we start school.  But that is ok I love how excited She is to start learning about Native American's.  

Summer field trip

On Friday we went to one of the Free Friday Events.  Every Friday there are at least 5 places free to go to. The Highland foundation pays for it.  Its open to everyone.  So we try to take advantage as often as we can of this.  Sometimes the places are so crowded its not worth it like last summer when we went to the Boston Children's Museum and it was at least 45 minute wait to even get in .  It was so crowded that you could hardly do anything once inside. Other friends of our waited 2 hours to get in.  Crazy.  Then there are times like the time we went to Plymouth Plantation and it was no busier then if there was a field trip going on. 

So 2 Fridays ago we went to the Pilgrim Hall Museum.  This is one of the places I planned on going in the fall. I was thrilled we could go for free.  

The museum did a great job they had a scavenger hunt for all ages.  Samantha needed to read each clue in order to find all the great works of art through out the place.  I was glad Daddy could join us on this trip.  He usually is at work during our field trips.

  

Sitting on a replica of a chair in one of the first families in Plymouth homes

Touching a piece of the "rock"  We have been to the rock many times and its really not that impressive.  LOL  But it was nice to be able to touch a piece of history

I love spinning wheels.  But a little fact  they really didn't have any spinning wheels in the early days of Pilgrims.  But I forget what famous painting had a Pilgrim at a spinning wheel and that soon became a symbol of that time

Samantha's favorite picture in the whole Museum

 Watching and educational video of the Native American's before and after the Pilgrims.  Nice picture of Daddy and Samantha

New School Year Excitement

So we are half way through the summer.  I am already getting excited about starting a new school year in the fall.  I thought I had it all planned out.  What we were going to use.  But ideas change and I have a whole new plan.

Why I changed the plan... Steve and I have been seriously talking about moving down to North Carolina next year so we can be closer to our grandchildren.  We do live in a great area for Early American History spots.  So we are going to visit Native American's to the Civil War Era this year.  We will hopefully be able to stop at some civil war historical places along the way down to visit Mike in the spring.  I want to make sure we get to all the spots up here in New England before we move.

Also science has changed too. Originally Samantha asked to learn about Human anatomy.  But now she wants to learn about about the ocean, ocean creatures, and beaches. Also in this study we she will be learning about live around a fresh water pond.  The ocean study because once we move down south the ocean will be about a 4 hour drive.

We will continue with our FIAR studies.  I had hoped to be finished with volume 4 but life got in the way so we will be finishing up volume 4 and then moving onto Beyond Five in a Row. I already have all of Beyond Volumes and the books.  Samantha loves FIAR so much she asked if she can finish the stories for FIAR volume 4 first.  I did purchase all the digital volumes too.  This should be shaping up to be a great year.

So the line up is:
Grammar- Rod and Staff
Math- Teaching Textbooks
History- Living Books, Five in A Row studies & Field Trips
Science- Living Books, Five in A Row Studies, hands on Experiments & Field Trips
Spelling- Spelling You See
Health- It's Great to Be a Girl! Finish this book from last year
Reading- Reading great books.

New School Year Excitement

So we are half way through the summer.  I am already getting excited about starting a new school year in the fall.  I thought I had it all planned out.  What we were going to use.  But ideas change and I have a whole new plan.

Why I changed the plan... Steve and I have been seriously talking about moving down to North Carolina next year so we can be closer to our grandchildren.  We do live in a great area for Early American History spots.  So we are going to visit Native American's to the Civil War Era this year.  We will hopefully be able to stop at some civil war historical places along the way down to visit Mike in the spring.  I want to make sure we get to all the spots up here in New England before we move.

Also science has changed too. Originally Samantha asked to learn about Human anatomy.  But now she wants to learn about about the ocean, ocean creatures, and beaches. Also in this study we she will be learning about live around a fresh water pond.  The ocean study because once we move down south the ocean will be about a 4 hour drive.

We will continue with our FIAR studies.  I had hoped to be finished with volume 4 but life got in the way so we will be finishing up volume 4 and then moving onto Beyond Five in a Row. I already have all of Beyond Volumes and the books.  Samantha loves FIAR so much she asked if she can finish the stories for FIAR volume 4 first.  I did purchase all the digital volumes too.  This should be shaping up to be a great year.

So the line up is:
Grammar- Rod and Staff
Math- Teaching Textbooks
History- Living Books, Five in A Row studies & Field Trips
Science- Living Books, Five in A Row Studies, hands on Experiments & Field Trips
Spelling- Spelling You See
Health- It's Great to Be a Girl! Finish this book from last year
Reading- Reading great books.

Five in a Row- Hanna's Cold Winter

We just finished up this row.  It was a real fun row for us as the setting is in Hungary and I just found out that my husband and daughter have a lot of Hungarian in them.

So we spent time learning all about Budapest, Hungary. We read the manual, watched a documentary   and looked at video's and pictures of Hungary's folk art, folk dancing and traditional Hungarian music. We watcha short video of a Hungary folk tale  I have a few more websites we looked at for Hungary on my pinterest,  We both really enjoyed learning about Hungary.

We learned about history and what it was like in Hungary during and after WWII.  We learned about the Cog-railway that Tibor's family rode to get to and return from the zoo.  We also learned about the type of the fireplace they showed in the book was from that time period.  We combined science with this when learning about the cog-railway and friction.  We watched the episode of the Magic School bus on Netflix on friction Season 1 Episode 10.  We talked about how at one time people worked 6 days a week and that was normal.  Now if we work that many days its called overtime.  

For language arts I asked Samantha if she could tell me what point of view the story was told from.  Right away she told first person point of view. She was correct. We talked about the parts of the story.  What the conflict is, what the plot is and the resolution is.  We talked about how the Dad like to tell riddles and we looked up a few.  

We talked about the art of the book.  Who the artist was.  How she used water colors to create the beautiful illustrations.  We talked Poetry and said a real cute poem about the Hippopotamus.  We discussed Architecture.  She looked at the Lion Bridge and Cover building.  I then showed her pictures of those in real life and how they still stand today.  If you have time look up the zoo on google maps.  I had her do an oil pastel water color painting.  It came out very cute. It didn't turn out like the lesson I had found said it would the oil pastel repelled the watercolor unlike the lesson one.  I kind of thought it would.  It supposed to be the hippo in the water.  

We listened to some classical Hungarian music, Hungarian Folk music and looked up the musician Franz Liszt and listened to his type of music, rhapsody.  He used leitmotif which is a recurring theme representing a person, idea or event. We listened on youtube the famous piece of music called "The Blue Danube Waltz"  Written about the river Danube that flows through Hungary right down the middle of Buda and Pest.  It also flows through Austria , Germany and a few other countries.  

Science,  We talked about the Paprika pepper.  Then we used Paprika in our cooking.  I used the recipe in the book for Hungarian Goulash.  We also talked about hot springs, Hippopotamuses, and zoo history.  

The Goulash was very yummy I wish I took a picture of it but I forgot. Both Samantha and Steve said they would eat it again if I cooked it.  I have so far loved the recipes we tried from the manual.  

There were a few more lessons in the book. Some we did others we didn't.  We both really enjoyed the book and all that went along with it.  

Samantha turned 11

Its so hard to believe that my baby is 11 years old.  For her birthday this year she wanted to throw a charity party.  She wanted her friends and family to bring no gifts for her but to bring cat and dog supplies to be donated to the local animal shelter.  I was so proud of her.  Here are a few pictures from the day.

Samantha decorated the cake and cupcakes all herself

The kids all having fun creating their pictures

A few days later we went to the shelter and donated all the animal supplies and one of the painting from the party.  I am so proud her of.

Day Dreams

Samantha is a dreamer.  She will day dream during school, during car rides, during bath time well anytime.  Sometimes it can be a big pain that she is daydreaming.  BUT other times it works in my favor that she is... well one day she was doing a lot of daydreaming but she somehow managed to get 2 whole days done in math without realizing it.  I love those moments

Winter Nature Walk

I know this is getting posted late but its so pretty I had to share..

Samantha and I took a walk along the board walk.  The ice looked so pretty...

Math in action

I often try to show Samantha math in action. Like cooking with her, showing her how I use math in knitting or even math in her sewing projects.    

I was about to give her math for the day it was a worksheet on measuring in metric.  So instead of her just doing it on paper I had her go out and measure my car. Measure the width and length of it. Then measure the height of it and the measurement of the wheels.  She then had to come in the house and convert it all into the American measurements.   

Then another day she came up with an idea of wanting to make the cat a toy to play with.  I had her use math again.  She had to measure the clothe  to make it the right size.  I love seeing math in action

So how do you do school in your home???

I like to hear how others do school.  Its interesting how each family homeschools.  There are so many methods out there. There are so many different life styles.  Some homeschool parents are home all day others work.  Some spend a lot of time at activities others do many classes.  I try for a healthy balance with working part time, getting school done and doing the fun classes and activities.

Oh and add 2 cats into the mixture this is how Samantha ends up doing school some days. Other days the other cat will try and sit right on her school work.

I do have to say I came up with a new system that seems to be working for us.  Our days can get crazy at times.  Some days she begs me to keep reading history or science.  Some days she is on a roll with math and I don't want to stop that flow.  So I started making instead of a daily schedule but a weekly list of all that I want done that week so if something has really sparked her interest we can keep on going with no interruptions of me going to the schedule to see what pages come next.  I keep the list with each subject books.  It is working amazingly.  It also helps her see what needs doing and how much she has accomplished.  There are times when she gets all school done by Thursday and that means Friday can be fun activity day, get in the car for an adventure day or anything we want to do day.  

Beach Nature Walk

We have been trying to add more nature into our days. So when a friend text asking us if we wanted to join then on a nature walk  we went.  My challenge to myself is to get outside whenever we can.  

Drawing in their nature journals.