Christmas Ideas...Getting Kids Ready for It

I wanted to prepare my kids for Christmas and really have them meditate on the meaning of it.  I found this website:

http://www.biblestoryprintables.com/Pages/BibleCrafts/NamesofJesus.html

There is an advent activity to do with your kids every day for the month of December.  We started today.  Actually, we did not print out the Names of Jesus ornaments but rather we drew them and decorated themselves.  My kids like to be creative.  My son dislikes just coloring something.  He'd rather come up with things on his own.  :)  You can either hang these on your tree or my kids decided they wanted to string them along the wall.

We also are going to read through the following passages that deal with the coming and birth of Jesus.

Sun. Is. 40:1-5
Mon. Is. 52:7-10
Tue. Is. 40:9-11
Wed. Gen. 3:8-15
Thu. Gen. 15:1-6
Fri. Deut. 18:15-19
Sat. Ps. 89:1-4

Second Week

Sun. Is. 11:1-10
Mon. Zech. 6:12-13
Tue. Mic. 5:2-4
Wed. Mal. 3:1-6
Thu. John 1:1-8
Fri. John 1:9-18
Sat. Mark 1:1-3

Third Week

Sun. Luke 1:5-13
Mon. Luke 1:14-17
Tue. Luke 1:18-25
Wed. Luke 1:39-45
Thu. Luke 1:46-56
Fri. Luke 1:57-66
Sat. Luke 1:67-80

Fourth Week

Sun. Is. 7:10-14
Mon. Luke 1:26-35
Tue. Is. 9:2-7
Wed. Mt. 1:18-25
Thu. Luke 2:1-20
Fri. Mt. 2:1-2
Sat. Luke 2:21-35

Any traditions or crafts that you will do or have done with your kids that have been really meaningful?

Math...Upper Elementary School

I have been using Singapore Math for a while.  3rd grade was fine.  4th grade was a little challenging.  5th grade is getting more challenging.

I think challenge is good, but there is very little explanation for how to teach concepts.  I have the instructor's guide and there is still very little help in there.

I actually have liked Singpore Math so far.  I think it is very strong on challenging word problems.  Now that the concepts are harder, I find my son is struggling more.  We just started learning about the area of triangles. We just started with right triangles and the book quickly jumped to finding the area of other types of triangles with little explanation.

I find that my son quickly forgets concepts we learned earlier.  I would like to find something with more practice.

What has been your experience?  Melissa said she chose to do Teaching Textbooks.  What are you all using?  What has helped?

Inventors and the Industrial Age

We are studying the Industrial Age right now.  Many inventors made inventions during that time period that changed the way we do things.  It would be interesting to make a notebook of those inventors.

My son just read a book on Thomas Edison the other day.  Here is a page that gives you notebook pages for various inventors that I found helpful:

http://www.homeschoolshare.com/inventor_notebooking_pages.php

I find notebook pages are helpful because it makes writing more interesting instead of writing on plain paper and we can clip them together with other sheets or hang them up on the wall.

Apologia...How it's Going

Well, thought you would like to know how it's going using Apologia Science for this year.  My kids love it.  I asked them if they liked this science or Sonlight better and both said they liked this one better.  They still loved the science books for Sonlight (My son especially loves books with lots of facts and information.).  The problem as I said earlier was the curriculum that went with it which consisted of random fill in the blank questions for each couple of pages or several pages.  We still enjoyed the Discover and Do videos and the science experiments.  The main problem I had was that it didn't seem to all connect together.

I think Sonlight's philosophy is to give a smorgasbord of books and information, hoping that children will catch something in the process.  I did enjoy reading and discussing the books but it was short on review and activities.

At least for the Apologia Botany book, there is reading, activities/experiments for you to explore what you learned, and various minibooks to create to review the concepts you learned.  There is a lot of scientific vocabulary to learn but I think the kids like the challenge and I don't expect them to remember everything. I am learning a lot myself! We have been going outside a lot to study the plants, which has been fun.  There is a little repetition when they ask you to review the concepts (answer questions, crossword, minibooks) but the kids don't seem to mind this since there is variety.  You get to study one subject in detail instead of various subjects that don't relate like in Sonlight.

I am also adding some Sonlight D curriculum that relates to botany. We will try to do the TOPS corn, beans, and lentils experiment.

I don't know how the other books are in Apologia but unfortunately, I had already bought Sonlight science books for next year so we will use them and maybe try to add some lapbooks to review some concepts or focus on a few concepts in more detail.  Then, maybe the following year, we will try to do Apologia Anatomy.

I would recommend Apologia for third grade and up, but I heard people use it for their young ones as well.  They have junior Apologia notebooks as well for younger children. The notebooks are expensive but the kids really like them and it saves me time.

Civil War, Abraham Lincoln websites, etc.

We are about to wrap up our unit on Civil War.  It has been very interesting to study and I learned a lot myself!

I thought I would post some helpful websites:

I thought this was a very interesting interactive website on the Civil War.

http://www.history.com/interactives/civil-war-150

History.com has interesting information for studying anything in history.  You do need to look at it with your children as it is also for adults as well.

We read the photobiography of Abraham Lincoln which was very good and then I asked the children to write about Abraham Lincoln, his importance, etc.

We used this notebooking page.
http://www.activityvillage.co.uk/abraham-lincoln-notebooking-page

The Children's Encyclopedia of American History by DK publishers has been very helpful in our Civil War study and honestly I preferred it over the Landmark American History book.  If you haven't gotten it, it is a great book with lots of color pictures and photographs on each page.  We'll probably use parts of it for our later studies on American history.



Anyone else had good ideas for studying the Civil War?

Getting Ready to Study About Civil War

Summer's almost over and school is here.

It’s been a while since I’ve written so I’d like to give some recommendations of things that have been helpful to my kids in our homeschooling.

Books

I’m always on the look-out for wholesome books.  We bought Katie Sue Goes West by Eleanor Clark recently for our Kindle and were pleasantly surprised. 

Katie Sue Goes West is very well written and is a story within a story about a girl who has to move west.  There are a lot of historical facts and background sprinkled throughout the story.  There are some bible verses as well but it is done in a very natural way that is not too preachy. My daughter really enjoyed this and I really enjoyed reading this book as well.  This would be a good book to read if you are studying about pioneers.  I would recommend it for ages 10 and under. 

I haven’t read the other books in this series but I know there is another book dealing with World War II.

William Wilberforce
We studied about slavery leading up to the Civil War.  One very influential person in the abolitionist cause was William Wilberforce.  We read the biography which was very good.  Then, we watched the "Amazing Grace" movie which was very well done.  I was surprised that my kids enjoyed it so much and wanted to watch it again.  There are a couple of intense moments but I recommend it highly.



Civil War
We are getting ready to study the Civil War, which I very much look forward to doing. Here are some lapbook resources I am using in addition to the Sonlight curriculum :

Websites for Lapbooks
http://dynamic2moms.webs.com/War Between the States page
http://www.homeschoolshare.com/civil_war_lapbook_templates.php

I also just bought this History Pockets since my kids like to make lapbooks and do activities.  There are also other History Pocket books for Ancient Civilizations, Revolutionary War, etc.



Anyone have any other ideas for studying the Civil War?

Summer Reading List

I am always on the lookout for quality books for my kids to read.  Now that it's summer they have even more time to read.  I thought I would post this question:  What good books have your kids read lately that you recommend?

I'll start off with some books that my kids read recently that they really liked (Most of these books are on Kindle but many I borrowed from Plano's ebook library) Most books here are 3rd grade level and up:

Zucchini by Barbara Dana
This book is about a ferret who runs away from the zoo.

Born to Trot by Marguerite Henry
This one is about a boy who has a horse that can run very fast.

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate (Newberry Award)
This is about a gorilla who remained in captivity in a cage in a mall for years who later discovers he has some special gifts.

Neversink by Barry Wolverton
This book is an animal version of America's breakaway from England.  My son enjoyed reading about the details of this fantasy world in Antartica.

Crunch by Leslie Connor
A boy's parents get stuck because they don't have any gas to fill up their tanker.  He tries to take responsibility for parents' farm/bike shop.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Flies Again