Monthly Archives: October 2011

October 28, 2011

Finishing Up With the Letter ‘I’

We made some homemade musical instruments.

“How many inches?”

This job required an assistant.

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October 27, 2011

Science for Miss Rumphius

We’ve continued our study on seeds and germination with Miss Rumphius. We talked about the word “sow” (as opposed to “sew”. We’ve been keeping a list of homophones we come across and added these two.) We found several Bible verses that talk about sowing seeds and what that is often used as metaphor for.
We’ve been keeping an eye on the beans we planted. They’ve taken a bit longer than expected to sprout, but we’ve finally noticed some changes in the last few days. Unfortunately last night our egg crate was blown around by the wind, but we were able to salvage most of our little bean sprouts and replant them in a pot, so hopefully we can keep watching them for a while.

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October 25, 2011

‘I’ is for Inchworm

Our book basket is a little weak this round. The few other books I requested for “instrument” and “igloo” haven’t come in on time. Oh well.

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October 25, 2011

Miss Rumphius

We’ll be learning about Maine while we read Miss Rumphius. Though the author never actually says it takes place there, we are given lots of clues that would suggest that it’s very likely that it does. We’ll also be continuing our study on seeds and flowers and we’ll be learning about libraries and books too.

We moved all our story disks that take place in the U.S. to our U.S. map since it allows us to be a little more precise in where they are placed.

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October 20, 2011

More for the Letter ‘H’

We used hair clips on our ‘H’.

She made a hen craft.

She loves Hello Kitty!

We enjoyed some bread with raw honey.

She practiced tracing her hand.

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October 19, 2011

Art for The Tale of Peter Rabbit

Today we talked about how the illustrations in The Tale of Peter Rabbit are naturalistic. The plants and animals in the book closely resemble those in real life (minus the shoes and jacket on Peter!). We talked about how Beatrix Potter owned and observed many animals growing up and as a result of that she was able to draw them very realistically. We compared and contrasted the illustrations in the book with drawings from a Peter Rabbit coloring book that we have that are not naturalistic but instead very cartoon-like.

Here’s an illustration from the book. Peter Rabbit, though dressed in clothes, looks very much like a real rabbit in his body shape and features. The vegetation also looks very realistic.

In contrast, here’s the coloring book drawing from the same passage in the book. Notice the cartoon eyes and unrealistic body shape (such as the paws that look more like hands). And the flowers are ridiculously perfect and unrealistic.

Elliot attempted to make a realistic drawing by looking at the illustrations in the book. He commented how hard it was. I reminded him that Beatrix Potter practiced for years to be able to draw so well.

We ended our lesson by enjoying some little Peter Rabbit crackers (Annie’s Organic Whole Wheat Bunnies).

Elliot re-told the story with his “props”.

He made a “rabbit pie”. He said it represented how Peter Rabbit’s father got caught and put into a pie by Mrs. McGregor.

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October 17, 2011

Language Arts for The Tale of Peter Rabbit

We did lots today for Language Arts. We learned a couple new vocabulary words, discussed descriptive language, and read all about Beatrix Potter. We were delighted to learn that she was homeschooled! We also learned that she wrote a letter to a sick child she knew, including a story she came up with off the top of her head about a naughty little rabbit, which later became The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

Beatrix Potter uses a lot of descriptive language in her writing that makes it much more interesting. I put up an example of a boring sentence and together we came up with a much more interesting one that uses some descriptive language.

We added “descriptive language” to our Choices Writers Can Make to Add Interest page.

This book is the oldest book we have done yet, with the copyright date being 1902.

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October 17, 2011

‘H’ is for House

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October 14, 2011

Contractions

We’ve been working on contractions lately since Elliot runs into so many while he’s reading. He has no problem reading them, but I want him to think about and understand what two words have been put together to make the contraction, so I put together a workbag for him with some of the most common contractions he sees in his reading.

I got these little pockets from the dollar store a while back, not knowing what I would use them for, but thinking that eventually they’d come in handy for some type of game or activity.

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