Since Leaf week was done in the summer for us we were able to spend a lot of time outdoors looking at the different types of leaves.
She loves crafts and one of them was to make a leaf necklace. The eye positioning is hilarious, but she did it by herself!
Blog: Organizing My Father’s World God’s Creation A to Z
Blog: My Father’s World – God Creation A to Z
Blog: S Sun
Blog: M Moon
We did the Creation weeks as weeks three and four instead of one and two as the teacher’s manual suggests. The timing of the Apollo 11 landing anniversary was too perfect to pass up studying the Sun and Moon weeks first.
She had a lot of fun doing her crafts for these weeks! The books we read pertained to what God Created each day. One of the crafts was a felt sticker sign. It had a number that correlated to each day of creation with matching stickers for that day. It was a fun and easy craft that now hangs in her room.
Blog: Organizing My Father’s World God’s Creation A to Z
Blog: My Father’s World – God Creation A to Z
Blog: S Sun
Blog: M Moon
We started with “S” and then “M” and will go back to Creation. I wanted Moon week to fall on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. It worked out perfectly!!! First, the library reading program was space themed this year so it worked out nicely. Second, there was all kinds of moon themed crafts, books and info readily available.
Between our local library and our own library we had a great selection of books to read this week. Her favorite book right now is the Usborne You Choose in Space book. It’s not an educational book like I would prefer but it is a good book about thinking and making choices.
We found a great Moon Phases Flip Book at Teachers Pay Teachers We talked about the different phases and the names while she got to color them in.
Oriental Trading seems to have a great craft for each week. This craft was scraping the moon to make it the correct shape for each phase.
It’s not a school week without the PERFECT snack!!! I love that Oreo came out with the Marshmallow Moon Oreos for the 50th anniversary. I only bought them because of the theme and they ended up being really good!!
Blog: Organizing My Father’s World God’s Creation A to Z
Blog: My Father’s World – God Creation A to Z
Blog: S Sun
We started My Father’s World God’s Creation A to Z! Okay so we didn’t start in order! According to the curriculum we were supposed to start with two weeks of Creation. We will definitely go back and cover those two weeks. The reason we started with S – Sun and then M – Moon is because of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. I wanted M – Moon to land right around the anniversary of July 21st. Not to mention everything is spaced themed right not because of this. Her schooling to match with all of this is just perfect!
She just loved making this sundial. We put it outside and I set my alarm to go outside every hour so she could get the full affect of how it works.
The Cruisenrods and sheets are a great way to teach math and to follow directions. I separated all the pages in the book and put them in page protectors. We are then able to use dry erase makers to fill in the answers and color the sheets. This way she can repeat the page as many times as she needs.
Here are the books we used for S Sun. The Moonbear’s Shadow came with the Deluxe Curriculum set. A Place for Pluto, My Very First Space Book, Sun, Moon and Stars and Astronomy were apart of our family library and the rest are from our local library! I try to get a good mix of educational and fun books!
We added some fun things like Astronaut ice cream and a Sun, Moon and Star rotation craft.
We are also doing Abeka Math and Phonics. She does really good with worksheets. With Abeka we go over her 100 chart every day, what the weather is like outside, and phonetic sounds.
Blog: Organizing My Father’s World God’s Creation A to Z
Blog: My Father’s World – God Creation A to Z
Blog: M Moon
We had a great family day on the fourth of July! We started the day out with Sister being in her first parade! Her dance studio had a place in the parade and she got to sit in the truck waving at people and throwing candy!
Since Sister was in the parade, we sat and watched it with both grandmothers, their aunt, two uncles and a cousin. We were really lucky to get a close, shady spot to watch. Brother loved the lights and sirens on the emergency vehicles. He watched everything with such fascination. It was so cute!
After the parade, the kids spend time time in the little pool to cool off. Brother is a fish out of water, but Sister is still not the biggest fan. Mother also found this to be a great time to use the pool to soak her feet!
Everyone took a really nice long nap! 🙂 Then off to see fireworks!!! Time to break out the wagon to haul kids, drinks, snacks and blankets! We sat with some friends and had a really great time!
Last but not least, how we also made this a fun learning experience for Sister. I found some worksheets that taught about the flag’s meaning and history, made some fun crafts, sang the Star-Spangled Banner and read books about Independence day!
We finished MFW Voyage of Discovery!!! I’m so glad we picked this curriculum. I feel it was perfect for my daughter, myself and Nanny! Since this was a group effort we needed it to be something Nanny and I can work together on. She did almost all of the daily lessons and picking out books at the library. My part was more the planning, organizing, finding crafts (Nanny picked out a lot too), buying supplies and doing some of her lessons when they didn’t get finished during the week.
I can’t believe how much she has learned this year. She want from messing up her ABC song to knowing all of her letters and their sounds. She now even talks about what letter words start with and is pointing out the letters and their sounds when we are reading books. She is doing a great job of writing her letters and numbers (still needs help tracing them but her writing is looking great for her age). She knows her numbers and is doing very basic addition and subtraction. It was a great review of her colors and shapes (she knew them already).
Doing something fun, but educational at the same time really helps the information to stick. The curriculum is great and complete, unless you have a child like mine. I’m very glad we added the extra’s to the curriculum as she soaked it all up. For math, we added worksheets, wipe-clean math books, telling time and more counting. We got a pile of books from the library each week to collaborate with the letter that week. So those books were on almost any subject like science, geography, fun picture books, colors, shapes and phonics. We also added her Wipe-clean letter book and cards, plus some basic Spanish.
I ordered and we already have, My Father’s World God’s Creation A to Z. Sister wants to start it already!!! I’m loving her enthusiasm for learning. She will have to wait a few weeks to start the new curriculum!
Blog: My Father’s World – Voyage of Discovery
Blog: What We Added to MFW Voyage of Discovery
Blog: Organizing MFW Voyage of Discovery
Blog: Z Week – Voyage of Discovery
Skyscape was the theme of the third day of the public library’s summer children’s program. Today was all about things you see in the sky.
They had set up a fun game on the sidewalk that connected the different planets. Between each planet they did a different movement like jump on one leg or twirl around.
I’m so glad and I’m sure Sister is so glad that Nanny is able to take her to this each week. Sister loves all things outer space right now. I know she is just loving all of these hands on activities.
We created a Space Journal for Sister to keep all of her space themed crafts in. She is loving getting to add new papers to it each week.
Blog: Space Explorers – Day One
Blog: Gravity Falls – Day Two
We were supposed to go camping this weekend, but the weather had other things in mind. We decided to spend the weekend in St. Louis, Missouri instead. We had a lot of people recommend the City Museum.
City museum was fantastic. ” Expect the unexpected. City Museum is a hundred-year-old warehouse in downtown St. Louis in which artists have repurposed the pieces of old cities to build miles of tunnels, slides, climbers, bridges, and castles. There are secret passages and grand galleries. Playgrounds and ball pits. A circus and a train. A rooftop school bus and a Ferris wheel.” Check out their website here.
Just driving up to the building was fascinating to see. The exterior had tracks, ladders, ball pits, random pieces of buildings, huge chains, stair cases and even a Saber liner and Bus.
There were multiple floors in which some exhibits crossed in to two or three floors and others that had it’s area. The first floor had the start of the “caves” but those “caves” crossed into three different floors. Definitely have a plan in place for when you get separated. You are definitely going to get separated will all the tunnels and splits.
There is so much to see and do here that it took up the whole day. It left us just enough time to hit the pool at the hotel.
Gravity Falls was the theme of the second day of the public libraries summer children’s program. They activities of the day were designed to show how gravity works.
One of the activities was to put a pom-pom ball in paint and drop it on a long sheet. They would see it drops and leaves a fun paint splat.
They also got to drop balls in a pool, throw bags through hula-hoops, and race cars on a track.
It’s great that our local library has put so much thought and effort into making education fun. My daughter had such a great time. She couldn’t wait to tall me all about it when I got home from work.
Our public library is doing a space themed children’s summer program because of the 50th anniversary of the moon landing. Sister, Brother and I all signed up for the summer reading program. For the little children, they are given a Bingo Card. When they fill out all four corners, they get a gift card to a local restaurant and a space sticker scene. When they fill the whole sheet, they get a free book and entered in a drawing. For adults, they have weekly drawings. You turn in a slip for each book you read during the reading program.
Space Explorers was the theme for Day 1. To start their training to be an astronaut, they had all kinds of hands on activities and crafts. Some of the activities included learning what it’s like to walk on the moon, pretend like you work at mission control, learn about handling moon rocks, pretend to be an astronaut and use finger paint to paint the earth.
Sister had a great time with everything. When she was done she got her Junior Astronaut certificate. This was added to her Space Notebook we created for the summer for all of her space activities.
Hoover Academy 