Egyptian Sailboats from paper towel tubes

Our first week delving into ancient Egypt we read Story of the World vol 1: Ancient Times ch 2: Egyptians lived on the River Nile.

I have seen a lot of great projects for the introduction into ancient Egypt, but I ultimately decided on a project from the Ancient Egyptians and their Neighbors activity guide.  I changed it up a bit from the book, but I think it still turned out well and was easy enough for Goblin to do mostly on his own.

First gather your materials:
paper towel tube
straw
wooden skewer
construction paper square (ours were about 7x7inches)
pencil
ruler
scissors
tape
stapler.

I forgot the ruler and stapler in this picture. (Sigh, being prepared at the beginning is not my forte.)  Also, you can paint your boat if you choose (we did not), which means you will also need to include:
paint
brushes
water
something to protect your work surface (ie newspaper, paper towels, etc).

Next, take the paper towel tube and cut a slit all the way down it, longways. (Sorry for the blurry picture.)

Next, draw a dot about halfway across each end of the tube (shortways), then measure in 3 inches from each corner and mark these spots. (You don't have to use a ruler for these measurements, but it does help keep the sides consistent.)

Then, connect each dot on the sides to the dot in the middle of the short side.

Cut along the lines you've made to complete the sides of the boat shape.  You should now have this shape.

Next, you need to cut 1 inch slits into the shape from the same corner you drew your dots earlier, as shown here.

Now overlap the two sides of your cut and staple them together, bending the points of your shape upwards.

Make slits, overlap the sides, and staple together at your other 3 dots, and you should end up with a shape like this for the body of your boat.

Now would be the time to paint your boat if you wish to.  After it dries, move on to the next step.

You need something to attach your sail to your boat. I took a straw and cut it down to only a couple inches high.  Then cut multiple slits on one end, so it can fan out and be taped into place in the middle of the boat.

Now take a skewer and poke it through the middle of your construction paper square at the top and bottom, then place the skewer into the straw.

You can add in rocks or figures to keep your boat stable.

The kiddoes had a lot of fun with their boats once they were finished, pretending to be Egyptians gods sending storms to rock their boats on the mighty Nile.

They capsized pretty easily, but they were also easy to put back together. :)  Not to mention, the more the kids enjoy their projects, the better they remember them and the stories that sparked them.  Fun history class is the best history class.

--Little Miss Crazy

Cutting with Wedges

We got started on science a little late this week, but all of our little projects were a lot of fun, so it was still a good lesson.  We talked about the simple machine called the wedge.  I started out using the same ramp we played with during our discussion of inclined planes last week so that they could have a visual reminder and be able to actually see how the two are related.

Athena read the page on wedges aloud from our mini-book on simple machines, and everyone came up with a few examples of wedges from around the house.  They had a hard time identifying these at the beginning of our discussion, so I pulled our the Usborne Science Encyclopedia to give them a little more information and provide more examples.

Our first demonstration came from Starting with Science: Simple Machines.  I cut some carrot slices and asked the kids to try to push them into an apple with no extra tools.  They made a couple good dents, but weren't able to pierce the skin.

Then I cut the carrot slices into little wedge shapes, and they tried again.

Success!  It took much less effort to push the carrot pieces into the apple when they were shaped like wedges.  And we were able to make some fun goofy faces, too. :)

Then it was time to take a little art break and color papers.  The kids came up with some nice drawings, and it was almost a shame to turn them into paper airplanes at the end.  I used this time to explain how wedges can "cut" through more abstract things, like air and water, as well as literally cutting like a knife.

Our final (and most fun) project was definitely the boats.   The kids were a bit more fascinated with the rubber band motors than the wedge shape that allowed the boats to push through the water with ease, but it was still a good demonstration.  We did try pushing the boats facing forward (wedge in front) and backward (flat front) to compare the effort needed to get them through, but it was tough for the kiddoes to tell the difference.

By the end of the lesson, they were able to find several new examples of wedges around the house and explain for their journals how they do work.  We were able to push through some unclear examples and enjoy a little goofing around and still get the point across.  Next week is our last simple machine before we get to put them all together for some goofy compound machine building for review, so I'm getting pretty excited checking out all the fun we have in store.

--Little Miss Crazy

Valentine Art

Earlier in the week, I found a Valentine's Day craft idea that I could not resist (Simple Valentine's Day Paper Craft).  Conversation hearts are such a classic for Valentine's Day, but I really did not want to give the kiddoes a bunch of candy.  Since the children's watercolors needed replacing, I decided this would be the perfect Valentine's Day gift for them all from Mommy.

These were so simple to make but so fun for the kids.  I cut out a number of heart shapes from white card stock (I traced around a heart cookie cutter, but you could easily freehand them or use your own template), then I used a white crayon to add "secret" messages. [This description is what sold the idea for my boys.  They are big into playing spies these days, so the idea of secret messages made these crafts seem exciting.]

I gave the kids each a new set of watercolors and a few hearts to paint.  Athena spotted all the words ahead of time, but Hulk and Goblin were really surprised to find letters magically appearing on the "blank" hearts.

As an added bonus, most words that fit on a heart are very simple, so the boys were able to practice sounding them out as they were revealed.

When the hearts had finished drying, I simply punched holes in them and strung them together to put up on the walls.  They would also look cute hung as a garland, taped up individually, or even placed on windows so that the light shines through the pretty colors (this would work best with a lighter weight paper-- card stock would block too much of the light).

Athena is already asking if we can move her string into her room for decoration.  I think we'll be doing this again next year, maybe just as simply as this time around or maybe adding in some more details.  Either way, this was a great way to give them a little something fun and spend a wonderful afternoon.

--Little Miss Crazy

What is a force?

Our first week of science was simple and fun. I introduced the idea of force as a push or pull to the children, gave them a bunch of examples, asked them to think of some of their own examples.  We watched an episode of Sid the Science Kid about forces (Sid's Super Kick). We built a simple Newton-meter (from the ScienceWiz Physics kit) to measure forces during the rest of the unit and used it to measure gravity pulling on an apple.

Then they all got out their science journals and drew a picture related to what we'd discussed with a written explanation.  Well, Athena wrote her explanation; Hulk and Goblin explained theirs to me, and I did the writing.

Then we went outside to play in the backyard, and that was where the real learning fun began.   While they were playing, I asked them which kind of forces they were using (and which were acting ON them) and the directions of the forces.

They were really excited that they understood what I was asking and soon, all three were shouting out answers and coming up with lots of their own ideas about forces and how they work.

This was probably their favorite demonstration of the day, and they kept at it for a long time.  They each tried hitting the ball first very softly, then a "normal" hit, and finally as hard as they could to see what would happen each time.  They discovered that the harder you hit the ball, the farther and faster it goes.  Little scientists coming up with their own ideas and testing them; it's all natural for them.

--Little Miss Crazy

Letter of the Week

Hulk and Goblin are following my variation on the popular "Letter of the Week" curriculum this year.  It's a work in progress, getting a little more finished as time goes on.  Of course, now that I feel pretty solid in how it's working overall, I want to change to something else. (Such is my habit.)  We will be sticking with it, right up to Z, but I am very excited for what's in the works after we finish.

Our primary goal for this program has been matching letters with their sounds.  I have only been using the primary/ most common sound for each letter, which makes this incomplete, but I think it has still been very successful in starting both boys on their road to reading.  Hulk is already reading words with short vowels very well, even ones with blends, which makes me feel like we have been making some significant progress.

In my opinion, the letter crafts are what make the LotW curriculum so fun and so appealing.  We make one uppercase letter craft and one lowercase letter craft each week based on the most common sound for each letter.  The boys really enjoy this, and after we finish them, they go up on the wall, so the boys can use them as a reference for how the letters look and sound in the future.  Most of our ideas have come from other blogs and websites but there have been a few I have come up with myself, since choices are limited based on my pickiness.

We also use quite a few paper resources.  I did not want to work on writing with the boys yet at all, which challenged me to find pages that I like. Hulk adores worksheets, so I wanted to give him a good variety without including the "print the letter so many times" pages that are so prevalent.  I found quite a few that we have really enjoyed around the internet for free (or very very little).  A bunch come from education.com, but many also come from other homeschooling blogs.  We do mazes, dot-to-dots, letter hunts, coloring, circle/match the sounds, etc.

We also do some simple activities each week.  I task them to find items around the house that begin with the letter of the week.  (Not including the first few weeks) we read a group of short words.  We play with Alphie's letter cards.  We watch old Sesame Street songs and skits on youtube.  We sing songs.  They play Boggle Jr and build words for the pictures.  Usually the boys come up with plenty of ideas of their own, so we go off on little tangents.  Each week is different and most of the time, the boys are asking for "more school;" it doesn't get much better than that.

--Little Miss Crazy

Some great links for Letter of the Week resources:

education.com 

Confessions of a Homeschooler 

No Time for Flashcards 

Totally Tots

1+1+1=1 

Spell Out Loud

Ultimate Alphabet Craft Collection

Poetry and Hot Cocoa

During our first couple months or so, I was lucky to get through basic Math and Language Arts with the kiddoes, throwing in a little History or Science a few times a week.  Most of the things we are doing this year are workbook based, since Athena is used to that format and Hulk LOVES worksheets (Goblin doesn't have much of an opinion one way or the other).  Even though I did my best to make sure the basics were as simple to cover initially as possible, I still felt exhausted by the end of each day.  I was wondering how we were ever going to work up to having time for the fun "extra" stuff when we were already having so much trouble with the basics.

Then came a Wednesday morning when I was tired and grouchy and didn't want to face the day.  I called off school and decided we would just have to make it up another time (this was the first good choice I made that day-- having the ability to make our own schedule was one of the biggest reasons we chose to homeschool, but it took a bad day to make me start implementing that thought into our regular daily life).  I sent the kids outside to play and started making myself some tea and settling into a good book.  I started thinking about how much nicer it was to relax with the written word than to deal with worksheets again when the idea finally rose out of the back of my head.

By the time the kids came inside, I had 3 cups of hot cocoa (to join my cup of tea), 3 bowls of animal crackers, and a small stack of poetry and nursery rhyme books all laid out on the table.  This was our first bi-monthly poetry time, and it went extraordinarily well.  The kids were thrilled and kept asking for "One more poem," and I realized that this was exactly what we needed.

After we finished our drinks and snacks and all the poetry my voice could handle for that day (I'm doing most of the reading), I called school back on, and we finished Math, Language Arts, and History with plenty of time to spare before dinner needed to be made.

Covering the basics ensures that the kids are getting educated, but it isn't the best education we can offer.  The extra stuff is the stuff that really matters in our days, and it makes them so much easier to last through.

I know poetry time is not my unique idea.  Honestly, I had probably read it from a blog or a forum many times before that cold Wednesday morning, but it clicked for me that day to put it into our life and our schedule.  Doing something a little different and making it special (I find the kids think it's much more fun if we lay out the tablecloth and they get to use "grown-up cups") is the perfect way to remind yourself of the fun you can have in your homeschool when you try.

--Little Miss Crazy

By the way, that IS a copy of The Phantom Tollbooth on top of the poetry books.  I included it so I could continue our daily read-aloud while they were enjoying their snacks before beginning the poetry.

Hello Out There

The way I see it, everything requires a good introduction, so I'm going to try to make one for my new endeavour into the world of blogging.  I must tell you, I don't know what to expect.  For the longest time, I thought blogs were the new online journal, only without high privacy settings. After extensive research (ie reading a LOT of blogs) I have learned a thing or two, and I finally feel ready to try my hand at it.  I'm not proclaiming greatness-- far from it, but I want to create a little window into my world just in case there's anyone out there who'd like to take a peek.

We are in the middle of our first full year of homeschooling-- another new and confusing experience, and I have been hemming and hawing for months now about sharing our crazy little journey.  There are tons of homeschooling blogs out there, and they all contribute just a little different perspective on things.  I just know that somewhere there is another crazy soul like me who'd be interested in our perspective.

Here's when we officially started.  I am probably still in the honeymoon phase of things, but I must say that I wish we had started homeschooling sooner.  It is amazing and fulfilling, and I love being able to share so much with my kiddoes.  It also makes it easier for my family to live our life the way we envision it.  Mr Crazy (that's the name I decided on for my darling husband) travels a LOT for work.  He's generally gone for a month or so at a time, so when he is home, we try to have as much family time as possible.  We also have family on the East Coast, so when we take a trip out to visit, we like to stay for a long time (minimum is 3 weeks).  Now we can just pack up school and take it with us. I think this has been the best choice for our family.

 

I get notes like this pretty often . . . and that tells me everything I need to know.

--Little Miss Crazy