Space Unit - Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto?

We are all most done with our Space Unit. We worked on last of the planets. J is enamored with the demoted planet Pluto so she asked me to include it in our line up. So, Pluto as well as the other draw planets made it onto our mural.

J researched the planets and worked on some mini books for her Space Notebook. It is funny how Pluto was demoted in 2006 to a draw planet but some of the library books still have it in the line up.

She is finishing up her mini books to add to her notebook. 

One of her projects this week was to make a Solar System headband. She colored the planets, put them in order, and glued them to the headband. The idea came from The Primary Theme Park (link below).

She added the last of the planets to the mural, included some comets and meteorites.

The final project for the week was to make moon dough. Kaleb joined in the fun by helping to add the water. This idea came from Learn Play Imagine (link below).

Using the moon dough, J made some moon rocks. The moon rocks exploded when we added vinegar. This project was fun but beware the food coloring dyes the hands for the rest of the day. But it came off in the bath that night.

Two more weeks in our Space Unit - constellations/stars and space travel/living in space. J has learned a lot. She is working on her final projects for the unit. 

Links

Learn Play Imagine - has the recipe for the moon dough that we used.

The Primary Theme Park - has the idea for the Solar System headband plus a link to the printable planets.

B4FIAR - The Snowy Day

We recently "rowed" The Snowy Day and it was so jam packed that we took two weeks to complete it. We just having so much fun and we didn't want it to end. This book is a story about Peter who wakes up after a snow storm. It came in a timely fashion as my parents just got a ton of snow - too bad we weren't there to enjoy it! The kids would have loved playing in it....maybe next time.

I made a simple sensory bin using cotton balls, some felt trees, a pipe cleaner tree, and, of course, Peter.

Kaleb practiced the letters of the alphabet using this super cute snowman game from I Heart Crafty Things (link below). Instead of milk lids, we used some metal bottle caps that I made using alphabet stickers. They were the perfect size.

I made a cute, easy game using water bottles that I made into snowmen. Kaleb would roll a number die and fill his snowman with foam blocks. The first person who filled his snowman wins. It is a simple game that involves counting and number recognition. This idea came from Metamora Community Preschool (link below).

Since we have veered from the alphabet, our focus letter for the week was S for snow. After tracing the letter with a snow plow, Kaleb made the letter into a snowman.

Kaleb practiced counting and number recognition with this cute snowman activity. He would choose a number card and add the buttons to the snowman. I had him working with two snowmen and then asked him which snowman had more buttons. This activity came from CBC (link below).

Since we currently live in a warm state, I thought it would be fun to have a snowball fight. I made a ton of large white pom poms, gave a few rules (eg. no hitting

the baby etc...), and we had the funnest time. I couldn't stop laughing. Not too bad for not having snow.

Kaleb made a shaving cream snowman sensory bag. This time, I super taped the opening so I wouldn't have any exploding bags! This idea came from Made By Mollies Mom (link below).

We had the best time launching snowman ping pong balls into the air. We wanted to see just how far we could launch them. Even J is getting into the action. Buggy and Buddy gave me this great idea. (link below)

For some fine motor practice, I had Kaleb fill the snowman water bottle with cotton balls. We counted how many it took to fill it up. (Can you tell I was just having too much fun with this book?)

He made two super cute art projects. One was potato stamping snowmen and another was a simple tree with Peter snow scene.

Kaleb cut and glued the simple tree using brown paper. I asked him if he wanted to make his own Peter or if he wanted me to cut one out. He asked me to make Peter to add and then, he added snow using q-tips. He completed the picture with snow falling on Peter's head - love it!

He used a small potato for the snowman and stamped the circles. I added the snowman details.

He played several days in shaving cream. He ran his cars through it and had some plastic people jump in it.

I made a name snowman using simple circles. Then, to make it fun, I hid the circles with the letters fro his name around the house. He had to find the circles and put them in correct order.

Then, we taped the circles together to form his name. We did so many other activities but this post is probably long enough. We had a ton of fun with this book and Kaleb (and I) loved every minute of it. We are moving to March - mouse month, a month of mouse books and activities.

Links

Growing a Jeweled Rose - has a neat project to create a snowstorm in a jar using basic supplies. If I can get my hands on some Alka-Seltzer, I will be trying this.

Along the Way - has a sensory bin for the story using Insta-Snow.

Intentional by Grace - has a super easy tree craft to do with your tots for the book.

Wild Flower Ramblings - has some cute projects for the book. I love the tree craft idea as well as the playing in the shaving cream idea. She also has a tutorial for making a mini Peter doll.

Deep Space Sparkle - has a Snowy Day inspired art project.

Homeschool Creations - has a free printable pack for The Snowy Day.

PreKinders - has a ton of pattern block snowflake templates.

Danya Banya - has cute idea using items from nature to make impressions in play dough.

Fun-A-Day - cute snowman name craft idea.

Six Sisters Stuff - has recipe for peanut butter snowballs.

Made By Mollies Mom - has a cute, snowman sensory bag to make with shaving cream and glitter.

My Montesori Journey - has a link to free printable animal track cards.

Metamora Community Preschool - cute idea for a snowman math game using a milk jug and milk jug lids.

Buggy and Buddy - has a great idea for launching snowmen using a lever (ruler) and ping pong balls.

Little Miss Glamour Goes to Kindergarten - has the free printable snowman used for estimation activity.

CBC - has a great idea for a math activity using buttons and number hats.

I Heart Crafty Things - has the alphabet milk lid snowman match game to print.

Play Trains - has the tutorial for the pipe cleaner tree that I used in the sensory bin.

Tot Tuesday

I recently found a table high chair for a really great price - yes, I know it has a girly cover but I don't think Riley will mind. It was too good to pass up and I love that it doesn't take up too much space and will be able to travel to Grandma's house. I have been placing Riley in the chair so he can be a part of our school day. I asked Kaleb to give him some toys and this is what I found....

He is such a cutie! He definitely won't be lacking toys with Kaleb around! Have a happy day.

Jesus Heals Centurion's Servant

Our Bible lesson this week was about Jesus healing the Centurion's servant. It was interesting other of this soldier's faith - he believed Jesus could heal heal his servant with just a word. And HE did. There wasn't a lot of fun things to do with this lesson no matter how hard I tried to find activities. So this week was somewhat short.

We started with the coloring page for the lesson while I read the passage from the Bible. Kaleb decided to join us this week - he varies...sometimes wanting to participate in our Bible lessons, sometimes not. I don't force him. I want him to like it.

We discussed the faith of this soldier and decided to make a Roman helmet (link below). Once, Kaleb saw what we were doing, he decided he wanted to make a helmet as well. But he did not want to wear it!

J was impressed with her gold Roman helmet. We tried to make the helmet craft found in the lesson but apparently gallon jugs, no matter how you cut them, won't fit on her head. The paper helmet was just right and easy enough to put together. Like I said, it was a quick week in Bible, not too much to do. I like the weeks we have lots of fun stuff so I am hoping next week will be better. See you soon.

Links

Children's Bible Lessons - has a neat 3D project for the lesson.

Growing Kids In Grace - has a few idea on the lesson as well as the printable for a Roman soldier.

Mass Explained - has a paper version of a Roman Soldier's helmet to download and color.

Crafting the Word of God - has a whole set of Roman amor to make from paper. It is really for the Armor of God but it could work with this lesson.

Space Unit - Jupiter & Saturn

This week, we learned about Jupiter and Saturn in our Space Unit Study. We are moving through the Solar System and we are learning so much.

She is continuing her research about the planets filling in the details she reads.

She worked on her planets for the mural that we are creating in our dining room. Every time we learn about a new planet, we add it to our mural. We plan to add the dwarf planets as well.

I bought a set of planets from Toys R Us but they do not necessarily match the planets that we are learning about. So, we make due and add pieces when needed. We had to add rings around Saturn!

More research....more reading...I am so proud of J. She really has put in a ton of effort in her unit study. As I said before, she chose the topic and I just added the activities. It really does make a difference when they are invested in what they want to learn! No hands on project this week but we have a list of activities that we are going to do (and we are excited about). On to the last of the outer planets, then stars and space exploration.

B4FIAR - Angus Lost

We "rowed" Angus Lost this past week. Still loving B4FIAR. Angus Lost is about a dog who ventures out on his own because he is tired of the same old things; only to find out that he liked the same old things.

We started the Row with a new sensory bin. I used white felt, cotton balls, a felt cave and several animals from the story. I could not find a Scottie Dog though, so we used another dog in our bin.

I also made snow dough from flour, water, and baby oil. It has a real nice texture. I gave Kaleb several dogs and let him dig through the dough.

For lunch, Kaleb had dog bone shaped PB&J sandwiches.

We started every day by reading the story. Then, he colored the Scottie Dog black. He also traced the color word and we matched the letters with the alphabet magnets. In case you hadn't noticed, in honor of our dog book this week - Mickey was replaced by Snoopy! Snoopy joined us the whole week while we rowed this book.

Then, using the same magnets, we matched the letters to Angus' name and Kaleb's name.

We talked about what other words began with the letter D. Kaleb made a book from Homeschool Share. All mini books will be put into a lap folder for later.

We played a game of Dog Lotto, also from Homeschool Share.

He practiced finding Angus' way through the maze.

We made a cave from a paper bag and added Angus inside along with cotton ball snow.

We measured different items with non-standard measurement - a snowflake ruler (link below). This also gave us practice in counting verbally. He loved finding things to measure - dogs, my foot, the baby....

We practiced our numbers by playing this cookie game from Scholastic. Kaleb decided to bring several dogs and feed them the cookies.

He practiced his name using the letter magnets. He recognizes the letters of his name but can't tell me the order of the yet.

We discussed taking care of a dog as well as petting only dogs that they know. When we lived in the city, there were a ton of street dogs that you dared not to pet. So I wanted to make sure that he knows when he may pet a dog and when he shouldn't. Now, when we see a dog in the neighborhood, he tells me if it is a pet or a street dog (mostly pets here).  He gave his doggies a bath to get them clean from the snow dough.

We made a cave in the corner of our living room using a blanket and some duct tape. The kids loved it. All week, they played and read in it. It kept falling down and they begged me to put it back up again.

I borrowed the other Angus books from the library - Angus and the Cat & Angus and the Ducks. Kaleb loved all the books and to celebrate our row - we fed the ducks.


Links

Nurture Store - has the recipe for the Snow Cloud Dough that we used.

Homeschool Year - had the idea of the cave with a bear, we just eliminated the bear and added Angus.

Homeschool Creations - has free printable for the story.

Homeschool Share - has lap booking resources for the story.

Kristen Stefanko - her TPT store has the free snowflake measurement printable that we used.

Tot Tuesday

We have a nickname for our newest addition - Riley. We call him Smiley Riley. He has a great smile complete with two of the cutest dimples! My problem with Riley is every time I pull out the big camera, he stops smiling. I try and try to get him to smile but he refuses to smile when I am holding the camera. Imagine my surprise when a friend of mine was babysitting him one day and posted these on her Facebook! I love them, they are super cute.

You can actually see his dimples. What a cutie! He definitely brightens up my day!

Jesus Walks on Water

Jesus walking on water just happens to be my daughter's favorite lesson from the Bible. I did not know that until we began but it was nice to know she had a favorite! We had some fun while learning about this miracle. I was surprised that there weren't many ideas around the web for this lesson. So, we basically did what was planned in our book.

We added a few more Books of the Old Testament for J to learn. She is up to II Corinthians. We are not on schedule with the book, we are doing it "our" way.

As I read the lesson, J colored her sheet. All of her Bible work goes into her notebook.

She worked on the maze, super easy for her, harder for Kaleb.

J made an ocean sensory bag. She cut a pair of feet and some fish from foam and added them to a ziplock bag. Then, we added some Dollar Store hair gel plus a few drops of food coloring.

She mush is around and we had Jesus' feet walking on water. A word of warning, though, if you do this project. Seal the top of the baggie with packing tape. If you don't, it will open up at a random time and cover whatever it is near. (I speak from experience, since it splashed on my mini blind. It cleaned right up.)

We talked about how difficult it would be (impossible, really) for us to walk on water. Then we did a sink/float experiment. I found several objects around the house and we discussed sinking/floating. I wrote the object down and asked if they thought it would sink or float. I noted what they said and we tested it out. There were a few things that surprised them by floating or sinking. Then I asked them to find a few objects around the house to see what would happen. Any time they can play with water, they have fun!

Not too much this week for our bible lesson. But that's okay since they still had fun and learned a lot. Hope you had a great week. See you soon.

Links

Serving Joyfully - has the experiment about the Dead Sea using an egg, salt, and water.

Bible Fun For Kids - has a few ideas for teaching the lesson, plus free printable. I loved the suggestion using two marbles.