Tree Rings

Was this tree a sapling or an adult? 

How old was this tree?

Close Examination

Le Petit Chaperon Rouge

French class ended the term with a performance...

Le Petit Chaperon Bleu, Le Petit Chaperon Violet, Le Petit Chaperon Rose

Noah delivers his lines.

Enter le loup.

Poor grand-mère is locked in the cupboard. 

Enter le chasseur.

Take a bow...

Conifers and Composers

We learned about the seeds of conifer trees.

We have 2 pine cones. One was heated in the oven until it opened. The boys examined each cone, made observations, and dislodged seeds from the open cone.

Each of the boys have a notebook to compile pages about the composers we study. Originally, only the older two had a notebook, however, Caleb insisted today that I make him one.

We spent several weeks studying Vivaldi. 

We completed our study of Bach today.

Headlamps, Pictograms, etc.

Here's a quick catch-up of some of our recent activities.

Caleb's work evidently required a headlamp.

We spent a week studying Ancient China. The boys created their own pictograms.

Cooper's first page of pictograms: Fish, Mountain, Bow and Arrow, House, Sailboat, Snow-capped Mountain

Cooper reviewed words with silent letters today by using sentences divided into subject and predicate. 

After reading each sentence properly, the subject and predicate were chosen at random. This was a favorite silly sentence: The crumb on the ground will save the king and queen from doom.

Nature and Science

Nature Studies two weeks ago: Twigs and Branches

The little guys worked on some "branches" worksheets.

The older kids learned about twigs.

Everyone made fabulous twig lanterns. So cute!

The Maple leaf bookmarks are a carry-over activity from a previous leaf lesson.

 Nature Studies last week: Seeds

The little guys did a tear and paste activity.

All of the kids made a seed mosaic.

 The chicken pox have struck, but school has continued (at least for the first two days of this week). Noah's the only victim so far. He was awake most of last night, so we took today off.

We're learning about evergreen and deciduous trees in science.  The photo cards show the same two trees pictured in each of the four seasons.

Eager Students

Caleb did a great job on his "b" worksheets yesterday.

Cooper's reading a Magic Tree House book. He'll record the pages read in his Reading Log.

It's all about trees and shrubs in science.

Noah was very thorough with his math work today.

Here's a close-up of all of the little bike riders he drew for his word problem.

Caleb glued blue yarn to the letter "b."

This book is super!!! It's a loaner from a friend. We've moved on from Vivaldi to Bach and read the Bach section of the book.

Re-cap of the last few weeks

Focused on their science work...note any similarities?

After French class, the kids lined up to watch the tow truck pick up Candace's car.

With the car safely towed away, we went to the park to gather leaves for Autumn crowns.

Caleb was very pleased with his "a" worksheets. 

Pictured here are two of my new favorite finds (thanks to Kirsty!).
Cooper and Noah have a Second Word Book and a First Word Book, respectively. Commonly used words are listed in alphabetical order with extra spaces to add more words. I can write a word once, and then it's available to be copied in the future. And, this is a great way to practice alphabetical order.
Here the boys are using their books to aid in the completion of a literature assignment.

More fun in nature. Kirsty led a study of twigs.

She prepared some fun activities for me to complete with the younger crew.

Getting crafty: All of the kids made lanterns using jars and twigs. 

They also made Maple leaf bookmarks.

 Yesterday...(which means I'm finally caught up on photos):

Cooper started our history lesson with Show and Tell. He was given some Egyptian papyrus, coins, and a Scarab beetle for his birthday.

Our resident expert wandered downstairs with the paper shown above. Line 28 is "Hammurapi" - that's not a typo, the "p" is correct. We've been studying Hammurapi and Shamshi Adad this week.