Category: School News

This week’s radish science continues today. We have had some major growth in the last 24 hours.

Today we are graphing and doing another assignment with our radish seeds. So let the day begin!

The seeds have really pushed out of their shells!
Only 15 and 20 haven’t shown any sign of growth.

Close-up of seedling.
Look at those root hairs!

She needs to finish her graphing and drawing for the week and than we can do today’s assignments.

Diagramming and labeling the seed growth.
Isabel was impressed by my drawing skills (I was impressed by them too!).

Special assignment:
You discover a new species of plant in a tropical forest that hasn’t been photographed or documented. You don’t have a camera and only your field journal with paper and colored pencils (and a ruler). How would you document this new finding to share with others and what would you call this new plant? Go!

Objective:

Making her graph for her drawing.

Graph is completed and now it’s time to capture the beauty of this new plant!

She did it! She has captured this new plant on paper and is ready to show the world!
It is called  “power flower” and it can give you energy for a week! That’s a special flower!

Today’s assignment:

Objective:

Supplies are ready and assembly of our new environments is underway.

Preparing the seed beds for each of the 2 environments.

These 2 environments will be sitting for next 17 days, afterward we will document our findings and record our results.

The dark environment with seeds.
What do you predict will happen?

Both environments are  completed and sealed.
(the sealing of each cup is to keep her from looking in (sealed) cup before the 17 days are complete )

“Even though it’s someone’s birthday today, we are still having school.”

Isabel was bummed that we weren’t taking the day off for her special day however I did let her sleep in and we started class later then normal.

After reading through our Bible lessons the excitement Isabel had for seeing her seedlings in their nursery environment was contagious this morning! So we did all our science lessons first thing.

Yesterdays observation was not a good one because we didn’t see any change in the seedlings from the previous day. Isabel was so disappointed.  So I didn’t take any pictures but Isabel did record her findings on her science graph. (also note: that after watching our “discover and do” video yesterday we decided to wrap our seedling nursery in a blanket)

Which leads us to today…

There are 6 growth stages in a seedling.

On closer observation into our seedling nursery we can see that some of our seeds have gotten through stages A, B, C and D.
However 2 of our seeds haven’t left the first stage of growth yet.

Each seedling stage is determined by growth and gingerly taken out of the nursery for further study.

She only needs to draw 1 picture for each stage of growth.
Yesterday, she drew stage growth A. Today her seedlings have gone well beyond that first stage!

Filling in her bar graph with her new seedling findings from this mornings observations.

Another follow-up assignment for the mini planter seedlings is to check the water levels.
More water was needed in the tray so she filled and measured the depth so it was just right.

Assignment 3 and supplies:

• 2 paper towels
• scissors
• clear cup with lid
• plastic wrap
• 12 radish seeds
• pitcher of water

Our supplies to make four environments.

After assembling her environment, she’s ready to add her seeds.

Wrapping seeds with plastic wrap to decrease the chance of evaporation.

Her 4 environments are completed.
1. under the plastic wrap
2. on the lid
3. under the water
4. on the paper towel
She’s excited to see what happens with her 12 seedlings!

Our other science in the classroom and our other new book we are reading for the week is:

“The M.S.B. Inside the Human Body” by J. Cole and B. Degen.
We started this yesterday and finished it today, not going into to much depth but learning how and where food goes when it enters our bodies.

With starting later, we didn’t get any creative writing completed for the day but we did get all our regular class assignments completed. Which is totally fine, all the science observation that is taking place we can pick up the writing again next week.

Isabel told me at the end of class today that today was the best day of school ever! Wow! that makes me feel great that she’s enjoying homeschooling so much.

It’s February! Our January was a good one. We didn’t have much rain in the area and last week we enjoyed some very nice spring like weather. It’s been a mild winter in our little neck of the woods. Let’s see what February has in store…

 

The Bible verse for this week is…

“As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another” – Proverbs 27:17

The Native American prayer focus this week is for the Miami and Shawnee tribes.

The dictation passage for this week…

“Your troubles have come in order to prove that your faith is real. It is worth more than gold. Gold can pass away even though fire has made it pure. Your faith is meant to bring praise, honor and glory to God. That will happen when Jesus Christ returns.” – 1 Peter 1:7

I have begun to give Isabel a creative writing assignment every day and today’s topic was to invent 5 items of winter wear. She could only think of 4.

See below:

To hear her explain each item to you brings a smile to your face!

She has the potential to be a great writer, she doesn’t have the drive/desire to write it! We are hoping these assignments give her a love of writing because when she writes, it’s amazing!

Her scarf idea is great.

One of our new books to read this week is:
(we’ll finish it next week)

“Toliver’s Secret” by  E.W.Brady
The story is about a little girl who helps her grandfather, who is s spy for General George Washington.

Reading our new book and listening to Isabel read aloud.

This week in the classroom, we are beginning a month long study about radish seeds and the plants that grow from the seed. Today is all about assembly of our planters, nursery and we’ll be planting our first seeds! As we dive into this new exciting lesson, I will post Isabel’s findings and other things. Let the experimenting begin!

Assignment 1 and supplies:

•  1/2 gallon milk carton.
• scissors and masking tape
• paper towels
• radish seeds
• ballpoint pen and a quarter to trace
• pitcher with water

Isabel’s completed seed nursery with 20 seeds inside.
I completely forgot the camera while she was making this, so no pictures of the construction.

Assignment 2 and supplies:

• aluminum foil
• masking tape
• size-D battery
• potting soil
• radish seeds
• permanent marker and a pencil
• Styrofoam® tray

The supplies she will need for her assignment.

Folding aluminum foil.

Wrapping that aluminum foil around a mold (a battery).

It’s secured with tape and labeled for use.

Two little planters ready and waiting for dirt and radish seeds.
She needs to make 2 more.

Both assignments are complete and we set up a table in the classroom below the window for our observations.
(later in the evening I moved the little seedlings because it seemed to cool)

This week in the classroom has been all about math. Multiplication tables, decimals, adding monies, graphs, adding (large numbers) with regrouping and subtraction (large numbers) with regrouping. She spent a lot of time on her math program website. It was a big week to really work the brain!

With a few items around the house we were able to finish this…

Her finished photo nature journal that we started on Monday
but was not able to finish until today.

Memory verse with handwriting for the week.

Dictation passage 1 with handwriting.

Both dictation passages for the week are President George Washington quotes. She did an amazing job on each and her handwriting is so beautiful!

Dictation passage 2 with handwriting.

Wow what a difference 24 hours can make! It’s not sunny. It’s not warmer. It’s cloudy and cool but at least there is no rain.

In the classroom today, we started our day a little later than normal however we did get everything completed by 3:15 p.m. Great job Isabel!

After most of our new work for the day was completed. I had a big review planned from yesterdays lesson on comparative and superlative adjectives. 

Some words I had picked out for her to work with.

Giving her only a few hints and helps along the way.

She flew through this recap of yesterdays lesson.

Her completed word list. I think she’s got the idea of comparative and superlative adjectives.
Fantastic!

Today we finally finished our book, Johnny Tremain by E. Forbes. Difficult to read but what a great story of heroism from those who chose to fight for freedom!

Afterward we had a few review questions about the book and than for a BIG surprise, I had rented the Disney movie (same name) for us to watch! The movie does’t do the book justice but you can get what the main idea of what the book is about. Always reading the book is better in my opinion.

What a gorgeous day we had. Blue skies. Warmer temperatures. I think our final temperature for the day was 62 degrees. Nice! for January.

In the classroom, Isabel worked hard this morning and had most of her work completed by lunch. So proud of her hard work! We were able to get outside before the sun set behind the tree line buffer.

This week’s Bible verse is…

“In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.” – John 1:4

We are continuing to add on to the verses that we have been learning for the past 3 weeks…

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things are made, without him nothing
was made that has been made.”
– John 1:1-3

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Our Native American prayer focus is the Potawatomi tribe of the Upper Mississippi River and the Great Lakes areas.

The dictation passage for this week are 2 quotes from George Washington…

“Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”

“It is far better to be alone, than to be in bad company.” – George Washington

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From our dictation passage quotes, she had to find the adjectives, which lead us to the study of comparative and superlative adjectives.

Comparative adjectives: are adjectives we use to compare two nouns and they can be easily recognized because they end in “-er“.

examples: taller, wider, higher, deeper and longer

for words with more than 2 syllables long:  more interesting, more difficult, more noticeable and more beautiful

Superlative adjectives: are comparing three or more nouns and most end in “-est” or are paired with the words most or least

examples: fastest, wisest, easiest and freshest

most improved, more noticeable, more perfect, most nervous

Irregular adjectives: those words that are not based on a single root word.

examples:

many – more – most
good – better – best
bad – worse – worst
far -father – farthest
much – more – most

Some of our examples from today.

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Today we started 2 new books.

“Listening to Crickets” by C.F. Ransom

This book is about Rachel Carson, the women who started the environmental movement and is a part of our science lessons. Being good stewards to the world that was given us means we need to take care of what He provided for us.

“The Cabin Faced West” by J. Fritz

In math we did a whole lesson on Roman Numerals. The most common numerals are…

Isabel learned these so quickly! I was impressed by how well she did.

Later this afternoon, we went on a nature walk to make a photo journal for a science project. We walked around the neighborhood and Isabel took photos that caught her eye. See below…

Today was another sick day. We all slept in until just past 8 a.m.

Feeling groggy, I was the first one up and went to check on Isabel. She was still sleeping and I really hated to wake her but we needed to get going with our day.

I asked her how her throat was feeling and she said it was still hurting and sore. I felt her head and she felt warm, so after checking her temp, realized she had a slight fever of 100.1. I told her to stay in bed while I made her something to eat. She ate a small bowl of oatmeal and while she finished I began the day with Bible reading. I did both Isabel’s reading and my own.

We completed our 2 new books for the week.

“And Then What Happened, Paul Revere?” by J. Fritz and “Phoebe the Spy” by J.B. Griffin

I couldn’t see why stretching these easy-readers out until Friday would be worth it. So we read both, completed the review questions and then around 10 a.m. we both headed back upstairs for a nap! I slept for about an hour and Isabel stayed in bed keeping warm (don’t know if she slept).

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Around noon, we got up again and had some lunch. My sore throat (like Gino’s) comes and goes, it’s not a constant pain. Isabel’s on the other hand, is constant. When and if she talks her throat is thick and heavy. Poor girly.

In the afternoon we focused on all the written work for the day:

• Spelling
• Science
• Language Arts
• English
• Math
• Art

 (insert photo of spelling test)
spelling tests.

Simple, complete, compound subjects and predicates in sentences. What are they?

• Subject is the who or what the sentence is about. Can be simple, complete or compound.
• Predicate is the information about the subject in the sentence. Can be simple, complete or compound.

These concepts are complex and can not be learned in a day. However Isabel is doing great figuring out what is what. We’ll continue to work on them to get a better understanding.

Confidence in writing is key!

Subjects and predicates learning what they are on the easel and worksheets.

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Later in the afternoon, I asked Isabel about her throat was feeling. On a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being the worse and 1 feeling normal, she gave her throat an 8 or a 7. I checked her temp again and it had gone down a degree to 99.0. We’ll keep monitoring the temp and how her throat is feeling.

About her butterfly mobile… we got it finished today after class and it looks great!

4-stage butterfly mobile!

Stage 1: eggs
Stage 2: caterpillar
Stage 3: cocoon
Stage 4: butterfly

Close-up of completed mobile.
She did a fantastic job!

Our new mobile hangs in the corner of the room above Isabel’s desk.