a book to keep

     Levi was thrilled when I introduced the concept of lapbooking to him.  A lapbook is just a little book where you gather up facts and pictures about a single subject.  Like knights.

     "You mean we get to keep it?  We don't have to give it back to the library?!"

     Out loud I said: "Yup!"  Inside I thought: Oh dear, this kid is concerned about having to give back all these books about knights and castles...

     Anyways...
     Here's our coat-of-arms: if you click on the picture, you can see it closer up and read what all the things mean, saving me the trouble of typing them in again (really, because that is just silly, right?)...

     This last part was too cool.  I asked him to draw a knight and he drew a squire helping the knight suit up, the horse in a stable eating hay, a guy in the dungeon with a guard watching him, the castle kitchen with all the "cookers" wearing chef's hats and busy prepping a big meal.  One was even in the garden, collecting food.

     It was a really fun project, and it's a neat way for Levi to review what he's learned about knights.  Google "lapbooks" if you're interested...

bird of the week

For science this week we've been studying the visitors that come to our feeder. We researched some of them, and picked one to record for our school work. This week's pick: the grey tufted titmice.

Levi played the part of junior ornithologist: he recorded the date we saw it, what the weather was like, and where we saw it, as well as the name of the bird, and tried to draw and color the bird as close to reality as possible.

Micah played the role of charming three year old: he disregarded all reality, gave his "a really, really long beak," and used the color that popped the most to him (he is a bright-oriented, little-man, I tell you).

An excellent science lesson, all things considered!

old-fashioned math

I totally have to recommend a good, old-fashioned abacus. Especially if you can get your hands on a solid, real wood one. My husband thought I was a bit odd when he found it amoung our early Christmas presents, but I was thrilled!

The thing they're really good for is hands-on math. You can use those beads for just about any basic function, and your kid can actually see it without having a bunch of manipulatives rolling off the table and being chased by the dog...

You know how you can look at a group and just know there are five things in it? Levi is learning that, because the humble abacus lines up those little beads consistently. We've also already used it to practice counting by 2's, 5's, and 10's, as well as figuring out how old both the boys will be in 2 years (word problems!), and for subtraction, and for counting to 100.

Huzzah for the lowly abacus!

paper building blocks

Okay, so we needed to do something especially fun for Micah, so picked a pre-school project that we hadn't done in a long, long time (which ended up being him watch in fascination as Levi and I constructed nearly a dozen of these for him). 

For each block you will need: 2 bags & markers to decorate & a bunch of newspaper.

Wad up the newspaper and stuff one bag.  Decorate the other, any way you like, and then slide it over the stuffed bag.  Voila! 

Our favorite bags are the Sir Punzel tower, the one made to look like our house, and the reversable bag, which has the building fine on one side and on fire on the other, so the firefighters can actually put the fire out!

When we're done with them, we're going to throw them in our fire pit, for a quick burst of warmth!

Levi's Photo Lessons: Close-ups

This lesson we began by finding the macro button and seeing the difference it can make...

After that I turned him lose with his checklist.  I knew this was going to be a tricky skill for him because you have to hold fairly still when taking close-ups.  But he tried and tried again, and took lots of shots, and got better as he went.

He also did some new things on his own initiative: he went off-list (looking for shots of his own design & interest), and he also tried turning the camera to see how the frame moved (which is why Eve is on an angle below; it was "on-purpose").



I totally recommend this little photography lesson idea to anyone out there, no matter how active their kids may be.  My Levi is fast, hardly ever sits still and he's about as careful with things as most 6 year old boys.

But with his camera he is oh-so-careful, and it's awesome to watch him slow down, to see the ideas rolling around in his head as he tries to decide on a shot. 

 Totally worth every moment.

photography lessons

So Levi has started his Beginner Photography lessons.  His first assignment was just to get him used to using a digital point-and-click, and to looking around and seeing things in a different way.

Something old.

Another something old.

And another something old.

Something that makes him happy...

Take a picture of your own camera (which really threw him for a loop).

Something you love...

More love...

He had such a great time, and is looking forward to his next assignment!

farm museum

We slipped back in time at Carrol County Farm Museum. The kids had fun seeing farm animals again (all though these were the kind you do not touch), but the real highlight of the museum is all their exhibits. We learned about broom-making (for this region anyway), quilting, weaving cloth, spinning, tin smithing, and old-fashioned animal veterinarians (Levi's favorite, as it was just like our studies of life science at home). And we saw tons of old farm equipment and wagons.

They have done a great job with the grounds as well. I loved the irises! I mean, isn't it gorgeous?

And this was my favorite part of the exhibits. This woman has her distaff loaded with wool, and she's spinning away on that tiny wheel. But the crazy, wonderful thing that drew me to the image was the fact that there's also a book on her lap. Her fingers are flying along, but she's reading! Love it!

The tin smithery was cool, cause there was actually a couple of smithies at work! They were really nice, and showed the boys a couple of their cool machines.

The boys loved the corn cobb checker board (wouldn't that be a neat history project when we "officially" get to that era?)!

We were all worn out, slap-silly! Especially me and Micah!

It was a good day.

Treas - ARRR!

First crack of their eyelids was accompanied by piratish demands for the promised treasure hunt, which explains the sleepy-pajama clad pirates.
Finding a clue behind the fish tank!
One clue was buried in the Mr. Potato Head, and so we lost one little pirate along the way...

Another clue!

At last! The well hidden Pirate's Cove and...

Treas-arrr!!!

Bits of Our 3rd TV Free Day...

Well, what have we been doing with all this extra time, now that we're not watching TV? Today L decided he wanted to go on a treasure hunt like they do in We Dig, one of his beginning reader booklets. So I told him that if he wanted, we could make some pirate-y things today, and go on a treasure hunt in the morning.

He wanted a sign that said "Pirate's Cove" and where he got that idea, I don't know. So I got two sheets of paper, and I wrote out each letter on mine while he copied them onto his. He decorated it and glued it to a piece of cardboard. Then we rolled several sheets of newspaper to make the stick, and put it all together.

He was really proud of this stuff...

...as you can see!

Then they went for some swashbuckling...

And back to crafting. He just wanted to do some cutting, so I drew a ship and he did the chopping. You can't tell from the photos, but this is actually a 3D piece that stands up.

And these are definately Hammock Worthy - I can not tell you how many times I've been asked to read Wind Flyers or Seaweed Soup since our last library run!
So here's the collection of Pirate Stuff at day's end. The five cards are for our treasure hunt. The boys will be given the first clue card, and follow them along until they find the pirate ship, anchored at Pirate's Cove. Inside the ship will be those two treasure boxes filled with Jelly Belly Beans (that was the treasure in We Dig). I can't wait!