The ever fabulous Jenn Manning sent out this review schedule for Classical to use at home during the week. This is a great guide for how to break up review times and to not be so bogged down with learning all the new memory work as well as reviewing the old work on a daily basis. I just started using this guide at home with Jordan this week. You can still take the time to have the weekly memory work playing in the background while you go throughout other daily activities to encourage long-term memory. You will just focus on working one-on-one with your child/ren in the specific areas of the day. LOVE it!
Monday -- History, Timeline
Tuesday -- Math, Latin
Wednesday -- Timeline, English Grammar
Thursday -- Geography, Science
Monday, September 24, 2012
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Cycle 1 Week 4
Sorry I was late getting this out to you this week. Sometimes busyness gets the better of me :).
In ASIA MINOR, there was a TURKEY named HATUSA/HATAI that wanted to take a trip to the ARABIAN DESERT, but settled for a vacation on the island of CYPRUS.
We layed out a path with our 7's on it and the girls went one-by-one down the path however they chose (skip, jump, hop, tip toe, etc.) as we all sang the 7's song for each of them.
8's
I numbered 12 spiders (because they have 8 legs) and we skip counted 8's.
The song
Some parts of a plant cell are Nucleus, Cytoplsm, Vacuole, Mitochondria, Cell Membrane, Cell Wall and Chloroplasts are some parts of a plant cell cause that's how God made plants.
The model
Hope this is a help as you go throughout your week with your students!
Geography
We worked on our blob maps, sang our continents song, located our places on the map using skittles and enjoyed the "fruits" of our labor as we read this silly story:In ASIA MINOR, there was a TURKEY named HATUSA/HATAI that wanted to take a trip to the ARABIAN DESERT, but settled for a vacation on the island of CYPRUS.
History
We went on a "Colossus Hunt". This is the same format as "Going on a Bear Hunt" but we we searching for the Colossus (of Rhodes) while going through each of the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World. We rode camels up to the pyramids, bushwhacked our way through the hanging gardens, tiptoed through the Temple of Artemis, dodged lightening bolts past the Statue of Zeus, quietly walked and "ssh ssh sshed" through the mausoleum, rowed our boats (or swam) past the Pharos Lighthouse, and when we finally found the huge colossus and saw how truly big he was we ran back through all the wonders until we were safe at home.Latin
This is the same as last week. We used the same pitograms from last week and sang our Latin song again.Math
7'sWe layed out a path with our 7's on it and the girls went one-by-one down the path however they chose (skip, jump, hop, tip toe, etc.) as we all sang the 7's song for each of them.
8's
I numbered 12 spiders (because they have 8 legs) and we skip counted 8's.
English
We continued learning the hand motions that go along with this video. Again, if you would like a written form of the motions for this video please contact me and I will send it to you.Science
We sung the memory work to the Old Gray Mare (aka I'm in the Lord's Army) and then put together a felt model of the plant cell as we discussed each part.The song
Some parts of a plant cell are Nucleus, Cytoplsm, Vacuole, Mitochondria, Cell Membrane, Cell Wall and Chloroplasts are some parts of a plant cell cause that's how God made plants.
The model
Experiment
We began working on our nature journals. We did this experiment out of sequence due to the beautiful weather we were having. The girls did really well collecting fun items outside. Once back inside, the girls traced, made rubbings of, taped or colored the items into their journals. The Nature Journals were very basic. A cover page had pictures of things to look for while outside and the inside pages were all blank copy paper waiting to be filled with their discoveries. There are more intricate versions but this worked well for our girls who weren't ready to read or record observations. We did encourage the girls to label each item with a simple word such as rock, leaf, stick, berry, seed, etc.
Timeline
We learned the hand motions that go along with this week. You can view these in this video. I am not putting dates in with the girls. We also reviewed all of the motions beginning with week 1. Here is the video with the first 6 weeks signed to the song. She does add in some extras motions during quiet times in the song.Art
Abstract Art
I gave the girls a half sheet of paper with a line drawing of an elephant on it. I then provided several shapes that the girls could them trace over top of the elephant in any pattern that they chose. The final step was for the girls to color in their tracings with the instructions to change colors every time they crossed over a new line. Here are the materials that we used and a possible finished product.
Hope this is a help as you go throughout your week with your students!
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Animal Cell Cake!
Sunday, September 9, 2012
Cycle 1 Week 3
So grateful for the opportunity to spend time with your young ladies each week. It is so great to watch their personalities be revealed through each activity and to watch them as they meet each challenge.
As always, we started our day with this topic. The girls worked on their blob drawings. They are getting fast at this. Some of them did it twice. We then sang a song Renee Wimberly taught us naming all the continents to the tune of He's got the World in His Hands. I am going to list this one in a separate post later. After that we worked on locating each place on the maps. This was a challenge since this map has changed form all preous versions in our manuals. If you have the new manual then we are learning based on what is in there. Our classroom maps are from a previous cycle and this posed a challenge since they are very different. The girls did not complain since they were simply having fun finding each place and marking it with a skittle which they were able to eat as I read the names in the following story.
We went over the CC timeline hand motions that go along with each card. The girls are doing well with this. I will be reviewing the previous weeks motions with them as we go along just to help with the retention of these. Here is the link for the motions for this week. You can search for rafikipaka and that will give you a list of all the videos that are up for the hand motions at the moment. There are also some videos of the hand motions set to the timeline song. Again, I am not currently teaching to the song. This may be something I do over time but right now I am teaching the girls the titles on the timeline cards and the hand motions. We do listen to the timeline song during review time.
I used a matching game printable that I found on CC connected and cut it into 12 necklaces or 6 pairs representing each of the Greek and Roman gods that were mentioned in our weekly song. Each girl got one necklace and then found her match (ex. Zeus/Jupiter, Ares/Mars, Diana/Hera, etc.). Once they were partnered up I played the history song from the CD and we danced with our partners while singing the song. We only had 6 girls this past Friday so we were able to do this activity twice. Below are pictures of the matching game and then what they looked like as a necklace. If you would like the MS Word document containing the game please email me and I will send the file to you.
We continued learning the motions that go along with the Classical Conversations Prepositions Song as found on the audio CD. Here is a link to the video that has the motions we learned. I also have a word document for the motions if it is helpful to see the motions in writing since the video is fast. Again, send me an email request for this and I will send it your way.
We practiced singing the memory work along with the song on the CD. We also looked at these pictorial phonetic spelling charts to help the girls with the pronunciation of the different endings. I will stress that at this age-level we are going for exposure to the language and not mastery. If they get in the ballpark with the pronunciations then we are on the winning team.
With skip counting 5's we did a basic hand play with partners (like Ms. Mary Mac but simplified) as we sang the song. The correlation was each has five finger so every clap was another count of 5. The girls seem to love math and pick it up very quickly.
Skip Counting 6's we borrowed a great activity created by Jen Manning, the Abecedarian Boy's Tutor. I wish I had taken a picture. She used egg cartons for illustrating the counting process. They were divided up into 12 sets of 6. Each egg cup counted as one and then she circled every sixth number. There are lots of ways that you could take this same concept and run with it for all age groups. I made a smaller version at home to use for my 2-year-old as a counting activity. Please note, the one pictures is set up in a group of 12 not 6 and I left the lid intact so that I could close up the activity with materials inside if I chose. Feel free to post extensions ideas on that in the comments section below.
We learned the science memory work set to the song the Itsy Bitsy Spider. One of the other tutors fit it nicely to The Wheels on the Bus but I couldn't get that tune to work out well for me. Funny how what works perfectly for one tutor is a struggle for another one. This is the wording that I used to make it fit.
Parts of an animal cell are nucleus and cytoplasm, vacuole, mitochondria, cell membrane and golgi bodies.
We were truly blessed by Heather Hoffman, Caylee's mommy) and her creativity when she bought in a cake representation of an animal cell as both a model and a yummy treat. She used icing, a cupcake and different types of candy to represent all the parts of the cell. I will post a picture if she is able to send one in. It was yummy...I mean informative!
We asked the questions:
"Why do some animals live underground in the dessert?"
and
"How does and animal's color protect them from predators?"
These were outside activities.
I began by using basic shapes to draw an image on the board step-by-step while the girls copied me. I named each basic shape as it was used. The girls guessed what we were drawing about halfway through but they humored me anyway.
When finished, I flipped my board over to look at the image in it's upright form. Next, they added trees, clouds, birds and/or a sun to their picture and colored them in.
Hope this blesses you during your week!
Jenny
Geography
As always, we started our day with this topic. The girls worked on their blob drawings. They are getting fast at this. Some of them did it twice. We then sang a song Renee Wimberly taught us naming all the continents to the tune of He's got the World in His Hands. I am going to list this one in a separate post later. After that we worked on locating each place on the maps. This was a challenge since this map has changed form all preous versions in our manuals. If you have the new manual then we are learning based on what is in there. Our classroom maps are from a previous cycle and this posed a challenge since they are very different. The girls did not complain since they were simply having fun finding each place and marking it with a skittle which they were able to eat as I read the names in the following story.
The lion of JUDAH lumbered slowly up through ISRAEL with JORDAN the Jaguar. Then they got thirsty and went back to get a drink in the DEAD SEA. "Too salty!" so they used the PHOEN-ICIA (phone) to call the SEA OF GALILEE to make sure it tasted better.
Timeline
We went over the CC timeline hand motions that go along with each card. The girls are doing well with this. I will be reviewing the previous weeks motions with them as we go along just to help with the retention of these. Here is the link for the motions for this week. You can search for rafikipaka and that will give you a list of all the videos that are up for the hand motions at the moment. There are also some videos of the hand motions set to the timeline song. Again, I am not currently teaching to the song. This may be something I do over time but right now I am teaching the girls the titles on the timeline cards and the hand motions. We do listen to the timeline song during review time.
History
I used a matching game printable that I found on CC connected and cut it into 12 necklaces or 6 pairs representing each of the Greek and Roman gods that were mentioned in our weekly song. Each girl got one necklace and then found her match (ex. Zeus/Jupiter, Ares/Mars, Diana/Hera, etc.). Once they were partnered up I played the history song from the CD and we danced with our partners while singing the song. We only had 6 girls this past Friday so we were able to do this activity twice. Below are pictures of the matching game and then what they looked like as a necklace. If you would like the MS Word document containing the game please email me and I will send the file to you.
English
We continued learning the motions that go along with the Classical Conversations Prepositions Song as found on the audio CD. Here is a link to the video that has the motions we learned. I also have a word document for the motions if it is helpful to see the motions in writing since the video is fast. Again, send me an email request for this and I will send it your way.
Latin
We practiced singing the memory work along with the song on the CD. We also looked at these pictorial phonetic spelling charts to help the girls with the pronunciation of the different endings. I will stress that at this age-level we are going for exposure to the language and not mastery. If they get in the ballpark with the pronunciations then we are on the winning team.
Math
With skip counting 5's we did a basic hand play with partners (like Ms. Mary Mac but simplified) as we sang the song. The correlation was each has five finger so every clap was another count of 5. The girls seem to love math and pick it up very quickly.
Skip Counting 6's we borrowed a great activity created by Jen Manning, the Abecedarian Boy's Tutor. I wish I had taken a picture. She used egg cartons for illustrating the counting process. They were divided up into 12 sets of 6. Each egg cup counted as one and then she circled every sixth number. There are lots of ways that you could take this same concept and run with it for all age groups. I made a smaller version at home to use for my 2-year-old as a counting activity. Please note, the one pictures is set up in a group of 12 not 6 and I left the lid intact so that I could close up the activity with materials inside if I chose. Feel free to post extensions ideas on that in the comments section below.
Science
We learned the science memory work set to the song the Itsy Bitsy Spider. One of the other tutors fit it nicely to The Wheels on the Bus but I couldn't get that tune to work out well for me. Funny how what works perfectly for one tutor is a struggle for another one. This is the wording that I used to make it fit.
Parts of an animal cell are nucleus and cytoplasm, vacuole, mitochondria, cell membrane and golgi bodies.
We were truly blessed by Heather Hoffman, Caylee's mommy) and her creativity when she bought in a cake representation of an animal cell as both a model and a yummy treat. She used icing, a cupcake and different types of candy to represent all the parts of the cell. I will post a picture if she is able to send one in. It was yummy...I mean informative!
Experiment
We asked the questions:
"Why do some animals live underground in the dessert?"
and
"How does and animal's color protect them from predators?"
These were outside activities.
Fine Arts
Upside-down Images
I began by using basic shapes to draw an image on the board step-by-step while the girls copied me. I named each basic shape as it was used. The girls guessed what we were drawing about halfway through but they humored me anyway.
Hope this blesses you during your week!
Jenny
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Cycle 1 Week 2
We had another great day on Friday! The girls are starting to slowly find their voices and not be so shy. They did a great job when I reviewed the previous week's material! I can tell you guys have worked hard with the girls. Great job moms! I know it is hard on a daily basis to teach on top of everything else life calls us to. Your girls are already showing the rewards of your hard work.
Geography
We did our Blob drawings. The girls are working hard to trace these perfectly. Within the next few weeks I may transition more to having them trace them onto another sheet of paper. We then located each destination on our laminated maps using skittles. Next, I read the girls a story using all the names and they were able to eat the skittles as they located each one. Below is the story:
You are floating down the RED SEA on a PERSIAN carpet. Suddenly Prince CASPIAN appears to help you fight the BLACK knights of BABYLON.
Timeline
We are standardizing our timeline hand motions across the co-op. These are no different than what I have been teaching the girls already. Some classes, however, had been using some slightly different ones. Here is a link off of YouTube that shows what I am teaching the girls. This is just the weekly posting but all 24 weeks are available from the same person. She even explains why each hand motion was chosen. She also does the hand motions to the song. I am not teaching them the motions to song but I do play the song during review time. The idea for this is to expose them to all the possible ways of learning the work even if I don't teach it to them during the new memory work section.
Latin
Latin was the same as last week.
English
I changed my approach to the prepositions. I found a video of the CC chant from the audio CD. The girls practiced the first week's motions with me and had fun with it. We shall see how it continues. I did have to slow this down so I could capture everything.
Math
The girls have been doing well with singing the songs for all the skip counting. I had planned to do follow the leader with them as we sang the songs for skip counting 3's and 4's. The girls had other plans :). Instead of "Follow the Leader" we played "Jump the Brook" just like last week.
Science
I had pictures of examples from each Kingdom. We sang the answer to "God Bless America". The Five kingdoms of Living Things are: Animalia, Plantae and Fungi. Protista. Monera. Are the five kingdoms of living things. We also colored a worksheet I found on the 5 Kingdoms.
History
We did the continuation of last week with commandments 6-10. The hand motions will be posted later. We did put both weeks together so that the girls would here it as one continuous string and not as two separate parts.
Art
This week we studied Mirror Images. I cut out several shapes of objects that could make up a princess drawing (castle, clouds, grass, trees, crown, etc.) I then cut these in half and had the girls trace around the outside of a piece and then flip it over to the mirror image and then trace that as well...two halves then made a whole. My idea behind this was to give the girls and activity on their skill level as artists that also incorporated their interests as well. Here are some of the shapes we used (The top picture is what they looked like when I gave them to the girls and the bottom picture is before i cut them in half):
Science
We did two experiments this week. One talking about how spiders judge the size of intruders and the other discussing why fish can float belly up. The girls did great with forming a hypothesis and working through the process of each experiment. I had lab sheets for us to work on together but unfortunately left them at home. In future weeks I am going to be working more with them on understanding the scientific process and looking at simplified lab sheets to be filled out as a group. This Friday's experiment will be outside and we will be paired up with an older group.
So blessed to have the opportunity to serve your girlies!
Geography
We did our Blob drawings. The girls are working hard to trace these perfectly. Within the next few weeks I may transition more to having them trace them onto another sheet of paper. We then located each destination on our laminated maps using skittles. Next, I read the girls a story using all the names and they were able to eat the skittles as they located each one. Below is the story:
You are floating down the RED SEA on a PERSIAN carpet. Suddenly Prince CASPIAN appears to help you fight the BLACK knights of BABYLON.
Timeline
We are standardizing our timeline hand motions across the co-op. These are no different than what I have been teaching the girls already. Some classes, however, had been using some slightly different ones. Here is a link off of YouTube that shows what I am teaching the girls. This is just the weekly posting but all 24 weeks are available from the same person. She even explains why each hand motion was chosen. She also does the hand motions to the song. I am not teaching them the motions to song but I do play the song during review time. The idea for this is to expose them to all the possible ways of learning the work even if I don't teach it to them during the new memory work section.
Latin
Latin was the same as last week.
English
I changed my approach to the prepositions. I found a video of the CC chant from the audio CD. The girls practiced the first week's motions with me and had fun with it. We shall see how it continues. I did have to slow this down so I could capture everything.
Math
The girls have been doing well with singing the songs for all the skip counting. I had planned to do follow the leader with them as we sang the songs for skip counting 3's and 4's. The girls had other plans :). Instead of "Follow the Leader" we played "Jump the Brook" just like last week.
Science
I had pictures of examples from each Kingdom. We sang the answer to "God Bless America". The Five kingdoms of Living Things are: Animalia, Plantae and Fungi. Protista. Monera. Are the five kingdoms of living things. We also colored a worksheet I found on the 5 Kingdoms.
History
We did the continuation of last week with commandments 6-10. The hand motions will be posted later. We did put both weeks together so that the girls would here it as one continuous string and not as two separate parts.
Art
This week we studied Mirror Images. I cut out several shapes of objects that could make up a princess drawing (castle, clouds, grass, trees, crown, etc.) I then cut these in half and had the girls trace around the outside of a piece and then flip it over to the mirror image and then trace that as well...two halves then made a whole. My idea behind this was to give the girls and activity on their skill level as artists that also incorporated their interests as well. Here are some of the shapes we used (The top picture is what they looked like when I gave them to the girls and the bottom picture is before i cut them in half):
Science
We did two experiments this week. One talking about how spiders judge the size of intruders and the other discussing why fish can float belly up. The girls did great with forming a hypothesis and working through the process of each experiment. I had lab sheets for us to work on together but unfortunately left them at home. In future weeks I am going to be working more with them on understanding the scientific process and looking at simplified lab sheets to be filled out as a group. This Friday's experiment will be outside and we will be paired up with an older group.
So blessed to have the opportunity to serve your girlies!
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