We are currently working on several things here. I don’t have any final products to show you, but I just wanted to give you a glimpse of our days when we are deep in the thick of things—a middle-view, so to speak, rather than always showing the ends.
This is the latest part of Superboy’s Colossal Castle that he has been working on for awhile–one of the interior structures. Just to show you the level of detail he is going for.
Today we tried our hands at making an Ice wreath (discovered via Whip Up).
We assembled them inside and then set them out on our snow-covered picnic table to freeze overnight.
I can’t wait to see how they turn out tomorrow!
JBug has been working on making a set of paper dolls from around the world. Here is her Dutch girl:
She is using this pad of paper people and these lovely global village papers. […]
Original post by lapazfarm
…the Petronas towers …
and an itty bitty city is complete!
Yes, we’ve been having fun with architecture around here.
Original post by lapazfarm
We had fun doing some of the 10 fun things to do that I posted the other day so I thought I’d brainstorm 10 more.
1. Make up polls and graph the results. We’ve done favorite ice cream flavors and colors in the past. We even graphed the favorite colors one in M&Ms (I bought Easter and regular colors to cover all the bases!). Let the kids pick their own categories to poll about and call friends and relatives to get their votes.
2. Report on a historical event as a news report. Let the kids pick an event and play news reporters to fill in viewers about what happened. If you have more than one child, let one be an anchorwoman, one a reporter, one a witness and so on. Videotape it if you can!
3. Chart the temperature. Find out the highs or lows for the past month (or week) […]
Original post by Alicia
We like to listen to music while we work here at LaPaz. The kids and I have a special fondness for listening to music from other cultures. Since we cannot afford to actually visit these places, listening to their music is a way to, in some small part, get to know other cultures.
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flashObject.write(”fo_targ_4hk13Dn7ePY2075481006″);
I’d like to expand our collection a bit and I need suggestions for CD’s of cultural music from around the world. We have and enjoy the Chieftains (as above), Sufi Traveller by Mercan Dede, and we have several CD’s of Native American music as well as a few “World Music” CD’s with a variety of music from different places. We have a lot of Cuban and other Latin music, thanks to dh’s cultural roots. We also like to listen to Afro-Pop Worldwide onPublic Radio.
But I need to expand, obviously!!!!
Any suggestions greatly appreciated.
(And downloads wont […]
Original post by lapazfarm
Since we were in Nebraska last week we didn’t get a chance to do a flag project for Unplug Your Kids. I told the kids last night that they could make up a family flag to take part in the theme, but it was a last minute thing. Then Daryl said we might be interested in something Polly sent from Scotland while we were gone….
What lovely timing she has! :) Here is the St. Andrew’s flag. We’re still deciding where to hang it to properly honor it. Jack keeps trying to hide under it, wrap himself in it and use it as a superhero cape.
It is so neat having such a link with Scotland through Polly and her packages! She also sent us more shortbread, which we all have been fighting over. Yum!
Original post by Alicia
Just a quick note that Yahoo is updating this page with results and gives quite a bit of information if you’re following along. The kids are happy to get to begin coloring now that 2 states are finally registering winners (one red, one blue!). The results should start speeding up now…. it should be quite a night!
Original post by Alicia
A few years ago, Daryl made up some car maps for the kids to use when we were traveling. When they spotted a license plate from another state (or country), they’d color it in on the map or write it in. The goal was to try to color the whole map during the trip/summer. He had one with the state names and one blank one so the girls could start to memorize where the states were.
Today we’re using the maps to track the election results. It’s the same premise, just coloring the states red or blue depending on which candidate wins each state. Daryl doesn’t have Alaska or Hawaii or the car map since it was just the continental U.S. (folks don’t often take their cars to MN from Hawaii!) but the kids drew those states in.
I’m sure you can find maps online too but I already had these. If […]
Original post by Alicia
The kids and I are making the trek to Tiffany’s house tomorrow. Wish me luck for the 6 hour drive with 4 small, loud people!
We’re planning on coming back Monday. I must be back in plenty of time to vote!
Original post by Alicia
I’m in love with this salt dough map idea! Now we need to start studying another country. And find a pizza box…
Original post by Alicia
I think most people know about FreeRice by now, the cool web site that tests your vocabulary and earns rice that’s donated to the hungry. They’ve expanded and now have categories like chemistry symbols, multiplication, world capitals, foreign languages and more! What a great way to help others and help your kids (or yourself) learn.
Original post by Alicia
The folks behind FreeRice have come up with a fun online geography game that donates clean drinking water to people in need the more you play!
The name of a place is displayed above a map and the object is to click on the map as close to the location of that place as possible. You earn 10 cups of water if you’re right on the button but even if you’re off a bit you still earn some water if you’re close. If you play long enough the locations are reused at random so it does help you learn, too.
Whenever you get a correct answer, the charity donates clean, safe drinking water to people in need, and it doesn’t cost anything to play, so everyone wins.
Original post by Alicia
Bringing Up Learners is offering a comprehensive world history curriculum free to download. I checked it out and it looks thorough, diverse, interesting and fun. There are fun read-aloud books, poems to memorize, maps, activities, world religions, myths and several history books that are used as spines.
You can even choose whether to download the one that teaches prehistory and evolution or one that skips it, along with choosing which history book to use as the main spine (Story of the World or A Little History of the World).
It lists what you’ll need for each week, along with day by day lesson plans and schedules to fill out the rest of your plans for the day. The author also points out that it’s meant to be used loosely, so you can pick and choose which elements to use.
The plan does rely on a number of books that you’ll need to either […]
Original post by Alicia
Here’s an addictive little online game where your kids can test their geography knowledge. You can pick a country or do the whole world, including neat things like landmarks. The better you do, the higher up the levels you move. It’s quite fun! Victoria played this afternoon and loved the sarcastic comments it came up with when she was too far off.
Original post by Alicia
Our dear friend Polly lives in Scotland. She asked Daryl to teach the kids to sing “Flower of Scotland” since it’s considered one of their national songs and is so beloved.
Daryl printed the words out and we’ve been singing it together in the car. It is a lovely song and it gets stuck in your head! I’ve asked him to learn it on the dulcimer so we can sing it to music, too.
The tune is a bit tricky to get from just the lyrics so I asked him to find some versions for me to listen to. Here are some favorites.
Video of the Corries singing it 40 years ago…
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flashObject.write(”fo_targ_BeOR_sNSPbg108817421″);
Brigid Gore for a female perspective
and The Red Hot Chili Peppers for a modern rock perspective.
A bit of the history behind it, from this site where you can find national anthems, sheet music and more:
A constituent nation of […]
Original post by Alicia
Read alouds have also tailed off a bit in the past several weeks. We still read at bedtime but that is dominated by the Agatha Christie marathon that Tigger and her Dad are on. Day-time non-fiction read alouds have been few and far between. So it has taken us a while to finish The Road to There: Mapmakers and Their Stories by Val Ross, which I tempted you with back at the end of June.
Tigger is the grand-daughter of a high school geography teacher (retired) and her dad is kind of into maps. So a history of maps and map-making was likely to be popular around here. There are 13 chapters beginning with one about forgery and the Vinland map as a way to introduce the importance of maps. The following chapters are arranged chronologically and take us from the 12th century through to the present day. Each chapter begins […]
Original post by jove
Yesterday was Victoria’s “mom and me” day so Daryl took the other kids for a couple of hours in the afternoon.
She decided she wanted to spend it making cookies, playing Scrambled States of America, and doing a craft. We generally only get an hour so I explained we might not have time for all of that, so she chose the cookies and game.
We made oatmeal raisin cookies. We were a half cup short of the oats required, so we supplemented with ground flax seed, whole wheat germ, organic spelt flour and pulverized organic whole wheat raisin bran. She was a little worried! I explained how to hide healthy things well and assured her that you wouldn’t taste them.
They were delicious! She licked the bowl and I licked the beater, and we agreed that you sure couldn’t taste any of that sneaky healthy stuff […]
Original post by Alicia
We’re finally finished! Victoria did most of the work, with a little help from me and and a few touches by Anna. I love the finished lapbook! There are multiple cardstock pages inserted with sections on art, history, maps, school, food and fun. We even included the slip of paper from the owner of the Ethiopian Restaurant where he wrote out how to say “thank you” for the kids. See the “Ethiopia” entry from earlier today for some links and more info on this fascinating country. Here’s some pics….
Original post by Alicia
We went to a local Ethiopian restaurant on Friday and it led to a wonderful unit study on Ethiopia!
Even though we live in a very rural area, we are lucky to have a diverse group of cultures nearby. A neighboring tiny town has a large Hmong population, another has a high Laotian population, and another has a large Hispanic and Ethiopian population. Tucked in a grand old building that has seen grander days, we found the Queen Sheeba restaurant and decided to give it a try.
A lovely Ethiopian gentleman helped us navigate the menu and we settled on a lentil alecha, a beef tip recipe and Ethiopian fried chicken. He brought us a giant platter of injera, a rather bitter pancake-like bread that is torn into pieces, rolled up and dunked in the saucy dishes. We also shared a tossed salad and finished the meal with […]
Original post by Alicia
I came up with a fun way for Anna to learn geography today. I gave her the world’s best book of countries and told her I wanted her to pretend to be my travel agent. After explaining what a travel agent was, I said that I wanted to go someplace different and wanted her to come up with 5 countries she recommended for me to visit.
She came back with some questions to help narrow the search, which I thought was very smart. She asked questions like did I like seafood, did I want to go someplace crowded or remote, did I like very old & mysterious places, did I speak French, and so on. I asked for some places with interesting things, lots of nature, good local food and not a lot of tourists. I said any language was fine.
Her recommendations:
Chile, specifically Easter Island
Finland (lots of lakes and trees, the […]
Original post by Alicia
Here’s a bit of what we’ve been up to lately in various subjects….
Literature–
Reading “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” together
Reading classic poetry to Jack and Anna at bedtime
Victoria just finished a novel (can’t remember which one) and has been reading old magazines.
We’ve been reading lots of books to Jack.
Daryl is reading another Sadie Rose novel to Anna.
Anna has been reading old Highlights magazines and various books and comics.
Both girls enjoyed the “New Moon” magazine for girls that I printed out.
Math–
Victoria and Anna have been doing workbook pages. I go over them with each girl afterwards.
Victoria has been answering math questions I email to her.
Victoria, Jack and Anna have all been playing Timez Attack on the computer.
Jack is still playing his other math computer game, and still insists on keeping it at 3rd grade level and having his sisters help him.
Victoria and Anna have done various math problems figuring […]
Original post by Alicia
The Iditarod ceremonial start is tomorrow, so today the littles and I took the opportunity to get into the arctic spirit!
First, Mama bear cooked up a big pot of “Polar Bear Porridge,” ( which was actually grits with white cheese) but when it was scooped into the baby bears’ bowls, we found it to be too hot! So while we waited for it to cool, we read this gorgeous book:
By that time the porridge was just right and the three baby polar bears gobbled it down (Mama bear, too!)
Then we went to the computer to read some more about the Iditarod. The kiddos really like me to read them Zuma’s Paw prints, which is the blog of the Iditarod’s official canine reporter! We learned a lot of interesting facts about the qualities that make an excellent Iditarod sled dog.
When we read that the Iditarod trail is 1122 miles long, JBug […]
Original post by lapazfarm
Our educational pursuits have taken a decidedly northern turn here at LaPaz homeschool. We are beginning our in-depth Alaska study in preparation for the Iditarod and our upcoming move to that great state. To set the stage for our northern adventure I got a bit of white oil pastel and sketched out a great big outline of Alaska on our living room picture window and Superboy hung his Alaskan flag!
I hope to use this as a base for the children to add evidence of their Alaskan studies:cities, animals, landmarks, and of course the Iditarod trail. This week, in addition mapping the trail, we will each choose a musher to learn more about and follow in the race.
And our geography center is topped off with a fun activity that JBug and Squirt did today:totem poles!
We read the book Whale in the Sky and then they made their totem poles to […]
Original post by lapazfarm
Daryl has been discussing the Gold Rush with the kids and he asked me to find a Gold Rush game online for them to find. I love the internet! After about two minutes I found this free printable game, complete with a map and 100 things that can happen to players on their trek to Sacramento.
Original post by Alicia
What did Ibn Battuta do? Approximately when?
1,000 B.C
500 AD
1300 AD
1800 AD
Approximately when did the Portugeuse first build forts in
West Africa?
1300
1500
1700
1900
How did the discovery of the
Americas affect
Africa?
Where and when was the Asante Empire?
Guinea
Coast, 500 AD
Guinea
Coast, 1600 AD
South Africa, 1000 AD
South Africa, 1500 AD
Name and give something about 1-2 other African kingdoms
How were the
Nile and
Niger rivers important to exploration?
Who was
Mungo
Park?
What was the importance of
Timbuktu to explorers?
Where did Livingstone explore?
What did Henry Stanley do?
I used to think that testing was unnecessary, but with my sister it’s good to give her these pausing points to look back and see if she understood/remembered what she did/read. We don’t grade our tests, as we are not giving grades. However, each question that she gets wrong will have a review or extra assignment added for it.
Our text for this study is Exploration into Africa by Isimeme Ibazebo. I like the book a lot, and I’m learning new […]
Original post by learningumbrella
I wanted to expand upon something I mentioned in an earlier post. While Superboy is researching routes across the USA, the littles have been busy working on a project of their own: mapmaking!And they are doing such good work and having so much fun that even though they are not done yet, I just had to share!
They are making it by using the Montessori puzzle map of the hemispheres as a template and tracing it onto a big piece of brown paper.
First they traced around the whole puzzle map to make a large rectangle. Then they used some dinner plates to make the hemisphere circles. Then came the hard part.
Using a control map as a guide, they positioned and traced around each of the puzzle pieces to make the map itself. That’s as far as Squirt has gotten so far. But JBug, being older, has worked more quickly and […]
Original post by lapazfarm
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