Five in a Row - The Bee Tree

 We rowed "The Bee Tree" by Patricia -- this week. We've read this book before, and it's such a fun book to read aloud. A girl named Mary Ellen is bored by reading her book and would rather go out and play. Her grandfather takes her on an adventure to find a bee tree, with a sweet reward of honey at the end, and teaches her that reading is the same kind of adventure. We kept this row simple with a focus on bees and pollination, onomatopoeias, and geography terms. Some weeks call for simple and this was one of them!

Monday:

We read the book and then read a book called "Honeybees". We talked about the different jobs of the different types of  bees and then completed a few worksheets. The first one described the three types of bees: worker, drone, and queen. The next one listed six different jobs of the worker bee (and there are more than six, I just had them choose six). We also did some copywork from scriptures that talk about honey - Proverbs 16:24 and Psalm 19:10.

Tuesday:

We read the book again and then read "The Honey Makers." There was similar information in the book, but also some new information and fun facts. The boys color-coded the parts of a bee (worksheet from here) and then drew the simplified life cycle of a bee.

Wednesday:

We skipped school Wednesday because I had a hair appointment that morning, and then we had so many errands to run and do that afternoon followed by church that evening.

Thursday:

We read the book and then talked about onomatopoeias. We briefly touched on this last year so it wasn't new to the boys. They filled in a simple worksheet where they had to name an object that could make the listed sounds. Then they drew and labeled eight onomatopoeias of their own.

We then talked about the geography terms in the book. The boys wrote them down along with their definitions and then illustrated each one.

Friday:

We read the book again along with the book "If You Were a Kid During the California Gold Rush." The woman "Klondike" Bertha in "The Bee Tree" had just gotten back from an expedition to the Yukon. I couldn't find a book for kids on the Klondike gold rush, so we just talked about the California Gold Rush. Then we looked in our World Books and read some information about gold. They then filled in a notebooking page with information about gold.

We then talked about pollination and they color-coded the parts of a flower.

Next they completed their book summary sheet, which we do for every book.

There were more activities I had wanted to do but we just didn't have the time to get to them. Next week we are going a little deeper with the book "Follow the Drinking Gourd."

Five in a Row - Night of the Moonjellies & Homeschool Highlights

This week we rowed a really fun book called "Night of the Moonjellies" by Mark Shasha. It's about a seven year old boy that is helping in his Gram's restaurant for the summer and he makes a neat discovery - a moonjelly!

Monday:

Today we read the book and talked about the illustrations. We discussed the warm and cool color palettes used on the different pages. We mixed paint colors using the primary colors and learned which ones were warm and which were cool.

Then we took different colors and "warmed them up" by adding warm colors and "cooled them down" by adding cool colors. The boys really enjoyed mixing paints to make new colors. They were excited to see which colors they were making. I can't believe we've never really done this before.

We also did our vocabulary words - marina, pier, and moonjelly. 

Tuesday:

We read the book again - the boys really enjoy this story. The story takes place in New England, and the actual restaurant from the book was in Connecticut. We read a book I had on the shelf, N is for Nutmeg: A Connecticut Alphabet. We then completed a Connecticut state page and labeled the six New England states on a blank map.

We also used pastels to create an ocean picture with shining moonjellies. I copied the cover of the book and cut out the boats for the boys to glue on their picture. They loved using chalk pastels!

Wednesday:

We read the book a third time - I'm making sure we read the book each day. We talked about jellyfish today (even though moonjellies aren't really jellyfish). I printed out a book on the parts of a jellyfish from Montessori Print Shop (they were $3.00) and we labeled a jellyfish using a free printable from TPT.

We also read lots of information about jellyfish from several books we have. The boys then wrote down some interesting facts they learned on a notebook page.

Thursday:

We read the book a fourth time. I asked if they were getting tired of the book yet, and Silas said he wasn't. Titus said, "Kind of, but I do like the book!"

We learned about bioluminescence by reading some books and watching a few YouTube videos. The boys thought it was really neat! I had them make their own notebooking page about what they learned and then we used glow-in-the-dark and neon paint to paint our own bioluminescent creatures.

Friday:

Today we read a book called, "Why Is the Ocean Salty? And Other Questions." I had the boys draw the ocean zones and we talked about them for a bit. We just learned about them a few months ago. 

They also did their book summary sheet and filled in all of the information.

Tonight we are cooking hamburgers, fries, and homemade milkshakes, just like the restaurant in the book! Next week I think we are rowing "The Bee Tree."

They each worked in their Math Lessons for a Living Education and Learning Language Arts Through Literature, as well as a few new workbooks I bought for them. Silas has a cursive workbook, a Grammar Minutes workbook, and a workbook on writing good sentences. Titus has a manuscript penmanship book, a grammar workbook, and a workbook on sentences. 

Eli had a basketball game last night and Mercie and I went. They lost (only their second loss all season). Today is Mercie's 13th birthday! We will have cake and ice cream with her best friend and my in-laws. 

How was your week?

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Homeschool Highlights #3 & Five in a Row: Lentil

We've read this book by Robert McCloskey many times, and I knew it would be a fun book to row this week! There were so many different directions we went with this book and so many more we could have explored. Silas is 10 in the 5th grade and Titus is 8 in the 3rd grade.

Monday:

We chose to focus on the American flag today. The townspeople hang up flags in honor of Colonel Carter who is returning to their town on the train. We read this book about the flag and the boys completed a notebooking page with six facts that they learned about the flag. 

Next we read this book about Betsy Ross and did another notebooking page with facts about her life and a picture of the original flag which contained 13 stars and 13 stripes.

Then we followed the directions in the back of the book to make our own 5-pointed star just like Betsy did by folding a square sheet of paper and then making a *snip*! It took a few tries to get the snip just right, but the boys finally had stars they were proud of!

Tuesday:

Today we focused on sound. We read this book about sound, which seems like a book for really young kids by looking at the cover. However it presented information about sound, sound waves, and decibels in a really clear and interesting way. The boys enjoyed reading it!

We then did an experiment on seeing sounds. We wrapped plastic wrap around a bowl and added a bit of rice on top. Silas banged on a metal sheet pan with a wooden spoon right next to the bowl and we watched as the rice hopped up and down! 

They drew a picture of their experiment and I dictated a few sentences to them to write down.

Next we looked at a print-out of sound waves at different frequencies. They boys copied the diagram down and wrote examples of what each sound wave could be. This required some critical thinking!

I also printed out a reading comprehension worksheet (I rarely do this) on sound. They took turns reading paragraphs aloud and then answering true/false for the statements. I'm not a fan of these types of worksheets, but this one was well written.

Finally we made Stick Harmonicas! We got the idea from Frugal Fun For Boys. It was super easy to make and only required 2 jumbo craft sticks, a straw, and three rubber bands. The boys were super surprised that it sounded just like a kazoo. Who knew you could make a musical instrument from craft sticks? Mercie even made one when she heard the boys playing theirs! I'm glad she still wants to join in on the fun once in a while.

Wednesday:

Today we did our book worksheet and filled in the title, author, illustrator, summary, main character, and our favorite parts. Both boys gave the book five stars! They do enjoy listening to it every morning.

Next we did a quick worksheet on facts about Ohio that I got from 3 Boys and A Dog, since that's where our story takes place.

Then we used chalk pastels to draw pictures since the illustrations are done in charcoal. They found this a challenging medium to work with, but I really enjoyed it! Here are their drawings (neither were too happy with their finished products).

Thursday:

We talked about the sense of taste today. I gave them each a slice of lemon, a piece of unsweetened chocolate, a saltine cracker, and a piece of candy. They tasted each one and we discussed the different tastes - sour, bitter, salty, and sweet. We read from a few books that had information on taste buds. 

They each drew a tongue on pink paper and label where the taste buds are. They cut it out and glued it to a notebook page, then did some dictation from the book. Did you know we have over 10,000 taste buds?

Finally I had them cut pictures from magazine of food that have the four different tastes and glued them on cardstock.

When we read the book today, I asked them to notice something about the illustrations we hadn't noticed before. Silas noticed a lot more! There are so many surprising things in the pictures.

Friday:

Today we talked about national monuments. I gave the boys worksheets with four monuments from our country. We did a bit of research and they wrote down information about each monument. 

Then we painted our lemons! We used watercolors.

Finally we made homemade lemonade! We took turns squeezing the juice from five lemons, which gave us a bit more than 1 cup of lemon juice. I boiled 5 cups of water and 1 cup of sugar to make a syrup, then we mixed it together! It was delicious. The kids drank all of it with lunch! It was much better than the Country Time lemonade we usually make (a powdered mix). 

We had a blast this week with Lentil. Next week, we will be rowing "The Bee Tree!"

How was your week? Link up any homeschool related posts below!

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