1st Day of School 2013-14

We did it!  We started the year with a BANG! Or rather a gluten free cinnamon roll as a treat.

 I was nervous.  Not sure why.  I think adding Story of The World onto what we were already doing, made me feel like it might be overwhelming.  Not to mention adding in pre-school for Emery. However, with prayer, preparations, and plans we made it through day one.  One day at a time, right?

So, here's a peek into our day.  We started out with a game.  That's the game lover in me coming out. We played match ten (I think that is the name).  Using playing card you pick out Ace-10 and the Q.  We laid them in a grid like most matching games.  The point is to draw two cards that have a sum of 10.  Nine and one, eight and two... then we also use 10 and Q, the Q representing zero.  They loved it!  

Then they worked on coloring their SOTW activity pages while I read Chapter One.  

Chapter One has you pretending to ride a magic carpet over the Roman Empire- thus the girls sitting on the carpets.

You can see how much of the first day "jitters" they have- LOL!  She couldn't get enough.

Lil' Emery was having fun with her preschool. 

She was threading foam onto a plastic needle and cord.  She didn't enjoy this as much as threading pieces of felt onto a ribbon "snake".

A ribbon with a button sewn onto one end, and piece of felt as a "stopper" on the other end.  About 12 pieces of felt with button size slits cut into them are threaded onto the "snake".  She did this about four times.  Each time she would finish she'd shout "I did it!". Then ask to to it "again!".  Of course if you take the time to make one for your toddler and have my fortune they'll probably not enjoy it this much. You know, I had made this last year and she wasn't interested, but is this year.

We drew a large map of the Roman Empire on our 4x4 white board.

Then they flew their carpets around the Empire.

Of course they are too busy flying to pause for a pic.

Then we made our Roman signums and they had to go outside to march like soldiers.  Claire wanted to be England and fight against Rome. It's bright out :)

After spelling and language arts Claire wanted to dress like a Roman.  Here's what we came up with on the spur of the moment. Dad's t-shirt, old satin curtain, belt, brooch, and some safety pins- tada!

She made her own paper plate leaf crown (sure that's the proper term for it:)

Claire was disappointed when we finished.  I think that's mainly because she thrives on spending time with... well, anyone, but particularly mom and dad.

We made it through!  One day complete!

Praise The Lord!

 

Fine Arts plans

Okay, I had started this another way, but it sounded negative... Here goes again.

I am still muddling through "tutorship".  I am still becoming aware of how it all works.   So, I read through the Foundations guide to get an idea for fine arts plans.  Then I moved onto CC connected.  This is the part I thought was a little negative, sorry.  I have a hard time with the CC connected site.  Not sure if it's because I'm on an ipad, but I think I found it this way on my windows laptop, also.  When I fill in a field and then go to the next field... it has to reload the page.  EVERY TIME.  I kinda get frustrated.  So, to eliminate some frustration you might incur, I'll pass on what I've found.  There are some wonderful resources on CC Connected, so here are some that I will use in presenting the OiLS drawing skills.

Uploader- Mom2five has great lesson plans for all six weeks.  They are charted in three columns, warm up, lesson and project.  She has typed instructions as well as drawn examples for each instruction. If you search Mom2five it actually comes up as the second file, but here's the file name 

Weeks1-6 Lesson Plans Drawing.pdf

Another great  OiLS for week 1 is one that combines with the science for the week with deciduous forests. 

Uploaded by:  loriberlie  

The file:  C2 Fine Arts W1- Trees.pdf.  

It has a wide variety of trees that can all be drawn with OiLS.  Younger students could draw one or two of the trees, while olders could perhaps duplicate them all.

For week 3 we are to draw upside down images, to help them learn not to draw the image as a whole, but as each individual OiLS part.  I found this resource that is something the kids will really enjoy.  You draw it with the "top" up, it looks like a frog.  When you are done you turn it upside down and it's actually a prince.  You can tell the kids "don't guess what we're drawing, because you are going to be wrong".  They'll have so much fun saying "oh, I know what it is".  Then when it's all done you can tell them to turn it the other direction and see the prince.  

Uploaded by: roynjillnkids

File: cc fine arts upside down instructions.pdf 

  

Week 4 is abstract art.  This file looks like much fun.  

File: Abstract art using name.pdf

Uploaded by: photomommy

It's kinda funny to find this one.  It's listed under  "cycle 4" and "week ALL".  I think they meant it the other way around.  

I thought I would do my name to show how neat it can be.

I chose mostly cool tones (that's just me).  I thought my name was sort of odd with this exercise.  I have mainly angles in my name ARIANNA.  Three A's and two N's.  kinda the same.  So as I wrote them I rotated my paper so they wouldn't just be stacked one on the other.

You could also play a drawing game using dice.  You have each type of "line", (OiLS) assigned to a number on the dice.  Whatever you roll they draw and see what type of picture turns up.  If they roll a 5 or 6  it could be a choice shape/line.  Of course, these types of abstracts look great when colored.

Here is the file for the drawing game:

OiLS review activities updated.pdf  

uploaded by: loriberlie

These were not the only files on CC Connected for OiLS.  These just happened to strike a chord with my personality and the age of my class.  Art is easily adapted for different ages, so I hope you can still find them useful.  

Happy Drawing Weeks!

Plans for CC Cycle 2 Week 12

The last week of the semester!!!! Plans for the whole semester done!  

Well, at the end of this post.

Timeline: song and motions.  

Science: time for an acrostic. My Goat Ate Socks

History: Simple song and visual today.  If we have time we'll write it on the board and erase a word or two each time we repeat.  I'm trying to hurry and get to a longer review time.

Geography: "Pop Goes the Weasel"

All around the cobbler's bench

What are the Eastern European Seas

The mon-key chased the weasel

White Sea, Barents Sea,    Black Sea

The monkey thought it was all in fun

Caspian       Sea,           and A-ral Sea

Pop, goes the weasel 

Eastern European Seas

Math: Teaspoons and Tablespoons, my kids never really did well remembering this kind of thing, no matter how many times we repeated it, or actually did it with spoons.  

So, we'll try adding a song a poster visual.

Do you know the song Michael Finnegan? cute song, and it kinda fits.  

There was an old man named Michael Finnegan

Tea-    Spoons    a-nd Tablesoons

He had whiskers on his chin-egan

3 Teaspoons equal 1 Tablespoon

He shaved them off 

2 Tablespoons 

And they grew in again

equal 1 Fluid Ounce

Poor ol' Michael Finnegan, begin again

 Tea-- spoons and Tablespoons

Because we have several songs today, I think we should do this one passing spoons around in a circle.  At least, that way we can get out of our seats, sit on the floor, change scenery, and include some movement.

English: Continuing with the song from last week: A Tisket a Tasket

A tisket a tasket

Indefinite Pronouns

A green      and yell ow basket

Everybody, Everyone, Everything  

I wrote a letter to my love

Few, many, more, most, neither

And on the way I dropped it

Indefinite       Pro   -  nouns

Latin: Review from last week. I think today we'll play red light green light.  We'll sing the song and while singing they can walk forward.  I'll hold up a stop for them to freeze and if anyone moves they get sent back to the wall. 

Review Game: Bingo

Plans for CC Cycle 2 Week 11

Timeline: After looking at the cards and working through the hand motions, we'll give a little "concert".  I'll have them stand at the front of class, or against a wall, and each will be assigned a timeline event. They will do their hand motions as we sing through.   I have 8 students and so I will have one be the conductor.  Then they'll switch places and timeline events.

Science:  http://io9.com/5987254/whats-the-difference-between-a-comet-asteroid-meteor-meteoroid-and-meteorite

this link has the perfect visual for this weeks science.

History: Wow! the thing that sticks out to me is the guillotine.  This seems like a good one to illustrate.

1st box: the year and flag of France.

2nd box: citizens

3rd box: stormed

4th box: Declaration of Rights

5th box: I drew rain, but put the crown in to remind the kids it's a royal reign

6th box: terror

7th box: guillotine

Geography: Geo- folders  tracing on the page protectors.  Then again on tracing paper, and color in the 

countries.  I will bring the large map and do some fly swatting with the kids.

Math: Cubes, Lets do some cake walking with this one.

English: I looked for a song, I found a good one, but it wasn't to a tune I recognized.  I like using songs that 

people already know so they can sing it later at home.  So, I kinda made it fit to "A Tisket a Tasket" 

A Tisket a Tasket

Indefinite Pronoun

A    green and yellow basket

all, another,  any,    anybody 

I wrote a letter to my love

anyone,      and  anything

And on the way I dropped it

Both, each and     eith-er

It happens to work out that the next two weeks of indefinite pronouns also fit this song.  So, we will build on 

to this song.

Latin:  work with the poster and song.  We'll do this in a circle passing a bean bag.

Review Game: BANG!!!

Plans for CC Cycle 2 Week 10

Timeline: Old faithful. This section of the timeline goes by rather quickly.  I would work on making sure they are getting the words.  It's easy to mush them together.

Science: This fits to B-I-N-G-O

There was a farmer had a dog

What are the phases of the moon?

and Bingo was his name-o

New, Crescent,     Quart-er

B I N G-     O

Gibbous,   Full

B I N G -      O

Gibbous,     Full

B          I                  N G - O

New,      Crescent,    Quart-er  (they squeeze in, trust me)

and Bingo was his name - o

Gibbous,                           Full

A visual would be great.  These are really unknown words to most and a visual would make sense of these words.

 

I will have the kids draw five circles and color one in fully for new, all but a banana-ish portion for crescent, half for quarter (which will probably confuse the kids:),  a fat banana-ish portion for gibbous, and nothing for full. I will make mine in advance to be the example.  This pic I posted also talks about waxing and waning, but I'm working with 1st and 2nd graders and that's just too much info, and it's not required.  SIMPLE, Ari, keep it simple.

History: I thought this would be one we could act out.  After singing it a couple times and showing the visual from CC. I'll tape a paper V onto person's shirt with masking tape to be Vladimir.  He will carry a Cross (or simpler still, a Bible) to the map of Russia.  Another student will have a taped on I for Ivan and they'll use blocks or a hammer to show they are building the Kremlin. A student with a taped on C for Catherine will have a paper with the word "Russia" on the middle third.  C will open up the other two sides of the paper to represent expansion.  

Geography: Get your geography folders out kiddos.  Let's trace the outlines and write the first letter of each country. If we have time we'll erase and do it again. Or I'll bring tracing paper so we can get a second round in.  On the tracing paper we can color in the countries

Math: Squares. I plan to bring worksheets with 15 square shapes printed on them.  The kids can write in the numbers and we'll sing several times.

English: I tried looking for a song or rap, since that last one was so much fun. No luck.  I think we'll just chant and use some actions.  Point to the space in front of them for "this".  Point to something across the room for "that".  Act like you are carrying a bundle for "these".  Sweep your hand in front of you for "those" as if pointing to multiple items.

Latin: we'll do the puzzle thing again.  I think someone should comment to me on if you do some creative and fun things with latin.  My brain seems to be stuck.

Review Game: Guess what time it is!! Battleship time.  Or this time I could do it Jeopardy style.  Instead of avoiding the hidden x's, we'll try to get the extra points.

Plans for CC Cycle 2 Week 9

Timeline: Good ol' CC song and hand motions.  I tried to come up with something fun, but I remember how hard it was to just get through all 7 cards, so I do try to keep it simple - plus I want to spend a bit of extra time on Science today.

Science: I am not a great lover of science, I don't hate it, but I was always more of a fine arts person.  HOWEVER, I do love planets.  I think they are just so incredible and show the handiwork of our Heavenly Father.  (Okay get on with it Ari) I have great visuals for this.  I was shopping in Minneapolis at a Toys R' Us much bigger than the two in my area.  They had a huge science section that happened to be 30% off.  Here's what I snatched

Our solar system in a bucket!  Glow in the dark and all.  Let me get it out for you to see (only $12ish)

(the barbie in the background is not included:)

I think I might string these by their hangers and hook them to the ceiling tiles the morning we do this (if we have time).  Wouldn't that just be fun!!! If not I'll put it together in a sensory bin (things I'm doing for my preschooler) and let the kids view it that way.Like this I found on Pinterest

from here: http://youcanteachyourtoddler.blogspot.com/2013/07/the-planets-sensory-bin.html

I have a big thing of purple star glitter/confetti that I'll throw in as well.  And no, there won't really be time

 to play with it during CC, but maybe at lunch.  Fun to picture it in "space" though.

There are a bunch of incredible planet ideas on pinterest.  Check out my board- Arianna Kuriscak, then

 get on my cc cycle 2 board.  

History: I believe I shall print out pictures of each of these monarchs and on the back write their country.  

I will pass out the posters, and as we sing the kids will show their monarch, and when we say the country, 

they can flip it to the country.  

Geography: ooh, the Caribbean!  I'm tempted to go pirate-y on this, but... I better just go island-y.  

Still simple, though.  I'lm thinking flower shaped sticky notes (I know I've seen these, but I better start looking now,

 because it's always when I need something that I have a hard time finding them).  I'll pass out 5 notes to each 

student (which means I need 40) then have them write C for Cuba, J for Jamaica... Then we'll place them in 

our Geography notebook.  I looked at the maps and I think I'll have to find a larger one.  These locations are so 

small in our CC guide.  But if I print it out I'll just stick it in the extra page protectors of their geography folders. You

could do pineapple stickers, or coconuts, sea shells, and have them just put the stickers directly onto the map.

Math: 15's We'll do the lego thing again.  You can write on legos or mega blocks with chalk markers all the 

numbers in this skip counting pattern.  Then the kids will each get almost 2, one person will have one (that'll 

probably be one of my own girls so I can tell them ahead of time), as we sing we'll stack the right numbers.

English:  Just found this super cute rap on Youtube.  Like she says she's a little out of her box, I know it will 

stretch me.  The kids will love it though and more than likely never forget it.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iCNQKMzwz-A&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DiCNQKMzwz-A

Latin: 

Basics: using the song and visual to drill the endings.  

Review Game: Big Dice