Week in Homeschool #8

The theme of the week :

 
Here's a bear at the entrance to her comfy cozy cave

Hibernation. 
~We read:
Hibernation, and Hibernation: Both of our nonfiction books offered a simple look at hibernation.  I would check out either of them again, but not highly recommend them. 
Sleepy Bears:  I love this book.  In fact, I thought I owned it, but since I couldn't find it I rented it.  (I must have bought it as a gift for someone else)
Sleep, Black Bear, Sleep:  This book was wildly popular with my children.  It can be sung to the lullaby of Sleep Baby Sleep, and they love anything book you can sing.

Our Letter of the week:
  H-M-K review
~Flower Fairy Poem: The Songs of the Herb Twopense Fairy, The Mallow Fairy, and the Kingcup Fairy





 Our Poem of the Month:

Our last week with Discovery, by Barbara Juster Esbensen.  Cyrus recorded a video reciting this poem.  He was worried he wasn't going to learn it in time, and then quite proud to discover that he could.


In Art/ Peace:
This week we combined Peace and Art.  I asked each of them to think of something very peaceful that they wanted to paint.  They chose their subject, and then asked if they could use acrylic paint.

Ava:

wanted to paint herself in a sunny field with flowers and butterflies,  and a few cats to love.

Cyrus:
said that he feels the most peace when he is loving his cat Pretzel.  It was very important to him that he painted Pretzel's green eyes, and his own gray. 

Art Study:
we examined  The East River, by Maurice Prendergast.  


Ava:  I like the swings, and I like how the floor looks like sand.  I like the water and the trees.  It looks like fun to be on the swings.

Cyrus:  I don't like how there is so much dirt.  I feel like there should be more grass.  I don't think they should have a fence for no reason.  They should make something like a sign or a swing with the blank poles.


In History:

We studied Hammurabi and the Babylonians.  They colored pictures of the Ziggurats that were used to worship the Babylonian moon god.


In Science:

 This week we took an amazing field trip to the California Academy of Science.  I was trying to think of ways to tie in our trip with our theme of Hibernation.  I found these cards on the CAS website that talk about the native animals to San Fransisco.  Because of our temperate weather we don't have many hibernators, but we do have a few.  (cards printed out and laminated from here)


In Math:
Ava:

Started RightStart Mathematics Level C
This starts off with lots of basic review which Ava would have been happy to skip, but I thought it would give us a chance to see if there are any skill sets that can use some polishing.  We also introduced several forms of Venn Diagrams.

Cyrus:

* Introduce the terms consecutive, equations, ellipse, and hexagon
* Overlap the 10s and 1s of the place value cards
*  Practice recognizing  10s and 1s on the abacus
* Count by 2s to 30

In Our Nature Journals:

Cyrus: 

Drew a picture of our pumpkin in our front yard, and added flowers for effect.

Ava: 
Depicted a scene with our cats and local squirrel.  She added a profile image of the squirrel's head.

Field Trip:  

We surprised our children this week with a trip to the California Academy of Science in San Fransisco.  This place is huge, and we had a great time.  On a visit here you'll find an aquarium, a planetarium, and a natural history museum.  (and the food is great!)  We walked through a rainforest, watched the penguins get fed, visited a living roof, experienced an earthquake simulator, and ate in a fine dining restaurant.  There was so much to see, we'll definitely return the next time they offer "homeschool discount days"

This was a great week.  Things were thrown in the air, and adventures were had.  We still managed to get quite a bit done.  I'm so grateful to be a homeschool family.