Getting back in the Groove.... sort of.

We tried to jump back into getting an education this week. It was hard the first day or so but we eased back into our somewhat normal schedule. Sophie of course resisted just about everything but I found ways to slip things in at first and then she was hooked.

We actually went through 3 chapters of Story of the World this week. I didn't mean to but I turned on the CD and we listened to some of the chapters we had already covered and then the one we were going to do this week. We also all were sitting around the table coloring while we listened. When I went to turn it off Sophie didn't want to stop. So we listened to the next one as well. When I finally got to turn it off I asked her about the two chapters and she could tell me pretty much what the chapters were about. Then a few days later she requested a history lesson again so I turned the CD on and we listened to the two chapters we discussed but Soph didn't want to stop there again. She wanted the next chapter as well. So we studied Assyria, Babylon and Crete this week. To go along with the chapters we read a number of go along books as well. Lots of books about Persia and magic carpets. After reading the book about the 7 wonders of the ancient world Sophie drew this. She also did some map work and of course some narration with out her knowing it.

We Rowed The Salamander Room this week. Which was a great go along with our animal studies. We haven't studied amphibians yet. So we read all sorts of books about Frogs and Salamanders this week.


I don't know why we haven't done this before now but we put up an animal classification chart on the wall under our timeline.
We will be adding animals to it under their classification as they come up in our studies. Classification of animals isn't something we have really studied. We knew there were birds, reptiles and mammals and such but to divide up the animals into Vertebrate or Invertebrate was new to Sophie.
Here is the Dollar Store Frog we "dissected". We never could get all the pieces back where they belonged but it was fun for a few minutes.

We also made some clay salamanders and painted them. The kids went wild for this project. I admit I did a lot of the sculpting. They just weren't looking anything like salamanders.
Sophie wanted hers to be orange like the salamander in the book.
Henry just love painting. He didn't care how ugly and mixed up the colors got.
Ian's request was for a long curling tail.
Here is our finished products.

We also watched the Reading Rainbow episode about The Salamander Room. I think we know Amphibians pretty well now.

We listened to some Gershwin music while we played and read a book about Degas for our music and art study.

Where we really fell short this week is Math. Our usual struggle. Sophie just flat out refused to do the exercises. I forced her to do it the first day but my husband told me not to do that. He doesn't want her to hate math or have any objections to math so we didn't do it at all the rest of the week. She has never been a workbook type of kid so it doesn't really surprise me. I think I am going to have to go back to just doing math games and break out my Family Math book again for some small projects we can do for math. Singapore math is just not going to work for us. Are there any other suggestions for doing math with a kids who hates workbooks?

It was actually a great week, except for the math and maybe some life skills. Sophie also refused to clean her room, pick up her toys or help set or clear the table either. We are having a little power struggle at the moment. We are trying to work through this but it is a bit of a worry. Strong willed children.... gotta love them.

A few fun books

I had gotten into the habit of going to the library and just getting the books we needed for school and the kids would add one or two that they wanted and that was it. The last few trips to the library I have purposely just picked a few books that either I remember as a child or that just looked like fun when I glanced through the shelf while the kids are at story time. We have had a few really fun books recently that we have enjoyed.

I picked up this one because of the knights. Ian has loved his castle and knights so much since Christmas so some books on Knights sounded good. He loved this one and I guess the author, Ulf Lofgren, has written a few more Alvin books where he visits pirates and such. I will have to see if the library has any of these other ones. I am sure they will be a hit.

We just picked this one up today at the libray. Sophie found it on the library shelf. The colors must have caught her attention. All three kids couldn't wait to get home so we could read it. They even fought over how got to hold it as we walked out of the library and in the car ride home. It is very cute. I don't think Sophie will ever have a case of stripes. She is far too opinionated and doesn't care what anyone else has to say. She does her own thing no matter what. She doesn't care what others are doing or saying. But it is a fun book and the illustrations are very funny.

Leo Lionni books have been a favorite for some time. We love Frederick and Fish is Fish. We pick up a book called Frederick's Fables from the library every once in awhile. It has a bunch of Lionni's books in it. My kids will sit as we read through the complete book of fables. Sophie often reads these to herself. The book ends up in her room on her little bookshelf by her bed for early morning reading.

Cynthia Rylant's Poppleton books are a new favorite. We have read through a few of them a number of times. I can't believe I forgot to grab a few new ones today when we were at the library. Oh.... well... there is always next week.

Favorite Birthday Gift

Ian has been wanting a bigger bike for some time. He has been sharing the trike with Henry but he really didn't fit the trike anymore. So with some money sent him from Grandma we went and picked out a brand new bike. I had to put it together when we got it home and boy did he have a hard time containing his excitement.
This is what he picked out.

He rode it up and down the driveway over and over, back and forth for a really long time this afternoon. He figured out the brakes quickly and loved showing me how he could make himself stop by pushing backward on the pedals. He also loved attempting to ride without hands and even standing up on the pedals, or as he put it "without his bum on the seat".
Henry was happy to have the tricycle to himself. He has only recently figured out how to pedal it. So the boys raced back and forth and back and forth.
Sophie got her scooter and joined the boys for a ride around the block. I actually made them wear their helmets. I have been lazy and allowed them to ride around with out them a lot of the time. But now that Ian has a bike I am going to have to be more diligent about the helmets.

Celebrating Ian

Ian turned 4 years old today. Here are a few fun facts about this big/little guy.As a baby he was a very happy, mellow little guy. This is one of my favorite pictures of him as a baby. He was just giggling and giggling. That roll around his neck and chin were just so ticklish I guess!

Ian crawled forever. He started crawling about 6 months old. Well rolled first for awhile and then developed his own style of crawling. One foot and one knee. He was so fast! He didn't walk until he was almost 15 months old. He got around so quickly crawling and crusing the furniture he didn't need to walk I guess.
Ian was the only one of my kids to take a pacifier. He used it at night until he was about 3 then it suddenly wasn't needed any more. We never really had to do anything to get him to stop using it.
I don't think Ian likes to get his picture taken. As I was looking through my pictures I found a lot of pictures like this one. Where he makes a funny face or he looks away just as you take the picture. So he is a little difficult to get a good picture of.
Ian is a bit shy, but he does like to get attention. I really hope he doesn't get some sort of middle child syndrome.
Ian is not usually an adventure seeking little guy. He will try something, like hold a large iguana, only after other people have done it too. He isn't the one to initiate the adventure.
Ian loves hats. I hadn't really thought about this fact until just now. As I look at all the different picture I have of him, he is wearing a hat in a whole lot of them. While at the dollar store the other day he found a new camo hat since the one he is wearing in this picture is now too small. He couldn't leave the store without taking it home. He now wears it in the house all the time. Either that or his dollar store cowboy hat that he got around Halloween time.

Happy Birthday Ian!

Calm

I read a great post about new years resolutions awhile back and have been thinking about it ever since. In it the writer explains that resolutions tend not to work for what ever reason but usually because we are trying to change things that we Do rather than things that we are or what to BE. She also explains that in order to make these changes we should find a word to focus on. This idea has stuck with my the last few days and I have been thinking about it.
What word would be my theme for the year? What word am I going to chant to myself and help me make the changes I want to see in my life. I thought about "order", or "organize" because I would like to see less clutter in my house and I need to get more organized with school and such too. But I kept comming back to the word "calm". I want my life to be more calm. I can't even count the number of times I say "calm down" each day.

I looked up the word "calm" in the Thesarus (thanks Sonja for the reminder to read and use such a useful book). I saw words like soften, tranquillize, peaceful, undisturbed, equanimity, still, tranquill, self-possessed. These are all GOOD things!

My little family isn't totally out of control it just feels like it sometimes. My kids are very active and are young (I have to remind myself that they are acting age appropriate, more or less). And when the noise, fighting and chaos goes on for too long I find myself losing my "cool" and these are the moments that I need to start chanting "calm" to myself. Maybe if I was more "composed" or handled things more "collectedly" maybe my kids would be more "serene" and "sedate".

This idea of "calm" will also roll over into our homeschooling and even housekeeping. Everything can benifit and run more "smoothly" when done with a "cool" head and "unruffled" attitude.

We are having rain today. A lot of rain! We really need it so it is a welcome rain. We still ventured out to the YMCA this morning so I could swim. The kids loved getting their rain boots and coats on and heading out into the down pour. They loved stomping in the puddles and getting soaked to the skin. I needed to go grocery shopping but with so much rain, and the kids being so wet, I think I will have to make due with what is in the cupboards.
After we made it home and striped off the wet clothes and draped our wet coats over the chairs, the kids enjoyed sitting in the story telling chair and reading book after book. Now the boys are sitting in front of the movie Cars, which they love. Sophie of course is on the other computer playing Zoo Tycoon. She claims it is for school because she is putting dinosaurs in her zoo. Ian requested cinnamon rolls so we made them earlier and they are rising at the moment. So later we will be enjoying them and listening to the rain continue to poor. I think I am going to have to make some soup for dinner. Rainy day schedule is kinda fun!

I love rainy days! They are so cozy when spent inside the warm house.

We are Dino crazy

Rather then do nothing again this week like we did last week. Sophie of course didn't want to jump back into school yet. She will avoid "school" as much as she can. So I decided we would do a mini unit and Dinosaurs seemed like something fun and it is something we really hadn't studied yet. So last week when at the library I picked up a few books on Dinosaurs. I am always surprised at how many books on dinos there are. But kids love dinos so people write books. Here is a few of the books we have been reading this week.Along with books we borrowed the reading rainbow episode about the book Digging up Dinosaurs and also the DK Eyewitness movie about DinosaursThe kids loved both but especially the DK movie. They even watched it again with their Dad when he got home from work.
























Hands on projects are always good so I brought out this one that I had found a few months ago and had stashed in the closet until just such a time. This is a little sand egg that they kids got to use paleontologist tools to dig out the little plastic dinosaur inside. I was actually really surprised at how well the kids shared the tools. They took turns getting to hammer or brush. This actually was very slow work. It took almost a half an hour a lot of Mom help before the dino was out. Sophie got a bit bored and moved on to other things. But Henry stayed and worked until the end. Now the kids have added the little dino to the "diarama" that they have built with all their plastic dinosaurs.
Here is another hands on project that the kids enjoyed. I did most of the assembly work but the kids had fun punching out all the pieces and watching the two dinosaurs take shape.

Sophie has been busy drawing all sorts of Dinosaurs. I will have to scan some of her drawings. She is getting quite good!

We have had a good time reading all sorts of books, learning about all the different dinosaurs. I even learned a few new things. I didn't know that there was debate between experts about wether dinosaurs were warm or cold blooded. They actually have a lot in common with birds and even mammals. But most importantly I have learned that what I learned was a Brontosaurus is actually called an Apatosaurus now.

We are going to get back to "doing school" next week but this has been a fun week full of "terrible lizards".