Adventures with Dinosaurs..

We have just finished our unit on Dinosaurs... It was a long one, because there are so many wonderful resources out there... The only thing left to do will be a field trip to the "Gray Fossil Museum"  ...

Here are some of the wonderful books and movies that we used for this unit...

Here's some more:

 

This is one of the fun things we did..The kids got to be "junior palentologist" using these wonderful kits..They get to "excavate" a dinosaur skeleton...Fun but a little on the messy side...*L*

 

and here is some of the drawings the kids made...

                                           Tommy's Allosaurus

Libby's Apatosaurus

and here are some of our notebook pages...  

 

Autumn and the Leaf Man...

We had a great time with fall, trees, and leaves this year... We did them last year, but DD really was to young to get much from them... I have a wonderful book called the "Kids's Nature Book, 365 indoor/outdoor activities and experiences"... It has an activity for every day and it was really put to good use this year...

We also did a science experiment on why leaves change color and chromatography that you can find here that was great... Both kids loved it and I had fun too...

 

 

Stellaluna...

This week we are doing Stellaluna...
We spent this afternoon reading the story, dicussing a bat's sense of smell and where bats are found...Bats are found pretty much everywhere in the world except for the polar regions...To let the kids see how strong a bats sense of smell was, I tied a bandana around each child's head and let them sniff certain household items to see if they could tell me what they were (I used cinnamon, vanilla, bleach, a dryer sheet, mouthwash, lotion, and peanut butter)... They did pretty well.. Another of the projects I planned was to make origami bats... It was very easy... We just followed the directions found here and this is what they looked like when we were done...

 

ORIGAMI BATS

Rowing with Thunder Cake...

We are easing back into our school routine... I have been considering taking 2 weeks for every book we row as I am doing lessons with both kidlets this year and DD is learning to read... I am thinking this might ease some of the pressure and we will get everything accomplished...

This week we are reading Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco... We will probably continue this unit into next week just to make sure we get everything completed because it is a wonderful unit...

There is a whole lot information about Patricia and the book here.

I am using the information about thunderstroms and rain from here and here.

HomeschoolShare has a unit on it here.  We are working on a review of ordinal numbers, random placement, and common / proper nouns...

There is also tons of worksheets and go-alongs here.

This morning we had a little "home-ec" as both kids learned to "seperate eggs" ...I then let each one of them scramble them and make breakfast... They love to help me in the kitchen...
We have found Michigan on the map and have talked a little about Russia...

Tomorrow evening after co-op (yes, it starts back tomorrow) we are planning on working on setting the table properly (one of the HSS lessons)... and finding Russia on the map..

Friday, we plan on learning about the water cycle and doing this experiment.

1.Pour water into the skillet and heat it. Let your kids watch as the heated water turns into steam and disappears.
2.Using oven mitts, hold the pan of ice cubes about six inches above the steaming water and tell your student to watch the bottom of the pie pan. Observe and ask questions regarding evaporation, condensation, precipitation, and collection. 

 

Another experiment can be found here on how to make a thunderstorm..

And you can simulate lightening by using Wintergreen lifesavers. Go to a really dark room and stand in front of the mirror. Wait a few minutes until your eyes get accustomed to the darkness.Put a Wint-O-Green or a Pep-O-Mint lifesaver in your mouth. While keeping your mouth open, break the lifesaver up with your teeth and look for sparks. If you do it right, you should see bluish flashes of light...

Great Math Lesson: Next time you see a storm, count the number of seconds between when you see the lightning and hear the thunder. Take the number of seconds and divide by 5 and that will tell you how far away the storm is in miles. For example: If you counted 10 seconds between the lightning and the thunder, the lightning is 2 miles away!

We are going to have a Russian meal and then have "Thunder Cake" for dessert...

We are using these books as go-alongs...

The Storm

The Magic School House Kicks up a Storm

Flash, Crash, Rumble and Roll

The Gullywasher

and The Rain

 

You can find more recipes for "Thunder Cake"  here.