Heart of Dakota: Bigger week 16

Back to school this week. As you all know I had to take off last week because I did not have a voice to teach with. I still can not sing a lyc, but at least I can teach. So this week was very interesting. We had a lot to learn about the new Government of the late 1700's  and the branches of the Government. I was not too sure how my daughter would do with all this information, being she really is only in 1st grade, but she did FANTASTIC.

First let me say that a friend of our has a son that has been widdling rubber band guns for a while now. I still think he should sell them to all the kids and make a few dollars. You know? Anyway, that has gotten my son to want to learn to whittle. BUT, after much research I found out that whittling is really called wood carving and for a child of 9, the knives you have to use are extremely sharp and is not recommended. Most of the sites I went on recommended soap carving to start with. So that is what we did. We got his pocket knife and some Ivory soap and he has now, at the writing of this, carved a duck and a car with windows. I only have the duck pictures up right now. This is a great little hobby and he can gift the soaps to friends and family as well as sell them too.

On Monday we had our art class and we finished up our paintings. My son's is of the race track and my daughter is the ice skaters. I took pictures of some of the other kids paintings too. They ALL turned out soooo good! I love this class. Not only because my kids are learning how to express themselves through different mediums of art, but also because we are doing it with all are great friends!

So the first thing we did in school this week was to learn to recognize the 13 colonies on the map plus the other 2 East Coast states. I have this huge dry erase map of the USA and World and we had so much fun playing a game of who can tell me where the state is and what  the abbreviations for each of the 15 states? You can tell in the pictures my son was having fun trying to be the first one to say "I found it!"

Our Bible study this week was Proverbs 27:19 and all about integrity. I was really able to show them how such a young child can have integrity just by not allowing another child to talk them into doing something that is not right either morally, lawfully or Biblically. Good character trait this week.

For our first Science project this week we learned about how animals and bugs camouflage themselves from predators. So they had to draw their own animal or bug, color it, hide it and then have dad try to find it. So I had them use just the dinning room because I figured it was small enough that dad would not take all day to find them. Their bug drawings came out cute and dad found them in just the right amount of time! Along with all this we also learned about the lifecycle of a butterfly. I found a wonderful book (picture below) that really made it come to life for them. But I have to say I loved how they worked together to draw their lifecycle picture!

And lastly today for science we learned about the Maple tree and how the fruit/nuts are distributed around to reproduce a new plant. The project did not work as well as I was hoping. But we finally found that if we threw our little paper Maple nut in the air we had better luck of it traveling. Oh, and then, of course,  the wind started blowing about an hour after school ended. Couldn't have done it while we were doing our project. I found a few more books I truly thought were great for learning a little bit more about trees. See the pictures below.

Now I have to say, I taught my son cursive first and then printing. However, I did not quite do the same with my daughter. She taught herself how to print while I was working with my son when she was about 3 and 4. So we are working on cursive now. Just look at her work. She really is picking up on it quickly and doing a great job. She has said many of time she wants to learn how, so here we go!

We also had to map out or branches of the Government. I did it on the white board and the children copied what I did. Here is another thing I went on-line and found some great sites that really helped to make it more clear to the kids and me.  The best site I visited was Ben's Guide to the USA. I thought this site was the easiest to run around in and had the best info in easy to understand format. I also had them find the 15 states on a small paper map and mark them on Friday just to see if they got it. They did really good. Raquel found 9 out of 15 by herself. Good job for a little 1st grader doing 4th grade work!

Oh I almost forgot, we also did our timelines. OK, wait till you see the pictures. Not that big of a deal until you see my drawing of the Presidents seal. OMGosh! What the heck is that thing? Is it an animal, vegetable or mineral??? We had a good laugh and my son made me promise I would share it with my readers so you all could get a good laugh at my artistic skills. Well at least my bird drawing skills. YES! That is an eagle!

OK, we are off to the weekend. See you again next Friday for week 17! Remember to double click on the picture to see them bigger.