Heart of Dakota Week 4 update

Ok, so this week was not as exciting and good as last week, BUT, it had nothing to do with our curriculum. We were just having an off week. Everyday seemed to start later then we wanted. I was having a hard time sleeping at night all week,  I could not pull my behind out of bed to exercise this week, so that put me in a funky mood. We ended up taking a walk everyday after school, which was great and made up for not exercising in the AM! But, my daughter was in one of those "I Can't" moods all week. My son put on the tears a couple of times during math when he did not understand something and instead of just asking for an another explanation or my help…whine. UUGGHH! Stressful attitude week! 

You all know exactly what I mean. I am sure at least one of you out there has had a week like that. Well, that was ours. But, as far as what we accomplished, wow, it was a lot. I still can not believe how much you learn in just 5 days with HOD.

So this week we learned about trading and how the pilgrims (John Smith)  traded with the Indians for food with the much needed help from Pocahontas. I truly believe without her, there would have never been a Jamestown! Now I think the Indians got the raw deal of it all, but I won't get into that hot topic. However, even my son noticed and mentioned that he thought the trades were not fair.

My son and daughter bartered back and forth for cookies, M&M's, pretzel sticks, and crackers. It was fun. My son got the good deal! He got both cookies and almost 3/4 of the M&M's. Oh well, I gave her extra after our activity!

I also read a book I happened to have called Adventures in Colonial America: Jamestown, New World Adventure by James E. Knight. We read 1/2 of it on Wed and the rest Thursday. The ending actually made me tear up! Sniffle, Sniffle!!!   I highly recommend you all get this book. Very easy read and it takes the perspective from a Master Carpenters point of view while building Jamestown. Such a great book!

One of the other things I added this week was a replica of Jamestown. You see I use to be on the Old School House review board as a reviewer, so I have tons of different curriculums sitting around that I reviewed and am either waiting to use or sell. One of them was this cool eBook on Jamestown by Homeschooling in the Woods. I printed out the pieces on cardstock. The kids colored them and then I had to cut them out. My fingers still hurt! This project is for sure not for the young grade schoolers who can not cut intricate objects. More for Jr. High students and up, but never the less, we did it and the kids started playing with them after we were done assembling them. Look at my son's picture of Jamestown below. You can see he made a mini John Smith (with gun) and Indians etc. to go with his colony.

Now as I have stated before I pick and choose the art projects with HOD because starting Oct 3rd we will be in an art class every week with our homeschool group. But I thought that the art project for unit 4 would be fun. And it was! The kids enjoyed making the Indian blanket, although I had to keep reminding my daughter to make each side the same. But they enjoyed getting to do this and my son has his hanging up on his wall in his bedroom along with mine!

Now HOD had us make a map of the continents. They wanted us to use graham crackers, but I was out so we used 5×7 index cards. We ended up gluing them to a blue piece of construction paper and then labeling them including the oceans. Turned out real cute and now we have another thing to add to our History Notebook!

For Science this week we learned the difference between Invertebrates, vertebrates, and Arthropods. We were taught how to tell the differences in the mollusks by the shells and Yup, mom learned some new things this week once again. I never knew the names bivalves and univalves and really what that was referring to in sea creatures. 

We also learned about air bladders in ocean life. This is what makes plants and fish float. Hmm, very interesting. Didn't know that either!!! OK, do not laugh. The curriculum asked for an eye dropper for our experiment this week. Well, I could not find one of course until after school when it suddenly appeared in the upstairs bathroom. Anyway, we improvised and used a…….Turkey baster. Weeeeell, it really is just an oversized eye dropper. Right? LOL!  The kids are really enjoying science and all the experiments. The experiments are short and quick and they love them!

Oh, the last picture is of my Jeopardy board. I have had a few people ask me what it looks like and how it works. I mean we are talking reeeal simple. Take some 5X7 cards with numbers 1-160 on them. I put the questions of the week on more 5X7 cards behind the number cards and as they are answered I turn the number card over and give the child who answered the question right, the card. Who ever gets the most cards get a prize from the $1 grab bag and who has the least gets 1 M&M for each correct answer. You should see these kids fight over who is going to answer the questions. It really has been a great tool in our home. One of these days I will get my hubby to video tape the kids during Jeopardy…shhhh…without them knowing!

So that was our week in a nut shell or maybe a bivalve clam shell! LOL!!! Overall it was a good week for our learning and bad week for attitudes toward everything, including me! Well, except for Friday. That was a great day. Good way to end the week!!! Next week is a new week and we will pray heartily over the weekend that our week 5 will start and end with GREAT attitudes, yes including me! I need more sleep this week! Tylenol PM here I come!

Don't forget to hover over the pictures and they will tell you what we are doing in that picture. You can click to enlarge them a bit, but click 2x and they will get perfect size.