Jazzy Journals

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September 3, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

We began Jazzy Journals for review and they’re fun and will make an awesome gift for Grandma!

We read the book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and counted letters. Letters on the tree and letters on the ground.

I searched for “coconut tree” and got an outline for the girls to color and cut out.

We used letter stickers. I had them go through and pick a color for each letter of the alphabet and place it on the tree or on the ground to look like the book.
$Counting Letters for Math Notebooking$

The girls had so much fun choosing the colors for each letter in ABC order.

Later, we worked on lesson 5 of Life of Fred Apples.

The girls were tickled to draw 7 elephants. Fred’s elephants looked funny!
$Drawing Elephants for Math Notebooking$ $Math Notebooking with Elephants$
We read many living math books this week and have math journal work based on the books we read. We did some lapbook printables I made with time and measurement. We doing the basics with Tori and Katie and review with Liz on these basic concepts.

We measured our height in ancient Egyptian methods: cubits, spans, palm, and digits.

Katie was quick to point out that everyone is different and the measurements wouldn’t be standard. I love that child. She’s five and got that right away!

We read a book about the Princess and the Pea but it was “mathemagical.” We read a fun art book with math combinations in it. The girls really liked that one – and Dad and I did too!

We use these notebooking resources in our math journaling…and every other subject!

Follow Jennifer’s board Math on Pinterest.

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End of Summer Nature Study

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August 29, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert 2 Comments

We went through the August grid and end of summer lists and did quite a few activities.

Aaron took these shots of our hummingbirds. I love her. We could all just sit and watch hummers for hours.

I love this picture:

Flying insects: We watched the bees on the flowers. We also have humongous dragonflies, but they wouldn’t land for a picture.

My rose garden. This Simply Mauvelous is struggling to survive.

Aaron and the girls got me this lovely yellow one this spring. It struggled for a while, but now it’s flourishing.

My favorite is Blue Girl.

Elizabeth has her rose named for the Queen.

Aaron and the girls also bought me this lovely magenta one this spring. It’s thriving.

Vegetable garden. Not seeds yet, but these will be fennel soon. The bees like it.

Our watermelon is growing like crazy. We’ve had one ripen so far. Yummy!

Do you see our little grasshopper friend in those shadows?

The bell peppers are growing nicely, but they’re a little bitter.

The kids are super excited for the pumpkins that are turning orange! We have more than enough!

My Roma tomato and eggplant

Peaches draping over my fence. That means they’re mine, heehee.

grapes that we shall make into jelly and juice in another month. I can’t wait!

Seedy weed and we counted the flower petals and looked at how they attach to the stem in a spiral fashion. Multi-tasking!

I don’t have to encourage the kids to play with rocks. Maybe I should discourage them to put them in the bird bath though!

They fight to water the plants by our front door. It’s been so hot and dry it hasn’t helped much. Everything is getting crispy.

Gratuitous cute kitty picture

Different leaf shapes

Notebooking pages. I think Katie is rather excited.

Liz helping Tori spell the words correctly

Tori super proud of her hummingbird drawing. Her favorite part of our summer backyard. Liz also drew the hummingbirds and the garden. Katie drew the quail that run across the lawn.

We love the resources in the Handbook of Nature Study Blog:

And we love the ease of notebooking pages.

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A Day in Our Life

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August 28, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

On a good day when Mama gets up early and the kitchen is clean and the coffee is made…

Homeschooling four kids can be a challenge.

Our Homeschool Schedule

7 AM

when we’re ~supposed~ to get up and eat breakfast. Some days, it staggers between 0730 and 0800. I am so not a morning person. I make eggs or coffee cake or cheesy grits or steel cut oatmeal, with bacon and two kinds of sausage. Why can’t they all like the same thing?

Morning chores need to be accomplished before our school day: clean the table, get dressed, brush teeth, make beds…

8 AM

Tori and Katie do their Grapevine Studies Catechism page while I or Elizabeth wrestle Alex into clothes for the day and convince him to brush his teeth.

He’s addicted to his iPad in the mornings (and every other minute of the day) and I have to convince him it needs to “take a nap or eat” so he will join us in the school room.

Often Tori gets her Bible page completed way before Katie even finishes breakfast and then she does her morning routine. Whatever works. She’s the “good one.”

I steal a few minutes to check my email and Facebook or get a blog post started. I need my two cuppas! I often have to remind all the girls to brush their teeth and wash their faces (multiple times). Really?!

9 AM

I get Tori and Katie started on their seat work.

They have a daily journal and math work and word families pages. Some they can do on their own and others they need me to direct them. I try to interest Alex in his workboxes at this time.

I remind Elizabeth that she does indeed have a school daily checklist and she better get started. She uses Alex as an excuse and will play with him every chance she gets. If she would work diligently, she could be finished with 3/4 of her work in about an hour.

Here are the girls’ checklists. I got the idea from here. I got some little Command hooks and they’re in front of their desks on the wall. The girls love it!

Elizabeth has a pink agenda with a monthly calendar and daily checklists. Trying desperately to teach her to manage her time!

10 AM

I do our read alouds on the sofa.

Alex has recently shown interest to join us which is wonderful! He really, really loved our Beowulf picture book last week.

Occasionally, I call to Elizabeth to join us if it applies to her studies. We’re currently reading through Famous Men of the Middle Ages. The only problem is Liz doesn’t want to get back on task.

I love being able to lay all over each other and read on the sofa!

Rubeus enjoys our sofa time. He likes to snuggle and look at the pictures. I swear he understands the stories!

11 AM

I usually give the Tori and Katie a break to play with Alex with his workboxes and other learning toys. They love helping him with his Tot School. It’s a good incentive to get Katie to finish her list. I help Liz move along in her studies. I make sure she’s gotten her Bible, math, and Greek completed, at least. I find my now cold coffee and some days warm it in the microwave or toss it. I steal a few minutes to check email or write.

12 PM

Lunchtime. Liz usually helps prepare this. I like the help, but I know she’s using it as an excuse to not do her work. I think she also wants the time with me. We usually have leftovers or deli ham with fruit and veggies.

1 PM

Naptime for Alex.

No excuses for Liz now since she has time to complete her list! I use this time to teach her any concepts that she needs in history or LA. She gets her notebooking finished during this time. I like this conference time because I love seeing the connections that Liz makes. She really does get it!

2 PM

I finish up anything with the girls: science, crafts, art…

3 PM

Clean up time, especially the kitchen. We make sure Alex is up from his nap so he will go to bed on time.

4 PM

I try to prep dinner and get the table set. Tori often helps. The kids play until dinner time. I try to get in some computer time to blog, check email and Facebook.

5 PM

Dad is home and he and the kids check the garden. Then we’re working on dinner and eating. Wednesdays, the littles have gymnastics.

6-7 PM

Tori, Liz, and I clean up most nights.

Then the kids like to play outside and practice cartwheels and watch the hummingbirds.

Tuesdays and Thursdays, Katie starts soccer practice this week.

8-9 PM

Sometime during this hour, we gather the younguns for baths and bedtime routines. I’ve been really lax with the nice weather and the sun being out so late.

We’ll have to gradually start going to bed earlier. My husband is also worn out and goes to bed with the kids most nights!

I usually stay up until about 11, reading, writing, researching, or watching Doctor Who.

Check out our other posts in this series. Our Curriculum, Our Homeschool Space…

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Math Monday: Games and Notebooking

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August 27, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

We did a lot of games and manipulatives this week

but not so much on paper…

Tori and Katie with clock works (heehee)

I found the clock flashcards and foam clocks from Target dollar spot last year sometime. I cannot for the life of me remember where I got the clock cards that Tori has. If you know, please tell me!

Don’t you love the crowns? They were a history project.

I introduced some three-part cards with time references. They were a bit lost but I helped with the reading.

Here is the completed work.

Tori and Katie are learning multiplication and skip counting.

The filled in a “counting by fives” card for their math journals. I helped them do it on the board first and then they copied it.

Our cat, Rubeus, gave Tori moral support.

I got the CUTEST Hello Kitty packs online for free and Katie is completing one of the math pages here.

Alex is loving our new math apps. He’s playing iLiveMath Animals here.

Alex likes to play with tangrams. He’s getting so much better keeping his work on his mat and cleaning up!

He still loves our little piggy bank

Liz had to research to fill in her math foldables. These were review, and she obviously needed it!

We worked on Life of Fred too.

Elizabeth still loves it and reads parts of it to me so we can share a laugh. It’s SO fun!

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Notebooking and Journaling

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August 24, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert 2 Comments

We’re excited about our new junior notebooking journals!

The girls begged for cursive work and I found these fun cursive workbooks that have animals for each letter.

It’s like cross-curricular with science! super!

Tori taught herself how to write her name in cursive from our wall border!

Tori practices her cursive on the Aquadoodle.

Tori loves Draw Right Now. We just got the whole set on sale! (her cat is upside down – haha)

I made pretty notebooking journals!

I covered their new writing journals with scrapbook paper and ribbon.

Tori has a blue striped front and Katie’s is green argyle.

I plan to put something decorative on the fronts, but haven’t gotten the stuff yet.

The backs are both Hawaiian print. We lived in Hawaii for three years. They girls still call it home.

I added a schedule on the inside cover with another fun paper cover for each girl.

Weekly writing schedule:

Mondays, they write about anything they did over the weekend.

Tuesdays are writing from our weekly vocabulary or spelling list.

Wednesday is narration day from history, science, or literature reading.

Thursdays are dictation. This is our most difficult writing task.

Fridays are fun choice – favorites from the week.

This is now the first thing the girls want to do during our school day! They love it!

This week we loved this fun printable and foldable from Scholastic: wallet words.

They had to determine which picture began with which blend: BR, GR, or TR.

Then we placed the cards in the wallet and folded it up. They loved showing it to Daddy!

We love Productive Homeschooling for fun printables!

Linking up: Every Bed of Roses, 123Homeschool4Me, Los Gringos Locos, Faith and Good Works

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Reading with Bubba

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August 22, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

Tori read Good Night, Gorilla to Alex (and Katie) since it’s G for Gorilla week for Tot School.

It was precious. He even has his gorilla pillow pet! aw! He was so cute and attentive. I love it.

Alex decided he needed some quiet time and started looking through his Bible books. He loves this Baby’s First Bible!

They’ve been in the basket for years and I love it that he’s finally discovering and enjoying them! He’s reading Baby’s First Prayers.

What’s your baby’s favorite book?

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Math Journals

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August 20, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert 10 Comments

We’re doing math differently this year. We’re focusing on math journals as our primary math learning.

We’re using Life of Fred and Singapore Math as our math texts. I’m gathering living math books from the library and our home bookshelves. And I’m adding more to our holiday wish list!

Math Journals

I found some interesting articles and supplemental materials.

Scholastic has an interesting article explaining why math journals are successful for understanding mathematics.
Let’s Play Math! has math journal prompts and links for articles about what to add to journals.
Information and videos about how to use Kindergarten and 1st grade math journals. These are from a classroom teacher, but the ideas can be adapted for homeschool use.
Graphic Organizers and a video help get you started with interactive math journals.
Mathbooking info here
This math teacher has a plethora of information on his site and in videos. He discusses living math books and has a lesson plan with a fun math video.
And look what I found! I am so excited! The girls have been using them all week! I just Googled Life of Fred notebooking pages and I found some here. Perfect! I love the format and I know I can probably make some similar for Elizabeth for her Fractions book.

We read a chapter in Life of Fred Apples and then we do the Your Turn to Play together. I write their oral answers on a white board and they copy it onto their notebooking page.

Katie always cracks me up with her expressions! After they copy the answers, they draw a picture representing something in the lesson.

For lesson 1, they drew 7 trees. The lesson was about the commutative property of addition with the sum of equations equaling 7.

The math journals will be like a math scrapbook, with the fun foldables and other neato lapbook-like printables. The Life of Fred pages will just go in a binder. Tori and Katie also still have Singapore math workbooks that we’re working through a couple times a week.

Here are the journals I found – and fun Duck Tape to decorate them! I also picked up a fun Jazzing Up Journals book at a teacher store.

Here are Katie’s and Tori’s journal all decorated. I’m sure they’ll add to them, but that’s it for now. I made stencils out of cardstock. Cutting Duck Tape with cardstock stencils is work!
$Decorated Math Journals$
Here is a page I made for Elizabeth to put in her math journal. Tori and Katie don’t have a fear of math like Elizabeth does. I hope this will serve as a reminder that she can do all things through Christ.
$Math Creed Scroll$

I got the scroll page idea from this math teacher guide. This guy’s website is wild! I love the Indiana Jones theme! He must make math so much fun for his students. Why didn’t I have great teachers like this?

Elizabeth just completed a transition math class through our local school district. It was eight mornings of review and she really enjoyed it. She won a scientific calculator for being the top of her class! Proud Mama moment!
And here I am, getting all organized. When I find something awesome to go in the math journals, I pin it, I save it, I print it, and I put it in my folder here. Now, I just need to remember to use them when we get to it in the math lessons!

I found this neato mosaic puzzle at the Target dollar spot. Everyone has been fighting over it! Maybe I should go back and get a few more. It’s great for art and history too.

Tori and Katie are starting to learn skip counting and multiplication. Liz is reviewing the concept since I realize there are gaps.

I made this little booklet out of these charts and look at these fun mazes! The mazes will go in their binder too. Gotta keep those journals special! The girls use the booklet when working on their Singapore math workbooks. They’re learning beginning multiplication.
$Math Maze$
I had to help Katie a bit more with the whole skip counting concept, but she understood after trailing off on her own a bit. That rabbit finally got his carrot!
$Dot Math Maze$
They’ve been singing the rather catchy skip counting song from this DVD. The kids all love them and Alex is learning so much too! We have several LeapFrog DVDs and keep them in the car DVD player.

The girls have really loved our new math apps for the iPad. They’re playing Operation Math here. It’s like a Mission Impossible game with math equations. Fun music too!

Multiplication activity: making squares and rectangles on the geoboards…I told them to do a 4 by 5 or a 3 by 4 and they counted the pegs to put the rubber bands in place.

I also found these fun cards for geoboards!

I have some printables to go in their math journals to help with multiplication.

I hope these changes to our math program help my girls (and me!) to understand math better and learn to love it!

Follow Jennifer’s board Math on Pinterest.

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Clark Planetarium and IMAX Field Trip

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August 18, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

When I heard we could go see an IMAX about Pangaea for FREE, I was excited.

And the Clark Planetarium is always free. This doesn’t get any better!

All we had to do was make clay dinosaurs since the IMAX is Claymation. Easy peasy!

The nifty electricity ball

Working on their scavenger hunts from the planetarium’s website.

A really cool projector-illuminated Earth…

We saw meteors, moon rocks, and Mars rocks.

Katie is irritated with me here that I interrupted her “scavenging.”

Display of different kinds of space rocks

Alex was fascinated by the pendulum that showed the movement of Earth

The movie was great.

We had popcorn, slushies, candy, and it was 3D!

Alex did really well sitting still and watching it and keeping his glasses on.

The film was snarky and fun and Claymation!

It gave us some opportunities to have conversation about Creationism and evolution and dinosaurs.

We just learned about Pangaea in our science book!

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Garden Bounty

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August 17, 2012 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

A garden update.

Tori loves the garden. She’s the only one Dad can trust out there without supervision. She loves to go check the beans and the tomatoes and she knows when and how to pick everything. She’s learning so much!

She was excited to help prep the beans for dinner and freezing.

Alex was thrilled to sample our first watermelon.

He does like watermelon. He calls it “little lemon.” It took me a while to understand and he got very frustrated with me. sigh

We have pickled LOTS of cucumbers.

We have frozen green beans.

And we have some beautiful tomatoes – Roma, cherry, and an heirloom. They’re delicious.

We’re getting overrun by yellow squash. We have frozen lots of it. We have sautéed it, casserole’d it, grilled it, and given lots away. We’re almost sick of it!

We have onions drying in the cellar.

We have canned blackberry jam and tomato sauce.

Soon, it will be apple season and we’ll make applesauce and apple butter!

Gardening is really hard work!

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