Happy Chinese New Year!!!

We had such a great time yesterday, celebrating Chinese New Year! This was actually a week-long celebration, as we began our study of China using Galloping the Globe. The first thing our children did was learn about where China is located, the capital, etc...  They completed their country fact sheets I printed from Homeschool Creations. They also colored the flag of China.  This year was the Year of the Rabbit, and so my children did a coloring page and a "bunny search" puzzle.

Activity Village had an entire section dedicated to Chinese New Year, and I was able to print off these wonderful bookmarks, each with a picture of one of the 12 animals of the Chinese calendar. It was fun to read the descriptions of each animal and see which one fit us best!

We practiced writing in Chinese too, and enjoyed listening to some beautiful Chinese music on You Tube.

One of our favorite crafts from China was this cute little cherry blossom pot. The instructions for making these are on Activity Village.

My little girl really enjoyed practicing all the different yoga positions. Here she is doing the tree. Taoist Yoga is an ancient practice that originated in China many, many years ago.

The kids made some nice paper lanterns to decorate our home. Paper lanterns are used throughout China for most all celebrations.

The girls had fun making these little paper dolls I found at http://www.education.com/  They have paper dolls from around the world. Some of them are a bit detailed and may be difficult for little ones to cut out ( I had to help my 9 year old) but they still enjoyed it and even gave names to their dolls.

We ended our week-long celebration with a delicious dinner from our favorite Chinese restaurant. This was such a great week and the kids really learned a lot about China and Chinese New Year. There were so many different things to do we didn't get to all of them, but that's quite ok- I will have some new things for them to do next year!

A Visit to Chile

This week, we learned about Chile. Although Chile is not one of the listed countries for Galloping the Globe, my children were interested in finding out about this fascinating country and so I thought, "why not!" They completed a fact sheet about Chile that I printed off of Homeschool Creations. We also found a map quiz from Enchanted Learning as well as a flag to color. Another activity they enjoyed was seeing all the neat photos of Chile at www.nationalgeographic.com I borrowed several books from the library for them to read but their favorite is always Around the World In 80 Tales.

While traveling through Chile, we discovered that felt art is very popular there and so we decided to make our own felt pictures. Here is my little guy working on his picture above, and the finished product below.

My little nut working on her artwork, and her final product below!

Last but not least, my big girl working on her picture. Here is her project!

I love all the fun, hands-on craft activities we are able to do while homeschooling and I think the children learn so much from these projects. It is always so neat to see how different they are as well!

God's Eyes, 3 Letter Words, and Too Much Sugar!

Every year, my kids get a TON of candy. When I say a ton, that is no exaggeration.  Each of their buckets was completely overflowing with chocolate, gum, Skittles, M & M's and just about every other type of candy you could imagine. So, always looking for a teaching opportunity, I decided to have my children do some math and science activities with their load, secretly praying it would all somehow disappear before they ate too much. First, I had them sort all the candy by brand. Then, they sorted the candy by type- chocolate, chewy, gum, hard candy, etc... The fun part came next. We did lots of experiments using various candies-melting time, water/oil experiments, etc...   They really enjoyed this activity and little by little, the giant sugar mountain started to disappear.  I don't even think they really cared about eating the candy as much as they were curious to see how long it would take a chocolate bar to explode in the microwave. Fun times...

We've been learning about Mexico as part of our Galloping the Globe studies and the kids had fun making Ojos de Dios (God's Eyes) this week. Much more about Mexico will be seen here, as we chose Mexico as our Christmas Around The World country.

I know I've mentioned this before, but I will say it again- I just LOVE Starfall Kindergarten. It is so thorough and full of all sorts of colorful, high quality manipulatives and products. My little guy has been working hard at sounding out words and so I decided to make 3 different colored circles and laminated them. Then, I wrote the words "beginning" "middle" and "ending" and placed one above each circle. I say a word out loud and give him a handful of magnetic letters. His job is to break up the word into separate sounds and then find the correct letters and place them in the appropriate spot. For example, I say the word "bed" and he repeats it and then says what each letter sounds like b-e-d. Then, he finds the letters in his pile and sets them in the correct order.  He really enjoys this activity and I am amazed at how well he is learning to distinguish beginning/ending sounds as well as vowels.

A Busy Week!

We finally had our first week of "fall-like" weather and you know what??? It feels GREAT! I absolutely love the cool, windy breezes and the crisp smell in the air. It's the perfect time of year for us to spend lots of time outside and so our first adventure this week was to the alpaca farm to learn all about these cuddly, cute animals from Peru.

We also engaged in some science experiments, including one where my daughter learned about air pressure and how birds fly.

My little guy loved reading "Caps For Sale" with me and even got out his own set of caps to "sell" to us. He wrote in his Starfall Journal about his favorite cap.

My kids were also able to finish their hot air balloons as part of our Galloping The Globe geography studies. I was quite impressed with their creativity and love how each one of their balloons is different.

What was my favorite homeschooling moment this week? It would definitely have to be the times I caught my older girls helping their little brother and showing love and kindness towards him. It sure does make me smile...

Is Your Mama A Llama??? No! She's An Alpaca!

As I mentioned before, I absolutely LOVE taking my children on field trips- especially ones that are related to something we happen to be studying. Well, this year we have hopped on the Galloping the Globe train and our first stop is Peru. We learned that Alpacas are native to Peru and so after some research, I was able to find an alpaca farm not too far away that would give us a tour! It was such an interesting trip. The kids were able to feed and pet the alpacas. Alpacas are quite friendly and love to be with people. There were only a few "nervous" ones and they kept their distance from us. We found out alpacas normally live about 25 years and their fur is used for all sorts of products such as blankets, socks, hats, and more. The farm we went to shaves the alpacas in April each year and sells the fur.  Alpaca fiber is extremely soft and was once used only by the wealthy. Alpacas are not common in the United States and so there is a demand for their fur. Alpcas are extremely expensive so I don't believe we will be purchasing one for a pet anytime soon, but if it were up to my oldest daughter, she would have brought one home today!