Blog Archives

Ladybugs part two

6/28/2012

Today we did the bookwork part of our ladybug study. Our practical and learning part you can read about here.

Our unit study came from Schoolhouse express. I find it helpful to do our bookwork after we do practical learning as it gives the lad a chance to recall his facts.

We did a variety of sheets. A word shape puzzle proved an interesting challenge, but set up a challenge for the criss cross puzzle as he was somewhat stymied by the blocks not having a "word shape" to them. Once he got it through his head that the boxes were different AND he remembered he could play with the xbox upon completion, things went more smoothly. We had a challenge with figuring out different words you can make from the bigger word ladybugs. He came up with lady and bugs, I added bug and lad. And we left it at that.

He thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of the maze and it gave us a chance to talk about the type of insects ladybugs eat.

He did excellent review today and was good at telling me when he didn't remember which gave us a chance to go over that material.

Ladybugs

6/27/2012

Today we learned about ladybugs. we started with this video called the lifecycle of the ladybug. We then went from there to watch a variety of other videos on them. we continued our study be reading this book which was suggested to me by another homeschooler. Excellent book at showing how God created animals to work together to create balance in the garden. it is NOT a Christian book, but the balance shown in it can be explained to show how God made the world in a way that works together. :)

ladybugs come in a cloth bag that you keep in the fridge. They need to be released within a month. We've done two releases now, and we're letting the rest of them go today.

I thought it was excellent timing on God's part when I was considering doing a study on Ladybugs (which we use for aphids control in our garden) that Schoolexpress sent me a free unit study on them. I am part of their email group and every Sunday they send me a new study unit.

picture of differently coloured ladybugs, courtesy of the lad. :) They are on a currant bush.

as we did this unit we kept popping outside to release our lady bugs. We purchased them for $20 from Ontario Growers which is located in London. We released some last week and all the aphids are gone off the current bushes which I think is WAY COOL. So now we are releasing them near the tomatoes and the rose bushes. Gotta get rid of the aphids.

Is it a permanent solution? No...but it's a helpful not have to do all this manual spraying method that not only benefits me but will benefit my neighbours as well.

released ladybugs

We didn't get everything done, but there's always Friday. :)

Before I forget, an update on our egg experiment.

see the large bubbles around it? most of the shell is completely gone now.

Workbook Activities

6/26/2012

we did four pages in both these books today.

Math Basics 1 - has stuff in it that is WAY too easy for my boy. so we skipped around in it a bit.
Reader Rabbit - but mommy! I can't read all these words. That's okay, mommy can read them and you can do the work okay? Okay mommy. :)

It was like pulling teeth. BUT somewhat to be expected since it's been two or more weeks since we did book work and the boy has the wigglings today. :)

I had thought I had the wigglies out since we had fun trying to look through microscopes and closely examining the bodies of June bugs both alive and dead. But apparently not enough.

We got through it with a promise of when we are done he can play Pirates of the Carribbean on the Xbox 360.

Bouncing Egg Day Two

6/26/2012

A continuation of yesterday's egg experiments.

Today we checked out the eggs. We noted that the egg in vinegar was softer and that it was covered in foam. it was still floating.

When we changed the vinegar covering the egg, the egg sank again.

the bleach egg...

good egg on left, bad egg on right

we decided to crack the bleach egg today and compare it to a regular egg.

Note:

the shell turned yellow. Normal egg is white.
it stank "like vinegar mommy!"
the yolk changed its' shape.
the solid part is bigger in the regular egg mommy! and see the liquidy part is bigger in the bad egg!
the yolk is more "UP" in the good egg mommy.

close up of the "bad" egg shell

Bouncing Egg Experiment

6/25/2012

Day one of experiment.

A while back I was sent the bouncy egg experiment. That linked to this page and here's another page with additional information.

Ingredients needed.
1 egg
1 glass somewhat bigger than egg
vinegar

Place egg in glass.
Ask what you think might happen if you add vinegar.
"I don't know" was the response
Add vinegar, reminding son NOT to overfill the glass.
Get observations
"it sunk"
"it has bubbles".

My son being who he is asked..."Can we try it with bleach?"
Sure we can do that.
So we tried it with bleach.
"It floats"
"it doesn't have bubbles".

I have NO idea as to why bleach makes an egg float. Do you?

20 minutes later "MOMMY come see!!!" I went to see "mom!!! It floats!!!" Why do you think it does that? HE had to think on this and dad said...what does it have all around it? "BUBBLES!!!" What do you think the bubbles do? "make it float."

Events over the past bit

6/23/2012

We continue to have fun with toads. The one our lad regularly catches in the backyard is called Dark Night. He plays a pivotal role in several stories.

We've also been releasing ladybugs in the backyard to combat the aphid problem.   It's been fun watching where they go. We bought a bag for $20 at Ontario Growers in the local big city. :)

We had play dates with a couple different homeschool families.

The lad had the sheer joy of drawing a lemonade stand sign and then selling pop, lemonade and cookies at my annual yard sale. AND THEN!!!!!!! he used his earning to buy a lego Spider.!!!!   What fun!   We've spent a lot of time playing with the spider. :) mommy didn't have to help him at all. Not bad overall for one six year old boy eh?

What else? We've continued to do our reading at night, but really haven't done a whole lot in the way of homeschooling this past bit. We've taken time to do on the spot learning, but no book work and no organized time for learning.

Today Toads and Reading Eggs

6/12/2012

this image taken from over here.

The lad has been quite intrigued by toads lately.   So far he captured two small ones, and one average one at the river near gramma's house.   The small ones unfortunately died over night, but today he caught "dark lite" in the garden.

Then we went to visit some homeschooling friends where he caught another toad....this one with an odd eye (one eye smaller than the other) we call him 'blind guy'.

Tonight as I was building a rabbit cage he was playing cat in the grass with the toad. he was having a hoot!   And then we played "how well can the toad hide" and "can mommy snatch and help toad hop away from the cat?". :)   He's six...he giggled.

In the midst of all that giggling he learned that toads have ears, they have five toes on the back feet, four on the front, they can't stay in water for a long time or they will drown, they are built fairly symmetrically, they catch all sorts of bugs, worms, and what not.   They can climb well, and that they are an indicator species.
They are land animals as opposed to water animals like frogs, though they start life quite abit the same as frogs do.      he had fun and he learned!

Before we went to W's house, the lad did a lesson on Reading Eggs.    We really like this reading program. I will most likely purchase it in the fall.    We did our normal reading tonight...the lad is really enjoying the "poem" book.   Tonight we read a poem about a mouse and cat having a conversation but the mouse declined to let the cat visit cause "mr. puss, you'll bite off my head".   The lad sat up and looked at me! "MOMMY! Did the cat want to eat that mouse????"   I think maybe so buddy. "but mommy! that's not being friendly!"   Made me chuckle as I agreed with him. :)

Night Time Reading

6/5/2012

At night I make a point of not just reading story books with my son. I do read story books, but I also make a point of reading different types of literature.

We read: a bible story, a chapter book, a primer, a fun book, a library book, and a story book. I also read a biography of some sort. we've done the rounds of missionary stories, the autobiographies I had in the house, some Canadian stories we found at the library and such forth.

Currently we are reading the following.

we actually just finished Billy Mink, and have just started chatterer the red squirrel. Billy Mink was such a fun read and the lad had to remember what happened the chapter before and to wonder what might happen next. :)

I am thoroughly enjoying reading this book with the lad. The Great Escape by Christine Farenhorst. Each story is quite short. Some are repetitive from what we've read before, but covered in a slightly different way. Some just have a new way of looking at a different event from life. What I love is they encourage my son to ask questions, and they open his mind up to new thoughts.

this is our "fun" book. Happy birthday Bad kitty. if you have a child who likes to laugh and to learn, these books will do it for you.

Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes

This book is so old you won't find it anywhere. it's a basic collection of nursery rhymes. I had planned to just read from it during the day, but regular non-school reading just happens better at night. I think there is much to be said for reading through poems and nursery rhymes so hope to continue to practice for quite a while yet.

the one we read tonight totally made the boy hoot though. I found out that the original name to the poem was read is this: the tragical death of A, apple pye who was cut in pieces and eat by twenty-five gentlemen with whom all little people ought to be very well acquainted with.

A was an apple pie
B bit it
C cut it
D dealt it
E eats it
F fought for it
G got it
H had it
I inspected it
J jumped for it
K kept it
L longed for it
M mourned for it
N nodded at it
O opened it
P peeped in it
Q quartered it
R ran for it
S stole it
T took it
U upset it
V viewed it
W wanted it
X, Y and Z (and amperse-and) all wished for and had a piece in hand.

NOTE: the italics were added in the version that I read, but were not in the version found on-line.

Picked up this book at a yard sale for 50 cents, it's based on The Message and is very much a paraphrase and takes a fair amount of liberties in the story line. This is not all bad as it makes me think about how to correct the misinformation. Sometimes we just go straight to the bible to get it all straight.

Windows to the World

I couldn't find this primer anywhere on amazon, tried a variety of ways to do so. It's an Abeka book and it quite interesting. I found it at a curriculum sale (the best way to find books when on a frugal diet -- next to using the library that is). It's a collection of short stories and we enjoy going through it.