Category:

Be Creative Every Day

2/20/2016

I love this quote from Art Before Breakfast, by Danny Gregory.

Aha!   Calling All Kids.   When you were little, you made art all the time. Remember?   Crayons, finger paint, poster paint, chalk, papier-mache, playdoh.You sang, you danced, you dressed up.   Your imagination was your constant companion.   And all your friends shared in your art.   You lived in an artist's cooperative.

Everyone around you was supportive.   Mom, Dad, teachers celebrated your work, saved it, pinned it up, stuck it on the fridge. You were a star.

Why does that have to be just a distant memory?   Why can't you have that same spirit of creativity, brave exploration, open-eyed wonder... even for just 10 minutes a day?

That little artist is still in there, inside you. Get that kid some crayons.

This book was my inspiration for a change in our schooling days. Having a creative lad, who plays and builds paper craft toys regularly, who uses them to help learn math and play games, who extensively borrows my tablet to use different drawing apps made the change all the easier.

Tuesday, Wednesdays and Thursdays I set the timer for 15 minutes and we "do art". We get our inspiration from a number of different sources, but predominately from the books below.

My son doesn't like to write in books (or draw for that matter). So all we use these books for is ideas. Using art sketch paper gives us more room to draw and and detail. My boy using a full sheet and me using a half sheet.

from 642 Places To Draw

My son's favourite Idea book is the 642 places to draw book. It is simply a bunch of blank pages with ideas printed in the upper corner of each section. We simply leaf through the pages until we hit one that intrigues. This one was "draw a greenhouse with exotic plants"

my son's exotic specimens

a more conventional greenhouse

My son had a whole lot of fun with this and drew on it over the course of 45 minutes. (he just couldn't stop after 15 minutes so continued to draw while I read out-loud to him).

I have to admit, some of the idea presented to us make my lad scoff. The idea of drawing what he had for lunch... he just really can't see the point of it. Whereas a windy day has the lad grinning at the possibilities...

from doodle your day

Other ideas intrigue him... but "they don't leave enough room for me to draw what I want mom!" This is why using a sketchbook is so handy. Inspiration doesn't have to be limited by lack of room. :)

from pocketdoodles for Christmas

I have to admit, it's simply fun to draw. I don't much care WHAT I draw, as long as I have an idea of what to do. (I know.. sometimes I'm limited) It's actually rather neat some of the ideas presented to us. LIke the fun of drawing the home of a hobbit. :)

my efforts

I love how we inspire each other to try new things. I love the stories he comes up with to go with his drawings... because being creative in one way helps us be creative in other ways as well. :)

my son's efforts

The Art Before Breakfast is a rather neat book. It talks about all the different ways you can do art, as well as talking about different art techniques. It shows options for how to encourage doing art spontaneously ... draw your children, draw your pet, draw your morning coffee, draw the stranger or a friend, draw the animals that you see and more. Just draw, and draw some more. Then to make sure you don't get stuck in a rut draw with something unusual like lipstick, mud or a paintbrush.

There are so many ways to draw, so many things to see and do and recreate.

For 15 minutes every day... just draw.

I have found it makes for a more settled boy if I give him time to just create, and because we have these lovely books for inspiration it takes the pressure off of having to come up with ideas on our own.

All these lovely books were sent out to me by Raincoast books.

Product Details:
PocketDoodles for Christmas. By Anita Wood.
642 Places to draw. Published by Chronicle books.
Art Before Breakfast.   by Danny Gregory.
Doodle Your Day.   By Anita Wood.

Review: Hands Of A Child

8/18/2013

Ponds...just what do we know about ponds? Before doing this study we knew some things about Ponds, but now we know a whole lot more. :) Thanks to a review we did for In the Hands of a Child and their lapbook Pond Life.

Vendor information

Vendor: In the Hands of a child
Product:Pond Life.
Price: Normally $12, currently $5.
Age/Grade Level: Kindergarden, 1st Grade, 2nd Grade

With this unit study you will be able to teach your early elementary classroom about life in and around a pond. Ponds may be small, but they are important ecosystems that are home to many plants and animals that support one another. Make your lesson planning easy with Pond Life Curriculum from In the Hands of a Child. This pack includes a 5-day Planning Guide, Related Reading List, 11 Hands-On Activities PLUS 1 Fun Extension Activity, and a 7-page Research Guide. Students will be introduced to how ponds form, how ponds are different from lakes, pond areas, plants and animals that live in pond areas, pond dipping, and more!

On the way up to camping I took the time (since it was an eight hour van ride) to read the text for "Pond Life". This gave us a good foundation to talk about the ponds that we saw while we were camping. :) It was easy to see and talk about the animals and plants you could find a various levels of the small ponds that surrounded us and then compare them to the lakes we saw.

emergent and floating plants. :)

We had a couple of rainy days so we used those to work on the lapbook. I had put the lapbook on my tablet for ease of references and had printed out all the activities before we left. We had lots of small pieces of paper to help us light our campfire. :) I did not print out all 70 pages, only the ones with the activities on that we were going to complete.

when we did this exercise the lad did all the ones he knew first, and then we went back to read about the ones he was uncertain about. As he listened he was able to finish it. :)

Most of the ponds we saw were quite small compared to the lakes we had. Some were so small they made for EXCELLENT frog catching areas. :)

small pond. the lad is just about to try scooping up a frog.

he ended up making a frog living area, it held 14 frogs. He caught about 18 frogs all together. He worked hard trying to catch a big bullfrog but that one was just too smart for him to manage.

I appreciated having this study to do, especially to read on my tablet on the way up. It gave me good words to use with my lad as we walked around enjoying the bounty of God's creation. Was he always interested? not really...frogs are much more exciting than examining the environment that they live in, but when it came to building a frog habitat it came it quite useful.

"Mom, frogs need plants the stick out right?"
"Mom, frogs like water that's all the same right?
"Mom, frogs like plants or things they can sit on or hide under right?"

And all those questions I could answer while giving him information about ponds. We enjoyed having this study right at our fingers tips to do something with. :) It was an excellent rainy day activity for us since it fit so well with where we were and what we like to do when on vacation.

most of the frogs he caught were green frogs, but he managed to catch one wood frog and two other kinds of frogs which names are eluding me at the moment. He learned alot about ponds just by catching frogs.

Suggestions I would have for change.

1. I personally find it easier to have lesson material, immediately combine with activity material. In the Hands of a Child puts all the activities at the end and then you need to figure out which part of the lesson material they belong with. I would rather it be connected immediately.
2. Some of the lapbook materials I had no clue how they were to be put together and could not find any instructions on how to do so. So that I would like to have a small diagram for each activity showing what it's supposed to look like when it is completed.

You can either click to read more reviews from the Schoolhouse Review Crew or click the banner below, whichever is more convenient for you. There were a variety of lapbooks reviewed, so it really is worth your while to check them out. In the Hands of a Child makes some GOOD lapbooks.

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Review and Giveaway: Insects by Hands Of A Child

5/2/2013

For the past month we've been reviewing Insects, a lapbook on Insects.
Vendor: In the Hands of A Child.
Product: Insects.
Price: Currently available for $9 (normally $15)
Geared for : K-6

What this is...

I started out homeschooling doing lapbooks. I love scrapbooking and this seemed a natural fit for me.   What I quickly learned was that I very much DISLIKE making lapbooks using file folders. Can't stand it.   So I decided as much as I like the concept of file folders doing them as such isn't a good fit. Therefore, we make books on cardstock and normal paper. We cut, we glue, we make up our own minds about where we want to put things, and we don't fiddle with creating elaborate lapbooks out of file folders.

What this means is we can add to our lapbooks as we gain new information OR as we find information that answers questions that the lapbook gives us, but doesn't answer as face it...you simply cannot answer every single question a child might have.   So I LOVE doing lapbooks my own way. :)

This lapbook is designed by In the Hands of a Child.   I must say, of all the companies I have used for doing lapbooks this company is one of my favourites. They do a thorough job. Their lapbooking elements fit well with the material taught, and they tell me how to make the different elements. Most can be figured out, but some... well... take some teaching. :)

This lapbook covers the anatomy of an insect, type of insects, vocabulary, habitats, hibernation and migration and so much more.

Insect we found, we wonder what type of moth or butterfly it will become.

Things I wish were different

I wish the lapbooking elements were placed throughout the book rather than all at the end. I find myself needing to flip pages as I've printed off the elements I need but not the directions. If the elements were within the study it would make it easier to simply proceed through the instruction part in an orderly fashion.

My Opinion

I like this insect study. It is quite a good one.

I really appreciate how they give options with the unit for making the lapbooking elements age appropriate...cut and paste for children, or write in the answer, or do a simple copy over words.    Means if I had more than one child I could do this with all of them with little extra effort on my part.

I have to admit, we haven't quite finished it, we are having fun doing it and making little side trips into....I wonder about (today it was antennae, how do they help tell temperature differences) so we've been looking that up and learning more.

I love materials that not only answer lots of questions, but also encourage lots of questions that require further study.   This unit does exactly that.

I recommend you get if you have someone in your household interested in insects.   :)

carefully watching the caterpillar. Note: we brought home some moss from our insect walk to help encourage more insects into our backyard. Moss brings in small and tiny insects which my son just loves to observe.

My Son's Opinion

I like this study mom, but there is SO much gluing.
Can we do less gluing?
But I like it! I didn't know that flies and bees were different kinds of insects.

Disclosure

I was offered a free unit in exchange for my fair and honest review. I was not forced to have a good opinion, just merely to tell you what I thought.

The Giveaway Portion

You too can do this study! Woot woot! I've got permission to do a giveaway. :) To get your very own copy of this study enter my giveaway and see what happens.

Entry -Form

Insects

4/25/2013

Today the lad and I predominately worked on the Insects Lapbook from Hands of a Child. Our main focus was on vocab and the orders of insects. I used the vocab words to show my son how if you know parts of the word you can often figure out the whole word EVEN IF it's a great big long word. :) For instance Carnivore...starts with a word the lad knows well. And it ends with a bossy R..... so Car ?? or... so play around with it and soon he said CARNIVORE! Precisely lad. :) He was happy...he figured it out. Just ways to build his confidence.

He also worked on his Adventus. The goal was to have him only do a practice session but ...well...the lad fights against that. He wants to keep doing something new. So...I looked up some music books I had and said OKAY...I have something that you can practice WHILE you do the "new" using Children's Music Journey 2 by Adventus.

ACK MOM!!! This is too hard, I don't like it.
Well...it gives you something to work on then doesn't it?
and look....You CAN do this too. :)

So I showed him that he could. Well...he got one page down, but then he let his "ackiness" get in the way and didn't really try for the second. But... He'll practice it daily until he has it. Good to challenge a lad a bit.

We called it a day after that since he's fighting a cold and was getting too... hmm.. "techy" for anything good to come of it.

Be Creative Every Day

Review: Hands Of A Child

Review and Giveaway: Insects by Hands Of A Child

What this is...

Things I wish were different

My Opinion

My Son's Opinion

Disclosure

The Giveaway Portion

Insects

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2013 TOS Reviews

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Be Creative Every Day

Review: Hands Of A Child

Review and Giveaway: Insects by Hands Of A Child

What this is...

Things I wish were different

My Opinion

My Son's Opinion

Disclosure

The Giveaway Portion

Insects

Who Am I?

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2013 TOS Reviews

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