This week we learned in 1773, Colonists dressed as Mohawks, dumped tea from the British East India Company into the Boston Harbor. Why did they dress as American Indian Mohawks? Upon research there are many conclusions, one specifically says the tea dumpers chose their symbol with the upmost care. The tea symbolized imported British oppression and taxation without representation. The Indian symbolized its antithesis, a trademark of an emerging American identity and a voice for liberty against British oppression. The Mohawk, appeared not only at the Boston Tea Part but as an anti-tea protest the length of the seaboard. Others suggested that they didn't dress up at all, that it was merely a fable. Although there are many differing opinions I agree that it's a huge statement to dump 342 chests to be exact. That's enough to make 18,523,00 cups of tea, that was worth 9,659 pounds, which amounts to nearly one million dollars today. Shortly after Intolerable Acts was put into place.
For geography after initial capitals and states were introduced children took their "gummy” on a trip to show me where each one was on their maps. Since the capitals and states we’ve been learning are in the upper right hand of the United States, they are smaller and harder to find so for review the children played twister on a much larger scale floor map of those states. They also played hop scotch. This proved to be a big hit.
For English we learned a past participle is a verb plus "-ed," used as an adjective or a verb. To drill in the information we marched in place singing the tunes, clapped the beat and eventually marched around in a circle forward and then backward. We even did a little jumping jacks. The children had a lot of fun with this. We followed the same method in math skip counting 5s and 6s. In Science, we learned the three types of muscles, skeletal, smooth and cardiac using hand motions.
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Discovering secret messages. |
Fine Arts included review of the Fine Arts OILS (five elements of shape), circle, dot, line, angle and curved line. Using the small white boards the children watched as i drew and drew line for line an upside down image. We discussed which oils were used and when we were finished we flipped over the image revealing a big surprise. Originally it looked like a frog but on the flip side a different perspective revealed a queen. To further the discovery of upside down drawing we drew on paper, using the same method of line for line calling out the different shapes used to reveal the Boston Tea Party. This was difficult for many of the children, however they delighted with the end result laughing and excitingly looking at each others drawings. What is the point of upside down drawing? Upside down drawing creates a shift from left to right brain activity by drawing a picture upside down. We learn to see lines in relationship to each other and develop observational skills. Observational skills dictate that familiar things don't look the same upside down. Our left brain expects to see things oriented in the customary way - right side up. When on the flip side, we see areas of light and shadow and lines instead of real objects.
This weeks Hands-On Science Experiment explored fingerprints. To begin with I explained how God made each of them special, how they were truly unique and each had their own set of fingerprints. We talked about how when they placed their hands on anything they left invisible fingerprints. First they were to uncover a secret message by using watercolors painted over the surface of their page. The secret message was a huge fingerprint. On the back the scripture references Psalms 139, which I encourage you to read to your child this week. To recreate this or to have them make their own secret messages just use a white crayon on paper, I used watercolor paper, but any thick paper would do. Then use children’s watercolor or whatever acrylic or tempera paint you have by watering it down. Did you know we aren’t the only species to have finger prints? Gorillas have fingerprints similar to humans. Kolas have fingerprints so similar to humans that you can barely tell them apart. I passed around an image of the first index finger of a kola bear and a human. I didn’t know this, but I’m a digger of information. I love to uncover information. I also wondered if our fingerprints were similar to toe prints. I figured this would be interesting for the children as well and as I figured, they were delighted to oblige. I found non-staining ink pads for fingerprinting and in groups of two the children fingerprinted their fingers and toes.
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Sink or float? |
Creed and I are focusing on rhymes this week. Among the books we've read so far are books by Jane Yolen, author of the infamous children's book series "How Do Dinosaurs ... Say Goodnight," and so on. She has authored books with rhymes including "Color Me a Rhyme, and " Count Me a Rhyme," but our favorite is Shape me a Rhyme." "Shape Me a Rhyme," is all about finding shapes and forms in nature. Have a favorite book to read with rhymes to your child? Please comment! Dr. Seuss is all about the rhymes and it's been a long since treasure for me. I like to get a subject and run with it collecting books from the library, going through the vast array. My prompt this week was led after reading a link my friend posted on the readiness for reading from The Measured Mom: h
ttp://www.themeasuredmom.com/reading-skills-kids-need-theyre-ready-sound-out-words/. Creed has been asking to read and honestly I didn't know where to start. The Measured Mom had a list of five things your kids need before they're ready to sound out words. The fourth on the list was about phonological and phonemic awareness, which is different from phonics because it's about listening, not looking. A child should be able to count words, count syllables in words, rhyme, put sounds together to make a word, and identify the first and last sound in a word. Here's a link from her site one 10 simple activities to teach rhyming:
http://fun-a-day.com/rhyming-activities-for-children/.
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Magnetic or no? |
Last week Creed asked to do an experiment using water. After filling up a basin of water, we gathered objects to find out which ones would float and which ones would sink. We read the book, "Mickey's Magnet," by Franklyn M. Branley and Crockett Johnson. This book through story really demonstrates how magnets work. A little boy was asked by his mother who was sewing, to bring her a pin from the pin box. During this task the pin box was dumped and he proceeded to pick them up one by one. His father handed him a magnet and to the young boy's astonishment the pins were attracted to it making the task easy. His father explained how only iron and metal is attracted to magnets. Creed and I further explored his experiment using a magnet to discover which ones could be pulled through the water.
If you noticed the title you may be wondering where does "piggy" pudding come into play. For some reason we've been singing We Wish You A Merry Christmas every nap time and bed time since last Christmas. It's fast coming a bedtime tradition. The second verse says, "Now bring us some figgy pudding, " which the only thing Creed can hear is "piggy" pudding. We've discussed this - he looked at me said said he wanted some cow pudding too.
Reference to Boston Tea Party:
http://www.historytoday.com/bruce-e-johansen/mohawks-axes-and-taxes-images-american-revolution http://americanrevolutionstoriesabc.wikispaces.com/Boston+Tea+Party
Helpful notes and links:
Dot-to-dots for each state we learn may be printed from
www.makinglearningfun.com They will need to eventually know how to draw them free-hand, so I also encourage you to have them trace them on their maps with a dry erase crayon or marker.
Print your own floor map for free from:
http://www.yourchildlearns.com/megamaps/print-usa-maps.html, where maps can be printed up to 9x9 feet wide. After printing you just lay them beside each other and tape them together. I used laid a white shower curtain over top the image and copied using a sharpie. This would be something fun for your child to remember the states and capitals.