Weeks 20, 21, & 22 Overview

We're back on the blog!! Glad to get back on track updating all our families and friends on the progress and adventures of the Coleman Academy for Girls! We all would love to continue Christmas break forever, but work is calling...

So, here's what we have been doing for weeks 20, 21, & 22!

• Bible: We are finished studying the Old Testament in our Field Guide and have begun our study in the New Testament. First, an overview of the world of Jesus: what life was like, culture, people, rulers, houses, work, and more. We looked at Jesus' birth and boyhood, then his baptism and temptation. Jesus used God's Word, His Truth, to battle against Satan's tempting and we can do the same.
• Read Aloud: We are reading The Great and Terrible Quest (a medieval historical fiction story of a 10 year-old orphaned boy's dangerous journey of discovery. He risks his own life for another and regains that which he didn't even know he lost. Full of mystery and danger!
• History: We finished our study of The Early Middle Ages (years 501-1100). Some people groups and lands we learned about were: The Carolingians, The Abbasid Dynasty, Magyars and Bohemians, Anglo-Saxon Britain, The Holy Roman Empire, Capetian France, The Americas, The Vikings, The Normans, The Seljuk Turks, and China's Song Dynasty.
• Science 3rd: We are studying plants.
• Disguises that help plants survive, how seeds travel, plants that grow on animals, how plants contribute to an ecosystem,  parts and functions of a plant, how plants make their own food (photosynthesis), cells in plants, parts of a flower, evergreens, and bacteria and fungi.
• Science 6th: States of matter, measuring temperature, heat energy, conductors and insulators or heat, waves, wavelength, E=mc2, plasma, fusion reactors, light, color blindness, reflection, refraction, lenses, sound waves, echolocation, static charges, electrical conductors, pneumatic drill, resistance, voltage, current, circuits, molecular magnets, compasses, measuring distance in space, light from the sun, the moon, developments in building materials, and much more!
• Writing 3rd: We are continuing our look and practice at writing correspondence letters.
• Math 3rd: After working on a couple reviews, we worked through "mental math". We looked at ways to compute math in our head by reorganizing the numbers. Ex. Instead of 36 + 6, think 36 + 4, for 40, then add 2 more for 42. There are many ways to think about adding and subtracting amounts. Even adults use a variety of ways, depending on the numbers involved, to compute numbers in our head. We also practiced dividing numbers that involve zero as the ones and tens digit, such as 1800 divided by 2 is 9 in the hundreds place and zeros in the tens and ones place for a quotient of 900. Last, we began our study of conversions in measurement of length. Ex. 3 yards and 2 feet is also 11 feet.
• Math 6th: Decimals and percent, including figuring percent for real work problems.

We also had a fantastic field trip to MOSH (Museum of Science & History) to view the Roman Exhibit. Afterward, we treated our students to lunch at Maple Street Biscuit Co. thanks to a donation from our favorite CAG family, the Skornias! We played at the park after that and visited the local library. It was a great field trip!

Thanks for reading about our learning from weeks 20, 21, and 22. Come back to see our week 23 adventures, soon!

Happy Discovering!

Usborne Quicklinks ~ Week 20, 21, & 22

Hello all! Well, cold January is behind us and I think I am finally out of "hibernation". To get back on track with our blog, you will find the Usborne Quicklinks below for three weeks! These are great for students to access outside of class for fun videos and such about what we have learned in Science and History. These are available only for the Usborne books we use. Reminder: we use Usborne AND other books, so that is why there aren't always links for what we are learning in a subject.

History~
Book: 12,000 Years of World History

Week 20
Page 122: Charlemagne, stain-glass windows at Chartres Cathedral in France, etc...

Week 21
Pages 116-117: Vikings, boat-making, chess pieces, Viking boat burial in the Scottish Highlands, Viking beliefs and stories.

Pages 118-119: Viking raids and seafaring skills, boat-building skills, trade routes, Viking raids!, Eric the Red and Leif Ericson, and a Viking longship that sailed from Norway to America in 2016.

Pages 120-121: Alfred the Great defeated the Vikings and united the Saxons, Anglo Saxons, Sutton Hoo ship burial, and more.

Page 124: The Norman conquests, Battle of Hastings, events of 1066, the Bayeux Tapestry, Norman castles, churches, and villages in England.

Week 22
Page 123: The Holy Roman Empire


Science (3rd grade)~
Book: Mysteries and Marvels of Nature

Week 20
Pages 42-43: How plants defend themselves, Bee Orchids, Poison Ivy, and more.

Pages 54-55: Algae and creatures that live in a sloth's fur, ants and caterpillars that help each other, army of ants that defend a tree, how a strangler fig kills and tree, and ants on a whistling thorn tree.

Pages 66-67: mangrove forests, lichens and air pollution, golden frogs in bromeliads in South America, and plant and animal communities in a rain forest.

Weeks 21 and 22 do not have any links


Science (6th grade)~
Book: What's Science All About?

Week 20, 21, and 22
Pages 227-235, 236-251, and 252-265

Choose Section What's Physics All About?
Choose Subsection Energy Everywhere (Websites 1-13)
     Heat, temperature, expand & contract, how a thermometer works, conduction & conductors, convection, radiation, absorbing heat, insulators, waves and wavelength, electromagnetic spectrum, and types of waves.
     Light, opaque, seeing colors, reflecting light, scattering light, reflection, refraction, lenses and focus, hearing, hertz, high and low frequency, ultrasound, infrasound, oscilloscope, decibels, sonar

Choose Sub-section It's Electrifying! (Websites 1-6)
     Electricity, insulators, current electricity, how to make an electric current, how batteries work, calculating current, types of circuits, how magnets work, electromagnetism, and electromagnets.

Happy exploring!

Week In Photos ~ Week 19

^^^ when a dad joins in on the fun!

 

 Studying mammals in nature study at co-op...looks like it was cats this week!

PE at co-op... Jedi dodgeball?

Week 19 Overview

Getting back into the swing of things after Christmas break was hard, but we have lots of interesting things that we are learning about, so it is worth getting back into our studies!

Here are just some of the things from week 19:

• Bible~ Ezra, Haggai, Nehemiah, Zechariah, Malachi, & Daniel; rebuilding Jerusalem and waiting; Cyrus defeated Babylon and established the Persian empire in its place. Then, he allowed captive people to return to their homelands. Several thousand Jews went back to the promised land. They were eager to rebuild the Temple of God and the city of Jerusalem; the prophet Haggai taught the Jews to put God first. We see that those who obey God's Word are blessed.
• History~ East of China, the Yamato dynasty of Japan, Korea, the first people of Australia and New Zealand, and the Maori people.
• 3rd Grade Science~ parts of plants, animal-eating plants, the movement of seeds,  how plants protect themselves, the Mexican jumping bean, and looking at radishes.
• 6th grade Science~ Understanding pressure, force, and area; density- sink or float; types of energy; power and in Cool Stuff 2.0- Optical microscopes versus an SEM, weather satellites, radiosondes, particle accelerators, neutrinos, and photomultipliers. (Say what? Yes, I know. I haven't heard some of these words before either!)
• 3rd grade math~ using the standard algorithm to compute double digit by single digit multiplication problems, review of our first half of the year, and beginning mental calculations.
• 6th grade math~ multiplying and diving with decimals, long division with decimals, decimal remainders, never-ending decimals, and rounding & estimating with decimals.
• Read Aloud~ A Single Shard: a Korean orphan boy, 12 years old, is indebted to the master potter, Min, in the 12th century. This fictional story shows integrity, perseverance, disappointment, hope, and loyalty.
• Vocabulary~ 3rd grade: absurd, accomplish, ascend, dense, experiment, flimsy, heroic, lumber, mimic, significant, soar, spectator, suspend, terminate, unwieldy; 6th grade: abet, agile, allot, balmy, congregate, divert, humdrum, influx, intricate, memento, query, sporadic, staple, tumult, unseemly.
• Writing- journal entries pertaining to Christmas break.

As you can see...lots of interesting learning! Check out our week in photos, coming soon!

Usborne Quicklinks ~ Week 19

3rd grade Science ~ Book: Mysteries & Marvels of Nature

Pages

6-7 carnivorous plants

18-19 sunflowers, Mexican jumping beans, and plant tropisms

30-31 Saguaro Cacti, most poisonous mushrooms in the world, and poison ivy



6th Grade Science ~ Book: What's Science All About?

Section: Physics, Energy Everywhere ~ Websites #1-6



History ~ Book: 12,000 Years of World History

Pages

76 Tomb model of a Yamato warrior

180-181 Easter Island (Moai), the aboriginal people of Australia, Polynesian explorers journey to the South Pacific, the Maoris & settlement in New Zealand, and the traditional clothing & tattoos of the Maori.

Week In Photos ~ Week 18

 Studying mammals in Nature Study at co-op (2nd semester has started!)

Using a tiny chisel and mallet for an archeology project.

She was obsessed with getting those bones out. Future archeologist?

 Girls first hockey game...it was a win for the Jacksonville Icemen!

Week 18 Overview

We all enjoyed one of the many benefits of homeschooling for week 18: a laid back, at your own home, traveling kind of homeschool! Before Christmas break, we worked hard to get ahead in a few subjects. So over the holidays, separately (with our own families), we read, traveled, played math games, played word games, measured in cooking and baking, and experienced lots of other  things together. There are still a few workbook items we will complete from week 18, but it was a fun break to do things differently for a few days.

Here is some of the academic learning we covered:

• Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Esther (Life in Babylon and captivity, God protects his people even among their enemies, God uses even our hard times for good, and there are godly people who have become famous because of their importance)
• The Rise of Islam, Muhammad, The Koran, Islam becomes and empire, the fight for Mecca, the spread of Islam, Baghdad, Sinbad in the valley of snakes (fiction), The great dynasties of China, Yang Chien, and the Tang dynasty.
• Multiplication and division facts
• Daily math and math fact practice
• Science 3- Inside the human body, stomach, brain, muscles, and bones
• Science 6- friction, oiling machinery, Newton's 3 laws of motion, physics and machines and work, simple machines, weight and mass, moon's gravity and Earth, velocity and stability, and binoculars and night vision cameras.

We are now right in the middle of the school year. 90 days completed and 90 days left to go. We look forward to an interesting second half of the year. We will still be working hard, but plan on letting go of a few traditional learning routines and adding in more real-world learning (cooking, sewing, fishing, field trips, gardening, service projects...lots of good stuff!). We are able to do this for a few reasons. One is that we have made a lot of learning growth already in just a short time. Another is that homeschooling allows us the chance to learn in a variety of ways, as we see fit- not just the traditional textbook and workbook options. Both books and experiences are important in the learning process, so we are happy to try out a little more experience in the next few months.

Remember to save the date for our homeschool banquet this spring: the evening of Friday, April 20th. More to come about this as we get closer. This is always a wonderful evening of showing-off and celebrating our co-op learning and experiences from the year. It seems far away now, but it will be here before we know it.

Enjoy our Week in Photos ~ Week 18 (coming soon!) and we'll be back with more updates in week 19. :)