Friday, February 5, 2016

What a Week!

This week was a perfect example of how learning is a lifestyle. We are all learning and growing daily. There is great value in book learning, but there is also great value in hands-on learning. This week had a nice mix of both.

Art ~ We started the week out with a Grandmother-Daughter-Granddaughter day out. This was my Christmas present to my Mother, and we were finally able to go out for our all gal multi-generational adventure. My Mom decided that she wanted to go to a pottery place. Once there, she decided to try glass fusion. Anne and I painted pottery pieces. We all had a lot of fun and I can't wait to pick up the pieces after they are fired.



STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) ~ Anne had the opportunity to videotape a church performance that her friends were in this past weekend. She used both of our cameras (which can record and take pictures) and set them up in different locations. It reminded me of my Father, who is a photographer. She did a good job and the movie came out nice. DH helped her splice the two films together, and they are burning them on DVDs. It was a good first experience for Anne.

Dean also had some fun with STEM activities this week. His latest Tinker Crate arrived. The theme was gravity. This crate was more challenging for him than some of the more recent crates. He stuck with it and got most of the experiments to work.

Science ~ We sure didn't have to go far for our nature study this week. Our neighbor's tree crashed into our yard during a windstorm on Wednesday morning. You can read about it here. The kids learned about the tree and also played in it for the past several days. It is still in our yard since the neighbor is getting bids to determine who to have clean it up. I suspect they will play in it more over this weekend.

The kids are inside the tree and you can't even see them. They can stand up all the way inside.
Anne on the top of the tree
Standing on the side of the tree. It is very wide and was more than 60 feet tall.
Home Economics ~ Anne sewed elastic into her pointe shoes to prolong their life. She is growing out of them; but her dance teacher doesn't want her to get a new pair until after the Showcase performances, because she won't have time to break in a new pair of shoes. Dean took all of the light fixtures apart and cleaned them. They both made molasses sugar cookies and muffins this week.

Physical Education ~ No one could ever say these kids don't get enough physical education. They have added an extra 1.5 hour class to prepare for the Showcase dance performance at the end of the month. They are now up to 8.5 hours for Anne and 4.5 hours for Dean. Next week Anne will be adding one more hour of pointe bringing her to 9.5 hours of dance. Dean graduated once again from his latest series of physical therapy (PT). He will continue an intensive at-home PT program that hopefully will keep him from needing more PT for the next six months. 

All the Rest ~ Plenty of book work happened this week as well. They each completed a chapter book. The kids continued with their study of elections, progressed through the War of the Roses in history, started new math books, continued with creative writing and listening to The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. They also completed Life of Fred Kidneys. Lastly, they took several literature review tests from the Help Teaching website that I will be posting a review about soon. 

Blessings, Dawn

10 comments:

  1. That's a big tree! Glad it fell in a clear area! Olivia just got new pointe shoes. We had to go with a hard shank to see if that will last longer for her. I'm hoping these make it to/through spring recital, but I doubt that'll be the case.

    Looks like a great week!

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  2. Lots of life learning - I love it. There is a pottery place near us much like the one you visited. It's a favorite place of ours to visit and create as well.

    Congrats to Dean for completing this round of PT. Have a great weekend and I hope everyone survives all the extra dance classes.

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  3. YIKES on the tree...huzzah for turning a lemon into lemonade with it - seeing a teaching opp is great...lots of great learning as always! Love that art class pictures!

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  4. Oh my goodness that tree is HUGE!

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  5. Oh I love glass fusion! My boys and I tried a class this summer and it was so fun. We have had a lot of trees and limbs down these past few days because we got a lot of wet, heavy snow and it caused a lot of power outages too. So glad the tree didn't do any damage and allowed your family to have lots of fun hands- on science lessons.

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  6. What a great week, and so balanced with fun activities, outside activities, exercise and general school. We need more exercise in our lives but all I want to do is hibernate at the moment :)

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  7. What a sweet thing to do with your mom! I have found as I get older that EXPERIENCES with FAMILY is so much more important than stuff. I would much rather do something with family than buy more things. The memories last a lifetime, but we forget "stuff". I'm planning to do some vlogging in the future. One of these days I need to do research on editing programs and splicing and all that fancy stuff. LOL I bet my youngest would love Tinker Crate. I should look into that too! LOL Yikes on the tree!

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  8. Love your multi generation adventure! Hope you are well, Dawn, and thanks for linking with Collage Friday!

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  9. Those pottery places are so much fun! I'm a little weird; I like those spontaneous learning opportunities like fallen trees! We used to live on acreage, and I miss it. My kids used to climb trees and get sap in their hair and eat wild blackberries and cherry plums. Now we live in suburbia. :/

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  10. What fun! It's so great to have the extended family in on the adventure!

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