Archive for 2012

Home Archive for 2012

The kids enjoyed potions class so much from Hogwart's school that my son asked to have a potions birthday party, then we went to the store and he wanted a potions costume birthday party. I gave myself an extra week to plan and we had his birthday party on the 20th. He had a blast! He couldn't wait for the party as he was seeing me set it up. I admit I had quite a bit of fun planning and setting it up. Halloween is one of my favorites and so I jumped at the chance to plan this. Since I had a wide ranges of ages of kids attending, I wanted something interesting for everyone, so I had some science in general type stuff lying around for the older kids to mess with.

Potions Class

Learning about bases and acids.

I made dirt cake with Milano cookies for tombstones and a creme pumpkin and gummy worm for fun. It was a bit too chocolaty for us, maybe next time I'll layer with vanilla pudding. My son had fun thinking it was mud and dirt though.

Water beads and body parts that grow in water. They didn't get as big as I had hoped in the time before the party. Everything else had the immediate effect, so I thought those would as well.

I picked up the beakers with eyeballs from OTC.

A Squishy Science kit I picked up months ago for when we cover it in school. This was perfect because the organs were really squishy, kind of like gummy candy, slightly tacky, but they didn't dry out. Eww!!

Some of our potion ingredients. I downloaded some labels I saw on Pinterest along with some ideas of what to do with them. Tip: Snapple jars make the best potion bottles because they have an S on them for Snape. ;) I used rubber eyeball bouncy balls in water, canned bean sprouts for Hippogryph Gizzards , whole water chestnuts for Blind Cat Eyes, spaghetti noodles in tomato sauce for Blood Worms, veg oil for Truth Serum, and dried black beans for Dried Black Crows Eyes. I had my son pick some leaves in the backyard to make Gillyweed. He insists I can make an underwater breathing potion with it, but I have to remind him I'm not allowed to do magic outside of Hogwarts. ;)

Target had battery operated blacklite in their dollar section which turned out perfect for making my Dream Fluid (tonic water) glow.

I didn't get pictures of most of my demonstrations, because I was busy doing them. ;) Here are some of the experiments we did:

From: She Knows

We made Borax slime with clear glue. It was really runny at first, but overnight in the fridge helped it out a lot and made it much less sticky and more solid.
I attempted Metamucil Flubber and I turned it into plastic somehow and ruined a glass dish. :(

I demonstrated the acids and bases color changing potions that is the first picture.

Science Bob

Elephant toothpaste was fun, but blew up quick like vinegar and baking soda. It was supposed to be a little more foamy, I don't think I let the yeast dissolve completely.

The hit of the party was a lava lamp. I had a bottle of colored water and cheap veg oil and placed a bowl of broken up Alka-Seltzer next to the bottle. Everyone got to put a tablet in and see this. It was really beautiful.

From: About.com

When the sun went down I put some mentos in a bottle of tonic water with a blacklite behind it and they got a glow in the dark fountain.

The kids haven't put this one down since I bought it. You become a human circuit by touching one hand on each of the metal ends. When you do, it lights up and makes noise. The fun part comes in when you touch other people and make a big circle and it still works. Then experiment with touching in a pattern and making a song because the second you stop touching, the sound stops.

Just add water and place in a shallow pan to play with. For a really beautiful effect, place in a clear pan on a light box or shine a light into it.

Thinking Putty is like Silly Putty only larger, more colorful and stiffer. The more you work it, the warmer it gets, which loosens it up a bit. It doesn't stick to anything and the kids just liked stretching it and making it pop when you fold it.

This one is fun for older kids. These super powerful magnets can be tossed close together in the air and they attract to each other. When they collide, they rattle and buzz from spinning against each other.

This was a demo I had one of the older kids do. The more you pour it back and forth the slimier it got. Eventually it gets so thick it creates a suction and actually moves opposite gravity.

I found most of these both at Target in the Halloween section and at Cost Plus World Market for less than Amazon, but I think it might be only seasonal. Of course, SteveSpanglerScience.com has these and lots more for sale along with demonstration ideas.

What are Snap Circuits? Think Lego with electronics components. You can build radios, fans, lights, and tons of other projects without having to solder anything.

Snap Circuits Deluxe Snap Rover
It shoots discs, lights up, records and plays sounds, can turn 360 degrees and he can customize it. This should last him awhile. I got this for my 6 year old and we built it together. He loves recording a message then going down the dark hall to see it light up and shoot foam discs out of it.

The Manual

The Snap Circuits can be placed on the clear plastic plate you can see above. Each piece has a snap on each end, underneath and above, that allows you to stack them and create circuits.

Basic Diagram

The diagrams are easy to understand. The plastic base has a grid system with rows being letters and columns numbers. If you follow the diagram, you might see some small numbers in a circle near some of the pieces. These represent the layers for stacking. It shows you everything, to make for little guessing. I think it's much easier than putting together something from a Lego diagram.

Elenco Snap Circuits SC-750R Student Training Program

This kit has all of the Snap Circuit kits put together in one case. The 750 means that there are 750 projects to try out. It even has solar cells, Many of the projects build on each other. For example, first you learn how to make a light switch, then you make a sound activated light switch. Then you change the sound by changing the component, etc. The only extra I bought was the battery eliminator, which the case had a spot for. It's been a long time since I was so pleased with a purchase; they thought of everything.

The student guide has a full middle school course in electronics and the teacher guide has quizzes. Eventually, I plan to use this for a semester of electronics. The kids love it and I don't feel bad if they just play for awhile because it is educational as well.

All of the manuals and student guide for his SC750-R

If you are interested in Snap Circuits, I would get the biggest kit you can afford. There are many different levels, this one is the largest. If you want to go slow, they do sell the case and smaller kits separate.

This is a look at my process that will hopefully give others some ideas. I lean toward a unit study approach where just about everything ties into what we are doing in history. I think that doing it this way leads to a deeper understanding of the time period and a better absorption of knowledge. It's also much more efficient because everything is tied together and streamlined. For example, he only needs to write one essay at a time, because it is all relevant to history. I don't require a separate essay for history, a report for literature, and an essay for science all at the same time; which did happen to us once in charter school. This is my own personal style and may not fit with everyone's ideas.

The first thing I do is look at what I should be covering by looking at scope and sequence lists and then base some of my decisions off of that. I also like to reread The Well-Trained Mind book and look at Core Knowledge for ideas and guidelines and a local private school's curriculum goals. This gives me a solid foundation for what I should be covering. According to the WTM, I should be on a 4-year history cycle. Well, it took me a year to cover ancient history up to, but not including Greece and Rome. I decided these were worthy of their own dedicated year. There is so much to cover there. Therefore, 7th grade will have one semester for Greece and one for Rome. These are still somewhat a work in progress, but this is what I have so far.

History
Greece
Connect the Thoughts Greece CTT is a critical thinking based curriculum that asks open-ended questions and requires a 50 word written response. It has vocabulary and maps built in and is designed to have the students consider and explain concepts. It covers history, (of course) philosophy, politics, science, religion, art and literature of ancient Greece. I'm hoping this will drastically reduce the amount of piecing together all of the above subjects I had to do this last year.
Rome
To Be A Roman and A Roman Map Workbook - bought as a bundle through Homeschool Buyers Co-op
CTT Rome, however, if I don't like how CTT Greece went, then I'll use Early Times: The Story of Ancient Rome.

Science
While history covers science in ancient Greece, it's definitely not a complete curriculum. I plan to rotate science again this year.
Computer Science - he enjoys making Scratch games. I thought I would let him continue that and try out some new programs I found for the National STEM Video Game Challenge.
Astronomy - I overdid it on the Astronomy curriculum, but they each have their use. I already have Intellego Astronomy and Great Courses Understanding the Universe videos, so I plan to fit these in as supplements. I was tempted to do a standard textbook, workbook and lab book like RS4K or CPO, but I found Holt Science & Technology: Astronomy: Short Course J, which was just the size I was looking for.

I plan to do science every day, so breaking it up I want 2 days of Computer Science which leaves me 3 days for Astronomy. One day can be devoted to reading a section and doing an interactive from Intellego or exploring the universe through Slooh, Microsoft Worldwide Telescope or Universe Sandbox for fun interest-led learning. One of my goals is to do more hands-on experiments, which means I'll use one of those days for that. Day three can be used for Great Courses videos or Netflix videos. I also plan to to have at least 3 studies of famous Greek and Roman scientists/mathematicians.

As you can see, I'm aiming for a science heavy year without it feeling like it. Incorporating lots of hands-on activities and experiments without a ton of reading and writing in workbooks should provide enough learning to keep the interest alive and possibly make him want to go deeper on his own. At least, that's my plan. ;)

Update: After scheduling the entire school year, I realized this wasn't going to work for me or my son. It was too much and I knew it wouldn't work out. Homeschool Buyers Co-op had a sale on Science Fusion and I decided to go with that. It is an inquiry-based science program that has a lot of interactive features, some challenging critical thinking problems and virtual labs as well as regular labs. To view a 27 minute video that will give you an overview of the program, click on the Science Fusion link above and scroll to the bottom of the page and click on Why ScienceFusion?

Math
I signed up for a free Pre-Algebra course for the summer with yourteacher.com through the Homeschool Buyers Co-op. It ends on August 31 and I hope to be mostly through Pre-Algebra by then. After that, I plan to sign up for a year subscription to Kinetic Books for Algebra or Pre-Algebra depending on how solid he is on it by the end of summer. I also bought Life of Fred Pre-Algebra books for fun really. He reads through those pretty quickly.

Writing
Writing with Skill - Complete Writer Level 1
While history has a lot of writing, he needs a more formal writing curriculum. Writing with Skill is a straightforward writing program that prepares him for the rhetoric stage. I considered Classical Writing which follows progymnasmata (before rhetoric) through high school. I wanted to use WWS because it includes more modern writing versus classical writing which is more formal and less applicable to today's forms of writing.

The Creative Writer - Level 1
This writing program will be scheduled on Fridays. It's a systematic approach to the parts that are needed for great creative writing. My son loved the writing prompts I gave him last year using 5-Minute Daily Writing Practice. My plan is to have him writing his own novel sometime in the next few years, so I'm giving him the building blocks for doing just that.

Killgallon: Sentence Composing for Middle School: A Worktext on Sentence Variety and Maturity - I love these books and so does my son! They use familiar, popular sentences from books and have you study the structure the author used. You then copy similar sentences using the technique given. My son is a great creative writer, but when he is writing expository essays or descriptive essays the sentences tend to follow the same pattern. This teaches him how to rearrange them to make them more interesting to read and still make sense.
Update: I decided for continuity reasons, to wait on Sentence Composing until he's done the Grammar book. They are similar in some ways and since he's already started the Grammar book, I figured I'l let him finish it, then move onto Sentence-Composing most likely in second semester.

Grammar
Grammar for Middle School: A Sentence-Composing Approach--A Student Worktext

A similar format to the sentence composing book, but for grammar.

Vocabulary/Spelling
Vocabulary Packets: Greek and Latin Roots
The Book of Roots: Advanced Vocabulary Building From Latin Roots - A perfect book to tie in history, vocabulary Latin roots and his Latin class.

Critical Thinking

Critical Thinking Book 1

We've already started working on this for about 15 minutes a day orally. This is a great way to start critical thinking. I've heard there are some issues with chapter 2 being extremely confusing and complicated. It covers if-then, only-then, double negative statements using symbols. We may have to go slow through that one, but I plan to plod through it.

Latin

Lively Latin Book 2

He's completed LL1 and will be moving onto book 2

Mythology

Classical Mythology and More: A Workbook - in preparation for National Mythology Exam and Medusa Mythology Exam.

Reading List/ Literature Study

Greek

The Trojan War - MP Guide - A retelling of the Iliad and the Odyssey. He's already studied these, so just rereading a light story to review.

The Aeneid Unabridged Audiobook Dramatization - I would like for him to read the full book, but I also want him to enjoy the stories and I have a lot of reading on my list. Could go with Memoria Press Guide.

Famous Greeks - bought on sale with code

Archimedes and the Door of Science

Herodotus and the Road to History

The Trial of Socrates
The Story of Science: Aristotle Leads the Way

Rome

The Bronze Bow

Famous Men of Rome - though Lively Latin covers many of the same stories, so I may not need this.

Horatius at the Bridge - Memoria Press

Augustus Caesar's World

City: A Story of Roman Planning and Construction - library

Rome Antics - library
The Ides of April

The Hunger Games Trilogy - yep, I plan to work a lit study of this into Rome when we're almost done and compare.

This may look like a lot of work on the student's part, it's really not. It's actually about 6.5 hours planned daily, give or take depending on lessons. Now, I'll show you my (updated) weekly schedule.

Subject	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
History	CTT - Greece 1-1.5 hours	CTT - Greece 1-1.5 hours	CTT - Greece 1-1.5 hours	CTT - Greece 1-1.5 hours	CTT - Greece 1-1.5 hours
Science	Science Fusion 1-1.5 hours	Science Fusion 1-1.5 hours	Science Fusion 1-1.5 hours	Science Fusion 1-1.5 hours	Computer Science - Scratch 2 hours
Math	Kinetic Books Pre-Algebra 1-1.5 hours	Kinetic Books Pre-Algebra 1-1.5 hours	Kinetic Books Pre-Algebra 1-1.5 hours	Kinetic Books Pre-Algebra 1-1.5 hours	Kinetic Books Pre-Algebra 1-1.5 hours
Grammar	Kilgallon Grammar 15 minutes	Kilgallon Grammar 15 minutes	Kilgallon Grammar 15 minutes	Kilgallon Grammar 15 minutes
Vocabulary	The Book of Roots 15 minutes	The Book of Roots 15 minutes	The Book of Roots 15 minutes	The Book of Roots 15 minutes
Critical Thinking	Critical Thinking Book 1 15 minutes	Critical Thinking Book 1 15 minutes	Critical Thinking Book 1 15 minutes	Critical Thinking Book 1 15 minutes
Reading	Lit Study 45 minutes	Lit Study 45 minutes	Lit Study 45 minutes	Lit Study 45 minutes	Lit Study 45 minutes
Writing	WWS1 1-1.5 hours	WWS1 1-1.5 hours	WWS1 1-1.5 hours	WWS1 1-1.5 hours	Creative Writer 1 hour
Mythology	Classical Mythology Workbook 30 minutes	Classical Mythology Workbook 30 minutes	Classical Mythology Workbook 30 minutes	Classical Mythology Workbook 30 minutes	Classical Mythology Workbook 30 minutes
Latin	LL1 & LL2 30 minutes	LL1 & LL2 30 minutes	LL1 & LL2 30 minutes	LL1 & LL2 30 minutes	LL1 & LL2 30 minutes

I'm also experimenting with a semi-block schedule. My son likes to check things off his list and he likes to get all of one subject done for the week at one time. This semi-block schedule would help him with that. History and writing are too big of subjects to tackle in one day for him, but others can be done once a week in a larger chunk if he wants. I've carefully chosen curriculum that is easy to plan and just "do the next thing." Some subjects like math I don't bother putting in a time frame. Depending on the lesson, it could take him anywhere from an hour and a half to 15 minutes. It depends on how well he's understanding it. I'm figuring approximately 4 hours for history, math, writing and literature total.

Semi-Block Schedule

Subject	Lessons Due	Days per Week	Approximate Time per Week
History	CTT - Greece	5x a week	5-7.5 hours
Science	Science Fusion Computer Science - Scratch	4x a week 1x a week	4-6 hours 2 Hours
Math	Kinetic Books - Pre-Algebra	5x a week	5-7.5 hours
Grammar	Kilgallon Grammar	4x a week	1 hour
Vocabulary	The Book of Roots	4x a week	40 minutes
Critical Thinking	Critical Thinking Book 1	4x a week	1 hour
Reading	Lit Study	5x a week	2.25 hours
Writing	WWS1 Creative Writer	4x a week 1x a week	4 hours 1 hour
Mythology	Classical Mythology Workbook	5x a week	2.5 hours
Latin	LL1 & LL2	5x a week	2.5 hours

He could easily spend 2 hours in one day doing Computer Science. He could also crank through 45 minutes of his root word vocabulary in one day and be done for the week. Two and one-half hours of mythology might be a bit much, but a lot of the Classical Mythology book is reading with a little response questions.

Next as books come in you simply divide the number of chapters into the number of weeks you plan to school. Most school years are 36 weeks. If you school year round like me, you can still use 36 weeks as your guide and take time off here and there without feeling like your behind. You just keep plugging along until you are done with your plan.

Once I've made all of my lesson plan lists, I'll print them out, put them through my ProClick and make a pretty cover and I'll be done for most of the year. Well....that's the plan anyway. ;P

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