Summer School Week 3

Week 3 Field Notes
OK, the honeymoon phase is over and we're parsing it down to what needs done and having lots of fun outdoors with Summer weather here.

Bird Call:  House Sparrow - We played this sound everyday and 1-2 times played the old bird songs just to quiz them.

Classical Music: Handel's Messiah - Phoebe's favorite thus far!  She knows almost all the words, well, at least the "Hallelujah" word.  She sings it all the time!!  "Alluya, Alluya, Alluya!"  Perfect pitch too!  We play the old songs from previous weeks 1-2 times a week as well.

Picture Study:  Rembrandt, Self-Portrait  - "Hey look, kids!  It's Rembrandt!  He painted himself!"

Animal: Giraffe - Read a book from the library on these.

Insect: June Bug - Learned about hissing June Bugs from YouTube videos.

Flower: Pansies - Colored these after researching the different colors they come in on Google and visiting a local nursery to see the flower up close.  It's been fun as we drive around town for the kids to see flowers they know. I chose flowers currently blooming to study each week, so we saw daffodils that first week, then tulips, now we see pansies planted in yards.  

Tree: Pine Tree - dropped the ball on trees this week, need to go up the hill and investigate what kind of pine tree we have!

Fungi: Puff Ball - I am smitten!  I can't put the mushroom books down.  I want to hunt them so badly, but realize that realistically, I have zero experience to rely on and eating a sneaky bad mushroom disguised as a nice edible one can be deadly!  Must find experienced mushroom hunters to apprentice under!!

Rocks: Obsidian - Finally got the box of Igneous rocks.  This is making learning rocks so much easier!!  Showed them obsidian the first day and had them say "OBSIDIAN" five times.  Then today, I pushed the box full of rocks (numbers concealed) toward them and said, "Find the obsidian. Find the pumice."  They loved it!

Constellation: Hercules - This one was chosen because I found a connect the dot for it here, but can't seem to find lots on it elsewhere.  Planning to stick to the dustbunny.com plan after this week as I previously mentioned. I realize I need a simple good picture of each constellation to hold up like a flash card to quiz since that's the point of this (see and recognize).

Dinosaur: T-Rex - Read a book from the library, watched a few on-line videos.

American Sign Language: K-P

Sea Life: Cod - The kids love coloring a flower and a fish every week.  So, I had to look up a picture for Cod and this is all I could find.  Found out the local fish and chips shop, "Gip's Fish and Chips" only sells cod straight from the ocean "no middle man" he said.  It was very yummy!

Biography: Christopher Columbus

Fiction Summer Must Reads: Pilgrim's Progress for kids