MFW 1st Grade - Bible Lands drawing

Delaney learned a great story to help her draw a map of the Bible lands.

Adventures ~ Week 16

I should apologize for these brief weekly summaries. If I had written them a few months ago when we had actually done the work, they probably would be more interesting. Don't let my poor writing and descriptions discourage you from TOTALLY loving MFW. It is an awesome program and has been a lot of fun for the kids (and for me too!).

On to Week 16!

This week we learned about Jesus as Immanuel/Emmanuel. We studied and memoried the first verse of the hymn O Come, O Come Emmanuel. It's one of my faves and I had fun belting it out, though I think Sydney might have been mortified. Sadly, there's no video to convince you of my wicked awesome voice. Shucks. Anyway, our memory verse this week was Matthew 1:23 "...they will call him Immanuel" - which means, "God with us."

Rhode Island and Vermont were the states we studied this week. We also did some reading in American Pioneers and Patriots and learned about Daniel Boone in Exploring American History.

Our science lessons this week were about air - how it expands, contracts, and rises. we did a couple of experiments to see the effect of temperature on air. I think the girls' favorite was when they made the coin "jump" on top of the bottle.

Adventures ~ Week 15

This week we continued a lot of the things we were working on last week - reading Farmer Boy, learning America the Beautiful, memorizing and understanding John 14:6, studying birds and in social studies we learned about New Hampshire, Virginia, New York and North Carolina.

Our Bible lessons were pretty interesting this week. On Monday we talked about how God does not always lead us the way WE think we should go - but always in the best way. Too bad I often struggle with thinking His way can't possibly be the best way *sigh* Tuesday we went on to learn about the Most Holy Place and what it meant for us when it ripped. Good stuff.

The state study was a lot of fun this week. We reviewed the Jamestown settlement when we studied Virginia, learned about the Statue of Liberty and did some comparative measuring for New York, but I think Sydney enjoyed North Carolina most of all because she got to fly paper airplanes in school. We learned all about the Wright Brothers and then did experiments to see what we could do with paper airplanes.

The Wright Brothers made four flights the first day they got their plane in the air. The first one lasted 12 seconds. The longest flight made it 59 seconds. We've come a long way since then.

Adventures ~ Week 14

Week 13 was a Thanksgiving Unit. We did read the Thanksgiving Story, but skipped most of the planned activities and did things on our own.

This week, Week 14, included the study of four more states -- Connecticut, Massachussetts, Maryland and South Carolina. We continued our bird study in science, started reading Farmer Boy and began listening to and studying The Nutcracker ballet.

We also began learning the words and history behind America The Beautiful. Apparently I was a bad student because I never realized that the song was written by a teacher visiting Pikes Peak. A dear friend of mine actually posted pictures of that area so my girls could see what Katherine Lee Bates was looking at when she wrote the poem that eventually became the song. To me, there's nothing more awe inspiring that those Purple Mountain Majesty (even when Sydney insists that they are blue).

Our Bible lesson verse for the week was John 14:6 Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

Amen.

Adventures ~ Week 12

This is the week that we finally began our study of the states. MFW gave us a fact sheet about each state, along with flag stickers and little cards with the state bird and flower. Each time we look at a new state we:

1. Locate it on the big US map
2. Color the state on our personal maps
3. Read over the facts about the state (this includes some info about history of its statehood, famous people from the state, nicknames, state symbols, funny/outdated laws, etc)
4. Complete any listed activities
5. Read library books about the state during Book Basket time.

We are following the order of statehood, so this week we studied Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Georgia. Our activity for Pennsylvania was to make a model of the Liberty Bell and for Georgia we were supposed to make a peach cobbler -- but we didn't because we were overloaded with desserts at the time. We'll probably do it this summer when we can use fresh peaches.

This week's science lessons were all about birds. We spent some time discussing mammals, reptiles and birds and learned about warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals. We then Googled all the state birds that we studied this week so we could see them "live" and hear their calls. Both Sydney and Delaney love to find birds in the yard, so we also got out the binoculars and wandered around the yard to see what we could find.

Ous Bible lessons this week also related to birds.

Happy Goat Day!!!

Goat Day. I wish I could say that I understand it. But I don't. I really and truly have no idea what it's all about.

Last October we were told that there was a fabulous family event called Goat Day at the pioneer settlement about 1 1/2 hours from our house. We had been to the settlement before and really had a good time, but it was uber rainy that day so we thought it'd be fun to go back. We were envisioning some sort of pioneer re-enactment having to do with goats - maybe demonstrations on how to make goat cheese or something??? Yeah, I don't know -- but what would you think?

So we loaded up the car on a warm October Saturday morning, drove cross country and were greeted with a HUGE line to get into the settlement. You have to understand that this settlement is literally in the middle of nowhere. Well, it's actually in a park - but the park is in the middle of nowhere. The line to get into this place was HUGE! Did I say that already? Yeah, well the size merits a bit of repetition. It was like we were waiting for Springsteen or something.

After waiting about an hour to get into the park, we were accosted by a guy wanting $5 a person. "For Goat Day?" we naively asked. The place was like a giant parking lot. No goats or pioneers anywhere to be seen. So we paid our $20 (it was a long drive and we figured we ought to at least go see what the heck was going on), found a parking space in the back forty and walked forever before we found some action.

OK so now I've been to Goat Day and I still have no clue what it is. It was kind of like a carnival with lots of inflatables for the kids to jump on, pony rides, food and craft booths and even a greased pig event. Honest.

There were also a lot of political signs and booths and pamphlets being passed out...but no goats. I wonder if it's some sort of beginning to the political season or something? I really just don't know. We did make our way over to the pioneer settlement though and saw two goats in a pen. But that was about it for the event's namesake. We'll need to go back again this year to ask more probing questions. Last year we just wandered around saying, "This is Goat Day." The kids still think it's hillarious and for whatever reason will pipe up with "Happy Goat Day!" at the oddest moments - just to make us all laugh. It always works.

Here are the kids outside the general store at the pioneer settlement. Notice their authentic, made in China, pioneer toys :)

These really ARE authentic pioneer toys - made from corn cobs and feathers. The kids loved flying these things all over the house and Lilley thought they were tasty *yum*

We had a good time chatting with these ladies. They showed the girls how the wool is dyed and spun and turned into clothing or blankets.

Happy Goat Day!!!!!

Adventures in MFW ~ Week 11

I am so ridiculously far behind in blogging our weekly lessons. I apologiz to those of you on the MFW blogroll who have been visiting!!! I'm going to attempt to catch up in separate posts - hopefully I don't confuse you or leave out too many details since everything happened so long ago.

Anyway...

Week 11
Bible ~ We continued learning about Jesus as the Giver of Water. It really difficult to explain to a 9 year old how a person can have his spiritual thirst satisfied. She nodded her head a lot and seemed to understand, but I felt like I could never explain it well enough. Perhaps the difference is in her innocence. There's something to the idea of coming to the Lord like a child!

Social Studies ~ Last week we studied the birth of our nation and the Declaration of Independence. This week we gained a new appreciation for George Washington. What an amazing man! We also read about and tried to make our own Johnny Cakes.

Ingredients: water, butter, cornmeal, sugar and salt. Easy peasey.

I think we did something wrong because ours fell apart in the pan....

But the girls seemed to like them anyway. They tried dipping them in maple syrup and melted butter. I'm sure you will understand how surprised I was when they declared maple syrup their favorite topping *gasp*

Read Aloud ~ We're still working on Sarah Witcher's Story which is supposed to be the true story of a little girl (4ish maybe) who wandered away from the family homestead and got lost in the woods for several days. She was taken care of by a bear whom she had mistaken for the family dog. It's been a good insight into faith, family life, and the culture of the time period and my girls are hanging on every word.

Music ~ We are singing and learning all about Yankee Doodle Dandy! The girls think it's funny that macaroni (as in "Stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni") referred to a stylish way of dressing and not their favorite lunch. They seem put off that the British would be making fun of the early Americans like they did. But, go USA! We all love that the early Americans took it in stride and adopted the song as their own - despite it's original cruel intentions.

Weird Fruit Night

I'm baaaaack!!!

So I've gotten a few not-so-gentle reminders lately that my blog is a wee little bit behind. I have no excuse really. Other than total laziness on my part :) But I'm back now and hope to catch you up with all the fun things we've been doing since November.

For now, I'll update you on what we did today :) It was Weird Fruit Night! On our last grocery trip, the girls noticed some strange fruits in the produce department so we decided to give them a try. In the name of social studies, we also did a little bit of research and learned about the fruits before we ate them. Are we homeschoolers, or what? Up for consideration tonight: sharon fruit, star fruit, cactus pear, Uniq/Ugli fruit and strawberries. I threw the strawberries in because I knew we'd eat those - the rest was purely experimental.

 

 

 

 

Clearly the girls enjoyed their homework.

Pioneer Days

Right after we originally did week 5 (I reviewed it before I made the last post), we went on a field trip to a local Pioneer Days village. It was a very rainy day, but we had such a good time!

The village is actually made up of houses that were built in our area and were all moved to this site. I can't remember the exact dates, but some of the houses were from the 1700s and others were in use up until the 1960s. Here is one of the older houses. One of the most fascinating things was that they knew the history of the homes and even had many of the families' belongings which made it seem more real to the girls.

One of our first stops was at the smoke house. The girls were a little grossed out by the idea of killing the animals and rendering fat, but they loved eating those cracklins! I think that was Sadey's favorite part of the day!

The blacksmith told us all about making horseshoes and even made me a plant hook for the front porch. I love it!

There were a few arts and crafts stations. Here the girls are learning about making quilts and even got to make their own squares. At another station they got to make and decorate marbles and were excited to learn how easy it is if you have some clay and lots of time to let them dry in the sun.

Here's the family outside the general store - waiting for the rain to slow down a little bit.



During a particularly bad part of the storm, we were stranded in a house with a wonderful older couple who were all about re-enacting the pioneer lifestyle. They gave us warm biscuits and homemade jam, and then taught the girls some games that pioneer children might have played. Here she is showing Delaney how much fun you can have with a button and some string.


Thankfully it didn't rain the whole day! Delaney had fun making us some butter.


We had so much fun talking to this woman about the baskets she was weaving from pine needles. Pine trees grow like crazy around here - we have more needles in our yard then grass! She told us how she collects, washes and prepares the needles and then makes the baskets with just the needles and some string. Someday it would be nice to take a class from her and learn the technique - but it doesn't SOUND like it would be too hard once you get the hang of it.