Photos - The Story of Calendars week 2

Last week in The Story of Calendars my focus was on making sure the Bongos really understood WHY a lunar calendar will always get out of step with the seasons over time. This week we learned the history behind the modern names of the days of the week and the months of the year. The Bobcats continue to practice their current math topic -- skip counting -- by playing games and doing our Circle Time songs and verses.

We continued to work on our Homemade Calendar Project and began our entries for the Booktacular Contest at the Carbondale Public Library.

The Saturday Art History class also had a field trip to SIU Saluki Stadium to view the annular solar eclipse! And in typing this I just realized that the word annular is related to annelid and means ring!

Some background information that may be useful:

Clocks & Calendars webpage

Booktacular Pumpkin Decorating Contest blog post

Science Club: Pumpkin Racers blog post

Art History: Louise Bourgeois blog post

We continued to read The Burgess Book of Nature Lore by Thornton W. Burgess at lunchtime. Our snacktime picture books this week were The Mushroom Fan Club by Elise Gravel (morels), The Ink Garden of Brother Theophane by C.M. Millen (black walnut ink), Pattan's Pumpkin: A Traditional Flood Story from Southern India retold by Chitra Soundar, and Pumpkin Town! (Or, Nothing Is Better and Worse Than Pumpkins) by Katie McKy.

Here are some photos from week 6:

Small Bead Frame

Hundred Board

Pattern Play

they were surprised to find that okra makes a lovely little flower stamp

a kitten is born!

the Ancient Babylonians divided the week into 7 days, named for the sun, the moon, and the five planets you can see with the naked eye

Bird Bingo

Turn Over

USA Puzzle Map

Pythagoras Board

and the Colored Bead Material to help with finding the multiples

a lesson on Chancery Script using fountain pens

writing with a quill pen and our lovely black walnut ink

writing in the plan book at the end of the day

carefully color coding each activity by subject area

because the children are all doing different lessons during their Work Time, they are responsible for their own documentation

the Checker Board for long multiplication (this material can be used for numbers up to the hundred millions place times a four digit multiplier)

a cross-stich chicken pincushion of her own design

Dr. Eureka, a logic puzzle

Mancala

Stamp Game

solving the problem using the hands on material

then carefully recording the answer using the Montessori color coding for place value (green is units, blue is tens, red is hundreds)

using tally marks to keep track of where she is in her knitting pattern

a chicken is born!

these pumpkins are going to be spectacular!

the Sorting Hat from Harry Potter... carefully hand painted

the children break into small groups and work on their pumpkins in different parts of the house to keep things from getting too crowded

during Choice Time, Handwork is a very popular option

in Waldorf education, children learn to knit before they learn to read, because it involves crossing the midline and is strengthening for the brain

gathering wheels and axles for our first trial round of building Pumpkin Racers! (more pics in the Pumpkin Racers blog post)

the Ring of Fire (a video image shared from another location)

see my Art History notes for how I tied this in with Louise Bourgeois!

we visited every station to see if there were some good Astronomy teaching ideas I could borrow!

Zac had a wonderful time

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