Saturday, March 18, 2023

Week 23 Notes

Some things going on this week that have their own blog post or webpage:


Monday, Mar 13


Tuesday, Mar 14


Wednesday, Mar 15


Thursday, Mar 16

    SSR

    Morning Math

      age 6, 7, 8 - static division with the Golden Bead Material

      age 10, 11 - fractions, decimals, percents

      age 12, 13 - The Book of Perfectly Perilous Math
      "The Sands of Time" & "The Final Countdown"

    Jazz Artist: Florence Mills - read Harlem's Little Blackbird: The Story of Florence Mills by Renée Watson at snack, listen to "Bye Bye Florence" (vocals by Bert Howell, organ by Fats Waller)

    Handwork - Knitting, Embroidery

    Read Aloud - read chapter 9 of The House at Pooh Corner at lunch

    Board Games - Quixo, Gnomes at Night, Mancala

    Art History - Helen Frankenthaler Tea Staining Art Lesson ($3.50 on TpT)

    Language Arts

      age 6, 7, 8 - SWI
      read The Tale of Lucky Patrick: A Leprechaun and Farmer Story by Suzanne Down, write word sums for the < gold > family

      age 10, 11 - Grammar
      finish reviewing Grammar symbols for Lower Elementary:
      article, adjective, noun, pronoun, verb, adverb, preposition, conjuction, interjection

      begin to study Grammar Symbols for Upper Elementary:
      nouns - common, proper, collective, abstract
      verbs - transitive, intrasitive, linking, gerund, participle, infinitve as adjective, infinitive as noun, infinitive as adverb

      age 12, 13 - The Canterbury Tales
      begin to read The General Prologue (PDF) in Middle English and fill out Character Chart (FREE on TpT)


This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!

Posted by at No comments:

Wednesday, March 15, 2023

Humidity: How and Why

How We Measure It & Why It Matters (Science Club/Weather series of posts)

Wednesday, Mar 15

    do Static Electricity Experiments

      Dining Room - station 1
      balloon, wall

      Bathroom - station 2
      plastic pen, wool sweater, a thin stream of water from the sink

      Library - station 3
      plastic pen, wool sweater, 3 hole punch, sheet of copy paper

    explain static electricity and how it works

    consider the positive end and negative end of a magnet, and look at how they are attracted to or repel one another

    note that the term 'electricity' comes from elektron, which is the Greek word for "amber" and think about what that connection might be (early triboelectric experiments in Ancient Greece)

    the prefix tribo means "rubbing" in Greek, so 'triboelectricity' means electricity resulting from rubbing

    explain why static electricity experiments work better in the winter when humidity is less

    look up the humidity outside at the present moment

    let children design their own humidity experiments (dishes of water with food coloring or sugar dissolved in them, left out covered or uncovered, left in places in the house of different temperatures)

    even though they know that humidity means water dissolved into the air, it's helpful to watch it happen firsthand!

    they are interested in how quickly it will happen, what else will evaporate up along with the water and what will be left behind (sugar? food coloring?), and if water can get out of a closed container


Wednesday, Mar 22

    Today we checked up on the results of our experiments. A lot of interesting things happened, actually! Some of them I knew would happen and some of them I didn't:

    Water goes up. Sugar stays behind. This was an expected result, but still fun to see all the crystals down on the bottom of the cup.

    Notice that the line on the side of this cup is the original water level as of one week ago. So we learned that adding the lid slowed down evaporation, but did not stop it.

    Food coloring also stays behind (which we all expected).

    BUT, from other experiments (each child designed his/her own), we also learned that adding food coloring to water makes it evaporate more slowly! We went and checked the ingredients list in food coloring, and hypothesized that the food coloring ingredients make the water more viscous and thus it evaporates just a tad more slowly.

    AND one group checked to see if stirring in -- or not stirring in -- the food coloring made a difference in the evaporation rate. And it did! I would have never ever thought to investigate that. Children are so marvelous.

    The cup of water which was placed in the fridge also evaporated more slowly than the one on the countertop, and we had a few ideas as to why that could have happened.

    - the temperature being colder ?
    - the refridgerator being a closed system ?
    - do fridges have humidity controls as well as temperature controls ?

    The children had to first observe the results of their experiments, draw sketches and make notes in their Science Notebooks, and then give a short summary of their results to the class.


    All of that took longer than I expected, so instead of beginning to make hygrometers using human hair, we just went over the experiment protocol and I explained how we would build the hygrometers. As it turns out, they are not interested in making one, so we just ended the class with a discussion and a diagram of how you would set one up. Since human hair does respond to humidity, it makes a surprisingly accurate hygrometer! You calibrate it by blowing a hairdryer on it until the length of the hair stops changing (and mark that line as 0% humidity) and by placing it in a closed plastic storage container with a sponge saturated with water until length of the hair stops changing (and mark that line as 100% humidity). Amazing!

    Make a Hygrometer with 3 Strands of Hair - Science Buddies


Wednesday, Mar 29


NOTE: Our conversations about humidity really came in useful when we hatched baby chicks in the classroom in April!


our previous exploration: wind speed

our next exploration: rainfall


This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!

Posted by at No comments:

Wednesday, March 8, 2023

Holi!

Today all of our homeschool group families gathered at Morris Library at SIU to participate in their Holi celebration. Even though it was Spring Break, we went on a field trip! This was a fantastic addition to the World Religions block we had in January/February. Holi is associated most closely with Hinduism:


Notes for Next Time:

It can be cold here during Holi, so as well as having pants, shirt, socks, and shoes that can get color on them, think about a jacket or coat!

Bring one towel per person to sit on in the car for the ride home.

Children can get powder in their mouths, so bring a bottle of water for rinsing & spitting.

Children can also get clumps of powder in their eyes, so bring an eyewash bottle. I have these in my first aid kit for the school and they are great!


Photos!


This post contains affiliate links to materials I truly use for homeschooling. Qualifying purchases provide me with revenue. Thank you for your support!

Posted by at 1 comment:
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)