Wordless Wednesday: Giant Gummy

Aric made a giant Lego minifig gummy today.

For perspective, that is a large dinner size plate.

Thankful Thursday

Today I am thankful for:

16. A quiet morning to catch up on things
17.  Grammarly. I've been writing a lot of reviews lately, and I've started using it more. It has helped a lot!
18. The cooler days of summer between the warmer ones.
19. Feeling less tired the past few days.

This is a continuation of my thankful list. My last post was on 5/2/19

Pioneer Day fun

In the LDS church, we have a special celebration to commemorate the pioneers who sacrificed so much to come across the plains and find religious freedom. Pioneer Day is a fun little holiday that is celebrated hugely in Utah, but those of us in other parts of the world like to remember it too. Although, sometimes we forget, like me who remembered at precisely 10pm last night that today was pioneer day while looking at some of my favorite blogs. I decided to throw some things together for us to at least mark the day. It wasn't much.

First, in the morning I played the Tabernacle Choir's 2019 Pioneer Day concert recorded a few days ago. They have a great arrangement of music with an orchestra and guest artist Sissel.

While listening I cut out some letters to make a banner. I finally got it hung at the end of the day. Oh well. We might leave it up for a few days since I put all that work into it.

Pioneer day is all about just remembering the pioneers, their stories, their sacrifices, and maybe spending the day doing things the way they had done them (think Little House on the Prairie style living). If I'd planned ahead of time we might have cooked outdoors over the fire with a dutch oven. We love cooking with the dutch oven, and that would have been fun. Maybe next year.

I printed up some fun printables for the kids to color, so we decided to do a 3-marker challenge with some smelly markers we picked up at Target. A 3-marker challenge is where blindfolded they picked 3 colors each (or 4 in this case) and color their picture with only those colors. Then the judge (me) picks the best picture. This is one of my boys' favorite ways to color.

They used these smelly markers from Crayola. They had to randomly pick 2 colors from both the sweet and stinky smells. They almost couldn't handle the stink!  (As you can see in one boy's very incomplete coloring job)

I have been wanting to head up to Deseret Book (our church bookstore) for a while and get the new church history book that came out recently (pictured below). I've read part of it online, but I wanted the physical copy to read from. While at the church bookstore it was so fun to see the workers dressed as pioneers, and one even wished me a happy pioneer day. An offer for a small discount was applied if we picked up a pioneer day thing from the basket. We picked the bandana that says "faith in every footstep."

That's pretty much all we did for pioneer day. One other thing I wanted to do was watch a pioneer movie, but that didn't happen. We'll make up for that sometime in the next few weeks. Watching a pioneer day movie can happen anytime!

Apologia Science (A REVIEW)

My newest middle schooler (6th grade this fall) has dipped his toes into his first middle school science course this summer with Exploring Creation with General Science, 3rd Edition from Apologia. For the past several weeks he has gotten a taste of what it's like to really look at the study of science with science experiments, lab write-ups, and discovering more about the history of science.

Exploring Creation with General Science Textbook and Notebook

For this review, we received the physical copies of the textbook, notebook, tests, and solutions books. The main part of the course, the textbook, and notebook are in full color with the textbook being a hardback book, and the notebook is a softcover spiral-bound book. Both the textbook and the notebook are required to complete the course. I wouldn't want to even have my child try to complete this course without the notebook as it is necessary to help the student follow along through the text smoothly and pretty much independently.

Exploring Creation with General Science Test book and solutions book

The test booklet and solutions book are also required to be able to administer the tests at the end of each module. These books are all black and white and contain the tests and answers. They are pretty straight forward being a quick resource for giving a test and finding solutions to the study guide questions and the tests. It is also nice to have a separate test book so that the student can write directly in it and not have access to the answers. Although, for the first two tests they are allowed to complete the exams with an open book.

A weekly and daily schedule to make sure you are staying on track to complete the modules in a timely manner.

One of the things that I always love about Apologia science courses is the daily schedule included in the notebooks. This course has one too! It lays out exactly what to do each day in order to get through a module in a timely manner. The student can check each day off as they complete all the tasks on that day.

I love this checklist at the beginning of each notebook day. It lays out everything to be done in full detail.

This course takes that daily schedule even a step further! At the beginning of each notebook section, there is a box titled "what to do" for the day with each thing listed out and a checkbox next to it. This makes it so easy for the child to make sure they do each and everything without missing any steps. I think this is so helpful for middle schoolers! I can't always be there to tell him or her what to do next. They can just look at the list!

Starting at the very beginning of the course, a very good place to start.

With this course, it is best to start at the very beginning, and just go through each module in order. As the student goes through the course what they learn builds on from previous modules. For example, in the first module, the student is introduced to formal lab write-ups and will be walked through the write-ups at first, but then later will be expected to know how to do that. The information is also comprehensive and builds on things they learned in previous modules. It's hard to skip around this book.

There is also a lot more formal writing in this course. This is to help middle schoolers prepare for more intensive high school courses. There are many places throughout the notebook for notes, thoughts, and answering in-depth questions. Not only that there are all the lab write-ups I have mentioned. But, I love how this science course guides the middle schooler through all of the writing requirements. It's right on level, and a great introduction.

A timeline is made for the first module as the student studies the history of science. This is so helpful to keep all those names in order.

There are many graphic organizers throughout the notebook. This timeline is one example of how the notebook guides the student to organize information as they read. The student did have to collect his own pictures to put on the timeline, but a simple search on google brought up some very usable pictures. With the exception of those pictures I mentioned, most of what the student needs for the notebook is already there. Even the pages that he taped together for this timeline were included in the notebook.

An example of the graphic organizers in the notebook. This is how the notebook guides the student to take notes from the reading.

Along with the notetaking, there are also spaces for vocabulary definitions, pictures and places to draw pictures for examples, big blank pages for "creation connection" to write down thoughts or questions, places to paste photographs, and more that we haven't seen yet. It's a very well laid out and complete notebook designed to carry your middle school student through a complete general science course.

Explore More activities or what seems like mini-experiments are found all throughout the modules. There are also "on your own" questions or things to think through.

I've talked a lot about the notebook and taking notes, but what about the text? The textbook is the main reading for the course. Along with the reading, sprinkled throughout the text are many activities including experiments, explore more activities, and on your own questions. These experiments and deep thinking questions are a bit tougher than what my boy was used to with the elementary Apologia books. He loves this and has loved the challenge. He has also loved the challenge of writing more, even though it has been tough for him.

The experiments in this book provide the challenge that a middle school science student should expect.

The experiments in this science book require a little more. Not just in the experiments themselves, but also in the keeping track and writing down of what you are doing. This was hard for my son as he is used to just doing and tweaking the experiment to get things to work. It'll take some time for him to get used to the fact that he has to write down what he's doing and any changes that he makes as he does the experiment so it's all clear. The details and procedure of science experimentation are important, and that is partly what this course is designed to get the middle schoolers to focus on.

An experiment of density. The ping pong ball was supposed to move up and that little fish weight was supposed to go to the bottom. The experiment mostly worked, but my boy kept wanting to change things to make it work better. This was the very first experiment, so it was hard to get him to remember to write down his changes.

After that first experiment, there was an "explore more" box with a little mini-experiment. This one was looking at water and how quickly the food coloring spread through hot water versus cold water. He didn't have to write anything down for this one necessarily, just an expansion on the experiment.

The last thing I want to talk about is the study guides. There are a series of questions at the end of each module that helps the student prepare for the test. They focus on the main parts of the text so that the student can prepare for the exam. The answers to these questions are in the tests and solutions booklet. This is a new thing for my beginning middle schooler, to study for a science test. We haven't had formal tests in science during the elementary years. He is getting used to this part too.

The first 4 modules are focused on getting to know the study of science, inquiry, learning to document experiments, the scientific method, and analysis. It can be a bit daunting for a new or even experienced middle schooler, but Apologia has done a good job in introducing that aspect of science. After the first 4 modules, the student gets into more specific subjects like astronomy, earth science, general chemistry, general physics, life science, general biology, and more. There are a total of 14 modules with each module containing 1-3 experiments and several explorations. The final module has a big experiment with several steps that will be a Rube Goldberg machine chain reaction. My son will love the end!

We will love continuing to work through this course in the next school year, and hopefully, he'll be able to complete the big project by spring.

If you'd like to see what others had to say about this curriculum, you can click on the picture below and see what they had to say!

Crafty Classroom (A REVIEW)

At the beginning of the summer I decided that we'd start a year-long study of the United States, so I was happy to try out for review the  USA Activity Bundle Pack from The Crafty Classroom. So many fun ways to explore the United States with this bundle including state-shaped mazes, state birds, and an activity notebook. All available as a downloadable pdf. Let's take a look at each component of the bundle!

First, we have 50 mazes...

There are 50 state-shaped mazes in this e-book download ready to be printed in any way you wish. They are originally full sheet mazes, but I made them into booklets (one for each boy) with the mazes half-sheet size. This makes them a little smaller, but still very doable. My boys love their booklets.

I made 50 maze booklets for my boys so they could each have their own.

Still a good size for doing the maze!

I told the boys they could go in any order they want, and that they didn't have to follow along with our weekly states. They could also work as fast or as slow as they desire.

Aric decided to start at the very beginning.

 Next, we have the State Birds realistic art cards...

This was probably, by far, my most favorite e-book of the bundle. It inspired a whole bird study, complete with a nature viewing window. Each page included in the state birds pdf file includes a space to write about the birds, a color picture of the bird, a blank bird to be colored in, and all of the states the bird is associated with. I was surprised to find out so many states shared their state bird!

One of the pages from the state bird pack.

One book is suggested by Crafty Classroom for use with this pack, United Tweets of America 50 State Birds by Hudson Talbott. This book is so cool. I checked it out from the library to see if we liked it first, and we loved it. I will probably be purchasing a copy of our own for our year-long study. I do highly recommend this book to go along with this pack as well. It is a good quick reference. We also used several of our own bird reference books as well.

We used the suggested book, United Tweets of America, along with some of our own bird reference books.

We all had fun coloring the bird cards, including Mom. The book was a great reference and even provided some humor. I encouraged anyone who worked on a bird page to write down a few facts about the birds on the lines.

Everyone colored pages, including Mom!

My boys enjoyed reading from the book while coloring their bird pages.

My goal was to get all the birds up in our window so that we could play the matching game, and have a reference. We'll get there eventually! This is how far we have made it so far.

I made a basket so that we can pull out the coloring pages and have the reference books available anytime. This makes my nature study heart so happy! I really like these bird cards.

Last of all, the U.S.A. Activity Notebook...

We have only made it through one state so far (it has been a busy summer!). So, the only page we have completed in the notebook is Connecticut. These pages are so nicely laid out. I love the items included on the pages. There are plenty of things to learn about with each state, and these pages really capture the best of it all.

3rd-grade boy

6th-grade boy

8th-grade boy (who doesn't think he should have to do this)

This USA activity bundle is just awesome. Such a fun resource for helping kids study the United States.

There are some other great resources from The Crafty Classroom that the other review crew members tried out. If you'd like to see what else they offer, click on the picture below!

Simply Music (A REVIEW)

Learning the piano has always been a dream of mine. I did a lot of self-teaching as a child, just playing around mostly, and learning simple songs like mary had a little lamb. The most I've had for lessons are video games, beginner piano books on my own, or music theory classes in college. I am thrilled that we have so many more ways to learn music online and from other great musicians now which is why I was happy to try out the Music & Creativity - Foundation Course from Simply Music. This free online piano course is for kids or adults and has the student playing great music very quickly, like 2-handed songs by lesson 3!

Simply Music Homepage

The flexibility of online learning just can't be beaten for a busy homeschool family. With these online piano lessons the student can log in anywhere there is an internet connection, and work any time of the day. To begin our lessons I simply created a free account did a little looking around, and jumped right in.

Simply Music Lesson page for Foundation Course

Once I logged in I had access to all the Foundation Course lessons (there are 19), and as I completed each lesson I could mark it complete. The lessons are all video-based, meaning he teaches through a series of videos. There are some printables for reference and a book called Music and The Art of Long-term relationships (a PDF file). With the lessons all done through streaming video it means that I had to have something near me to view the lessons while at the piano like a laptop or tablet, or some other device. I just set up the laptop on my piano so I could have it almost in front of me.

How I viewed the lessons as I was at the piano. I've also used the iPad on the music stand for my kids.

As I mentioned earlier, there are some printable things available. I printed up the Foundation reference book which includes notes of things that are taught in the lessons. This is useful for practicing.

Foundation course reference book. I printed this up to use for practicing.

I didn't have any binding on the reference book, but I realized that it worked just fine without the binding as it would sit open nicely on the music stand on the piano.

Since none of my kids were interested in doing piano right now, I decided to use this program for myself. Even as an adult I still want to learn to play, but I'm not really wanting to take formal piano lessons from someone. This is the perfect fit for me as a busy mom. I can do the lessons in the evening, or whenever I can fit it in, and I don't have to leave the house!

I really enjoy learning the piano through Simply Music. The videos are good quality, he speaks clearly, and it doesn't move too fast. I felt accomplished playing a nice song called "Dreams Come True" with two hands after only a few lessons. I like that he explains things thoroughly and really gets to the why and how of getting our brains to think about music so that our fingers can follow.

If you've always wanted to play, give it a try! The Foundation Course is free and worth a try.

Read the crew reviews to see what others had to say: