A Home School Day with Just One Child

This year, as I mentioned in my last post, My Ideal Plan for Elementary Home Education, I am only home schooling one child, my nine year old daughter Melody, who is in third grade. While home schooling and juggling my other responsibilities is still quite a challenge, I have to say it is so much less complicated with only one to teach.

We usually start school around 9 AM with math flash cards. I have found this is the ideal way to get her brain turned on for the day. She thinks it's fun, and it is a fairly easy review of what she already knows: addition and subtraction facts up to 20. We each take half of the deck of cards and take turns answering the problems. Then we switch piles. When she gets to the problems in her math workbook, she's got the facts fresh on her mind. If we start in straight with the workbook, she is likely to moan that she can't do it. So the math flash cards are a great way to start the day. 

Unfortunately, I found when I opened my flash card box that our subtraction facts cards only had the easiest facts. So I got out stack of index cards and a marker and completed the set, just like I made the addition set many years ago for a different child.  I keep the sets of math fact cards in a zip lock bag.

She knocked out her math workbook - part of a test and one lesson - pretty quickly. We would normally move right on to Daily Grams, Wordly Wise and other language arts skills after that, but she asked if we could read next. I like to be somewhat flexible with our schedule to keep her interested.

So we gathered up a stack of history and science books from the shelf on her desk, and headed into the living room. We started school a month ago with unit studies on explorers and the oceans (they went together splendidly!), and now we are working on the Early Colonial Era and weather. We have a lot of books on our own shelves, and we find even more at the library. 

We read several books about subjects like Pocahontas, colonial homes, and hurricanes that morning. We usually take turns reading, usually by page. I often remind her to read the words just as they are written, since sometimes she's in a hurry and leaves out or changed them. We don't just read for our unit studies. The hands on activity in our weather unit this day was learning about the water cycle by boiling ice cubes until they turned into water vapor. I also have some colonial and weather activity books that we will be using this week.

I took a few quick breaks to do laundry and other small tasks while she got out her Asus tablet, which was a birthday present from her siblings and me. She has games and educational apps on it, and it's great for all the times we're in the car running errands or picking up the other kids from after school activities.

Lake Lily

Melody asked if we could go somewhere. I've been planning to get a family membership at the Orlando Science Center and went on the web to check that out. I decided to wait on that a bit longer.  She suggested going to Lake Lily, and that sounded good to me since there are not only water birds to feed, but a lovely Victorian era home tour at the Waterhouse Residence Museum. 

Instead of taking a picnic, we decided to eat lunch at home. A day or so before, I had fixed several containers of ready-to-eat salad with chunks of chicken, bacon bits, and hard-boiled egg. That was easy enough to grab.

We also had a few errands to run - the bank, library, Redbox to return a DVD. I like to make the best use of teachable moments, so I asked her what route we should take based on all of our stops. We also talked about why people use the library book drop, how the book drop works (there is a cart inside that they can roll out), why they were building an overpass, what the big crane was doing, and all sorts of other ideas.

We finally arrived at Lake Lily and decided to feed the birds first in case it started raining. The egrets were much more aggressive than the ducks at lunging for the bread bits we brought.

Then we went to the museum and found that the tour started around 1:45. 

We had a wait a little bit on the porch and she took the time to read the informational placard.

I was delighted to see that many of the items in the home were similar to ones we had seen in our colonial homes book. Since both eras were pre-electricity, butter churns and other tools were pretty much the same. She paid attention during the tour and asked a lot of questions, which was fine since there were only two other people. We also went over to the adjacent carpentry shop before we left.

Kitchen with butter churn

Sewing and darning basket

By the time we finished up, I knew we weren't going to get any more school work done at home. I did have her try to recall some of the things she had seen. Maybe we'll write about them this week.

All in all it was a great day of school! I liked the mix of skill drill, seat work, unit study reading, and activity.

You might also like to read: How to Plan a Unit Study

I took a lot more pictures at the museum that you can see here: The Waterhouse Residence Museum at Lake Lily.

In February 2015, I followed up with this post: A Week of Home School Third Grade

Virginia Knowles

www.StartWellHomeSchool.blogspot.com

SeaWorld for the Holidays! (Florida Field Trips #7)

Welcome back to my Florida Field Trips series!

Our family had a marvelous time at SeaWorld Orlando yesterday during their Christmas celebration.  My husband and I took our five younger kids, ages 7-15.

Just one of many photo ops...

The park is decorated for the holidays, and best of all, many of the shows are themed for Christmas.  Live musicians all around the park added to the holiday spirit.  I wasn't having very good luck with my camera yesterday so pardon the lack of good show and night pictures here.

Christmas toy king

Saxophone quartet

In the snow globe

  
Of course, they have all the regular year round attractions as well, like the Shark Experience, the Turtle Trek, and the Blue Horizons dolphin show.  The only attraction that is closed right now is the Penguin Encounter, since they are building a new Antarctica Empire of the Penguins exhibit to open in the spring. 

Exhibits and shows aside, the older kids (of the five we brought) would have been quite content to just ride Manta, Kraken and Journey to Atlantis all day long. 

Kraken roller coaster

Manta picture from summer trip

My youngest daughter loves Shamu's Happy Harbor with all the kiddie rides and splash pad, so we had "Mommy and Me" time yesterday while the others went with Dad.

The Sky Tower is also now included in admission.  The view from 300 foot up as the rotating room ascends is quite something to behold.  



We attended three of the Christmas shows and my husband and I loved them.  (Most of the kids enjoyed them, too, but like I said, they go more for the rides.)  Some of the Christmas shows only run in the evening, you need to get to them 45 minutes ahead of time to get a decent seat, especially on the nights that the park closes at 9 and there are fewer shows.  Other nights, the park closes at 11 and there are more shows, but that may be too late for families with young children.  Check Park Hours and Show Schedules and click on the calendar for the day you wish to attend.  Most of the shows run for about 20-30 minutes.

I was especially touched by the "O Wondrous Night" show, which is a musical living nativity.  The singers are amazing, and though there were plenty of comedic moments, it was very reverently done, incorporating contemporary adaptations and medleys of religious carols.  While we waited for the show to begin, a spirited guitar and fiddle duet entertained us for a Christmas carol sing-along. 

(This picture is from a summer visit.)

The next show we attended was "Shamu Christmas Miracles" in the whale stadium.  I always enjoy seeing the whales (magnificent creatures!) and loved hearing the carols as background music to their performance, but I'd have to say my favorite thing here was the awesome saxophonist who played carols before the show!  


We bustled out of the whale show to make it to the "Winter Wonderland on Ice" skating show in the Bayside Stadium.  We sat up in the balcony, which gave us a great overall view from above, but I found it hard to take decent pictures without a telephoto lens.   

The other drawback of balcony seating during Winter Wonderland is that when the Reflections Fireworks and Fountain Finale fireworks go off at the end of the very last show of the night, you can't see the ones way up high in the sky.  

The 100 Christmas trees in the "Sea of Trees" out in the water also change colors to the music at various times during the day.  The Wild Arctic ride has been transformed into Polar Express Experience for the holidays, but we didn't go to it this time.  The two other Christmas shows are "A Sesame Street Christmas" and "Clyde and Seamore's Countdown to Christmas" (sea lions).  I'm hoping to see them next time we go. We want to tuck in one last trip before our 2012 tickets expire! (My mom bought ours for us this summer and we've certainly gotten our use out of them!)

The cool thing is that if you buy a ticket now, they will give you a Fun Pass good for admission all the way through the end of 2013!   Yep, Florida residents can buy one day and get more than a year of park admission!  Adult Fun Pass tickets are $89 plus tax, and kids are $81 plus tax.   (If you really only want one day, you can pay $10 less per ticket on-line only.)  Or you can purchase an annual pass and get free parking and other perks.  A SeaWorld annual pass is $149, but you can pay extra to extend the admission to the Aquatica water park and Busch Gardens amusement park.  Check for the best ticket options for your family.

A word about food:  SeaWorld has great restaurants, but for a large family on a budget, you can bring your own food and eat in the picnic area just outside the entrance gates.  You can bring snack portions of food into the park, but not big coolers or full lunches.  

Enjoy SeaWorld!

Virginia Knowles
www.StartWellHomeSchool.blogspot.com

Golden Rain Tree with Autumn Seed Pods (Nature Study in the Neighborhood)

If you live in Florida,

you might see these trees a lot in the autumn.

They seem to be everywhere!
That's good, since we don't have too many autumn leaf colors.
This will do, I try to convince myself.

I wondered what they were, so I googled

"trees with red or pink seed pods"

and came up with the golden rain tree.

One golden rain tree in our neighborhood,
with bushes at the base

Pod in the hand, from the stem end

Pod in the hand from the open end

The seeds pods fascinate me,

especially their geometric construction.

I had to pull some apart,

just to satisfy my curiosity.

Two of my kids did, too,

as an impromptu science lesson:

kitchen table botany.

Golden rain tree
pods opened up to reveal seeds inside

You can read more about the golden rain tree.

Look for yellow flowers in the summer!

 God is so creative!

What are you doing for nature study this year?
Leave a comment!

Post will be linked at:

P52 Photo Project 

This week's photo theme: leaves (but my focus is on pods...)

Raising Homemakers 

Whole-Hearted Home

Nature Walks

Dear friends,

This is an excerpt from my book Common Sense Excellence: Faith-Filled Home Education for Preschool to 5th Grade.  I'm really glad my kids are nature lovers!  We're going back to Secret Lake Park today to catch some little fishies, with a real net this time! (See Florida Field Trips #4: Secret Lake Park)  The photos and bird sketch in this post are from my son Micah's blog, http://www.godsanimals.blogspot.com/.  (Note: We're having problems with his blog right now, so as of June 23, you can't access it and the pictures that I linked here from there aren't showing up.  We're trying to get that fixed ASAP!)  

Enjoy!

Nature Walks  

Get outside and see nature!  After all, nature walks are free and easy to do, and observing nature for yourself is one of the best ways to learn about plants and animals.  Children get excited about their "specimens" and the fresh air is good for your health.  Francis Fenelon in his book Education of a Child says,  “A simple walk through the woods or splashing in a stream brings contentment to the soul and appreciation for God’s beauty in a manner that extravagant amusements cannot.”

Here are some ideas for your own nature explorations:

        Start in your own backyard. If you live in an urban or suburban neighborhood, you may not have much “habitat” at first glance.  Still, I’ll bet you could find lots of living things in your own backyard: birds, bugs, flowers, lizards, cats, worms...  To go farther afield, hike at a trail, park, preserve, lake, river, or mountain.

     Keep your eyes and ears open. Learning to pay attention is so important to nature study!  We often hear a red headed woodpecker rat-tat-tatting on our back fence.

 

     Be careful not to upset nature. Please remind your children to refrain from disturbing animal homes.  They don’t always know that they shouldn’t remove an egg from a nest, even if they return it right away.  This upsets the mama, and she may abandon it!  Talk about nature conservation -- how pollution and human expansion affect an ecosystem’s quality of air, water, soil, plants and animal homes.   Read about animals which have become extinct.  You don’t need to be a “tree hugger” to be a prudent environmentalist!  God has called us to stewardship!

    Practice nature safety.  Learn to avoid poisonous snakes, stinging insects, irritating plants, and hazardous bodies of water.  Wear protective clothing, sun screen, and/or insect repellent. 

   Collect and/or identify interesting specimens using a pocket-sized field guide. (Obtain permission from the landowner before you do this!) Look at your “finds” with a magnifying glass or microscope.  Do a scavenger hunt. Each person needs to find listed items like an oak leaf, a brown rock, a nut, etc.   You don’t need to take the items, just check them off on the list.  My friend Michelle suggests buying a plastic divided box in the sports department to store your treasures.

                           Savor the seasons of nature.  Do special activities related to winter (snowmen), spring (flower arranging), summer (beach trip) or autumn (pressing leaves).  My uncle in Pennsylvania hosts home school groups for syrup making when the sap starts running in the maple trees.  What makes each season special? Flowers have their own annual timetables for sprouting and blooming. Northern trees bud in spring, stay green through the summer, turn brilliant colors in autumn, and are bare in the winter (except for evergreens, of course)!

   Take field trips to organized nature study areas.  Go to the zoo, petting farm, botanical garden, nature center, science museum or county fair.   Out of their natural habitats, you can find specimens organized by category.  When you go to the zoo, have your child identify whether an animal is a mammal, bird, insect, amphibian, reptile, etc.  What are the characteristics of each group?  (Before you go, you can learn about this from books.)

       Find an experienced nature mentor.  This human resource can answer your questions and  help guide your explorations.  It could be an adult who works in this field, but don’t overlook home schooled kids as resources.  When we had questions about catching bugs or growing pineapples, we used to call two middle school boys in our support group.

        Keep a nature journal.  Have your children make drawings or rubbings of what they see, and then label them, also telling where they found the specimen.  For language arts, they can also  “paint” a word picture to describe a flower or other nature object.   A nature journal is also handy for recording changes in the seasons or the weather from day to day or week to week.

      




  Take pictures.  Show your child how to take landscape pictures or close-up shots.

    Bring portable field guides: I recommend Peterson’s or Audubon. At the minimum, you should have one each for birds, insects & spiders, and flowers.  Trees, reptiles, rocks & minerals, and other guides will be useful too, if your child is interested. A regional field guide will focus on species which are most commonly seen in your area. 

Florida Field Trips #3: The Orlando Science Center

Dear friend,

This is the third post in my Florida Field Trip series.  You can find the first two here:

#1: Historic St. Augustine

#2: Silver Springs Nature Park

(I thought I had posted #2 back in November, but apparently I never hit the post button!  So, it's actually a new post! Check it out!)

Our family just signed up for an Orlando Science Center annual membership, which is $125 per family.  For a large family like ours, this is quite a deal, especially since it includes parking, which is usually about $5.  Regular daily admission, which includes entry to the giant screen IMAX movies, is $17 for adults, $16 for students with ID, $11 for children ages 3-11 and free for under age 2.  You can calculate how many trips it would take your family to break even on an annual membership.  For us, it is just two, and we've already been twice!

There are four floors of great exhibits.  We haven't had the time to fully explore all of them yet, but the weather and Dino Dig rooms were my favorites on our last visit.  I know we'll be back to spend more time in those.  We have also enjoyed petting the baby alligator and playing in the physics room.

The Kids' Town is a perennial favorite in our family, especially the Orange Grove.

OSC has a very special exhibit, The World of Mechanical Muusic, which is just about to end next Sunday, January 9.  I went this week with my kids and thought it was well worth it.  Here is the blurb from the OSC web site (www.osc.org):  "Do you still think of a music box as a trinket or novelty, something pretty to look at for a while, then placed on a shelf or stored and forgotten? The up-coming exhibit at the Orlando Science Center might just change your thinking! This new exhibit called The World of Mechanical Music; Science, History, Craftsmanship and Art will take place at OSC beginning November 13, 2010 through January 9, 2011.  Mechanical Science, where it all began, will prelude this musical interlude. Visitors will be given hands-on, self paced lessons in the basic physics of sound and instrumentation, as well as the physiology of hearing. They may even learn how to tell the difference between music and noise…. if there IS a difference!  Next, visitors will step back in time to the Victorian era where they will enjoy a glimpse into lifestyles and leisure activities of the day. They will be escorted by docents to hear, see and experience live musical entertainment just as ears heard it over 100 years ago!"

In case you are wondering what kind of instruments they are talking about, there are vintage music boxes, metal disk players, mechanical bands, organ grinders, player pianos, and much more.  The guide will play most of them for you on the tour.

We have seen both of the current IMAX movies, The Forces of Nature (about volcanoes, earthquakes, and tornadoes) and The Ultimate Wave: Tahiti.  Both films interweave scienctific principles, nature, and world culture and were highly educational.  The visual effect of the huge screens is stunning.  Just a heads up, though: the dramatic natural disasters in the first film can be alarming to small children, and the second film shows bikini clad surfers which may offend some people.  I think an IMAX on chimpanzees is coming soon, but I don't know when.  The current films are playing at least through the end of January.  You can see  video trailers for both of them on the web site.

We enjoy the Orlando Science and we're glad we signed up this year.  The kids have been asking me for months to do this.  It's going to be our main source of science field trips in 2011.   We hope to see you there!

Virginia Knowles

http://www.startwellhomeschool.blogspot.com/