MFW K

Today, I thought I would try to update Khloe's Kindergarden journey. ;) 

We are using a wonderful curriculum called "My Father's World" and are enjoying every moment of it. It has been so much fun that her big sisters have been joining her with a lot of the fun projects. We love the way that it teaches character 

We started with a week of learning about Creation. The girls all made creation books, which was fun. I have pictures of those, but can't seem to locate them. Hopefully, I can do a better job of keeping current with the blog so I won't have to backtrack again. :) Here are the units we have learned about so far and a few of the projects we have done. 

Sun Unit

Memory words: "Jesus is the Light of the World"

Some of the fun things we did: watched a neat movie about the sun, did some fun sun arts and crafts, read some fun books about the sun

Moon Unit

Memory words: "I am the light of the World."

Some of the fun things we did: Learned the phases of the moon and made a chart, made a moon cake, painted moon rocks with fluorescent paints, hid them and had a moon rock hunt, watched another neat informational DVD for kids about the moon, learned how high we would be able to jump on the moon

Leaf Unit

Memory words: "I will live and grow in Jesus."

Some of the fun things we did: It was a little difficult to do a lot in this unit because we started it during the winter and most of the leaves were gone. :(  We did read a lot of books about trees, and learned about different types of trees and how to tell how old they are, etc. We are planning on doing a little more on this unit when we can get a hold of some more leaves. :)

Apple Unit

Memory words: "If I stay in Jesus, I will have much fruit."

Some of the fun things we did: We first attempted to make some apple tarts, which did not turn out very good.....I am very challenged in the kitchen. :(  So, we found an apple cake recipe in Gigi's (My Grandmother's) recipe box. We decided to give that a try and it turned out wonderfully!!! :) We even made it Gluten Free. :) We also read a lot of neat books about Apples and the different types, learned about the fruit of the spirit and wrote each of them on apple cut-outs that are hanging in our dining room to memorize. I know we did some other things, but I can't seem to remember at the moment. 

Nest Unit

Memory words: "Jesus Takes good care of me."

Some of the fun things we did: We read a lot of fun books about nests and different animal homes, we made birds nests for a treat (these were like rice crispy treats, but had some coconut in them and were shaped like little nests), we learned about different types of birds, we also watched a movie about different animal homes. The part the girls enjoyed most was that they got to paint their own birdhouses. That was a fun craft project. :)

Khloe thinks it is really neat when her big sisters join her in Kindergarden. They all love to do Kindergarden because they feel ripped off that they didn't get to do all of these fun activities when they were in Kindergarden. They didn't have this particular curriculum when they were in K. Actually, it did exist for Kyla, but I didn't know about it yet. 

We are currently on the Turtle unit right now and are enjoying that. I will write more about that as soon as we finish, so I can post photos. ;)

Khloe isn't doing the phonics in MFW because she is already reading real well.  We are continuing with Hooked On Phonics, which she LOVES. She is now in Level 4 and is really enjoying reading! :) 

Kaylee's Science Experiments

OK....I am backtracking and had to go through hundreds of photos. :) So, I know I am missing some, but here are some photos of Kaylee's Previous Science experiments from this year in Apologia's General Science. I am hoping to do a good job of keeping up and posting a photo, or two each week so we can keep current. Backtracking is hard work. :) I have given Kaylee an assignment today to write what she remembers about each experiment. So....Here she is:

Experiment #1: This experiment was done to learn about density.

What I did: Taking a tall glass, I Added to it vegetable oil, water, and corn syrup (in that order). Then, To that I added a small rock, a grape, an ice cube, and a piece of cork (also in that order). 

What Happened: The Liquids made layers inside the Glass; the corn syrup sunk to the bottom, the Vegetable floated on top, and the Water in between. By adding the objects, something similar happened: The cork floated on top of the Vegetable oil, the ice cube inside the Vegetable oil, the grape on top of the water layer, and the rock sunk to the bottom of the glass. 

Why it happened: The water, vegetable oil, and syrup are made up of atoms. The atoms in the water are denser (packed closely together) than those of the vegetable oil, making them able to squeeze in-between the atoms of the Vegetable oil, sinking underneath it. The same thing happened with the corn syrup. This also applies to the objects: The atoms in each of the items have different density levels, resulting in making each of the items a different weight and making them sink to various parts of the layers. 

Experiment 1.3: 

What I did: First I put 2 cups of water in a saucepan with a a few red cabbage leaves. I heated the water\cabbage until the water boiled. While I was waiting for the water to boil, I took a balloon and put 2 tablespoons of baking soda in it. Setting the balloon aside, I added 3/4 Cup of Vinegar into a 2-liter bottle. Once the water started to boil, I removed it from the heat, and cooled it. When it cooled, I added 1\2 of a cup of the liquid to the 2-liter bottle, then attached the balloon containing the baking soda to the opening of the bottle. After setting that up, I lifted the balloon and let all of the baking soda fall into the liquid in the bottle, leaving the balloon attached to the opening of the bottle. 

What Happened: When the baking soda hit the liquid in the bottle, it began to fizz, and the balloon started to inflate. There was a change in the liquid's color as well: Changing from a pinkish color to a more blue-ish-looking color. :)

Why it happened: This experiment was caused by a Chemical reaction. There were actually 2 chemical reactions going on in this experiment: The one causing the balloon to inflate, and the one causing the liquid to change colors. The first one occurred when the baking soda was added to the vinegar that was inside the mixture in the bottle. The two substances interacted, forming 2 new substances, water and Carbon-Dioxide. The Carbon-Dioxide bubbled out of the vinegar and went into the balloon, causing it to inflate. The Second reaction occurred when the vinegar was being used up in the first reaction. Something inside of the Red cabbage called "Anthocyanin", interacts with the vinegar, turning it pink. But as the vinegar was being used up in the first reaction, the Anthocyanin had no vinegar to interact with so it turned into a blue color instead. 

Experiment 3.1: 

What I did: Taking a tall glass, I filled it with 1\2 cup of water. I took an egg and dropped it carefully into the water. The egg sinks to the bottom of the glass. I took the egg out, added a teaspoon of salt into the glass, stirred it into the water until it dissolved, and added the egg in again. 

What Happened: After repeating this process about 6 times, The Egg started to float. 

Why it Happened: For the same reason in experiment 1: Saltwater is denser than pure water. By adding so much salt, the water became denser than the egg, resulting the egg to float somewhere in the middle. :)

Experiment 3.2:

What I did: I made 4 little "Boats" by cutting 3x2 inch rectangles out of cardboard. I gave them a triangular point on the top, and cut out a little triangular notch on the bottom of each boat. I then took a wad of chewed gum into one of the notches, a chunk of soap into another notch, a wad of wet tissue into another notch, and left one of the "Boats" without anything in it's notch. I set each of them on the water in the bathtub.

What Happened: All but one "Boat" didn't move. (the one without anything in it's notch was the one that didn't move). There are stray winds in each house and that could have participated in some of the boats' movements, but there was one that moved more than any of them, and that was the one with the soap. 

Why it happened: This experiment was caused by Surface tension. Surface tension exists on the surface of any liquid and could be thought of as a thin film spread across the surface of said liquid. There is something in the soap that weakens the surface tension of the water. So... the soap in the notch of the boat was reducing the surface tension at the point where the soap in the "Boat" was. This caused the "film" on the water to pull back, pulling the "boat" along with it. Thus, the "boat" moved as if the soap was pushing it. 

Whew! I think those are all of the "Fun" experiments I've done so far. :) I hope I've explained all of them well. 

Welcome! :)

We have decided to start a little Blog to document our journey in homeschooling. We are thrilled this year to be using a new curriculum called My Father's World. We are using their Kindergarden curriculum and also a Geography program called Exploring Countries and Cultures. So far, we are loving every moment of it. :) I am going to do some back tracking and post some photos of what we have done so far and then, keep this blog up to date. :)