Week 30

 Mali: In math this week I have been working on division. I did 2, 5, 10 and learned about remainders. I drew a picture of Moana on the ipad. I also was playing around with the symmetry tool to draw ladybugs. I read more of Ruby the Red Fairy. I am almost done and should finish next week. I did my writing practice. This week's nursery rhyme was It's Raining, It's Pouring. 

Max: I did the temperature lessons in my math program this week. The one on celsius was tricky because we don't really use that so I'm not used to those measurements. I read more of my Space Case book. I also did reading in my reader for language arts. I did some language arts lessons too. I started playing the Globle and WorLdle games this week. You have to guess a country in one and it gives you clues about how close you are. The other just shows the shape of a country and you have to guess it. It also gives you clues to help figure it out. It is fun. Because of our geography lessons, I was able to recognize the shape of Zambia right away. 

Both: In science we did the Hereditary quiz show and we got all the questions right. We learned about 2 trait punnet squares. They have 16 squares to fill out. We made banana chocolate chip cookies for our Mix-It club. We learned about the islands of Central America for geography and about Queen Elizabeth of England for history. The people loved her so much and she was such a good queen they called her Good Queen Bess. She was queen for more than 40 years. 

Max and Phoebe

Mali & Phoebe

Making banana chocolate chip cookies

The finished delicious cookies!

Mali's drawing of Moana

We played a version of dominoes with our OuiSi cards.

You look for connections between the pictures. It was fun. 

We decided to be done when we ran out of table. 

Mali was ready for a change--we cut off a lot of hair!

Week 29

 Mali: I designed and built a house in Minecraft this week. I really like how it turned out. Here are some screenshots of it.  I patterned the little pokey out window after a lot of the houses in our neighborhood that have something like that. 

Max: My grandpa's foot has recovered enough from his surgery so he was able to take us to recycle our cans. We had so many this time. We got a bunch from a neighbor who saves their cans for us as well. We got $43 which is more than we've ever gotten before. It was pretty exciting. Usually we get around $20 or maybe in the $20-30 amount. 

Week 28

 This week we went back to Wildflower Pottery Studio to glaze our pieces. We should be able to pick them up next week. It was fun to do. Some of the glazes look like a totally different color after they are fired so you have to look at the little picture on the label to have a good idea of what the finished piece will look like. For Mix It class we made mini fruit tarts. They turned out really good! In science we learned about the rules of mendelian genetics, which are independent assortment, segregation, and dominance. 

Mali: I started doing lessons on division in math. My writing/spelling assignments were based on "Baa Baa Black Sheep." I did music class and music practice. I read more of Ruby the Red Fairy. I like that book. 

Max: I finished up the Capacity section in math. Now I am doing weight. I learned about kilograms and that they are a little more than 2 pounds. I read more in my Space Case book and did lessons in my language arts program. I went to music class and practiced music. I learned a bit more of my Bad Piggies song. 

Our Darwin Day Donuts! We always get donuts to celebrate Darwin's Birthday on February 12. 

Glazing our bowls at Wildflower Pottery Studio.

Finished up Volume and Capacity

Making mini fruit tarts

Doing some Punnet Squares for science class

Week 27

 Max: This week in Math I finished up Area and started on Volume. I think the cups to pints to gallons is kind of tricky to remember and keep straight, but I understand it pretty well. I did my language arts lessons and we are reading a story called The Chipmunk who went to Church. At music class this week I did really well so I got 5 pennies to put in the candy machine at the end of class. My teacher was really pleased with me. I started working on the Bad Piggies theme song on my own (with mom's help) because I like that song. Is is tricky but I am learning a little bit at a time. 

Mali: I started reading Ruby the Red Fairy with my mom this week. We are taking turns reading paragraphs. It has a lot of challenging words but I am doing ok. The fairies on the covers of the book are cute. I did my writing/spelling lessons as well and finished up the Hey Diddle Diddle lessons. I am still working on multiplication. I am using Times Tales to help me remember some of the tricker math facts. 

M&M: In science we started learning about genetics. We learned about alleles and how there are dominant alleles and recessive alleles. If a dominant allele is present, that trait will show up in the phenotype of the organism. For history we learned about Copernicus and Galileo and how their ideas challenged what people believed at the time. We had a good conversation about how people don't like to have parts of their worldviews challenged and it feels wobbly like a jenga tower. 

Mali made this polymer clay dinosaur holding a banana for her 

brother Leif for his birthday

Doing the mosaic activity with the Art Club

Times Tales

Another Times Tales

Max diagramming a sentence with an article and an adjective

We made chocolate cupcakes from scratch for the Mix It Clube

Mali also made this snail out of polymer clay

 

Week 26

 In music class we are playing a song called Echo Edison. It is a really simple song, but we will be learning to play it in multiple keys. It does have a fun duet part though. Our mom played it with us and we recorded it. This semester's music class focuses on composition, so we will be coming up with our own songs. We also practice our flash cards several times a week to get better at the note names. Another song we are learning is Cockles and Muscles, an Irish folk song.