Lego Club

I don't know how I stumbled upon this, but sometime last year I signed Lexi up for this Lego Club for Homeschoolers (well, it could be for anyone really, but I think the session times are 10am or 3pm our time), and with our usual efficiency, we finally got round to joining in the February session.

It's a free, online, guided club, each month Roni - the tutor/host/presenter - puts together a theme, a supply list, and a presentation, then at the appointed class time (the sessions repeat several times a month, though you only 'attend' once) everyone 'meets' in a digital space where Roni does a live webcast about the topic.

This month's theme was fairy tales, so there was a short presentation about what a fairy tale is, common motifs, and famous fairy tale authors. Then Roni lead the kids step-by-step through building a little fairy tale cottage - 

 (check out the cute little fireplace & hearth! It does actually open into the wee chimney outside)

We rummaged up some suitable accessories to furnish the cottage too (thank you to Lego Harry Potter, Lego Friends, Lego Pirates arrrh, and our Lego Minifigure Leprechaun for the teeny tiny cauldron!)

Lexi really enjoyed it, and is looking forward to the March instalment, which is making a set of constellation viewers (like binoculars, but with constellation cards to drop in & compare) coinciding nicely with our space theme, mwahahaha...

If you decide to join in, I highly recommend hunting out all the pieces WELL in advance, *not* the night before and then during the class when you realise that you missed one page of the PDF supply list! For those with less time but more money, or just less Lego, you can actually buy each month's pieces in advance via the class, or you can fudge it and make do with whatever you've got. Lego is good like that, and it's encouraged in the class too :)

I really love that this sort of fun opportunity is available to our kids!

August 2013

August was a busy month, with me feeling more organised & capable than I have in a long time. (I find newborns much easier than pregnancy!) The kids have really been getting into the rhythm of regular-ish 'school' days, and are finally beginning to grasp the idea that if they concentrate & co-operate we can get more fun stuff done!

Eli has just started on grade 1 of the Light Blue series of Math Mammoth, and Lexi is whizzing through grade 2 - 

Lexi was reading about how the footprints of dinosaurs & other creatures became like solid rocks as muddy areas dried up, so we recreated it first in playdough -

then in salt dough -

(which after 8 hours in a low-heat oven, and over 2 weeks later is STILL not dry! It's only 5mm thick!)

We've started using some of the Brave Writer materials for our literacy work, here they're illustrating their copywork from 'Hop on Pop' -

Lexi made a playdough ring wraith, complete with black horse, from Lord of the Rings -

Leo's been practising his cuteness and neck control -

Eli had fun doing playdough numbers -

Maia is just sweet -

Lexi is learning to play my 1998 vintage copy of Sim Safari -

(it's actually rather good, apart from not being able to rotate buildings or the map. Fantastic for learning about food webs though!)

And she just received her first four badges from the St John Youth Penguin programme!

Once again courtesy of our friend Mr Spangler, this is what is currently sitting on our kitchen bench....

May - June 2013

I don't know where May went, but this is how nearly all of our photos from June look!

The kids learnt all about having a baby in the house, with new brother Leo!

April 2013

We joined a homeschool co-op in the first term, so Lexi could do sports and Kapa Haka. But in the meantime, I had two little ones to amuse there, since the drive home was too long to make it worth it..

Luckily the adjoining library encourages play -

and we can watch the sports group -

or run around outside.

Eli discovered one evening that a hidden bonus of having a large family is that an 18-pack of toilet paper makes a great construction toy -

And every family needs a Super Hero day once in a while, right?

More baking with Delia Smith -

And Lexi had an end-of-term performance with her Kapa Haka group -

Shake!

At the end of last term we participated in the inaugural New Zealand ShakeOut national earthquake drill!

To start with we watched the Turtle Safe video (available at the bottom of the link), which the kids really enjoyed, they kept singing it for days afterwards -

then it was time to Drop, Cover, Hold!

 (grubby faces are what you get when you have earthquakes right after breakfast!)

Then the kids decided to be turtles, using their rugs -

 someone didn't quite get the concept...

Much to my surprise (though possibly no-one else's, nerd alert) our local library had quite a large selection of quake related books still available, so I chose these ones -

"Quaky Cat" and "The Butterfly and the Earthquake" are both New Zealand books, written about the recent Christchurch earthquakes. I recommend the Max Axiom earthquake book too, it has quite a lot of technical information about plate tectonics and fault lines etc, but presented in dynamic graphic novel format. Oh and a nice 'teachable moment' with two silly adults who stay sitting on their office chairs, panicking, instead of getting under their desks.

I also printed out some colouring pages for the kids -

 on of which has the Turtle Safe song for extra reinforcement -

I think it was a great exercise,  good reminder (for those of us not living in Christchurch or the Bay of Plenty!) to work on these things with our kids, and get them passionate about civil defense and being prepared. My lot have initiated numerous quake drills since, and I took the opportunity to print some planning & inventory paperwork for our whole household too.

2012 Olympics

Here's some of Lexi's work on the 2012 London Olympics, most of the printables are free from Teachers Pay Teachers, which is an awesome site!

I popped a whole heap of pages into a clearfile, and let Lexi choose what she wanted to work on...

First we did a "Thinking Rings" (based on de Bono's six thinking hats, which are conveniently the same colours as the Olympic flag) to find out what Alexis already knew about the Olympics, how she felt about it, and what we wanted to find out about -

This one you get to invent your own event - 

 Lexi's new event is called "Ice Pot". A winter Olympic sport, it is played on an ice rink, with two teams of 19 players. The players pass a diamond shaped pot of ice (ouch!) around the rink to their team mates, intending to keep possession for as long as possible, with one point per minute of continual possession awarded. First team to 20 points wins. Players aren't allowed to tackle opposition players, but the ice pot can be intercepted during passes. Additional rules are no pushing, no talking, no being bad winners. Rule breaking results in being sent off the rink & your team deducted one point.

Spot the theme -

 "What is one interesting fact about that country? Two volcanoes erupted when the olympics where on onese [sic]" Yep, two of our north island volcanoes - Whakaari (White Island) and Tongariro erupted during the two weeks the Olympics were on! And Lexi did our flag from memory too... I think it has blended with the Australian one slightly ;)

Lexi really loved doing this one! She's asked to do it again several times -

I can't remember where I found this - I think it was a lapbooking site - but you have to match the event descriptions to the name & image -

Lexi was dubious about this, but really enjoyed it once she tried it out, it's the classic 'see how many words you can make from these letters' concept, using "gold medal" -

This was Lexi's first ever foray into using wikipedia -

Designing your own medal -

 and symbol/flag -

This is a poem she has been learning -

 umm.. yeah...

and her event pages - 

 You'll see a recurring theme of seating (those square things), and encouragement to try or watch the events, funny girl.

 "all the other horse moves"

there were a few other things that were half done, but I think that ship has sailed ;)

I've put the event pages template (which could be used for anything really), and another, more complex, event description page up for free download on TPT here!