Play-dough.

We are starting summer, and we've been neglecting to post anything. We have learned things, I promise, we're just so engrossed in doing so that we haven't remembered to record it! I better get better at it, though, since our son will be six soon, meaning that his schooling will be mandatory, and if we move to a state that has less flexible homeschooling laws, I'll need proof that the kids are actually learning something.

Today, we played with play dough. You might think this isn't really a learning activity, but it is. I had the kids shape their names with the dough before being able to do anything else with it. We made a dough with glitter in it, just for fun. Green, for spring. Here are our two favorite play-dough recipes. One is edible, the other is not. I got the edible recipe from my good friend, Nadine, who does some wonderful things with her children, and is a crafty queen in her own right (though she might not admit it).

Cookie Play-dough (the edible one)

The dough turns out the consistency of playdough. There are no eggs, so the dough is edible. The forms hold (if they aren't too tall), and one of the other perks? the color doesn't change when you bake it!

1 cup margarine or butter
½ cup sugar
1 tablespoon mil
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
Food coloring

In a large mixing bowl beat margarine or butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed about 30 seconds or till softened. Add sugar and beat till fluffy. Beat in milk and vanilla. Add flour and beat till well combined.

Separate dough into various containers- stir in food coloring until color is desired. Roll, shape, or mash dough into desired shapes/forms. Bake at 325°F for 12-15 minutes- just until bottom of cookie edge on the cookie sheet is lightly brown (color of dough will not change significantly). Cool on wire rack.

Additional decorating as desired.


Earth Friendly Play Dough

• 1 cup flour (not self-rising)
  
• 1/2 cup salt
  
• 1 cup water
  
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
  
• 1-1/2 teaspoons cream of tartar
  

Mix in saucepan over low heat. (It does not have to heat long.) Dough is ready when it rolls into a ball. Keep dough fresh in an airtight container. If you need to make different colors, add food coloring while mixing over heat.

We have added glitter, or extracts to this one to make it more interesting (some fun combos are mint extract (a TINY bit added to the vegetable oil) and white or blue glitter--for winter "coldness", cinnamon for fall--you get the point).

simple double-digit addition

On Thursday last week, Zachary wanted to know how many years he and I had between us. To motivate him to learn addition, I had him first calculate our combined age by counting my age in cheerios, his age in cheerios, then combining the two sets of cheerios and counting them. That takes a long time. Then I showed him how to do addition with two digits in at least one of the addends. Here is a picture. Also, on Saturday, I introduced both Zachary and Chayce to the positive real integer number line, which they both found quite intuitive to use for single digit addition.

Craftiness and Counting to ONE MILLION!

Yesterday and today consisted of some artsy elements. I posted them on our family blog, as I'm having a hard time deciphering between what is school and what is life when I go to post. Are all activities done with the children school? Or just the math and reading things? Yet, I really could pull math and reading out of any activity. Sigh. Perhaps I should send them to school just for the free time, because they're going to learn a ton while living in our house anyway. Perhaps that is why I never studied as a child...life at my house was study. Hmmm. It's a thought, but for now, we are homeschooling, and so far, so good.
Anyhow, here are the posts about the artsy things done / discovered:
Surrounding Children With Beauty
Step One in Adding Some Beautiful Fun

Then, we read the book Count to a Million by Jerry Pallotta. The kids really enjoyed it.

B is for Boa Constrictor

So, we studied boa constrictors today. Mainly triggered by reading
The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the Wash

Then after reading about how boa constrictors really eat (click on picture of actual boa at top for link), Zac simulated it with a stuffed animal and a slinky. Cool. It was his idea.

Then Payge tried to eat the stuffed animal. She's teething. The other two started to refer to her as "Mommy Constrictor" with the slinky being her offspring, I guess. Hee hee.

We returned to our water color pencils, and made these:
Zach's wiggly snakes.

Chayce's wiggly snakes.

L is for Lizard

I know, we're bouncing around with this one. BUT, it went with the kids' interests, and I find that if I teach them something when they ask for it, they remember it much longer. Here's what we did for Lizard (sorry if you read our other blog, this is a repost):


Home made "fossils" are fun, cheap, and easy.

1. Purchase (at the dollar store) those cheap plastic dinosaurs and lizards.
2. Make up a batch of salt dough.
3. Mix a cup full of dirt (from outside, don't buy dirt.) into the dough.
4. Wrap balls of dough mixture around each lizard/dinosaur.
5. Let dry.
6. Give them to the kids with a dull butter knife and tell them to find the animal inside.
   

Education on the fly

So, it seems that we haven't been doing anything structured lately, but don't let that make you think we haven't learned anything!
This weekend, we went to our library's Science Alive! activity day, and it was a blast! The children handled skulls, owl wings, talons, earthworms, cacao pods / beans, dogs, honey bees, robots, magnets, marbles, etc. There were experiments to participate in, nanoparticle counters to watch, and telescopes to win.

Soon, there will be a wonderful new telescope on the market, named the Galileoscope, which I plan on purchasing. The Michiana Astronomical Society is having a night where you can purchase one for $15, and have an astronomer show you how to use it and what you are seeing. I can't wait!!

That was all on Saturday. Then Sunday was our day of rest, with a little church thrown in (which I do not see as rest with three children, but whatever), and on Monday we ventured out to the HealthWorks Museum to learn more about the human body. I didn't bring my camera, but my friend promised to email me photos she took of Chayce dressed up as a tooth. The museum was doing a "How to Brush Your Teeth" skit, and Chayce volunteered to be in it. She made a cute little molar.

U is for Uakari and Unicorn

A Uakari
The common name is believed to come from the indigenous term for "Dutchmen"; their red faces apparently reminded the locals of sun-burned Europeans^{[citation needed]}. Too funny.

A unicorn.

So, we learned about both animals. The monkey mainly for Zach, and the unicorn for Chayce's sake. I mean, really, we're going over the alphabet for her sake, so I have to cater to her a little.

The Artsy Animals assignment didn't go so well. They wanted ME to do the drawing, and I'm not going to showcase my artwork online. Sorry.

On another note, if you head over to my Regression blog, you'll see that we also had some great hands' on experiences!