We're still here! May 25, 2011

We haven’t dropped off the face of the earth, despite my lack of posting. 🙂  The weather is finally getting nicer here, so we’ve been out of the school room and spending our days outside gardening and enjoying nature.  I’ve also been spending this time getting prepared to start homeschooling Jedi in June.  We got our homeschooling approval letter from our county, and Jedi’s officially excused from school after the end of this school year.

So, while I get prepared for that, Monkey and Bug have been spending less time in the school room.  That’s ok though–like I said, it’s been gorgeous out and that’s what they need to be concentrating on right now. 🙂  That, and the school room is under construction again (about a month and a half ago, we had a flood in our house that destroyed part of our first floor and finished basement, and so the insurance company and contractors have it torn apart so it can be fixed again. 🙂 )  So, my regular montessori and homeschooling posts will be back mid June. 🙂

In the meantime…here are some pictures of our outdoor learning…

A gorgeous post-thunderstorm sunset.

We have a guest living in our garden beds! I went out to pick salad greens, and found this killdeer egg.

Day 2...a 2nd egg showed up!

And here's mama bird! She lets me go over to the garden, but if the kids come over, she does some cool theatrics. Killdeer pretend to have a broken wing if something comes too close to the nest. They hope that the predator will follow the easy prey (hurt bird) and leave the nest alone, but then when you come close to the bird, it up and flies away. The broken wing 'dance' is amazing!

More of the wing dance...

More of the wing dance...

More of the wing dance...

Mama bird watching me harvest.

Day 3! A third egg!

Turkey vulture really close to the house.

Frogs in our little pond

Bigger frog in the pond

The garden beds--where the killdeer nest is has the herbs, next to it has the salad greens, spinach, broccoli, and oregano. There is also red potatoes, cilantro, onions, green onions, cantelope, bush beans, and cucumbers.

The first box is strawberries, the second box has green peppers, banana peppers, hot peppers, and lemon basil. The far box has tomatoes and basil.

Science time…learning about Volcanoes May 4, 2011

We are currently learning about volcanoes, and to help Monkey remember the different parts of a volcano, we decided to make a (safely) erupting volcano!

The volcano...we made it out of wire, clay, and acrylic paint.

In a small plastic paint cup, we put a tablespoon of baking soda, a tablespoon of dish soap, 5 drops of red food coloring, and 5 drops of yellow food coloring.

Next, we put the cup in the top of the volcano. Then, we added 2 tablespoons of white vinegar.

The beginning of the eruption....

The kids thought this was delightfully messy and fun!

Late Montessori Monday, combined with Toddler Tuesday

Monkey is 4 years 2 months old.  Bitty Bug is 2 years 3 months old.

I’m a bit late getting yesterday’s post out, and barely made today’s post in time, so here is the combined post. 🙂  I have a science experiment post coming tonight too…

Bug and Monkey making sidewalk chalk drawings on the porch

This week, we continued our unit on Asia, concentrating on Japan and India this week. One of the works I put out was this mini Japanese garden

A tea set where the girls practiced pouring water.

The book basket this week

The book we looked at about Japanese Woodblock Prints

To make our own mock woodblock prints, I carved designs into styrofoam blocks. Then the girls used a paint roller to put black tempura paint on the blocks. Next, they stamped the image onto the paper.

Some of the prints

Monkey pouring water.

The 2nd week is complete with the chick eggs!

Bug pouring water. As you can tell, it was a favorite of both girls.

Monkey working with the woodblock art.