Ocean Life

I have totally slacked on blogging this week! I am so sorry!!
I have no good excuse. I usually can find SOMETHING to write about!!  :)

Anyway, we are back to science class tomorrow!

We are done with Antarctica and the Arctic Circle and now we are on to ocean life. We just have four more sections in our book on animals and then we are going to start studying the human body for the next 10 weeks!

We are going to learn about the smallest fish in the world.
http://species2011s.wikispaces.com/Dwarf+Pygmy+Goby

And the largest fish in the world- the Whale Shark!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUMUSFLyZpU

We are also going to talk about poisonous animals, like the sea slug.

http://discovercreation.org/kids/seacreatures.htm
I like this article because it does NOT say the sea slug "evolved" or "developed" over time, but said that only God could create an animal like this- we are definitely reading this article tomorrow!! I wish there were many more like them out there!!

We are then going to talk a little bit more about whales and how they feed underwater. To learn more about them, we are going to read out of our Zoobook on Whales.

Our last animal is the sea turtle! I wish we could go to the zoo tomorrow and just talk to the zookeepers at the aquarium! We won't though. :)  We again are going to use our Zoobook on turtles to learn about them. 

As we read about turtles, the Zoobook mentions the largest sea turtle that was ever found was Archelon.  We might read about this turtle if we have time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archelon

Antarctica!!!

We did it! We finally made it to the page that Courtney has been waiting for all year in our science books! Page 100- Antarctica!!!

We are going to do a brief overview of the continent and look at the largest animal that lives there and no, it is not a penguin, those guys live in the water and not actually on the land.  The largest animal is the midge!

http://www.factsmonk.com/facts_about_Antarctica

http://www.marinebio.net/marinescience/04benthon/AAlife.htm

There are seven species of penguins that live in Antarctica!

http://www.coolantarctica.com/Antarctica%20fact%20file/wildlife/antarctic_penguins.htm

Balleen Whales

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_BqC9IIuKU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsfSNN1HRyo

https://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play;_ylt=A2KLqIMBZCZTpAsAdp37w8QF;_ylu=X3oDMTBzcmQxMWhmBHNlYwNzcgRzbGsDdmlkBHZ0aWQDBGdwb3MDMTg-?p=baleen+whales&vid=b0dff4d9306d8cd2c6aecb1f3a49a9f7&l=1%3A45&turl=http%3A%2F%2Fts3.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DVN.607997842540334226%26pid%3D15.1&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fscience.howstuffworks.com%2Fzoology%2F428-corwins-quest-whales-video.htm&tit=Corwin%26%2339%3Bs+Quest%3A+Whales&c=17&sigr=12b610vbq&sigt=10q56bqt8&pstcat=animals&fr=slv1-yie9&tt=b

Lastly, we will look at the variety of seals that live in Antarctica.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140311-paul-nicklen-leopard-seal-photographer-viral/

https://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play;_ylt=A2KLqIJ6aCZTl2YAs2n7w8QF;_ylu=X3oDMTByYXI3cnIwBHNlYwNzcgRzbGsDdmlkBHZ0aWQDBGdwb3MDNA--?p=elephant+seals&vid=2bb3acbc0f6dc605442c299ed293b820&l=1%3A46&turl=http%3A%2F%2Fts3.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DVN.608051765852964270%26pid%3D15.1&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DDU4xW79ASsg&tit=Vicious+Elephant+Seal+battle+on+South+Georgia&c=0&sigr=11ah5bome&sigt=11da4cnrb&pstcat=nature&age=0&&tt=b

List of Antarctica animals that I thought Courtney might like. :)

http://www.coolantarctica.com/Antarctica%20fact%20file/antarctica_animal.htm

New Bicycles!!

Poor Megan, she has been riding a bicycle that has been too small for her for over a year now and Matt and I finally decided that she NEEDED a new one THIS year!!! We had been telling her for quite a while now that we would buy her a new one and today, we finally did!!

We headed out to Wal.Mart this afternoon and found her a new bright purple 26 inch bike! She tried a 24 inch, but with the way she is growing lately, I didn't think it would last her very long, so we went with the bigger one.

We got it home ok and then we decided that it was time to move Courtney up too, except she wasn't too happy about it! We moved the seat down on Megan's old bike and put Courtney on.  It took a little bit, but she soon got the hang of the bigger bike.

Now Christian.  He still has his tricycle, but Matt had mentioned putting the training wheels back on Courtney's old bike and letting him ride that around. Christian was not going for it! I think he didn't like the idea because the bike is purple!!!

Matt, Megan, and Courtney disappeared about twenty minutes ago, I have a feeling they went to the trail to ride their new bikes!!!

"But I like to listen to you, mom!"

It was time for Megan to take a shower tonight, but I was playing piano. Not just kid piano songs, the kids were actually letting me play by myself, so I pulled out some old songs by Beethoven that I played in high school and college. I got out "Moonlight Sonata" and some other ones that I played for scholarship application when I applied to college

I kept reminding Megan that it was time to go take a shower.  Her response, "But mom, I like listening to you play. Can you play some more??"

How can I turn that down?? She can take a shower in the morning. :)

Tundra and Taiga

We're getting closer to the end of our book. We are learning about the tundra and taiga tomorrow.

What is the tiaga?

http://www.blueplanetbiomes.org/taiga.htm

We are going to learn about small rodents that live in the tundra like mice and lemmings. Do you know these little animals don't hibernate but live in the snow year-round??

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemming

The caribou (or otherwise knows as reindeer!)

http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/caribou/

We are going to look at pictures of the stoat and arctic foxes and see how they change their coats to match the seasons.

Courtney also found a book on our bookshelf that is about Eskimos, so if we have time, I may read that to them too.

We learn about Antarctica on Monday- it is the lesson Courtney has been looking forward to all year!!

Quality or Quantity??

I had a discussion today with a fellow homeschooling mom- what is better? Quantity or quality?

Is it better to get through your curriculum just to get it done by the end of the year and not put much time or thought into it? Or is it better to slow down, really learn things, and maybe not get done by the end of the year? Or is there a happy balance between the two??

I am a "slow down and let's really learn things" kind of person.  This is why it takes me all day to get through with school. :)  I don't want to go through material just to have my kids not understand it. If I am going to teach something, I want to make it meaningful and I want them to understand.

For example, if anybody reads my blog, you know that I always do some extra research everyday for science class. Yes, I could just read our two pages in our book and do the three questions and call it good, but honestly, I don't think that is good enough. (It may be for some and that is fine.) But I know my kids are capable of taking things to a deeper level, so I do.  And they seem to remember things a lot better!

 For example, last night "The Amazing Race" contestants were in Malaysia Borneo and I said to the girls, "We studied Borneo! Remember the monkeys with the big noses??" They remembered! Today when we were doing science, I flipped back to the pages on Borneo and saw the other animals we had studied that day.  There was one animal that Courtney still talks about all the time- the mudskipper!

I also take time for Bible class.  Today we started a new unit on the book of Acts and how Jesus gave his disciples (or are they apostles?) the commission to spread the gospel to every corner of the earth.  Because I was unsure of the difference between "disciple" and "apostle", I looked it up and taught it to the girls.  Hopefully they know now! We also were talking about the Sadducees today and how they were part of the Sanhedrin. A couple of weeks ago, we made a chart on the Pharisees, so today, we made a chart about the Sadducees.  We learned the difference of these two groups and the role they played in society during Jesus' time.  We also talked about how these two groups could not get along.  But because I was going over this background information today, we didn't even get to the story! Would it be better to skip all this background information and just read the story? Or is this important??  (Honestly, most of our Bible stories don't need all this background information, so today was an exception!)

I also take time during our Read-Alouds. Yes, I could just read everything straight through and not stop to make sure the kids are comprehending or even listening, but then what happens if you don't understand something on page 14 and by page 20, you are really lost?  I know some education experts say to keep reading no matter what, I don't agree with that statement! I would rather stop every so often and explain words, plot, etc. than have to re-explain 5-10 pages at a time! Yes, this takes longer, but does it help any? I would say so. And yes, there are some books that I can read straight through because I know the kids get it, but others are really "thick" that even I had a hard time understanding the first time I read them!

So because of all the "extra" stuff we learned today, we didn't get to math.  Is that ok or is it detrimental to my kids that we were focusing on Bible and science today and didn't get to math? I think it is just fine.  Yes, we will be doing one more extra math lesson this summer, but we may be able to catch up by doing five math lessons next week.  I would like 4th grade math done before next fall, I think we will be able to get Courtney's 2nd grade math done too.  Can we do school in the summer? Yes. Is it ok not to finish our curriculum by the end of May? Yes. Do I want to rush my kids through without really understanding? No. Would I rather slow down and make sure they understand? Yes! But is there a point when I could slow down too much and not get things done? absolutely! Do I have a goal to get curriculum done? Yes!  Will it all work out in the end? Yes!!

The goal is a happy medium, I want to keep moving forward in our curriculum, but not so fast and no so slow. :)

(Speaking of school, I need to go type out an English test for Megan!)

Family Bike Ride

After spending the weekend in Kansas City, Matt and I both agreed to take Monday off.  I knew I would need a day to get everything put away and laundry done and Matt just wanted a day away from work.

I am glad we came home Sunday because it was beautiful out today!!  We knew we wanted to do something as a family in the afternoon, but couldn't figure out what we wanted to do. The girls really didn't want to go to the zoo, so we agreed to go on a bike ride. Little did we know that we would be gone for 2 1/2 hours and bike about 11 miles!

The girls did great. This was our half way point. McDonalds at 138th and Q!!! We love getting treats from McDonalds, so it was a good goal!  After we were done, the girls wanted to continue down Q Street, but Matt insisted we head back. I am glad we did!

Everybody did great and I love it that it works out so well! I know one thing though, both girls need bigger bikes for this summer!!!