Evaluation of Set Seven

• Bible -- K. has learned concepts and memorized verses. I'm glad it is time for our winter break so we can really work on putting these things into practice. We sang Standing on the Promises in church last Sunday and she was poking me and smiling really big while she sang.
• Writing -- we really had a lot of fun with the games and activities we played during this set. It was a good to do this.
• Spelling -- K. is becoming more aware of spelling correctly when she writes her stories.
• Grammar -- reviewing the parts of speech was fun, and she understands them. Using the workbook for writing the novel was at times frustrating because she just wanted to write a story, but once she understood what we were doing, it became a lot of fun. I'm quite sure we will be doing this every year.
• Reading -- K. is doing very well in reading. She can read anything put before her and sounds out words she doesn't recognize. Using Reading Corner has given us something to do besides read and answer questions.
• Math -- I think K. had made the biggest improvement in math this year and we gave her a certificate and ribbon for her effort. She has made the connection between repeated addition and multiplication and knows her math facts well.
• History -- This has been a fun period of history to study. K. understands why the compass, gunpowder, and the printing press were so important.
• Science -- K. really enjoyed learning about the desert. I'm not sure why it was more interesting to her than some of the other habitats, but it was.
• Fine Arts -- we didn't do anything with composers, but she has learned to play Old MacDonald had a Farm.

First Grade, Bible, Set Seven

• We are continuing to memorize 1 Corinthians 13.
• In 24 Ways we are on #2, Reading the Bible and Praying everyday with an open heart. We have discussed what an "open heart" means, and I am able to pull examples from our memory verses, so that makes it more meaningful.
• We finished reading Genesis.
• We completed the Friendship book and are working on making a board game from what we learned.
• In lesson seven of Life Lessons from P & K,  we were learning about godly wisdom. The book suggested making a paper crown, but K. has so many crowns that I knew it wouldn't be special. I looked online for crown crafts and came up with this one. The beads are supposed to be on safety pins, and then hung from a larger safety pin to make a pin to wear, but I decided to just use things I had on hand, so we came up with this craft.

 

We put the beads on floral wire, and wrapped

the extra wire around a popsicle stick.

I used another piece of wire to make a hanger.

 

I had wooden alphabet letters (just about every letter

except W, so we turned an extra M upside down)

and K. painted them and we glued them on a tongue

depressor, and then glued the stick with

"WISDOM" onto  the popsicle stick.

• We finished reading Joel this week and played some games to review 1 Corinthians 13.

First Grade, Writing, Set Seven

Because we are doing a lot of writing in Grammar during this set, I have planned activities that don't require much writing. All are from Games for Writing.

• How Many Words page 127 -- this continues to be a favorite game for us
• Alphabet Code page 98 -- we played this at the doctor's office
• Words By Design page 101 -- we are using the last part of the Alphabet Book I made for her in set five. I picked the word "Compass" to go along with our history.
• Traveling Words page 102 -- the sentence was "Deserts are dry places that get very little rain". I drew a desert scene with a cactus and a rock for K. to write on.
• Dotted Alphabet page 105 -- we used the word "chuck walla"
• Mixed Up and Missing page 107 -- We did about six sentences, then we took parts from those sentences and made some crazy sentences. I let K. pick one to illustrate.
• Strange Sentences page 113 -- The sentence we ended up with was "My aunt fell in a crack in his cave yesterday." K. illustrated it.
• Race of Words page 44 -- K. won by a landslide!
• Story Map page 17 -- we added a butcher shop and doughnut store to our park story map
• Catch My Silly page 13 -- I took a couple stories and made changes. Then I let K. pick a story and see if I could catch her "sillies".
• Mazes -- I printed mazes from MazestoPrint.com

First Grade, Spelling, Set Seven

• I added the words 'desert' and 'dessert' to the spelling list this week, since we are learning about the desert.
• I decided to add more words that are similar, like 'wonder' and 'wander'.
• 'Hawk' and 'squawk' were a couple words she had trouble spelling.
• We completed the spelling book this week!

First Grade, Grammar, Set Seven

We are using games to review the four Parts of Speech we learned this year. I found these ideas on the internet, and then made changes to fit our situation.

• I made paper bags with labels "Verb", "Noun", "Adjective", and "Preposition". On the back side of each label I wrote the definition and glued them on so they could be lifted and the definitions read, if need be. Then I wrote 88 words on pieces of card stock. We took turns sorting the words into their correct bag.

• The next week we took a word from each bag and used them to make a sentence. We each did five sentences.

During this set we are learning about the Writing Process. Since November is National Novel Writing Month, I downloaded the elementary school workbook (it is FREE to download) from the Young Writer's Program and we are working through it.

• We started by putting her inner editor away
• Deciding on some novels she really likes and why she likes them
• Now we are getting to know the characters in her story
• Next we work on the plot of the story.
• The workbook uses the plot roller coaster. K. seemed a bit lost while we were working on the plot, so I drew the roller coaster on a piece of scrap paper and we used it to write out the plot of a book we had just finished reading. Then she seemed to understand the concept and we were able to finish the plot of her story with much better participation and input from her.
• Then she drew a map of where her story takes place.
• After K. wrote her novel, I typed one chapter each day and then we edited it (there were four chapters).
• She only wanted to draw a picture for the cover. I scanned it in and put it on the cover.
• I saved it as a pdf and printed it in the "booklet" format. We will print enough copies for her to give to her aunts for Christmas presents.

I like this novel workbook so much that I am planning on ending each school year using it. It will be fun to see how K.'s novels change from year to year.

First Grade, Reading, Set Seven

We are finishing off the BJU reading book. Now we are reading Story Train, published by The L.W. Singer Company, Inc. in 1960.

From Reading Corner we are learning about Details:

• We talked about Who, What, Why, When, and How in a variety of stories this week.
• I read K. a story, leaving out details to show that details are important.
• Details are important in recipes, games, etc.
• We each made a lantern, following the instructions given.
• We talked about some details being more important than others.
• If this story took place in the city instead of the forest would it be the same?
• If it was a mouse instead of a beaver would it change the story?
• If the girl had a blue dress instead of a red dress would it matter?
• We wrote a telegram for a story we read. Telegrams must be short, so you have to eliminate everything except the main idea.
• Another day we decided on the main idea and the important details of a story. Then we made a mobile, writing these things on card stock cutouts of the animals in the story.
• I copied a descriptive paragraph; each day we took a few sentences and crossed out everything that was descriptive.
• I read The Peterkins' Thanksgiving and then we wrote the Who, What, Why, When, and How inside large W's and an H.
• We each took a basic sentence and added description to it. The sentence "The boy ran." could turn into "The tall, freckled boy in blue pants and red shirt ran around the block, over the bridge, and under the tree to meet his father." We made it a contest to see who could add the most words. We did this a few days, and on the last day K. beat me.
• Details are important in word problems. I had about six problems. Some had extra information, some didn't have enough information, and some had just what was needed to solve the problem.

From Games for Reading:

• Matches and Opposites, pg 144
• Dictionary Reading, pg 146 -- K. loves to look through our BJU Student Dictionary. It always takes us a while to look up words in the dictionary because K. wants to keep stopping to find out about the things that are pictured.
• See It - Name It, pg 138 -- K. picked the bathroom and we set out goal at fifty words.
• Go-Togethers, pg 140 -- we played this game twice and used "Thanksgiving" and "Winter" for our subjects. It would be a great game for in the car.

First Grade, Math, Set Seven

Games, activities, books, and web sites that enhanced our learning:

• We are continuing to practice the Triangles every day.
• We reviewed the 10 More / 10 Less and 100 More / 100 Less concepts using the spinner we had made before and Uno cards. K. took three Uno cards and made a number (345), then she flicked the spinner and which ever instruction it landed on, I had to write the new number (if it landed on "10 More" I would write 355). Then it was my turn to take three cards, etc. We worked our way through the whole pile of cards.

• I had printed a worksheet of three-digit addition problems. K. worked two problems each day, then on Friday we pulled out the Place Value mat and worked the last four problems using manipulatives before solving them on the paper.
• We took turns handing each other a handful of coins. Then the person wold count them and write the amount.
• We worked on Subtraction: 2 digit, money, missing addend, word problems.
• For missing addend we used these manipulatives. We used pinto beans for the known addend and the sum, then it was easy to figure the missing addend, 'x'.

• I printed some rectangles on a paper, then told a story of why someone need to know how much fence they needed. I drew pictures on the rectangles as I told the story. Then K. used a ruler and measured the rectangle and got the Perimeter.

• I made a fun worksheet for estimating capacity. I used clip art and put pictures of things (large mug) and then put options for her to choose as to the capacity (2 cups or 2 gallons).
• We played Fractions games on Johnny's Math Page.

First Grade, History, Set Seven

Resources we used along with Child's History:

• Life as a Knight by Rachael Hanel -- okay, I found one more really interesting book about knights. This is an interactive history adventure, so you get to make choices which affect what happens to the knight. There are three stories in the book, one about a French knight in 1096, one about an English Knight in 1346, and one about a German knight in 1525. All three stories are based on actual events. We had fun with this book.
• Compass and Gunpowder:
• Fantastic Inventions and Inventors by Zhu Kang -- this book is written in comic book style and we quite interesting.
• Bubonic Plague
• The Black Death by Jim Ollhoff -- the information is presented in a way that children can understand
• Bubonic Plague by Jim Whiting is another book written for children
• Joan of Arc
• Joan of Arc by Shana Corey -- I picked up about four books about Joan of Arc that were written for children. They all had good points, but I liked this one best. It is a Step into Reading step 4 book. It has the pronunciations of the French words, which is very helpful.
• Johann Gutenberg -- these three books have a lot of the same information, but they also have different information, so I decided to read all three.
• Gutenberg by Leonard Everett Fisher
• Johann Gutenberg and the Amazing Printing Press by Bruce Koscielniak
• Breaking into Print by Stephen Krensky
• Constantinople
• Istanbul, Once Constantinople by Sue Donovan -- we read pages 7 through 19. It had nice illustrations and easy-to-understand text.

First Grade, Science, Set Seven

Here are the resources I recommend for learning about Deserts:

• Deserts by Darlene R. Stille -- this book is written for young children, with lots of photos and easy-to-understand text
• Deserts by Norman S. Barrett --  so far we have only used this book for the illustrations on pages 8 and 9. It has a nice map showing the deserts of the world, a diagram explaining what causes an oasis, what a rain shadow is, and the difference between a plateau, mesa, and butte.
• A Walk in the Desert by Rebecca L. Johnson -- this book only deals with the deserts of North America, but in small chunks it is enjoyable for young children.
• Discover Deserts by Jennifer Vogelgesang -- there is large print to skim over the subject, and small print for more detail
• America's Deserts: Guide to Plants and Animals by Marianne D. Wallace -- we used this book to find our ten plants and, since I didn't have a book on food chains, we used it for that. Making up a possible food chain from each page.

About Specific Animals:

• Amazing Snakes! by Sarah L. Thomson -- this is An I Can Read Book level 2
• Armadillo Trail by Stephen R. Swinburne -- a picture book that teaches, too
• Desert Birds by Alice Flanagan -- there is not a lot of specific information about birds, just a lot of general information, but you can find some that interest you and look them up on-line.
• Meet the Meerkat by Darrin Lunde -- another picture book that teaches
• Ostrich by Wallace Litwin -- the pictures are black and white, but it is written for children and teaches about the ostrich without getting bogged down in details
• Desert Mammals by Elaine Landau -- tells about camels, kangaroo rats, pallid bats, antelope jack rabbits, and addaxes

Literature or Picture Books:

• Deserts by Cathryn Sill -- illustrations of deserts from around the world. One or two lines of text accompany each illustration.
• This is the Oasis by Miriam Moss -- good illustrations with about one sentence per page
• Desert Voices by Byrd Baylor -- a book of poems about desert animals
• Hassan: Boy of the Desert by Dominique Darbois -- tells about a family's stop at an oasis
• Desert Trip by Barbara Steiner -- story of a mom and child hiking in the desert

First Grade, Fine Arts, Set Seven

Well, when I said we were going to work through the piano books at our own pace, I wasn't kidding! We have gotten to page 16 in the first book, but K. is leaning the concepts, and enjoying the time on the piano.

Evaluation of Set Six

• Bible -- we are enjoying reading Joel. I really think K. is learning to be a better friend. I can observe that she is putting the lessons into practice watching and listening to her conversations with playmates during park days. She still asks when she can see her kiss.
• Writing -- we did get the "Laura Ingalls Board Game" finished and we have played it once. It was fun. K. enjoys writing stories, so a few times during this set of weeks my plans were preempted because she wanted to continue writing a story. I don't think that is a bad thing.
• Spelling -- K. is doing really well with her spelling, dictionary skills, etc. I need to do better with keeping track of miscellaneous words that K. misspells in her writing so I can add them to her regular spelling words.
• Grammar -- capital letters are frustrating me. K. knows the rules, but doesn't practice them. She will write a whole story without any capitals, or she'll put them in the middle of words, or random words will be capitalized. I am quite sure this is happening because she is concentrating more on what she is writing than "the rules" because if I ask her to "check your capitals" she will go back and make the corrections. So right now, I'm trying not to make a huge issue of capital letters because I'd rather her enjoy writing and make mistakes than do everything correct and hate writing.
• Reading -- K. has learned the concept of "main idea" well. We were talking about something the other day and she said, "Oh, like the main idea." Yes, it is.
• Math -- K. is doing so much better with "the triangles" (fact families). Reducing the number to 11 a day, and having the timer set for 2 minutes, with the reward of a sticker did the trick. Now she is trying to get through each day's triangles before the timer changes from "2" to "1".
• History -- this set of weeks went well because I planned out which pages to cover each day in the books I wanted to read to her. I need that level of accountability. Some days we read more because it was interesting.
• Science -- I planned which pages of what books to read each day, so that went really well. K. enjoys doing food chains.

First Grade, Bible, Set Six

• We have started memorizing 1 Corinthians 13 (which is different from my original plan, but I think a better choice). We will memorize verses 1 - 8a, and 13.
• We have memorized quite a few verses and passages of scripture and I like for K. and myself to review them regularly, but with the volume, it is becoming burdensome. I am trying to figure out a way to review, but have fun too.
• We made a holder that has two pockets -- two envelopes glued back to back. We each decorated one side. Then we wrote the references on pieces of pretty paper and stuck them in side one. Each time we get in the car we will pick a paper and recite that passage of scripture. Then we put the reference in side two of the packet. That should have us reviewing three or four passages a week.

• Our hymn this set is What a Friend we Have in Jesus. It is calmer than the other hymns we have sung and I was wondering if K. would like it. The accompaniment is beautiful and she really likes it.
• We started reading Joel: A Boy of Galilee this week. It is very interesting and a couple times I've read past "Bible Time" and into "Math Time".
• Now that we have been using the above method to review our Bible verses for a few weeks, I can tell you that it is working very well. In fact, K. will remind me when we get in the car that she is supposed to pick a paper for our review.

First Grade, Writing, Set Six

We've set aside Draw Write Now for this set of weeks.

• Comic Book (Games for Writing pg 182) -- we didn't make a whole book, as this style of literature did not interest K. very much, but we did get one page done. She said what the narration should be. I wrote it and then she drew the pictures, wrote the dialogue, and colored the page.
• Family Journal (Games for Writing pg 180) -- even with each of us writing about each day, they turned out differently because we have different perspectives.
• Board Game (Games for Writing pg 174) -- I gave K. a choice of using a "Laura Ingalls" theme or a "Mary Poppins" theme. She chose Laura. Our game board has 17 spaces. We chose events from all the books we have listened to. So one square might say "The grasshoppers ate your wheat. Lose $50." And the next one, "Mr. Edwards brings Christmas gifts from Independence. Win $30."
• Three Sentence Challenge (Games for Writing pg 146) -- we had as much fun with this activity as we did the first time we played it. Be sure to make your lists ahead of time.
• Rhyme Time (Games for Writing pg 64) -- this time our poem was rather nonsensical, and the rhyming pattern turned out to be: AA BB AA CC AA DD
• Acrostic Poem (Games for Writing pg 69) -- I wrote the word "AUTUMN" down the side of two 9 x 12 sheet of white construction paper. After we each wrote our "poem" we cut pictures out of old magazines. K. glued hers on the paper, while I glued mine around the edge, making a frame.
• Story Invention Game -- we used this form to decide on the characters, problem, and solution of the story. Then K. wrote the story, keeping the main idea in focus and adding details along the way. You can get this form from balloonstoryteller.com.

First Grade, Spelling, Set Six

• Did you realize that in the words grow, snow, and throw the 'w' is a vowel? When w occurs at the end of a word, it is considered a vowel letter. (It is silent and makes the o say its name.)
• Some times when "life happens" and we are short on time, I skip the final test if K. has shown through the week that she knows how to spell the words.

First Grade, Grammar, Set Six

We are starting with The Child's Own English Book "The Adjective". Here are the games we played:

• I'm Thinking of Something -- describe an object in the room and see if the other person can guess what it is
• My Grandmother's Cat -- use the sentence "My grandmother's cat is a/an (insert adjective) cat." Go through the alphabet with each player inserting an adjective that starts with the letter A. Then B, C, etc.
• Similar and Opposite -- find adjectives with meanings similar or opposite to a list given.
• Blank Spaces -- The story of Cinderella was in the book with blanks in place of the adjectives. We read the story inserting adjectives.

This week we were learning about maps, concentrating on color coding. I found a worksheet I liked at Super Teacher Worksheets. It was a map of a campground, which gave me the idea of going to the KOA website and printing out a couple maps of different campgrounds -- I found a couple that had good color coding. We finished up the week with making a color coded map of our bedrooms.

 

Now we are learning about diagrams.

• I found one of a piano and one of a shoe on-line and printed them out. The first day we talked about them.
• The next day I gave K. a drawing of an elephant and a list of body parts. She numbered the body parts, and then numbered the parts on the elephant.
• We also made a craft of a flower, and labeled the parts. I saw this one on a teacher's blog.
• We learned about Venn diagrams, and practiced with a selection of her blocks. (Red/Round; Blue/Rectangle; Yellow/Arch) You can use string to make circles on the floor.
• We also played a game on-line to practice Venn diagrams.

We review the rules we have learned this year about using Capitals and Punctuation. Then we spent the rest of the week writing a story, making sure we capitalized and used punctuation correctly. We used the game That's Good / That's Bad from Games for Writing.

This week we practiced using street maps. I pulled out our Thomas Guide and we found where we live. On other days we found where friends or family live, where our favorite park is, etc. Then we would figure out different ways of getting from our house to that location.

First Grade, Reading, Set Six

We started On Yonder Mountain by Millie Howard. The chapters are divided in half, and so she reads half a chapter each day (about 5 pages) and then we talk about it. We have been able to add new words to our "vocabulary letter" almost every day. For the last three chapters of the book, K. read the first half of the chapter and I read the last half so we could finish the book in this set of weeks.

I picked up the book The Reading Corner: Ideas, Games, and Activities for Individualizing Reading by Harry W. Forgan from a "free table" at a support group meeting. It has some really neat ideas and so I am using the activities it has for teaching Comprehension Skills.

• The first thing is learning to pick out the Main Idea.
• Find the M.I. -- take index cards and write four or five sentences. One of them is the main idea and the others are supporting details (put them in random order). Read the sentences together and have your child pick out the main idea. Here is an example:
• Ann puts on boots.
• Ann is ready to go out in the rain. (main idea)
• She puts on a raincoat.
• She puts on a hat.
• Category Tic Tac Toe -- play as regular tic-tac-toe, however you must prepare the game board ahead of time. In each section write three things that go together (dress, pants, blouse) and leave space for a fourth item. Before a player puts their X or O in a space, they must tell the category (clothing) of the items and add a fourth item (skirt).

 

• Main Idea and Details Hand -- I traced my hand on a sheet of paper. We read a paragraph in the reading book -- I had picked the paragraph out ahead of time. We discussed the main idea of the paragraph and wrote in on the palm of the hand. Then I had K. tell me the details in the paragraph and write them on the fingers. The main idea was that the children formed teams and built snow forts. Some details were that Sarah was on Jonathan's team, they made snowballs, they wore mittens, etc.
• Give Me a Name -- I found nine pictures in old magazines and cut them out. Then I wrote a main idea for each picture on an index card. I laid the pictures and cards out and had K. match them up.
• This week I had two pictures and had K. come up the the title for each.

First Grade, Math, Set Six

Games, activities, books, and web sites that enhanced our learning:

• I divided our Triangles into five sets of about 11 cards. Each day we review one set. If K. can get through the set before the timer goes off (2 minutes) then she gets to put a sticker on the calendar. The sticker seems to be enough incentive to get her to try; each set of cards seems to be small enough that she doesn't get an "this is going on forever" attitude; the 2 minutes seems to be short enough to challenge her, but long enough to make it possible.
• Reviewing Place Value:
• We played Three Pots (Games for Math pg 152)
• Using UNO cards, we each took three cards and made them into the largest number possible. I had put a marshmallow in a small bowl. The person with the larger number got to take the bowl. The person with the bowl on the last turn (when we ran out of cards) got to eat the marshmallow. This also reviews Greater Than and  Less Than. Another day we played, but made the smallest number possible.
• 10 More/Less and 100 More/Less:
• I wrote a 3 digit number on a piece of paper. Then I flicked the spinner. K. had to write the number it told her to write (either 10 more or less or 100 more or less). Then it was her turn to write any 3 digit number and spin. Then I wrote the new number. I discovered I needed to pull out the manipulatives as she didn't remember how to figure out the new number.

• Reviewing First/Next/Last and Before/After:
• Find a Penny (Games for Math pg 52) review "before" and "after"
• I took some pictures I had glued on circles and spread them out. I picked one (picture of dog getting a bath). I said, "First, Bowser went outside. Next, he played in the mud. Last, Susie gave him a bath." Then it was K.'s turn to choose a picture and tell a little story using the words "first, next, last". Listen for errors. For instance, once K. said, "First, Sally and her mom went to the hot dog stand. Next, they got some raisins." That sounded a bit weird to me, so I asked where they got the raisins. She told be they got them at home. She revised her story.
• Addition
• If You Were a Plus Sign by Trisha Speed Shaskan -- a fun book that talks about different kinds of addition problems
• Animal Word Problems Starring Addition and Subtraction by Rebecca Wingard-Nelson -- right now all we did was read some of the word problems and solve them, but the book goes into the different methods of solving word problems. This will be a book to use more thoroughly another year.
• Addition Made Easy by Rebecca Wingard-Nelson -- this is a really good book, and I'm thinking about buying a used one. It explains the different properties of addition, explains regrouping and carrying, it goes into rounding, money, time, and word problems. This book is in a series called Making Math Easy.
• Here are links to a couple fun addition games
• Addition Invasion -- this one is a "see how fast you can do it"
• Pizza Pizzazz -- I really like that you set the problems you want to practice
• We worked on renaming in addition problems all week (week 4). We started out using the mat and working each problem with manipulatives, and by the end of the week she did need (or want) to use them. We just did about six problems each day.
• Adding and Subtracting Book 2 by Ann Montague-Smith -- This is a really good book. It is colorful and fun. Each page has an activity or game to increase your child's understanding of addition or subtraction. We did the activity on one page of this book each day this week. I wanted to renew it and use it during our break next week, but there was a hold on it -- so I've requested it again.

First Grade, History, Set Six

Resources we used:

• Look Around a Medieval Castle by Clare Hibbert -- this book takes you on a tour through the Krak des Chevaliers. The Krak is in the present-day country of Syria. It was originally an Arab fortress, the Krak became the headquarters of a holy order of knights called the Knights Hospitalers. I hadn't planned to read any more books about castles, but this one was so well done, with interesting photos, drawings, and descriptions that I decided we need to read one more!
• Crusaders by Joanne Jessop -- this book has great illustrations, easy-to-understand information, and covers crusades from 1095 to 1291
• Ghana, Mali, Songhay by David Armentrout -- we looked at this book a little in the last set of weeks, but this time we are reading the whole thing.
• Ancient West African Kingdoms by Jane Shuter -- After reading the page about the silent trade system between the Berbers and the Wangara (which is all we used this book for) we decided to play it. Now it is a game K. wants to play again and again.
• A Medieval Cathedral by Fiona Macdonald -- tells about how cathedrals were built. It has large and colorful illustrations.
• Early Discoveries by Gerry Bailey -- we used this book to find out more about stained glass windows and we did the craft on page 43 (actually we are still working on them because we are letting the glue dry between adding each color).
• Magna Carta by C. Walter Hodges -- this book isn't really for young children, but it has a lot of drawings and explains the why and how of the Magna Carta simply enough that I could re-word and simplify the concepts so that K. could understand them.
• China by David Armentrout -- this book gives a simple overview of the history of China.
• The Mongols by Robert Nicholson -- this book is more illustration than text, so it is great for young children. It covers from where they live to their homes to their clothes and food and more. In fact, a couple times this week we've read about or someone has mentioned the Gobi Desert and K. lights up right away because she knows where it is.
• The Adventures of Marco Polo by Roger Smalley -- this is a graphic novel and I don't generally like comic style books, but this covered the travels of Marco Polo quite well and kept K.'s attention.

First Grade, Science, Set Six

Here are the resources I recommend using for learning about the Grasslands:

• A Walk in the Prairie by Rebecca L. Johnson -- this book has great photographs and drawings and is written for younger children. It takes you through the seasons on the prairie, introducing you to a variety of animals and plants that live there. The prairie is located in the United States, from the Rockies to Illinois and Southern Canada to Texas. The book is part of a series called Biomes of North America.
• The Wide Open Grasslands: A Web of Life by Philip Johansson -- this book talks about grasslands all over the world. It has a good map on pages 10 and 11.
• Hiding in Grasslands by Deborah Underwood -- a book about camouflage
• Grasslands by Cathryn Sill -- this book has great illustrations and very little text, making it ideal for young children
• Grassland Mammals by Elaine Landau -- a good book for young children, it tells about grasslands and then about African elephants, prairie dogs, giraffes, aardvarks, and kangaroos
• What are Earth's Biomes? by Bobbie Kalman -- I wish I had found this book back at the beginning of the year. It talks about the differences between biomes, habitats, and ecosystems, and then has a few pages about each biome: forests, grasslands, deserts, tundra, marine, and freshwater.
• Prairie Food Chain by Kelley MacAulay -- we were able to use this book to figure out some food chains

For learning about specific animals, we made a list of animals K. was interested in from the two books listed above. Then we went to the library and checked out books about each animal. We found it much easier to get the information we want this way. Most of the books are okay, but here are some that I would recommend:

• Zebras by Melissa Stewart
• Coyotes by Julia Vogel -- this one as "Fun Facts" on almost every page
• Fox by Jinny Johnson
• The Friendly Prairie Dog by Denise Casey
• Prairie Dogs: Animal Prey by Sandra Markle
• A Rhinoceros Grows Up by Anastasia Suen
• My Life in the Wild: Cheetah by Meredith Castain
• Sandhill Cranes by Lynn M. Stone
• Elephants by Martin Schwabacher

Literature or Picture Books:

• Prairie Friends by Nancy Smiler Levinson -- this is "An I Can Read Book" about a girl who lives in Nebraska wanting another girl to play with. It takes place back in homesteading days.
• Saving Samantha by Robbyn Smith van Frankenhuyzen -- this is a true story about a farming family that finds a fox pup with a broken leg. They raise it and then return it to the wild.
• Buffalo Thunder by Patricia Wittmann -- story of a family traveling west in a covered wagon. The boy wants to see buffalo and one day there is a buffalo stampede.
• Phantom of the Prairie by Jonathan London -- about a black-footed ferret

First Grade, Fine Arts, Set Six

• George Fredrick Handel
• George Handel by Mike Venezia -- this is a biography written to keep the interest of young children
• Hallelujah Handel by Douglas Cowling -- this is a fiction book about Handel's concern for the orphans of London. He was involved in raising money for the first orphanage in London.

Evaluation of Set Five

• Bible -- we completed learning Luke 2:1-20 and Kimmi earned her $2 for saying it perfectly, without any helps. We went ahead and finished Little Pilgrim's Progress and will start another book with Set 6.
• Writing -- K. seems tired of the books we were using and so I'm changing things up a bit so we are again working together.
• Spelling -- K. is doing well with her spelling words.
• Grammar -- we had fun learning the parts of a book and playing games to review nouns.
• Reading -- K. enjoyed reading The History of Flight. Next year I think we will read more of this type of book.
• Math -- we got away from playing games and math became a bit boring, so we will be getting playing more games in this next set of weeks.
• History -- we really enjoyed reading Ivanhoe and Robin Hood.
• Science -- we were able to use some of the information we learned about rivers and lakes when during our vacation.
• Fine Arts -- K. is enjoying listening to the music cd's

First Grade, Bible, Set Five

• We started the second part of Little Pilgrim's Progress this week.
• The two "Ways" from 24 Ways for this set, about being content and generous, are really making for good discussions.
• K. brought me a book this week and said, "We should read this book for Bible. It is about being content." The book is The Runaway Flying Horse by Bonzon. She showed me on the last page that is says that the horse was content. We did read it for Bible one day and when we were through she said, "It is about learning to be content with where you live because God put you there."
• We read Genesis 29 - 35. I truly believe that God can close children's ears because K. did not ask questions about anything she isn't ready to hear about (and I'm not ready to explain).
• Chapter 6 in the Friendship book was really good on being content with what we have (including our talents) and not envying our friends because everything we have, and everything our friends have is a gift from God.

First Grade, Writing, Set Five

In addition to Draw Write Now,

• Alphabet Book (Games for Writing pg 166) -- K. didn't want to use any describing words for her alphabet, but she is using the front and back of each page, so we will go back later and use the last half of the book for describing words.
• Read for the Fun of It by Bauer has a section titled Picture Books as Story Starters. It features a five page list of books to share with your child, with suggestions for something to write or tell. For instance, we read Nature Walk by Florian. This book is about some children see as they take a walk through the woods. The suggestion is "A City Walk". After reading the book we took a walk around our block, noticing lots of things. When we got home, K. wrote down what she could remember.
• Egg Carton Tales (Games for Writing pg 134) -- I took the time during the planning week to change some of the "problems" and "settings" so the game would be fresh.
• Writing to Form (Games for Writing pg 139) -- I took the story from an old text book, re-typed it, substituting blanks for some of the words.
• Alphabet Code (Games for Writing pg 98) -- this time we just wrote the letters of the words on paper. It is a little harder this way than using letter cards, but makes a great game for a waiting room. I kept the words for K. to four letters, but her words for me went to five and six letters.

First Grade, Spelling, Set Five

• The magnetic letters are great!

First Grade, Grammar, Set Five

• In order to make learning about the parts of a book fun, I decided to make a lapbook. This was my first attempt, and it was a learning attempt, but I think the end result met my goal.
• Karl and Carolina Uncover the Parts of a Book by Donovan -- this is a story book about two children learning about dinosaurs. Carolina shows Karl how to use the parts of a book to help them choose a book at the library.

I made a book character to walk us through the learning. When I was finished I noticed I didn't give her a mouth!

Here is how the first page looked when K. opened it.

We talked about the Cover, Spine, Title Page, and Table of Contents. I showed her one of each in different books, then let her find her own. We scanned them into the computer and printed them out the right size to fit on each pocket, then glued them in place.

The next day we went to the next page.

Here we learned about the Appendix, Glossary, Index, and Bibliography. We did the same process, letting K. choose the ones to scan, print, and glue in the book.

After reviewing the first pages, we went on to the last.

I had labels of all the parts, and had K. put them in alphabetical order (by first letter only). Then we glued them on. Next she matched them to their definition (on the left) and their location in a book (on the right).

• I downloaded and printed The Child's Own English Book by Ball (copyright 1920) through Homeschooling Freebie Of The Day. We started part 1 "The Noun" this week. There were a few pages about what a noun is. It discussed how a baby learns to talk and all the words they start with (Daddy, cup, dog, etc.) are objects and a noun is the name of an object. Then it has five games and two written exercises to reinforce the concept of nouns.
• One game has us see who could name the most objects in the room you are in, or outside in the garden (or any location).
• Another game has us write all the names of people we could think of.
• Another had us list cities, streets, oceans, rivers, countries, etc.
• Friday we played My Ship Has Come In. The first player says, "My ship has come in and it is loaded with apricots" (any noun that starts with an A). The second player says "My ship has come in and it is loaded with apricots and beads" (any noun that starts with a B). We did change the game a bit from the book to suit two players, but it was fun. Our ship had a pretty interesting load as we added canaries, doughnuts, elephants, fans, grapes, hatboxes, ice cream, jaguars, etc.
• We thought of pairs of words that mean the same (or close to the same) thing; example: woods/forest, blossom/flower, brook/stream, etc.
• The book had some sentences where we underlined the nouns. We took turns. K. found the first and I found the second, and so on.
• This week we have been reading books (very simple ones) and finding the nouns in them. One book was about God making the world and another was about animal's homes.

First Grade, Reading, Set Five

We are deviating from our original schedule to read the book The Story of Flight by Mary Lee Settle. This is a Step-Up Book, copyright in 1967. K. is interested in flight since learning about the Wright Brothers for her Science Fair project. Most of the chapters are just a few pages, but the longer ones I have divided.

• Poster Words (Games for Reading pg 6) -- K. has been having a difficulty remembering how to spell her middle name, so we made a poster of it. I cut out or collected her name in different fonts and mediums. Then she glued or stuck them on and added some decorations to make a very pretty poster.

• Jigsaw Sentences (Games for Reading pg 67) -- we did four sentences, then mixed them up and made new sentences.
• Finish a Fairy Tale (Games for Reading pg 152) -- I wanted to use fairy tales K. had not heard before, so I picked up The Tasha Tudor Book of Fairy Tales from the library. I marked the places I wanted to ask "what do you think happened?" in The Flying Trunk ahead of time.
• Taking Turns (Games for Reading pg 148) -- we played this with sentences for reading, but later in the day (when K. was bored and I was feeding my mom) we used it to tell a story.

First Grade, Math, Set Five

Games, activities, books, and web sites that enhanced our learning:

• Reviewing Odd/Even Numbers
• I found the idea for making a maze and having your child follow either the odd or even numbers to find the path through the maze. This took a bit of time, but it was worth the effort. It provided great review and practice reading numbers aloud.
• I also found some on-line games for practice. One is at Crickweb and the other at Teachrkids.

• Reviewing Greater/Less Than
• We played the game with the Uno cards again
• Here are some games on-line that I liked. Here is one at Kinderwebgames and one at Abcya.
• How Full is Full?: Comparing Bodies of Water by Parker -- this book starts with a glass of water and ends with an ocean. There is an activity at the end, putting 1 cup of water in different size and shape containers. The question is: does it look like each container has the same amount of water?

• I introduced the concept of perimeter. We used her measuring tape we made in Set Four and measured each side of a book. I had her use a calculator to add it up. Then she used the measuring tape and wrapped it all the way around the book and got the same measurement. We measured a total of 5 things.
• We did a lot of games on the computer this week:
• Spatial Relationships: Johnny's Math Page
• Sorting Shapes: Jayzeebear, Coppschool, Sheppard Software, Mathematics (K. didn't want to play this one ), NLVM
• Pattern Games: ABCya, Kaboose, Primary Games
• To introduce the concept of the "decimal point", we counted money and then wrote the amount. I have a bag of coins I keep just for school. I dumped them on the table and then slid a "handful" over to K. She counted them and I showed her how (and why) to write the amount. Then she slid a bunch over to me and I counted and wrote the amount. We each had three turns.
• We have been practicing the Subtraction Facts. To liven it up:
• I added a hippo shaped water squirter. One day I squirted K. every time she gave me the correct answer.
• Another day, I counted out fifteen fact family triangles and set the timer for three minutes. If she got through all fifteen cards before the timer buzzed, she got to squirt me until the timer went off. It took four or five sets to get through all the cards. When we were finished, I got to squirt her until the hippo was empty.
• Another day, I took a small bag of M&M's and divided each color into a different bowl. Then I divided the triangles into 4 stacks (there are about 14 in each stack). If K. could get through a stack before the timer went off (3 minutes), she earned a bowl of M&M's.
• Another day, I told her that if she got through a stack before the timer went off, we would stop and play a game.
• We played Star Count (Games for Math pg 113) on her chalk board.

First Grade, History, Set Five

Along with Child's History of the World (chapters 53 - 55), we read:

• Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe adapted by Marianna Mayer -- this is a quick read and is meant to introduce young children to Ivanhoe, not as a substitute for the novel. It adheres closely to the original plot, not changing any key details, but certain scenes, subplots, and characters are omitted.
• Robin Hood retold from the Howard Pyle original by John Burrows.
• Castle Diary: the Journal of Tobias Burgess, Page by Richard Platt -- I wasn't sure if K. would be interested in this story, but the first day I read it, she didn't want me to stop.
• Crusaders by Joanne Jessop -- this is a "Beginning History" book
• Ghana, Mali, Songhay by David Armentrout -- this is another book written for younger children, but don't try to cover too much in one day
• Ancient West African Kingdoms by Jane Shuter -- these two books (above) cover the same material, but I felt that the one by Armentrout was easier to understand, but this one has illustrations that explain things better.

First Grade, Science, Set Five

Since our map already has the main rivers and lakes of the world marked on it, we are labeling them as we read about them in these books.

Here are the resources I recommend for learning about Rivers and Lakes and their Animals:

• Rivers and Lakes by Helena Ramsay -- this book teaches what rivers and lakes are, how they are made and used. It has a lot of illustrations and is written for younger children.
• The Brook Book by Jim Arnosky -- if you have a brook that you can explore, this would be a good resource
• River Beds by Gail Langer Karwoski -- picks one animal from many rivers around the world. It doesn't give a lot of information about the animal, but you can find more in other books. This is almost a picture book.
• The River by Gallimard Jeunesse -- an interesting book with wonderful illustrations. Shows life cycle of a dragonfly. Introduces some birds, animals, and insects. Shows frogs laying/fertilizing eggs
• Amazing Water Frogs by Meish Goldish -- great photos and simple text
• Animals of Rivers, Lakes, and Ponds by Sandra Donovan -- great photos with text that is easy to pick out the information you need or interesting facts without reading long passages that bore first graders
• What Lives in Streams and Rivers? by Oona Gaarder-Juntti -- great photos, but not a lot of information
• River Life by Barbara Taylor -- great photos with easy to use information
• River Food Chains by Rachel Lynette -- good book for older children; talks about a lot of rivers throughout the world
• A Nile River Food Chain by Rebecca Hogue Wojahn -- a Who-Eats-What Adventure; we really like this series

Literature or Picture Books:

• River Song by Steve Van Zandt -- if you get this from your library, be sure it has the cd. The book would be nice to read, but the cd has it in song, which makes it a lot of fun. The pictures illustrate each verse of the song. The story starts in the mountains at the source of the river and takes you all the way to the mouth of the river at the ocean.
• The River by Brigitte Sidjanski -- this book follows five pine cones that fall into the streamlet all the way to the ocean.
• The Raft by Jim LaMarche -- a boy enjoys a summer on the river at his Grandmother's house

First Grade, Fine Arts, Set Five

We have fallen behind in our schedule, so I plan to catch up during this set.

• Franz Schubert
• I could not find any books in our library system that would interest a first grader, so we will just be using Child's Own and listening to cd's.
• I picked up a cd that has "Trout" Quintet on it.
• Frederic Chopin
• I picked up a set of cd's that has Chopin's Nocturnes. They are great for going to sleep.
• Chopin by Ann Rachlin -- this is in the Famous Children series; at the end of the book it mentions the Minute Waltz, Raindrop Prelude, and Cat Waltz. I searched in our library system and was able to find all three, but it is probably easier to just find them on YouTube.
• George Fredrick Handel
• Handel and the Famous Sword Swallower of Halle by Bryna Stevens -- this book brings the mood and magic of Handel and the seventeenth century to life in its spirited and humorous retelling of this biographical tale.
• I picked up a set of cds called The Handel Experience -- it has selections from Water Music, The Messiah, Joy to the World, and many others.

Evaluation of Set Four

• Bible -- K. is doing really well learning the verses and sometimes catches me saying the wrong words since I am re-learning them from the KJV. I am continually amazed at how God weaves things together. The topics "I planned" for each set of weeks last winter in 24 Ways or the Friendship book seem to be exactly what what we are needing to discuss now.
• Writing -- while K. still enjoys drawing from the Draw Write Now book, she seems a bit bored with the writing, so I'm keeping it for drawing and using more games for writing.
• Spelling -- using the magnetic letters on the fridge for reviewing spelling has been a great way to reduce the "are we done yet" attitude.
• Grammar -- the activities and books about prepositions were great, and through the mad libs, I am sure K. knows the difference between action, naming, and describing words.
• Reading -- our Friday games help keep things fun. Since K. reads well, and loves to read to herself, I keep the number of pages for "Reading" short.
• Math -- K. is catching on well to the new addition facts. She seems to have grasped the concept of even and odd numbers. She understands which number is greater or less, but we need more work on using the symbols and reading the math sentence.
• History -- K. is enjoying this period of history. Our castle still isn't completed, but we will work on it some more this next set of weeks.
• Science -- I wasn't sure how much K. would enjoy My Side of the Mountain, but we took our time with it and talked about it, and now that we have finished it, I saw her reading it the other day.
• Fine Arts -- I've started keeping the cd's in the car -- it's a good place for listening.

"Off School" Review Time

Since we are taking a two week break, I decided we really needed to spend some time each day reviewing. I also wanted to continue having Bible each day, so this is what we have been doing this week:

• Bible
• I chose two songs from the hymnal and let K. pick one for us to sing. We have been singing Make Me a Blessing this week. It has been interesting to talk about being a blessing to other people.
• I've continued reading Little Pilgrim's Progress (this will mess up my "master plan", but we are enjoying the book so much that we didn't want to take a break from it)
• I let K. choose a book from our Bible Shelf for me to read
• We reviewed Luke 2:1-15. We each took a piece of scrap paper and thought of a verse or section of the passage. Then we wrote the first letter of each word on the paper. Next, we exchanged papers and figured out the verse or section the other person and written down. As and example, verse 1 would look like this: A i c t p i t d t a d w o f C A t a t w s b r
• We ended our Bible time with prayer.
• Review
• I took six strips of card stock and wrote a subject on each: Math, Writing, Reading, Grammar, Math, Reading
• Each day K. chose a strip, then I would give her a choice of 2 games we could play for that subject.

First Grade, Bible, Set Four

• We are continuing and enjoying Little Pilgrim's Progress.
• "We choose to be gracious, even when we don't feel like it." is the Way we are working on during this set of weeks. We are discovering all sorts of situations in our lives when we can apply this.
• Chapter 5 in the Friendship book was about being gracious to our friends and having a good attitude by deciding before we get together that we will be cheerful and cooperative.
• Lesson 4 in Life Lessons is about God's most precious gift -- Jesus and eternal life. One of the activities was to make a gift. K. wrote "eternal life" on a card and put it in this little box. Then we wrapped it in white tissue paper. She wrote "Jesus" all over the wrapping paper and we attached a card with her name on it.

• This week's new catechism, "Where is God?" brought us back to last year's memory work with Psalm 139.

First Grade, Writing, Set Four

In addition to Draw Write Now,

• I'm a Quiet Mouse (Games for Writing pg 150) -- after working with similes in the last set of weeks, this was fun to play, but I would suggest changing the metaphors to similes.
• Three Sentence Challenge (Games for Writing pg 146) -- K. really enjoyed this and we completed all the sets of words given in the book before she wanted to stop.
• Writing to Form (Games for Writing pg 139) -- we came out with very different stories, and it was a lot of fun to read them to each other.
• How Many Words (Games for Writing  pg 127) -- this is another game that K. and I really enjoy and she usually wants to play longer than I had planned (like that's a bad thing!)
• She is so . . . (Games for Writing pg 121) -- we did "She is so fast" this time. We had "her" running right out of her shoes, blowing the roofs off of houses, and stopping the earth spinning.
• Writing to Form (Games for Writing pg 139) -- I used the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff. Next time I won't do something that is so long.
• I printed a couple sheets of paper with pictures from our camping trip (and lines for writing). She is writing a few sentences each day about the trip. Then we will put them in a folder.
• K. wrote about five sentences each day this week to complete her journal about our camping trip.

First Grade, Spelling, Set Four

• We are working on dictionary skills, also -- entry words, guide words, word forms, sample sentences
• Alphabetical order, by first letter, is another skill that gets worked on with spelling
• Somtimes K. wants to do her spelling "tests" on the refrigerator -- I think I'd better get another set of magnetic letters!

First Grade, Grammar, Set Four

• I found a couple good FREE websites with printable activities for leaning Location Words (prepositions). Busy Teacher and Free Language Stuff 
• Where Is Mortimer? by Karen Bryant-Mole
• If you were a Preposition by Nancy Loewen -- I only read through page 11, because after that it starts teaching about prepositional phases and we aren't that advanced yet.
• Snail Trail by Ruth Brown
• Under, Over, by the Clover: What is a Preposition? by Brian Cleary

With this game you make up a sentence (with a location word)
about the picture when you land on the square.
Example: The monkey is between the trees.

• I am using short stories to teach how to Skim and Scan a story. When you skim, you look for the general idea of the story. When you scan, you are looking for specific information.
• To review Action Words, Naming Words, and Describing Words, I am making my own Mad Libs from stories in a 1960 Reader called Merry-Go-Round. I choose words to leave blank and ask K. for an action, naming, or describing word. When we are through, we read the story and laugh at the silliness of it. I print out two of each story, so K. can go back and write a sensible story, too.
• I added in our Review Game this week.

First Grade, Reading, Set Four

We played these games to enhance our learning:

• Pick a Blend (Games for Reading pg 126) -- I made different boards this time. It is interesting how simple this game is, yet K. really enjoys it.
• Rabbit Sounds (Games for Reading pg 110) -- I made the level 5 chart with sidewalk chalk in our driveway. We did each sound once, then K. was ready to do something else.
• Problems and Solutions (Games for Reading pg 167) -- after K. told me what she would do, I asked "and then what" a couple times to make her keep thinking about it.
• Chain Game (Games for Reading pg 130) -- we did three lists with 10 - 15 words in them. We kept getting stumped.
• Linking Words (Games for Reading pg 102) -- we actually played this game after dinner one evening because our schedule got wacky that day!

First Grade, Math, Set Four

Games, activities, books, and web sites that enhanced our learning:

• Measurement Mania by Lynette Long
• We made a measuring tape (activity #5)
• We made a measuring cup using just a can of soda (activity #19)
• We discovered that most "cups" hold more than one cup (activity #20)
• We tried to find things that weighed one ounce (activity #28)

• We measured different water temperatures (activity #34)
• The first day we worked with Comparing Numbers, K. and I secretly wrote down a number, then we showed the number and K. put out the correct wolf, and read the math sentence. The second day I used Uno Cards. I just took the top four cards and laid out two 2-digit numbers.

•  For Even and Odd Numbers we started a chart.
• Odds and Evens by Thomas C. O'Brien -- this book has some activities and concepts to explore
• The first day we used paper clips to determine if a number could be separated into two groups with the same number of paper clips. We did numbers 1 through 20.
• The second day, she noticed the pattern. We started with 20 paper clips. I asked how many paper clips I needed to add to make the next even number. We did this through the number 30. Then we talked about the pattern and I wrote random numbers in their proper places on the chart. K. colored them appropriately.
• The third day, I put out 2- or 3-digit numbers using Uno Cards (I just picked them up in the order they were in the stack) and K. held up signs that said "Odd" or "Even".

• I introduced addition problems up to 9 + 9 this week. For a couple days we worked on grouping concepts. For instance if you take 15 counters (beans, paper clips, etc.) you can group them in different ways (9 + 6; 8 + 7) but you still have a total of 15.
• We played a game with Uno cards. I made a spinner with the numbers 10 through 18 on it. I divided all the numbered Uno cards between us. Flick the spinner (it lands on 15) you have 1 minute to make as many sets as you can that equal 15, such as 5+5+5, 9+6, 4+5+3+3, etc. We had fun playing it. At this point K. copied my sets a lot, but she did come up with some of her own.
• We played Addition War with the Uno cards. Shuffle the numbered cards, then each of us took two cards and added them together. The person with the highest sum got the cards. If the sums were the same, we each drew two more cards and the person with the highest sum got all eight cards.
• Other games we played to help learn our new addition facts (and review the old ones). Math Checkers, Double It, and Fast Track (all from Games for Math).
• We played Fraction War (Wacky Word Problems by Lynette Long, Activity #15). The activity in the book was for percentages, but we aren't learning that yet, so I changed it to be fractions. We used Uno cards, so all her categories didn't work, so I changed those.
• For Multiplication Readiness and Repeated Addition we played:
• Star Count (Games for Math  pg 113)
• Victor Vampire's Birthday (Games for Math pg 117) -- only I changed it to Pooh, Piglet, Rabbit, and Tigger. Piglet wanted to bring 4 haycorns for each animal; Pooh wanted to bring 5 glasses of honey punch for each; Rabbit had 16 carrots - how many does each animal get?; Tigger brought 1 bottle of strengthing syrup for each animal.
• Lots of Boxes (Games for Math pg 123)
• Shoebox Math (Wacky Word Problems #28)

First Grade, History, Set Four

In addition to Child's History of the World, we used:

After reading chapter 51:

• Knights and Castles by Will Osborne -- the is the research guide to the fiction book The Knight at Dawn (which isn't worth reading, in my opinion).
• The Medieval World by Philip Steele -- full of illustrations, text in a large font to read to younger children, lots more information in a small font for children that are older
• A Knight's City by Philip Steele -- a fun book with pop-ups, which give a interactive tour of life in a medieval city. Here is a picture of one pop-up.

After reading chapter 52:

• Illuminations by Jonathan Hunt -- we mostly looked at the pictures
• How to be a Medieval Knight by Fiona Macdonald
• The Middle Ages by Sarah Howarth
• The Days of Knights and Castles by Pierre Miquel

Literature:

• Adam of the Road by Elizabeth Janet Gray -- about a boy (Adam) that gets separated from his father in 1294 and Adam's travels and (mis)adventures to find his father

We are making a castle. First we took a square piece of cardboard and painted the moat. Then we made the walls with battlements. K. drew the battlements and I cut them out. We have attached the drawbridge and made a portcullis. We were going to paint the walls on Friday, but the trees on our street were getting trimmed, and that was much more interesting, so maybe we'll do it over the weekend.

We got the walls painted. (Don't glue the walls together before you paint.) We used sponges to give it a rough look. Inside we have a kitchen, the great hall, and the stables. I used half gallon juice cartons and glued (hot glue worked great) white paper on the outside so K. could paint them. I'm still working on the keep. Since K. isn't old enough to use a knife and cut the buildings, I have found it works better to talk about what buildings we want, then I make them at night and read to her while she paints them. Otherwise, she is sitting there watching me work and getting very tired of the project.

I put a counter along one wall of the kitchen.

There are two tables in the great hall. K. wants to paint the wall yellow with pink dots.

I made this door too big, so it is the stable.

First Grade, Science, Set Four

Here is the list of resources we used in learning about the Mountains:

• Mountains by David Cumming -- this book has a map that we used as a guide for coloring our map to show where mountain ranges are. It has a few pages on vegetation and wild life, and a really nice illustration of the different types of vegetation at different altitudes of a mountain.
• Hills and Mountains by Sabrina Crewe -- this is another book that has a little bit of a lot of different kinds of information about mountains, but this one is written for younger children and has some activities to do.
• Mountains by Fran Howard -- this is another book that touches on what mountains are and where they are and animals there. This one is even shorter, for young children to read on their own.
• Food for Life: Mountains by Kate Riggs -- this is a book about who eats who
• Hiding in Mountains by Deborah Underwood --this book is written for younger children, so it has large photos and minimal text. It shows different animals that live in mountains around the world camouflaged in their habitat, and then it has a picture showing the animal "revealed".
• Who Lives in . . . the Mountains? by Ron Hirschi -- another book with great photos and minimal text
• America's Mountains: Guide to Plants and Animals by Marianne D. Wallace -- if you can only find one book, this is the one to get. It has full page spread illustrations showing the plants and animals of each mountain range in America (Appalachians, Northern Rocky Mts, etc). K. just loved this book! It is also great for comparing the plants and animals of different mountain ranges.
• Animals of the High Mountains by Judith Rinard -- this book is divided by continents, and has great photos with minimal text
• Faces in the Mountains by Ron Hirschi -- great photos
• Mountain Mammals by Elaine Landau -- learning about six animals that live in the mountains
• A Temperate Forest Food Chain by Rebecca Hogue Wojahn -- We really like this series of books. You pick an animal and turn to the page designated, then read about it and then choose what it had for dinner last night, turn to that page, learn about it, choose what it had for dinner last night, etc. until you get to plants. There is a lot of information in this book, so to keep it at a 1st grade level we are skipping quite a bit, but it is definitely a book to re-visit when she is older.

Literature or Picture Books about Mountains:

• Kami and the Yaks by Andrea Stenn Stryer -- picture book about a family in Nepal
• Caravan by Lawrence Mckay Jr. -- picture book about a trip through the mountains in Afghanistan
• My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George -- about a boy living by himself in the Catskills
• Heidi by Johanna Spyri -- about a girl in the Alps