Our Ant Study - COMPLETED

As part of our biology unit we will be studying ants and will chronicle their adventure here!

I decided on purchasing an Ant Hill from Insect Lore through Amazon. I choose this particular model because it had great ratings and I really liked the idea of the three dimensional design allowing you to see what the ants are doing in and out of the hill in a much more realistic fashion. We ordered the ants from Ants Alive and since it said we had 7-10 days until they would arrive we waited until the following Monday to prep our ant hill following the directions exactly. I also went to the library and picked up a few book for the kids to peruse: Ants (Nature's Children), An Ant Colony (Nature Watch), and Ant Cities (First Sight).

The day the ants arrived KM and I were very excited and took all necessary precautions to get them into their ant hill safely - for us and them, as these are harvester ants and they can STING!!! We did manage to get them in and ready to go. Here I will be posting various links, photos and videos from our study as well as KM's Daily Observations. If you have any interesting links you would like to share PLEASE leave a comment and let us know!!!

OBSERVATIONS BY KM ----

2/8/12 - The ants arrived today and are currently clumping together and getting used to their new home. 

2/9/12 -  The ants have started tunneling on the right side of the hill.

2/10/12 - 

Up close

9:46 am

10:31 pm

2/11/12 - 

9:11 am

9:58 pm

2/12/12 - The ants have a little graveyard outside the hill. They have also constructed about 9 tunnels.

8:51am

8:59 pm

graveyard on backside of hill

2/13/12 -

8:11am 

8:03pm

2/14/12 - The ants are moving very slow and seem to only tunnel on the right side of the hill. It also looks like they have no motivation to work on tunnels. It appears as though only 2/3 are still alive.

8:31am

2/17/12 - They seem to have slowed down working quite a bit the past few days. Not sure what is going on.

2/19/12 - They are busying themselves again, but working more on the outre graveyard than tunneling.

3/2/12 - Haven't posted much of anything as they really are just doing the same old thing. There are only about 17 left now though and it is starting to feel a bit creepy and deserted.

3/15/12 - We released the last two ants today because they just seemed so sad. We learned a lot and it was a really interesting study.

World Education Games Are This Week!!!

Here are the event dates -

World Spelling Day - 6 March 2012
World Maths Day - 7 March 2012
World Science Day - 8 March 2012


Be sure to register early so that your kids can get some  practice time in!!!

Weekly Update - AAAAAHHHHHHHHH Balance

This week was so balanced and relaxing which is just what was needed around here!

DN was here while CJ was home and things went okay. He and KM worked on the earthworm experiments in Janice VanCleave's Bio Labs. We all learned a lot and had a good time with them. CJ and DN spent some time together and CJ got some things done around the house while I took KM to a teen hangout event Saturday night.

Once the boys were off on their adventures, KM and I had two days of relaxing, getting things done and just lounging around the house and two days running all around town. Monday KM got a lot of her lessons done, while I cleaned out closets and reorganized things. Tuesday we ran errands, went to see The Secret World of Arietty, - which was FABULOUS!!! - ran a few more errands and then found the perfect shoes to go with her dress for the semi-formal. Speaking of the shoes not only were they perfect but they were $59 marked down to $11.99 and we had a $10 off coupon so we got them for $1.99 which means we saved 96.7%!!!!! Wednesday we finally had a wintry day at home! It snowed, I built a fire and we spent the day in the living room - KM working on lessons while I finished up the spring lesson plans and then we caught up on the 3 episodes of Smash we had missed. Then Thursday we went  ice skating, to the grocery store and swung by the library to pick up some thingss we had on hold. We were hoping to make it to the BSU observatory for their special events for the opposition of Mars, but the sky was just not cooperating, maybe we will make it there this weekend. All and all it was a pretty good week and we hope that this balance will continue! 

Some extra pics of the critters around here this week -

Spring Session Plans ALL SET!

Got every little piece tidied up this afternoon and it is like a weight has lifted from my shoulders. As I have said a bazillion times before, although I am willing to switch things up it is SOOOOO nice to just have things set and ready to go.

After some discussion DN has decided to stay on an every other week schedule, which means he will be here for only two or three days every two weeks and will complete the majority of his work at home. I had to switch things up a bit so that this could work, but I think that it will go well as long as he stays on top of things. KM's schedule will basically remain the same as it has, but we are tweaking a few things here and there to hers as well.

Literature -
City of Embers - DN

Animal Farm - DN

Math - 

Manga Joku - Both

Science - 

Biology Coloring Workbook - KM

Janice VanCleave's Bio Labs - Both
Usborne Science Encyclopedia - DN

Health & Phys. Ed. - 
Bowling - KM

Tennis - Both

Ice Skating- KM
Basketball - DN

Heads Up: Real News About Drugs and Your Body - Both
Mind Over Matter - Both


Social Sciences – U.S. History & Geography - 
A History of US Books 1-2 - K

Liberty Kids - K

Story of the US DVD -  - K

U.S. History – Basic Not Boring - K

Hip Hop History - U.S. - D

Westward, Ha-Ha!, 1800-1850 (America's Funny But True History) - D

The Journal of Douglas Allen Deeds: The Donner Party Expedition (My Name is America) - D

The Revolution - D
Journey North - Both
25 Map Crosswords - Both

Elective - Financial Literacy -
Building Your Future - Financial Literacy Curriculum - Both


Foreign Languages - 
Japanese from Zero!  - K

Spanish Grammar Study Cards- D

Spanish Conversation Demystified - D
Spanish (The 100+ Series) - D

Current Events - 
CNN Student News - Both

Ants Arrived - Let the Adventure Begin!!!

As part of our Biology studies we are going to be observing ants and will be chronically our adventures doing so on a new page located HERE!

World Education Games - Full Registration & Practice is open!!!

Here are the dates -
World Spelling Day - 6 March 2012
World Maths Day - 7 March 2012
World Science Day - 8 March 2012


Be sure to register early so that your kids can get in as much practice time as possible!!!
Practice begins today!

Disneynature Chimpanzee - Coming to theaters this April!

We have truly enjoyed going to see the Disneynature movies each year and are excited for the next installment - chimpanzee

As always there is a free education guide available for download - HERE - which has more to offer this year as it is a whopping 135 pages and includes powerpoint presentation with audio and video clips! 

You Tube Monday - Frozen Whirlpool -

Just thought this was pretty cool! 

Professor Noggin's Card Games - Official Review

Our family has been using these games for years and they are a fun, entertaining and exciting way to learn a number of subjects in numerous categories from Science to History to Art to Geography. These fun games can take your family to the far corners of Outer Space and deep into the Ocean. You can find a complete list of titles - HERE

Each game comes with 30 cards and 1 three numbered dice - meaning a six sided die that has 1, 2, & 3 on two sides each. Each card has 6 questions - 3 easy and 3 hard - which makes it fantastic to play with the whole family regardless of the amount of knowledge individuals may have in each area. Questions come in the form of true or false, multiple choice or trivia. I truly can not say enough about these fantastic product!

Here are the titles we have on our bookshelf -

  

Janice VanCleave’s Presents Science Projects that Really WORK!!! – Official UM Review

Janice VanCleave’s Presents Science Projects that Really WORK!!! – Official UM Review

Science was always my worry area. I didn't enjoy it in school and feared havingto take the responsibility of ensuring that my VERY science minded daughter was going to get all that she wanted out of our science education at home. I bought all sorts of kits and checked out every project book I could find at the library until I came across Janice VanCleave. If you have never heard of her, then you have never read some of the most concisely written science experiment books I have ever encountered and you and your kids are truly missing out!

Although I have enjoyed each of her books that I have read The Science For Every Kid series is a favorite in our household. In this series she covers everything fromChemistry to Food and Nutrition to Geometry, cohesively covering topics so that the kids can clearly grasp the material. This series could easily be used as a spine to jump off from, as a full science curriculum or a supplement for labs and projects. For example in Food and Nutrition for Every Kid VanCleave has each chapter set up as follows:

• What You Need to Know - here terms are explained and background information is given
  
• Exercises - the learner is presented with questions to be answered or situations that need to be resolved utilizing the information they read in the previous section.
• Activity - a project to allow the application of the skills in a real world situation.
• Solutions to Exercises - she not only gives the answers but lays out step-by-step instructions for solving each exercise.

With over 50 best-selling science experiment books that span an audience from toddler to mature adolescents, this is one author you will want to remember. Not only have I never had a single failed experiment from her books, she gives explanations that make sense. Though we have come across a few materials that we had to do a bit of digging around for the majority of materials you will need can be found in your home or in a quick trip to the local grocery or hardware store, making it convenient on a rainy day or spur of the moment. I can't say enough about these fabulous resources.

To see some more of our successful science experiments from Biology for Every Kid check out my blogposts - HERE and HERE.

You can learn more about Janice VanCleave as well as take a look through the plethora of tips, ideas and projects at her site - JVC's Science Fair Projects.

Back to lessons - Winter Session has begun and LOTS OF COLORS!!!

This week has felt really good, as we have gotten back into a flow and routine after the hustle and bustle of the holiday season. I think we are past the deschooling with DN and are in more of a see how it keeps going point. He is no where near independent, but is open to try anything I put in front of him and eager to learn. I think he has come to the realization that this could actually work.

DN was here at the beginning of the week and managed to get nearly all of his weekly work completed in just a day, which was rather impressive especially considering CJ was here. When we reviewed the History flash cards that they are both memorizing there was such pride in his eyes when he realized that although he hadn't touched them in a week, he remembered 10 out of the 11 cards almost verbatim!
KM has been wanting to spread out her lessons a bit more, so has been doing some in the evening and working on her drawings in the afternoon. KM is excited to be doing a poetry class utilizing Skype this session, she has taken online classes before, but this will be the first fully interactive one that she will be doing. We received the syllabus and I was impressed to see that she jumped right into it.

I have been doing a lot of reading the last few weeks and after finishing The Well Educated Mind decided to try out Susan Wise Bauer's process. I picked up Don Quixote from the library and was surprised to see KM flipping through it this morning. After some discussion about it and the intensity of it she said she thought it sounded interesting and would like to read it with me - I was SHOCKED, but very happy at the same time. I think we will enjoy reading this together and I think she appreciates that I am always continuing my education. I KNOW that we can learn a lot from each other.

As for the colors that were mentioned in the title...KM dyed her hair -

We also tried out the first tube from Test Tube Wonders and it was rather interesting. Here is the video that we made -





Oh and my cat thought she would try to take over the world -

Pre-registration is open for The World Education Games

Pre-registration is now open!!! Get ready to challenge yourself and others around the world!

Here are the dates -
World Spelling Day - 6 March 2012
World Maths Day - 7 March 2012
World Science Day - 8 March 2012

Practice begins Feb 1 so be sure to register to get as much warm up time in as possible!

Week 4 - Deschooling and Book Break Update

So our week is running a bit differently this week, as we are not doing "lessons" again until after the new year, instead we are working on some projects, getting ready for the holidays and trying to help DN understand that learning is a part of life and not just something you do on certain days, at certain times, and on specific predetermined topics set out by someone else. So he spent the weekend at home and we met up with him on Sunday evening so that he could join KM at the Smash Brothers Tournament at the Library on Monday. Since we didn't need to be there until later in the afternoon the kids had the day to do what they wanted.

KM choose to be on the computer, work on some Snap Circuits Projects, play on the computer and used some of the turkey bones that were leftover from soup making this weekend to try out a bendy bone experiment that she has been meaning to do for a while, but always seemed to think of AFTER I had disposed of the carcass. DN choose to read, read, watch Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer at lunch, read and read some more. KM tried to get him into some of the things that she was working on, but he was really into Battle of the Labyrinth - book 4 in the Percy Jackson Series, he read the first 3 in record time and was really glad I was able to get the 4th through our library network and even happier that I grabbed the final volume while they were in the tournament - luckily thing too since he finished the 4th within minutes of us returning home.

KM has been feeling a bit under the weather, sniffly and coughing at night, so we decided to put skating off until later in the week to not subject her to the cold and hit the movies instead to see Arthur Christmas. I had heard mixed reviews, but was really happy that we decided to go. It was super funny and both the kids really liked it. I was glad to see that it was rated PG as there were a few parts that I would think could be a bit disturbing to little ones. After the movies we dropped KM off at home to rest while DN and I went to run some errands. The beans we had setup last week to determine if direction of helium mattered needed to be transplanted and DN got to see how the bean transforms into the leaves. We spent the evening making ornaments with Sculpey and then at 9ish I had a surge of energy and decided we NEEDED to clean the fridge. Glad I did though because it took just less than an hour to scrub down everything, with the kids helping and they got to sleep in the next morning while I went grocery shopping. Teamwork and cooperation went a long way on this one!



Wednesday was shopping and chore day - I went grocery shopping and the kids needed to get their rooms organized and tidied up before the holiday.  They also spent some time painting the ornaments they had made the night before. We were hoping to get to the BSU observatory for their last public viewing before winter break, but the clouds just didn't cooperate. We did get to the discount store so that KM could pick up the fabulous dress for the formal New Years Eve party she will be attending with some of her youth group friends. She is VERY excited as this is her first formal. She picked a gorgeous flowing gown. We got the dress, shoes, and  shawl all for under $35! WOOHOOO for bargain shopping! The kids finished up their christmas shopping online, since CJ got stuck out on the road longer than expected this week. DN learned how to play Wii Music, set up his profile on Wii Fit Plus and played the new Zelda game he got from the library.

We made it to skating Thursday and they had a great time. We met up with DN's Uncle so he could spend the rest of the week home with them. Then KM went to a jewelry making class at the library - I just love how many activities she is getting involved with over there! I managed to find some time to get the last of the footage edited from KMs theater group and to finalize the majority of their winter session lesson plans. I always feel so much more at ease when I know they are all set. I am open to tweaking and twisting them around and I have a few more things to iron out, but just knowing they are there and ready makes me feel organized and ready to go. I will post about our upcoming plans next week!



All and all it was a really great week. We got a lot completed and had a really good time. DN seemed to really catch on with what we do around here, he was interested in most of the things, but passed on a few, which is to be expected - don't we all want to pass on some things.  It is weeks like this that remind me of why I started this blog in the first place - it is just a great way to see what it is that we have done. Even when it seems like it wasn't very much. Hope you all had as much fun this week as we did!