Back to School – 5th Grade

I don’t think any of us can believe Ms. S is in 5th grade.  My oldest thought she was going into 3rd!!

I’m excited to start her off.  A friend recommended a new program to me and after looking at it and dwelling on the choices, I decided to make the jump.  Ms. S does not like to read or write and this program looked like a good segue from First Language Lessons which I loved {made for 1st-4th graders}.

Writer’s in Residence – new program by Debra Bell

Reader’s in Residence – new program by Debra Bell

Math 5

Mystery of History – Volume II

Awana – T&T book 3

Apologia Human Anatomy – with journaling notebook

 Art

Violin

No trips out of the country for her in summer of 2017!

Back to School – 8th Grade

Ms. A is excited to start.  We’ve chosen together some new things that I hope fits her better and challenges her.  She will be taking a few credits for high school this year as long as she does the work.  I know she can meet the challenge!

Total Language Plus – she will choose the books she wants to study off a list I’ve provided and is starting the year with Pride and Prejudice

Biology 101 – Great program for the not so much science lover.  We will add dissection to this and follow Apologia Biology for these lessons.

Mystery of History –  Volume II

Algebra I 

Bible – Including Jesus Freaks, Passion to Purity, and Quest for Love

Art

Homeschool Band – this is her fourth year.  She plays the flute and will be in advance band.

And because one going to Teen Missions is not enough, Ms. A has decided to go in the summer of 2017.  She is going to Nepal where the team will help with the Children’s Home doing construction as needed.  I wonder how hard it will be for us to leave our daughter with Teen Missions????

{and her hair is a brighter blue now}

 

Back to School – Senior Year

We start school today!  I’m ready… but it’s going to be a crazy year! Let me introduce my students for 2016-17.

First up is Mr. C.  He has two credits left to finish high school. Hard to believe I’ll have two graduates!

He will be doing:

Latin 2 {his choice} -This is an amazing program. LOVE it!

Pre-Calculus – because this kid is super smart and will totally be able to handle this level.  He has gotten straight A’s in each high school math and NEVER written a problem down.  He does it all in his head and just has a doodle page for the whole year.  Drives me crazy.

He works part time at a local hardware store and volunteers at the Food Pantry all day Tuesday. He also still takes piano lessons and is looking for a Ukulele teacher.

But his biggest plan is going with Teen Missions again in the summer of 2017.  He has chosen Madagascar which is a team that rides motorcycles to the villages to host Sunday School classes and spread the Good News.  Fundraising details to follow.

Art Project

I posted two pictures from the creation of this project.

It started with the girls wanting to splatter paint on paper.  They laid down garbage bags and went to town.

Then they liked the look of what was on the plastic bags so they took a poster board and pressed it into the paint.  Ms. A thought it looked like two butterfly wings.

So… she added a body and antennas.

I love when they create things on their own.

Reminder: Discovery Education Streaming Free Offer

The Homeschool Buyers Co-op is giving away a FREE subscription to Discovery Education Streaming Plus for the summer to homeschoolers.  A 1 year subscription retails for $375, so this is a REALLY GOOD DEAL.  It has won oodles of awards and testimonials from homeschoolers. It has over 12,000 full-length educational videos, games, interactive and more.

Click here to sign up.  This offer is only good through August 31st!

You can read reviews from other homeschoolers that use this amazing resources here.  

Now go sign up yourself and finish off the summer with this amazing educational tool.

Bring your Homeschool Lessons to Life this Summer!

The Homeschool Buyers Co-op is giving away a FREE subscription to Discovery Education Streaming Plus for the summer to homeschoolers.  A 1 year subscription retails for $375, so this is a REALLY GOOD DEAL.  It has won oodles of awards and testimonials from homeschoolers. It has over 12,000 full-length educational videos, games, interactive and more.

Click here to sign up or read on for more information about Discovery Education Streaming Plus.

It’s easy to see why homeschoolers rave about Discovery Education Streaming Plus. It’s probably the most extensive and feature-rich educational video streaming service in the world.

It’s much like having the entire DVD selection of your local public library available to you from the convenience of your home, 24/7/365.

But it’s not just a collection of videos that you can watch from beginning to end. This library has been organized into useable video clips, organized and categorized, close-captioned, and supplemented with lesson plans, teaching guides, interactive simulations, images, audio resources, and other resources and materials that you can incorporate into virtually every aspect of your homeschool curriculum.

Discovery Education Streaming Plus features:

• Thousands of full-length videos from scores of producers, segmented into tens of thousands of content-specific clips tied directly to state and national standards.
• Supplemental resources such as Assignment Builder, Quiz Center, Writing Prompt Generator, lesson plans, and more
• Fast and accurate search functionality and dynamic navigation menus
• The ability to customize and personalize lessons to different subjects, grades, and learning styles
• Comprehensive K-12 curriculum coverage in six core subject areas.
• Thousands of images
• Membership in the Discovery Educator Network (DEN)
• Interactive self-paced training
• Exclusive Discovery programming such as Frozen Planet, Human Planet, LIFE, Into the Universe, Mythbusters, and Curiosity
• Video series from trusted content providers such as BBC Worldwide, CBS News, Channel 4, Discovery Studios, Scholastic, TV Ontario, and Westin Woods
• Hundreds of games, skill builders, and body atlas interactives
• Thousands of self-paced math tutorials spanning concepts from basic addition to calculus
• Thousands of audio files including podcasts, classic literature audiobooks, children’s literature audiobooks from Scholastic, and numerous supplemental study aids for auditory learners

You can read reviews from other homeschoolers that use this amazing resources here.  

Now go sign up yourself and enjoy this amazing offer this summer!

Necropsy

Necropsy – another word for autopsy; usually refers to one done on an animal

A few weeks ago my animal loving son got a call from his good friend/mentor that one of her snakes had suddenly passed away.  She was thinking of performing a necropsy on it and wondered if she could bring it to my house after church for Mr. C to join her in the process.  She wasn’t sure why it died and wanted to “delve deeper” to see if she could figure it out.

Of course, being the good Mom I am, I said sure.  For some reason this does not gross me out one bit so I took lots of pictures to document it.  For those that don’t want to look past the next, not so gross picture, I’ll give you the details.

They determined that the snake died from internal bleeding and she was suspicious that the snake was much older than she was told when she purchased it.  Interestingly the heart muscle was still moving so we could watch the heart go up and down {yes, it really was dead}.  We found a huge sack of blood below the heart and the sack the heart was in was full of blood also.  There were other discoveries too, but I never heard what that was determined to be.

After his mentor left {she had another event to get to} Mr. C searched for the other organs and just “looked” around.  Then clean up.  Now for the pictures, if you’d like to see.  The first three are pretty “clean”.  Next two not so much.

At first the thought it was a problem with it’s skin… which I am suddenly drawing a huge blank on what that was called.

The vertebrae {where the spinal cord would run}.

Some of the organs Mr. C identified after she left.  The blue little thing is the pancreas and in the other hand is the liver.  He also saw the small intestine but I won’t bore you with more pictures…