Collage Friday - Sharks, Titanic, & Handel
Friday, March 1, 2013 at 5:00AM 
This week was all about learning.
Get ready.
This post is full of links for our interest led studies that include lots of lapbooking, notebooking, music, and our favorite resource of the week.
It was rainy and cold most of the week. We didn't go anywhere spectacular.
Most of the week (other than our co-op day) was spent at home, working on lapbooks, notebooks, reading aloud, practicing instruments, and playing games.
When we get very busy I look back on weeks like these and wonder:
"Why can't all of our weeks be like this one?"
Do you ever have the urge to just STOP all outside activities and be at home most of the time?
I see what the kids learned and accomplished and it gives me pause - makes me reevaluate our schedule.
I will share with you the three big projects accomplished this week.
Shark Lapbook
This was purely an interest led study for Grant. He and Anna have been addicted to Shark Week episodes on Netflix, so when I suggested a lapbook he jumped at the opportunity.
We used the free lapbook from Homeschool Share.
We checked out every book about sharks in the children's section of our library.
I ordered three WONDERFUL books for our library at home:
- All About Sharks
- DK Eyewitness Shark
- I Survived The Shark Attacks of 1916 (this chapter book was GREAT -- the kids want more in this series, so I'm going to get some as we study sujects that have them)
This is the most awesome way to learn about a subject! When a child directs their own learning and completes a project based on their interest, the retention and excitement is quite something.
{I'm having a warm fuzzy homeschool moment, aren't you?}
Titanic Lapbook
Anna also had her own interest led study this week.
She's been obsessed with The Titanic for nearly a year. She's read tons of books, watched documentaries, and seen the traveling exhibit.
Last week, she was rereading her favorite series of Titanic books (more on those later).
We searched for a free Titanic Lapbook and found a lovely resource at Dynamic 2 Moms.
Wednesday we heard about the Titanic II, which is slated to set said in 2016.
Anna's favorite resources for this unit:
- Titanic - by Gordon Korman - this is actually a series of three books. They were great!
- I Survived The Sinking of the Titanic, 1912
- Dear America, Voyage on the Great Titanic
- National Geographic Shorts (Titanic) -- on Kindle - Anna says this was her favorite resource she used!
Learning About Handel
A study of Handel is perfect for us right now because we are at this point in history.
I also received the .mp3 of My Name is Handel: The Story of Water Music. We adore all of the Maestro Classics stories and this one did not disappoint.
To integrate all of this into history, we added notebooking pages to our Story of the World notebook about Handel, Water Music, and the harpsichord. The Story of the World provides our spine for the year. All activities in our homeschool (art, music, literature, geography, etc... are based around where we are in SOTW.)
I used some of the premade notebooking pages on Notebooking Pages, but also used the Notebooking Publisher to make my own page for the harpsichord.
Are you familiar with Notebooking Pages? This resource is a staple in our homeschool.
Here is a little video about the publisher tool -- my kids like to play with this, too!
Odds and Ends
1. I've been walking on the treadmill this week. Now that my eating is under control and I'm losing some weight, it is time to exercise. This is really hard for me because I just don't like it. Maybe I will learn? I'm grateful to my husband for his encouragement in this area.
2. We played Yahtzee one day in place of formal math lessons. There are so many skills to be learned in a good game of Yahtzee, aren't there? Plus, playing with this cool Pirates of the Caribbean set (a birthday present for Grant) made it even more fun.
3. Both children made progress in their Grammar Minutes this week, too. We love this grammar resource.
4. Grant enjoyed making more stories with the LEGO Storystarter from LEGO Education. You are going to be hearing more about this in the coming weeks. I'm excited to be working with LEGO Education to share great products they have that can benefit homeschoolers. This Storystarter is amazing. Trust me.
5. Anna completed Level 4 of Writing With Ease. This was no small task for her. This is a difficult curriculum, but well worth the investment. She readily admitted that she didn't love it, but that it made her a BETTER WRITER. That was the goal, and I'm glad she could see why I choose the things I do sometimes.
On The Blog This Week
Healthy Chocolate Banana Peanut Butter Smoothies
Educents: Saving You Time and Money
Finally, this week's favorite thing in our house has to be No Stress Chess. One night we watched Searching for Bobby Fischer. It was an excellent movie, which spurred Grant's interest in Chess again. So, we pulled out No Stress Chess and he and his dad played for an entire evening while I took Anna to choir.
What is so sweet about the above photo is that it looks EXACTLY like my husband when he was a little boy. They are carbon copies of each other. Those two boys are really something.
That wraps up a very long Collage Friday post.
Thank you for sticking with me to the end.
Please join me for Collage Friday!
The rules are simple. Link your post (that incudes photo collages) about your homeschool week. Be sure to grab a Collage Friday button or text link back to this post in some way. Then, be sure to visit the other blogs on the list to offer support and gain ideas. This is a wonderful community and I love reading through your blogs each weekend and seeing how you all encourage each other.
*I will delete any links that don't comply with these guidelines. {not trying to be crabby, just trying to respect the hard work of those who do follow the rules}
Reader Comments (19)
Legos are SO the rage at the moment! Everyone's using them to school with-such a great idea! Thanks for hosting!
It sounds like a FABULOUS week, Mary! Actually, the kids and I have had a few discussions this week because I would like to lighten our outside commitments. I wanted to get their opinions and give them a heads-up that I wanted to make changes. I really do love all the interest led learning, reading, and projects they work on if I just give them time at HOME.
Love the post.
Heidi
Wow, Mary! You always accomplish so much! You inspire me to do more in our homeschool! I don't like exercising either so you are not alone. But, exercising is what keeps my blood pressure down so I keep doing it.
What an awesome week. We played Yahtzee one day this week also. My kids love it. I will look into the "I Survived" series. IT sounds good.
Blessings, Dawn
We love days home as well. Since I am just doing K I have been able to avoid getting sucked into lots of activities. (Though there are plenty out there). Thanks for reinforcing my desire to really keep our schedule as simple as possible. I know we will have to add more in the future. But I love how much time my girls have to learn and play when we are home all day.
Btw, I messed up my first link. #9 is broken, sorry. Please delete. Thanks for hosting, I love visiting the other blogs.
I love this post. It is so full of passion for learning. It is exciting to see. Keep up the excellent work!
Looks like a great week. Any week with sharks, Yahtzee, Chess, and better writing is a good week to me! Thanks for sharing.
I often have times when I want to cancel all outside activities and stay home! Fortunately, we were able to stay home more this week. It was a great week. It looks like you had one too.
What a wonderful week, Mary! I think we're going to be switching to more interest-led learning for the rest of the year. Our science isn't exciting us, so it's time to let them "take the wheel" and see what happens!
I agree, being HOME to homeschool makes such a difference! When we're overscheduled and running here and there our children often lose out on time to really dive into delight directed studies. It's one reason we don't do a co-op or anything like Classical Conversations - we need our time at home. Because we're already working around so many medical appointments we really can't add outside things without homeschool time taking a hit.
Wow, great week. Can't wait to see more about Lego Story Starters.
Mary, my little guy made a LEGO "how-to" video this week. When he finished it, I told him, "I know JUST the person who would love this, because she LOVES to teach using LEGOs!"
I love your spirit -- you don't hide your light under a bushel! Keep sparkling!
~ Kim
Very nice looking lapbooks! I'm looking forward to hearing more about the Lego Story starters, too!
Looks like a great week! Thanks for hosting this.
Your week sounded wonderful! I love Homeschool Share - I've collected a lot of their resources over the years. We stick close to home most of the time. I guess I'm still recovering from when all three girls were in outside schools and I was scurrying around all the time, picking up and dropping off! I am reading a great book called Project-Based Learning and your post reminded me of her message. I'm considering transforming my dining room into a project room :) I'm not an exercise fan either, alas my age is requiring it now, especially for pain free shoulders and joints. I need to mix it up - I like T-Tapp, Turbo Jam and Leslie Sansone. Haven't lost anything yet though (sigh). Keep at it and use music to motivate you!
Your Titanic unit brought back so many memories for me! My best friend in high school and college, Sean, is a Titanic-o-phile. He has always been fascinated by the Titanic and used to talk about it all the time. In college, we would do this goofy thing where we would pretend we didn't know each other and launch into a discussion on the Titanic around people who didn't know we knew each other. you pretty much had to be there. Good memories. I should really cover the topic with the girls.
What an incredible week, Mary! Hooray for being in a super groove and diving into the kids' interests :) Hope you've been having a good weekend.
Love those lapbooks! I have always been fascinated with the Titanic.
By the way, you inspired us to have a literature fair with our homeschool group!
Thanks:)
What a wonderful week - and so many amazing links and ideas here!!!