September Homeschool

Simon has been really into helping me make "smoochies" lately.

I love when the school year starts and the chaos of having neighbor kids around all the time dissipates and my kids go back to being great friends.  

  

The kids worked on name signs with found nature items like little leaves, flower petals, and twigs.  They turned out adorable!

We've been enjoying the warm weather with family walks.

Nolan has been working hard on excavating rocks from the kit that Grandma got him in Duluth.  

Our favorite little bookstore, J.C. Weddle Books, not only has a dog we love, but an actual wardrobe that transports you to Narnia!  We love visiting and stocking up on great books!

Co-op has been a wonderful addition to our Tuesday schedule.  The kids have art, music, and phy-ed classes, while Simon gets to play.  They absolutely love it and it has been a great opportunity to get to know more kids.  

Working hard on "Willodeen" copywork.

We're studying weathering and erosion in Science.  We began with an experiment about wind erosion using sand and straws.

Olivia had her first piano lesson!

Livi got a weaving loom for her birthday and has really enjoyed learning how to do it all by herself.  

Most days Simon doesn't want to let me out of his sight.  That includes while I'm cooking, doing school work, or going to the bathroom.  He is so sweet, even though he's pretty clingy and it makes it hard to get stuff done.  Today, he was happy to sit up on the counter and eat a peanut butter sandwich while I worked.

Our whole family loves reading "Willodeen" outside, including Miles.

We've been secret codes to write messages this month.

We treated ourselves to a Briar House drink after completing our first week of school!

Simon was so brave for his first covid shot and it was so sweet how his brother and sister were there to support him, holding his hand and cheering him on.  

Nolan has been exploring his family tree.  He has been enjoying seeing where his ancestors are from and seeing their names and faces.  

We bought a rock tumbler!  We are so excited!  Nolan used the rocks from his excavating kit, as well as some of the ones that came with the tumbler.  It will take about a month to finish the four cycles.  We can't wait to see how they turn out!

Making applesauce has become a fall family tradition!

Our second science experiment was about water erosion, specifically in mudslides.  We simulated a mudslides using dirt, toothpicks for trees, and a watering can.  

 

Our Willodeen unit taught us about compound nouns.  The kids worked together to create their own creatures with compound noun names.

At Co-op the kids worked on bird art inspired by Australian artist, Pete Kromer.  The turned out beautifully!

Nolan wrote a book review that's on display at our library.

Queen Elizabeth II died this week at the age of 96.  Being able to watch history unfolding in real time and adjust our schedule to allow time to watch the funeral made me fall in love with homeschool all over again.  We had some incredibly insightful conversations!

In September, we concentrated on the fairy tale, "Snow White."  We read the original Grimm's fairy tale, watched the movie, "Mirror, Mirror," and the Disney movie, "Snow White and the Seven Dwarves."  Eric made us an amazing chicken pot pie and poison apple pie for our movie night.  Throughout the month the kids worked hard on writing their own versions of "Snow White."  Olivia dictated her version to me and I helped her type it.  She then illustrated it and laminated it.  It turned out adorable!  Nolan was extremely ambitious and wrote his own chapter book using Google Slides.  He wrote it from two different points of view - the wicked queen and Snow White - following the example set out in "Willodeen."  He did such a wonderful and creative job.  His story had its own voice and point of view and wildly creative.  I hope he always enjoys writing and keeps that creativity coming!  I was so very proud of both of them!  This was a fun project!

For Social Studies, the kids worked on an American Symbols poster and learned facts about some of our nation's most iconic symbols: the White House, the bald eagle, the Statue of Liberty, The American flag, and the Liberty Bell.  

Our final project for our "Willodeen" unit was to create an imaginary animal and write about it using descriptive language and similes.  Nolan wrote about The Creature of Death and Olivia wrote about a Bearjalope.  Their writing was wonderful and extremely descriptive.  

This week Jupiter was closer than it has been since 1963.  It is bright enough to be seen with the naked eye!  We were able to identify it quickly, but Eric wanted to up the ante and get a telescope.  I picked one up from Hobby Lobby, but unfortunately it didn't work well and we weren't able to see anything through it.  Regardless, the kids marveled at the stars and thought it was really cool to be able to see Jupiter.  We also talked about some of the constellations including Orion, which Mom built out of raisins and spaghetti noodles.

Our third science experiment was about mechanical abrasion.  We shook sugar cubes in mason jars to see the effect after 30 seconds and 2 minutes.  Once we had observe that the corners had worn away and much had turned to powder, Nolan decided to see how long it would take for the cube to complete turn to powder.  He shook it for 22 minutes and there was still a little bit of the cube left!  He got a good appreciation for how slow of a process weathering and erosion can be!

We picked our pumpkins from Grandma's garden, which has been the tradition since Nolan was little.