Homeschool Highlights Weeks 5 & 6 (2018-19)

We have had some great Bible lessons the past few weeks.  Our topics have been God is Holy, God is Almighty, God is Faithful, God Has Many Names, and God Made all Things.  In addition to these devotions we read a lot of scripture verses every day and sing a few Bible songs.  Each week we have a memory verse.  They finished up memorizing all the verses of Psalm 1 and also memorized Genesis 1:1.

In our Spanish lessons we learn one verse and song each month in Spanish.  This month they are learning Genesis 1:1 (in both languages).  They are also learning the hymn How Great Thou Art in Spanish.  I am also teaching this verse and hymn to the kids in my village Bible studies this month.

This year we are using this book by Wycliffe to learn about different people groups and pray for them.  Our first group to learn about was the Arop people in Papua New Guinea.  What a joy to hear my boys pray for this group of people each day.  We will learn about a different group each week.  I look forward to this study over the school year.

While Cruz has been busy learning his multiplication facts, Ben's math lessons have focused on addition facts and place value. 

Ben working on a keyboarding lesson.

Cruz doing a Science worksheet

Ben working on a handwriting assignment.

In History we are still studying Ancient Egypt.  We began using this book in week 6.  The boys are learning so many fun facts from it. 

In Reading, Cruz has read stories about the States of North Dakota and Minnesota. He is also reading through this book by Clyde Robert Bulla.  Sonlight uses a lot of his books and so far we have loved them all.

In Science we are continuing our study of animals around the world.  Over the past two weeks we have focused on animals that live in North and South America.  We have learned about the rainforest, the Amazon, the Rocky Mountain region, the prairies, the Sonoran Desert, and the Florida Everglades.  The boys have both always had a big interest in animals so this study has really kept their attention well.

Each day as part of our lesson we have several video links to watch about the specific animals that we studied that day.  They love the videos!  So far this school year their very favorite of all has been the youtube links for Breaking Trail on The Brave Wilderness Channel.  They love Coyote Peterson who hosts it.  Even when they are not in school they are asking to watch more of his videos on youtube. 

Each day as part of our lesson the boys have to cut out animals and glue them into the right habitat section.  This is their finished sheet from North America.  You can see some of the specific animals we studied.  

As part of our animal study we took a recent field trip to the zoo in Guatemala City to see some of the animals in person.  We always enjoy a visit to the zoo!

Our science experiment topic was on Water's "skin".  Our first experiment had us drop coins into a full glass of water to watch it form a bulge on top.  Here they are ready to experiment.

I first had them guess how many coins they could drop before the water spilled over.  It held more than they thought.

so much fun!

Next we tried to float a needle on the water's "skin".   It was harder than we thought but we did it.  We used a spoon to gently slide the needle on the surface of the water.

Here is our needle floating.  We then took a straw, dipped it in dish liquid, and touched the surface of the water with it.  The dish liquid makes the skin weaker so it stretches.  It gets too stretchy to hold up the needle and so it sinks. 

Who doesn't love blowing bubbles?  Another experiment we did was mix dish liquid with water to make bubbles.  The mixture had a very stretchy skin.  We took some wire and made a homemade loop.   The boys got to use it to blow bubbles.  We noticed the skin across the loop and how it stretched when they blew to form a bubble. 

We also used just our soapy hands to blow bubbles.  At first the boys did not believe they could do it without the wire.

 Ben's surprised face when he did it.

It worked really well if you formed your hands like this. They were fascinated.

He loved that he could wiggle his finger inside the bubble without it popping. We love science!

In art we studied texture.  They had to draw an outdoor scene that had objects with texture or repeated patterns.  Here is what they drew.

Ben's artwork

Cruz's artwork

Lastly, we changed out our schoolroom door for the month of September and added a fall theme.  We will plan to add more to it throughout October.  We do not have a fall season here but we celebrate it anyway.  The colors of fall just make me happy.