Sunday, August 21, 2011

New Find . . . Paper Crafts for ECC, CTG and the rest of the MFW 5 Year Cycle

I was looking for a Roman Colosseum paper craft for my son after he (voluntarily) watched The Torchlighters Series DVD The Perpetua Story. (I cried through the whole ending but that's another story. This might be a good movie for RTR.) After watching the movie he tried making his own paper Colosseum and in my infamous mother/teacher mode I began an online search for a realistic Colosseum.

While looking for a free downloadable Colosseum resource I found this awesome site by Canon (the camera makers). The site was called Canon Creative Park. They had a whole paper craft section. It included animals, architecture, science, toys and more.

I found a few different Eiffel Tower projects if anyone is looking for one for ECC. There were also several other projects that could be used for ECC as well such at the Sydney Opera House or pandas. These would be great projects for older kids or as family projects if paper crafts are of interest.

There were projects that could be used for probably every year in the MFW 5 year cycle. There was a Viking Ship, Sphinx, Statue of Liberty, The Parthenon and even a world globe to name a few. There were simple to difficult animals, a silhouette puzzle (or tangram) and even Matryoshka Dolls. (Again for ECC).

They are located here: http://www.canon.com/c-park/ Click on your language. Then click on 'Paper Crafts'. Then click on your area of interest on the left hand side. The 'Art' section had some origami and 3D paper mosaic projects also.

I also posted this on the MFW message board.

Saturday, August 20, 2011

CTG Week 1

This week was our first full week of school.  We were all still getting into the routine of things and taking it a bit slow.

Our Projects

We completed two similar hands on projects this week.

The first project was the notebook page from the MFW CTG Student Pack.  Instead of having my kids draw in the days of creation I had them use colored paper, stickers and anything else I had on hand that would work.  They really don't like to color or draw too much so they really liked completing the project this way.



The second project was the Days of Creation project from our Old Testament Activity Pak from Homeschool in the Woods.




We also started the art program God and the History of Art.  I have not been able to follow through with a formal art program in the past but I'm hoping to stick with this one this year. 

The kids first lesson was a lesson in frustration.  The book told a little about Joni Eareckson Tada and then challenged the kids to try to draw with a pencil in their mouths.  I looked up some of Joni's artwork online and we also brought up the movie we recently watched, Soul Surfer as we talked about other disabilities and ways to work around them.  As we discussed this the kids got the idea of trying this project with their toes as well!

For more information about Joni you can visit her web site here:

http://www.joniandfriends.org/

Creation Game

For a review of the days of creation I thought we could play a simple game.  I sort of made up my own variaton from two creation game ideas that were listed on the My Father's World Kindergarten Creation week archives board.  I printed the Creation Game Board and Flash Cards found here:  http://sundayschoolsources.com/ottoc.htm.  I then used the game pieces and one die from our Sum Swamp game (any small toy animals or even buttons or beans and die could be used.)

The rules I made up were as follows:

Roll the die.  To move forward you must correctly say what God created on that day.  If you answer incorrectly you lose your turn.  If you answer correctly you move forward the number of spaces you rolled on the die.  If you land on a number on the game board you may move forward that amount of spaces.  If you land on a  negative number you must tell what happened on that corresponding day of creation.  If you are correct you move forward that number of spaces.  If you are incorrect you move back that number of spaces.  To help us remember, as mom would get days 3 and 4 mixed up herself, I laid out the number cards from the flash card deck I printed face down and wrote the numbers on the back. Then the players could self check their answers.  The kids thought it was a fun way to review the Days of Creation.  (This was much easier to say than to write.)



We didn't get to do the Sabbath feast due to scheduling and time conflicts.  :(

Friday, August 19, 2011

Our First Days of School 2011

To keep with tradition we went on our annual Family Field Trip to kick off our new school year.  We went to a small local zoo as we do every year, had a picnic and went to a local museum.  The kids loved it, as always.  :)


The Old Court House.  They don't make 'em like that anymore.
The Court Room

The School Room

Beau on Rotary Phone

Roo on Rotary Phone
Monkey Watching with Dad

The Kids and the Mountain Lion
Our official first day of school included gifts of school supplies (and some fun extras), all about me posters and pages, pictures with their teacher (mom), etc.




We also finally finished our Independence Day lapbook from this summer.



Speaking of summer, when we did do summer school we did a mini study of U.S. history.  We worked on the lapbook, read a few of the books and listened to the Patriotic music CD from when we did MFW ADV and watched a few Liberty's Kids episodes from Netflix.  This was in addition to math and reading.  You can find the lapbook here:  http://www.currclick.com/product_info.php?products_id=37985&it=1

I'll be posting about our first week with MFW CTG soon.

Our 2011-2012 curriculum choices are now posted

Well, I finally have our curriculum choices finalized and posted.  If interested, check the sidebar to the right under 'My Pages' and click on 'Curriculum Choices 2011-2012'.  I'm sure I'll be adding and changing things as the year progresses.  I'll post any additions or changes here on my main blog page.