Unit 2: Preparing

We had a lot going on this week, so some of our days were more stressful than usual and felt a bit rushed. We made it through though! This is our second week with Preparing Hearts for His Glory. Now that Sis is becoming more familiar with how this program is going to work, some of our assignments are starting to go a little smoother because I don't have to do as much explaining.

History: We took a break from our Grandpa's Box book & project, and we read The Great Ice Age and The True Story of Noah's Ark. We studied what life was probably like after the Great Flood and what might have cause the Ice Age. We also studied "cavemen." We learned that God created humans who were intelligent and made in His image.The people who lived in those days were not primitive evolved animals, as many believe. The True Story of Noah's Ark is a beautifully illustrated story by Answers in Genesis (Creation Museum) that comes with an audio CD. It's packed with information and paints a vivid picture of what life was like in Noah's day. I am so happy to add this to our library.

Sis is learning how to use the computer and reference books to do research this year. Her assignment was to research flood legends around the world. We discovered that just about every culture has a flood story in it's history that has been passed down for generations. Some are very different from Noah's story. However its very likely these legends began as the result of a real event that happened in history and were changed as they were told throughout the years. We read the true account of the Flood in the book of Genesis!

We started our timeline. We decided to make an accordion type timeline this year so that we can fold it up and store it away. We added the first 2 entries and we will add to it all year as we travel through history.

   

Sis also used her Draw& Write through History book to learn how to draw people, an ark, and a giraffe. Then she did her copy work about them.

Art: Last week I totally forgot to post a picture of Sis' shield of faith for her Unit 1 weekly art/history project! Opps! A week late but here it is...









This week we learned about warm and cool colors by making a collage on day 1. Boo joined us for art this week. Then we painted a background for our painting. Sis chose cool colors and Boo chose warm. Then we practiced mixing colors by painting a rainbow onto our dried background using only the 3 primary colors (Red, Blue, and Yellow.) ok we cheated a little...after trying to make purple 3 times we finally gave up and just used purple paint!  I think the finished products turned out pretty good!

 Language:
Sis's vocabulary words this week were: Sulfur, barge, and ancient. She added those to her journal. She got 100 percent on her first spelling test of the year. We also reviewed parts of speech, did a poem study, and going back to our history story she did her first written narration about the Ice Age.

Reading:

We're still reading Little Women as our first book in our Historical Fiction study. This week we looked at "setting" and descriptive words that paint a pictures in our minds.



Science: Sis was so excited to begin science this week (one of her favorite subjects.) The entire year we will be studying the human body using "Apologia Human Anatomy and Physiology." This curriculum is packed full of experiments and activities as well as a science journal for her to record what she's learned.We were not disappointed with the first week of lessons. We started out the year by looking at what different groups of people once believed about the human body. We looked at Ancient Egyptians, Hebrews, Greeks, Romans, and Europeans. When learning about how the Egyptians mummified bodies, we did an experiment using the same basic chemicals to mummify a piece of fruit so that it will not rot. We used 8 apple slices each in a cup with a different combination of chemicals to see which best preserved our apple slices. Here's Sis with the beginning of her "apple mummies."

We also talked about microscopes and lenses ( some of the instruments scientists use to learn about cells and anatomy.) We experimented enlarging words with a drop of water and piece of plastic. Sis was amazed that the water drop acted like a magnifying glass blowing the words in our text book  2x their size.

Math: Sis started her first lesson on division. She did pretty well with it.

Bible:
We started memorizing 2 Samuel 22:32. We're studying how to build our lives on the Rock. God is a great architect who has laid out an awesome plan for our lives. However just like a foolish builder who chooses to ignore the blueprint laid out for him and build the house his own way, many people ignore God's instructions and choose to live their lives their own way. Their 'houses' are falling apart and a mess because they will not listen to God. We looked at 7 ways we can build our lives on God and follow his blueprint for our life.

The one thing I want to change this school year is field trips. Especially with both girl's curriculum being 4 days a week, I want to use as many of those extra school days for field trips, educational experiences for them, extracurricular classes, and spending more time socializing with other homeschoolers. I already have a whole list of ideas for field trips this year. We're hoping to be able to take our first group field trip of the year next week.