Unit 6: Preparing

History: We are continuing to enjoy our time in Ancient Egypt. In our Grandpa's Box book, Grandpa is telling stories of Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and how the Hebrew people ended up in Egypt.

In her Draw and Write through History Sis drew a Spinx and a picture of Joseph this week.

In our "Tirzah," book for story time, we are reading about a young Hebrew girl and her family. Moses has led them out of Egypt and she crossed the Red Sea with her cousins. Now they are facing heat and thirst in the desert as they follow the cloud of God to the promised land. It is fun to put yourself into the story and feel the emotions and fears that the Hebrew people (especially the children) may have been feeling.
 
We added Joseph to our timeline and we used a globe and maps to locate the land of Cannan, Egypt, Goshen and the Red Sea.

Sis had 2 history projects this week! The first was to research an Egyptian Crook. We learned that the crook (a shepherd's staff with a hook on the end) and a flail were symbols the Pharaoh's used to symbolize being King (or a shepherd) over the people and the land.  She made her crook out of white construction paper rolled up, foil for the hook, painters tape and yellow marker to decorate it.

Her second project was to make Egyptian pastries. We learned that Egyptians were known for their bread. Joseph's brothers also came to buy grain from Egypt. Our pastries look a little like cinnamon rolls, but they are honey flavored not cinnamon. I thought they tasted gross and had too much honey, but all the kids ate them

Reading: Book project week! Sis officially finished her historical fiction genera in the "Drawn Into the Heart of Reading," curriculum. She read both "Little Women," (which takes place during the Civil War) and "Sarah Plain and Tall," (which takes place on a prairie during the pioneer days.) At the end of each genera she has a book project to complete. Her project for historical fiction was to choose one of the two books for a "scraps from the past activity." This involved making a 5 page scrapbook/diary about the book. She had to imagine that she lived in the time period of the book and was friends with the main character. She then had to write 5 diary entries describing what happened that day (answering who, what, when, where, and why?) She also had to paste illustrations that she drew in her scrapbook. She chose to do Sarah Plain and Tall and imagined that she was best friends with Anna (the 12 year old main character.) Sis enjoys things like this so she had no problem doing the assignment on her own with little help from me. I'm letting Sis have total control over which genera she wants to do next. She picked "adventure." She next week we will begin our adventure!

Science:

In science we finished up learning about the skeletal system. We did the second half of our bone experiment that we started last week. Our chicken bones soaked for 5 days. One in vinegar and the other in water. We discovered that the bone soaked in vinegar was bendable and soft, while the bone in water was still "hard as a bone!" Vinegar takes the calcium out of the bone. So we discovered just how important calcium is to make our bones strong and healthy...bring on the milk!
 The final thing we did for bones was add bones to our "personal person project." This is a year long project in her notebooking journal. Each time that we finish learning about an organ system we will add it to a picture of Sis that we made. for some reason this project cracks us up every time we look at it.