It is finished! Hooray for everyone for finishing strong. My congratulations to everyone. It has been a privilege to have the opportunity to have work with your kids and you, too. I have to admit I was really scared at the beginning of the year... and now... I have to say, I enjoyed every moment of it. It was fun learning along side the kids and to be able to really enjoy the learning process is an added bonus.
Thank you Mrs. Culpepper for the review on Dvorak and Brahms. For reading about these composers, see previous post. And by the way, I'd like to share a book we just read about the orchestra that has an audio recording "The Remarkable Farkle McBride" Check this site for the musical adaptation of the story as read by the author (John Lithgow) himself. You can hear the different instruments distinctly. I think the site is a classical music station for kids and that is one of their episode (51:26 minutes in all) if you just want that section start at 35:14.
New Grammar
Presidents: Song - CC CD
It is the presidents' song and I am very glad that most of them knows it well. We did a round robin thing where each child name the president one at a time in order. We sang through it a couple of times. Thank you for working with them the last two weeks. We just finished reading "Don't know much about the Presidents" by Kenneth Davis. It is a wonderful book on little trivia and facts about our former presidents with a Timeline included.
If you are interested in doing a president's lapbook, this is a wonderful site. And the best thing is it is free. Have fun... may be a wonderful project for the summer.
History: Song - CC CD
We sang through the song lots of times. I sort of explain what apartheid is and how the black people were not allowed to even vote and when President de Klerk allowed free election, Nelson Mandela, who is a black person, became the president. So from not being allowed to vote, now he is president. And I did mention (maybe some of them might have heard on the news), that Nelson Mandela died recently (I might have mentioned early this year, I stand corrected, it is late last year). The hand motions are below which I am very surprised they gladly did.
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South
African Pres.
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The S-hand moves downward,
transition to an A-hand.
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Free
elections
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Left hand fist, right hand draws something out of the fist.
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Nelson
Mandela
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N-hand transitions to M-hand.
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1st black
president
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Flash 1 finger; salute for president
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Apartheid
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Palm-in thumbs-up A-hands begin midline with knuckles touching and
then pull apart.
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Latin: Song - CC CD
This is a review of last week's. And I went through all six memory work for Latin, with all the hints given to them. They did pretty well.
Math: Song - NoGreaterJoy
Identity law for Addition and Multiplication. I have an illustration for this one (which will be sent to you via email). A person (hence, identity), if you add nothing will still be the same person. And that same person, multiplied by one is still the same person. We sang through the song a lot of times (feels like 100 times). They seem to get the law, some of them might need help memorizing the law.
English: Song - NoGreaterJoy
I wrote "Wow!" and "Oh my!" on the board to show them that interjection can be a word or a phrase. We read through the sentence a couple of times and sang through it lots of times with strong feelings and emotions. I did mention that the interjection is grammatically unconnected to a sentence (this phrase is part of the song).
interjection - Hands on fist, arm bent, punch upward
strong - Show your muscle on one arm
expression - Same arm, move fist to heart
feeling - Right palm opens and moves away from chest
emotion - Left hand palm opens and moves away from chest, too
Science: Song - NoGreaterJoy
This is my favorite part of the day because after researching on how to explain it to the children, I found an illustration (which I will send via email), that made me understand what is the difference is between ohms, volts, amperes and watts. This is also a good analogy and explanation of the units of electricity. If you see the illustration, I explained that amperes is the electrical current flowing (that's why amperes is trying to move through the tunnel), volt is the pressure that push amperes (hence volt is kicking amperes), ohms is the resistance, i.e., the size of the tunnel (that's why ohms is holding the rope to tighten the tunnel) and watts is the end - the power that comes out. Now, you understand why I like this so much because now, I understand it so much better, too. We sang through the song a lot of times and I believe the children got it (hopefully).
Geography: Point, say and trace
We went through the different countries of South Africa. And I think they are having a hard time remembering Namibia. Work on that with them... we added a bonus country from Cycle 1, Zimbabwe, which is between Botswana and Mozambique.
Review is "Sudden Death", we went through every subject from week 19 -24 and each child had a chance to answer, if they can't answer, the next child gets the chance. They did pretty well adding to their ticket collection.
The "AUCTION" - the activity the children have been waiting for since the beginning of the day. It was a very good learning experience for both the children and the parents... Thank you so much Miss Monika for handling the auction for me. I hope your children got what they wanted. I wanted the gifts to be an encouragement for them. Just think of it, they were not suppose to get anything at the end but ended up having lots of things to bring home for their hard work throughout the year. Isn't that nice. Thanks for everyone's participation.
Book recommendation for the week:
The End of Apartheid A New South Africa by Richard Tames
Cool! Whoa! Ah and Oh! What is an Interjection? by Brian Cleary
Science Works Charged Up: The story of Electricity by Jacqui Bailey
The Magic School Bus and the Electric Field Trip by Joanna Cole
It has been a wonderful year and I'd say, we all enjoyed the ride along the way... at least I know I did. Thank you again for the opportunity you've given me to work with your children. Signing off now. Have a wonderful summer.
Miss Zabrina
