Tuesday is Art Day

I'm really starting to look forward to Tuesdays.  I had TBear signed up for professional art lessons for the first two school quarters, but he wasn't having as much fun as it was costing me money, so I decided to can the art lessons.  Don't get me wrong, the teacher was lovely and very knowledgeable, but she just didn't mesh with what TBear and I were hoping for or expecting to get out of it.  Who knows why.

It occurred to me that I had paid for many art lessons for Riss, who is actually a very talented artist.  So I asked if she would be willing to come share some of her knowledge with her brother (and me!) and continue our Tuesday afternoon art classes at home.  I wish I'd thought of this sooner!  We have had the best time for the past month or so painting and visiting with Riss.  The best part is that I get to "do" art too!  (I think I was a deprived child in that subject.)

We're studying the 1800's in history this year, and one of the books we're reading is Monet and the Impressionists for Kids, so it made sense to me to try out some 19th century artists' styles.  Rissie's assignments don't always stick to that century in artists or art styles - she tends to flit around in the subject, rather like a butterfly - but we did do one fun project on pointillism that I'll share, primarily because we've finally finished it!  The pictures we painted are copies of works we liked by Georges Seurat.   Riss took hers home before I could photograph it, but if she brings it back, I'll add it to the post.

Pointillism takes patience.  And practice.  We're not ready to quit our day jobs yet, but it was fun, and we have a new appreciation for gifted artists.

Chemical Reactions: a Science Experiment

This year we're enjoying the General Science course written by Dr. Jay Wile.  TBear recently did an experiment on chemical reactions that was kind of fun... and funny.

The set-up was to boil a few leaves of red cabbage in some water, then add the bluish water to  vinegar in a 2L bottle.  Next, he was to put some baking soda into a 6-9" balloon.  He was supposed to attach the balloon to the top of the bottle without letting any of the baking soda fall into it just yet.  So while I boiled the cabbage for him, TBear went in search of a balloon.

 
Unfortunately all we had were those tiny water balloons.  Then TBear hit on the brilliant idea of a rubber glove from the barn.  I wasn't sure it was a brilliant idea yet : ), but it was an experiment, and the glove was about the right size, so why not.

 Pouring the bluish cabbage water into the vinegar

Getting that glove with the baking soda in it rubber banded to the top of the bottle was interesting. Here he is adding the baking soda from the glove into the blue vinegar

 Whoa!  The glove worked!  Apparently there was enough carbon dioxide produced to inflate the glove.  (The baking soda combined with the vinegar produced carbon dioxide, sodium acetate and water.)

And the more you shook the bottle to mix up the baking soda, the bigger the glove got.

 

Fortunately I took pictures because he was also supposed to notice the change in the color of the vinegar water from blue to pink and back to blue again as a second chemical reaction was taking place.  TBear commented on it, but then had to think about it when the question was asked. : )  The second reaction happened as the vinegar was used up.  Something from the red cabbage (anthocyanin) interacted with the vinegar to turn the water pink.  As the vinegar was used up in the baking soda reaction, the water returned to its blue color.

I love fun science!  I also love the creativity of TBear.  I never would have thought of the glove; I'd have just put the experiment off until after I'd found a balloon.

A Visit to the Aquarium

This year TBear has been studying marine biology for science. We used Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day by Apologia, and loved it. At the end of each week's lesson, TBear wrote a paragraph about what he'd learned, and often did a related experiment. Writing and narrating about what he's learned is wonderful, but the highlight of the lessons was creating a clay replica of some of the creatures he studied.

TBear created an aquarium from a box by lining the top and sides with blue paper, and the bottom of it with yellowish paper. Each week, after he finished the unit, he would make a clay or paper replica of the creatures he studied. While it may have seemed redundant in addition to the narrating and writing, it very nicely solidified in his mind the anatomy of the creatures as he tried to recreate them accurately for his aquarium box.

Here are some pictures of the end result. He was very proud of it, and I thought it turned out pretty darned good too!


I love the clay squid on the right side, and the humpback whale breaching. TBear's favorite pieces were the sea lion on the rock (on top of the box), the squid, the nudibranch, and the bright pink sea anemone. :-)

I also really liked how the bright pink sea anemone turned out (next to the sponge on the left.) He used Sculpey oven bake clay to make most of the creatures. Because the oven is only set to about 275 degrees, and the baking only takes from 4 to 10 minutes depending on the density of the object, he just baked the creature with the pipe cleaners in it.


Recently, on Memorial Day weekend, TBear went camping in Boothbay with some friends. The small but impressive Maine State Aquarium in Boothbay was only a few miles down the road from the campground. On Sunday, Whit and I drove down to Boothbay, and my friend Sonia and I took TBear to the aquarium. (We were sad that TBear's friend came down with a fever about the time we arrived. He stayed behind in the camper with his dad and Whit, poor baby.) As we wandered around the aquarium, I was tickled to hear TBear sharing so much of what he remembered from his science.

We thought the sea anemones were pretty neat. All the creatures in this aquarium can be found in the Atlantic waters off our coast here in Maine.

One of the highlights was a touch tank with a few dogfish sharks and two skates in it. The dogfish shark acted just like a dog, pushing its snout up out of the water and wanting to be petted! The aquarium docent explained that they might have gotten the name dogfish because they like to hunt in packs, but I'm pretty sure it's because they like to be pet like a dog does. The docent explained that the shark's skin actually has a lot of nerve endings and it really does like the feeling of being stroked. It was a pretty interesting experience. We learned this year that dogfish sharks' skin feels rough if you pet them from snout to tail (and doesn't feel good to them) because it is made up of scales called dermal denticles, which are basically tiny, sharp spikes (i.e. "teeth") that point in the direction of the tail.

Finally, TBear spent some time at the shallow tank, which had starfish, sea cucumbers, scallops, horseshoe crabs, hermit crabs, spider crabs, and other small creatures that one could pick up and look at more closely. It was kind of interesting picking up the horseshoe crab. They tend to whip their tails forward as you turn them over in sort of an en garde position to defend their tender undersides.

I can't believe I didn't think to get a picture of the lobsters! One was distinctly half blue, half yellow due to a strange genetic anomaly kind of like albinism. The line of color went from eyes to tail with the left half being blue, and the right half yellow. While Whit and I have been diving for lobsters in the distant past, and we used a scale to determine whether they were "keepers" or not, I just learned that there is actually an upper size limit on lobsters. Their carapace has to measure between 3 1/2 and 5 inches for them to be keepers. Anything larger than 5 inches has to be tossed back. It takes about 7 years for a lobster to reach the 3 1/2 inch minimum carapace length. My guess is that because it takes so long for the lobsters to grow to a minimum "keeper" length, by returning lobsters over 5 inches to the sea, they're allowed to continue reproducing as long as they live (which can be decades), thus avoiding being overfished. (There are a LOT of lobsters being shipped out of Maine each year, as well as being consumed here.)

All in all, we thought the trip to the aquarium was a great way to wrap up our study of marine biology this year.

Tapestry of Grace Year 1, Unit 3 Wrap-Up

We spent last week wrapping up projects and reviewing the third quarter of our history studies.

TBear learned that after the reign of King Solomon, around 931 B.C., the Kingdom of Israel was divided into the Northern Kingdom of Israel (with ten of the original twelve tribes) and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. The Northern Kingdom endured centuries of spiritual decay and political upheaval until finally it was conquered and destroyed by the Assyrians, the people deported and scattered. Lasting a little longer, eventually Judah became more and more corrupt until God must judge them too. Judah was conquered by the Babylonians, who then deported the Jewish people to Babylon. TBear drew a beautiful picture of the Ishtar Gate in Babylon, through which conquered prisoners were marched, and I thought I had a photo of it, but I don't. (I know it's part of the A-Z History book he is compiling so when that is done, I'll post a photo of that.)

Next we noted that the Persian empire rose to conquer the Babylonians (and everyone else) and freed the Jews to return to their homeland. The Persians set their sights on lands to the west. In our study of the Persian wars we saw that the Greeks successfully prevented the Persians from conquering any of the lands west of Greece. However, after uniting to fight a common enemy, the Greeks fought between themselves, which brought our studies to the Peloponnesian Wars and the achievements of the Greeks. TBear was especially interested in the Spartans and Athenians. We spent quite some time creating armor for a Greek Hoplite warrior. He was fascinated by their weapons too, but we skipped reproducing those for now.

The first project was to create a pair of greaves, which are the shinguards worn by the Hoplites. Next he designed and made a cool shield out of foamboard. The final project was to make a helmet out of a paper paint bucket, but do you think I could find a paper paint bucket?? They make metal and plastic ones now, but the paper ones that can be cut up are hard to find around here apparently.

So we bought some poster board and he designed a helmet along the lines of a paint bucket. First he drew a circle, which he "smushed" into an oval for the top of the helmet.Measuring the circumference of his head plus a little breathing room, he cut a rectangular piece of poster board for the side of the helmet. (The really cool thing about that was that we had just studied calculating perimeters and areas of circles. I love applied math.) Next, he cut the eyes and nose piece out, along with notches for the helmet to sit over his shoulders.
After some experimenting, we decided that gluing and taping to hold the glue till it dried worked best to assemble the top and sides of the helmet.
The flat top was made round by folding pieces of newspaper and taping it to the top.
Originally, the intention was just to papier-mache the top part, but TBear decided he wanted to make the whole helmet more rigid, so he papier-mached the whole thing.

After some brass-colored spray paint and a red plume, the helmet was finished. I thought he did a fabulous job.
Here's the whole Hoplite assembly. It really brings home the difference in climate between Maine and Greece this early in the spring! :)

Here's Sunshine watching the progress of the project with his buddies. : )Since using the Excellence in Writing curriculum this year, TBear's writing has improved drastically. Not only that, it's a lot less painful than it used to be to get him to write. He is actually enjoying creating his A-Z History book. The paper below is about the Hoplites and their wonderful weapons, which he presented at our small celebration.
TBear made up a shopping list for me and we created a Greek meal for our celebration too. We had a nice selection of olives, feta cheese, and hummus with pita bread to start with. Then we made some grilled chicken with sourdough bread and olive oil for dipping. For dessert we had slices of pound cake with warm honey drizzled on top. We also bought some figs to try. Truth be told, we prefer them in the fig newtons. :) However, we all agreed we liked this meal a lot.
Next up, we take a look at the Etruscans and the founding of Rome. More fun projects are in store for us. TBear informed me this morning that he's already read David McCauley's book, "City" and would like to create some models of Roman architecture and engineering.
It's working for me.

Tapestry Of Grace Year 1, Unit 2 is done

Last week, we finally wrapped up our second unit of Tapestry of Grace history. We didn't do as many projects for the second unit as we did for the first unit; however, TBear enjoyed the ones we did attempt. Because we tried our hands at weaving and making cylinder seals for the first unit, we didn't repeat those projects this time. However, after looking at beautiful pictures in The Story of Painting by Sister Wendy Beckett the week we studied the early Greeks, TBear wanted to try his hand at painting a fresco. The project turned out to be harder than it looked. First TBear drew a picture, copying a pair of dolphins from a picture of one of the frescoes in the Palace of Knossos, on the island of Crete. Then we mixed up a foil pan of plaster of paris.

While the plaster was still wet, TBear laid the picture gently on top of it and traced his dolphins. That was an interesting race. The paper started to sink into the plaster faster than he could lightly trace.

After carefully trying to remove the picture without lifting up his traced lines or the plaster with it, TBear painted the wet plaster. He had to work fast so the plaster didn't dry before he finished his painting.

Here is the finished fresco. TBear gained a new appreciation for the artists who painted the beautiful frescoes in ancient Greece. And isn't that what the projects are all about sometimes? :)

Another project that interested TBear was creating a map of ancient Israel and her neighbors. Over the course of a few weeks, he continued to add to it. It was fascinating to note the route Joshua took when he went into the Promised Land, and to look at pictures of the geography of Israel and the surrounding countries. The first thing TB did was to denote and color the territories of the twelve tribes of Israel. As we continued to study her ancient neighbors - the Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites, Amorites, Hittites, Philistines, and Phoenicians - TBear added a picture and some pertinent information about each country to his map. I was surprised at how much he really enjoyed this project. It certainly cemented the knowledge he acquired.

Finally, as we wrapped up our second unit with a study of the Phoenicians in conjunction with our study of King Saul and King David, making models of a Phoenician warship and an amphora was too much fun to pass up. Here are the finished products.

From what TBear has indicated, I suspect we'll be doing another interesting map of trade routes and goods in the Mediterranean and mideast as we investigate King Solomon's relationship with the Phoenician traders.

M is for Monday

It doesn't seem so very long ago that TBear was the Sunshine's age when I was trying to do school with Nutmeg and Rissie. My grandson, Sunshine, is visiting us this week, so I had to refresh my memory this morning... What did we used to let TBear do while I was trying to teach new things to his big sisters? Besides his obvious love for his cars, we discovered Sunny likes to color.
So we set him up with his cars and some colored pencils and paper, while TBear worked on his math assignment.
After awhile, Sunny decided he liked TBear's lap better. TBear didn't mind the help with his spelling words at all. He's really enjoying having his nephew around for awhile.

In fact, TBear even informed me that he really likes sharing his bottom bunkbed with Sunny at night. Isn't life grand? : )