Concept Week #14: Life Cycles

This Concept Week was super easy, however the boys loved it so I have no complaints. Actually, Optimus Prime picked out this unit. I was at www.education.com trying to figure out what we wanted to do when he saw a sheet where you glue pictures of frog eggs, tadpoles, and adults into the correct order. He wanted to do it so I spent the day printing up a TON of sheets. They had coloring sheets as well as gluing sheets. They covered plants (corn, pumpkin, etc.), animals (reptiles, amphibians, fish, birds, and mammals - including humans), and bugs (lots and lots and LOTS of bugs!).

Like I said, some sheets were for coloring, some were for gluing, and there was some overlap in them (grasshoppers and butterflies, for example, had a coloring and a gluing page). It covered how life starts as an egg (either inside a mammal or laid somewhere) then turns to a hatched (or birthed) baby, which ultimately grows into an adult who has more babies.

Was it a very basic concept for second graders? Yes. I think even for first graders (though that was the heading I found the sheets under). But they enjoyed it, even if it was easy, and they were excited to learn some of the interesting facts that went along with some of the pages. We had never really covered the idea of death before in our schoolwork - beyond talking about mummies - so we got to go over that a bit too. Eventually the mommies & daddies stop having babies, and as the babies grow the mommies & daddies age and begin to die. This happens sooner in the world of bugs than animals, but it still happens. We also talked about how some animals (and pretty much all bugs to the best of my knowledge) lay their eggs and leave. They don't stick around to raise the babies like mammals (especially people) do.

So, we got to cover a few different themes with this unit.

We did not have a project. I really couldn't think of an appropriate one to do, and they had so many cutting and gluing pages to do that I felt like we really didn't need one.

On the flip side we did have two books to go with this unit. I was fairly certain we had a Magic School Bus book that covered life cycles, but I couldn't find it. I did, however, find two other Magic School Bus books that covered the topic. The Magic School Bus Goes Upstream: A Book About the Salmon Migration and The Magic School Bus Plants Seeds: A Book About How Living Things Grow. The first one obviously covers the salmon migration. But, in case you don't know, the salmon go upstream to lay their eggs then they leave them. The eggs hatch and the babies find their way home. The second one covers plants going from seed to plant to seed again. We had already read the second one for our kindergarten Concept Week on gardening, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to read it again.

So there we go, our first 2nd grade Concept Week!

Concept Unit #13: Dinosaurs

This Concept Unit (renamed from Concept Week for the simple fact that it wasn't a week long...) lasted three whole months and covered nothing but dinosaurs! My kids were in heaven.

There was quite a few differences. Instead of worksheets they had an entire workbook, there was no set project to do because the workbook was filled with projects and games, and there was no book or storybook to go along with the unit because we had an entire 300 or so page workbook to do. No need for overkill here!

The book we used was called Science Essentials: Dinosaurs Grades 1-3. I have to admit, even though it was a 1st grade book a lot of the stuff in there was over their heads and kinda boring. Most of it consisted of page after page after page of dinosaur, Pangaea, climate, landscape, paleontology, etc. facts that you would read about and then answer questions for. There was some fun stuff (dot-to-dots, mazes, picture finds, etc) and a LOT of math pages. And, like I said, some games (dominoes, rummy, and other easy games) and projects to do (homemade dinosaur digs, making a dinosaur playset, making a macaroni dinosaur, etc.).

All in all they had a blast doing a dinosaur unit that lasted the whole summer. I just wish it had been more their level. It was really largely a level where kids can read those big words and answer those questions completely on their own. So I guess 3rd grade more than 1st... Then there were some really easy pages that were honestly more kindergarten than 1st grade. However, I suppose that's the problem with a text book that tries to cover so many grade levels in one book. Some stuff will be too easy, some stuff too hard.

Still, they had fun for their final 1st grade Concept Unit and that's really all that matters.

2nd Grade Spelling Units #1-12

Here it is! The Spelling Units! It's almost halfway through the quarter, but hey, you know...

SOME OF THESE WORDS ARE REPEATS FROM FIRST GRADE!

These units are based on some spelling pages inside one of the workbooks I bought for them. They are all fairly easy words, quite a few of them were done in 1st grade, but that's okay. Repetition doesn't hurt anyone, unless it gets boring. Right now, it's not boring, so it's okay. Plus, this will help reinforce sounding out unknown words (for Optimus Prime) and learning how to read (for Bumblebee).

Unfortunately I don't think there will be any holiday units this year after all of these are done. :(

Unit #1 - Numbers
one
two
three
four
five
six
seven
eight
nine
ten

Unit #2 - Short a Words
bat
cat
fat
gnat
hat
mat
pat
rat
sat
vat

Unit #3 - Short a Words Part 2
camp
clamp
damp
lamp
ramp
stamp
bath
math
path
wrath

Unit #4 - Short a Words Part 3
an
ban
can
clan
fan
man
pan
ran
tan
van

Unit #5 - Long a Words
bail
fail
hail
mail
nail
pail
quail
rail
sail
tail

Unit #6 - Long a Words Part 2
came
fame
game
lame
name
same
tame
fade
made
wade

Unit #7 - Long a Words Part 3
faint
paint
quaint
saint
taint
bain
main
pain
rain
train

Unit #8 - Long a Words Part 4
bake
cake
fake
lake
make
quake
rake
snake
take
wake

Unit #9 - Long a Words Part 5
clay
day
gray
hay
pay
play
say
stay
tray
way

Unit #10 - Long a Words Part 6
bale
dale
female
gale
kale
male
pale
sale
tale
whale

Unit #11 - Short o Words
blot
cot
dot
got
hot
lot
not
pot
rot
slot

Unit #12 - Short o Words Part 2
flop
hop
mop
plop
pop
slop
stop
top
box
fox

Ghost Detectors

For the record, we have NOT finished the Ghost Detectors series. I have no idea how many books are in it, what I do know is our library only has the first six and book seven is currently going on amazon for $25 new/$42 used. Ummmm, yeah, no, I don't think so. If our local library ever gets more, we'll read them. If not, we'll call it good at six.

Synopsis - Malcolm loves science, ghosts, and ordering new gadgets from the back of magazines. Most of the gadgets are fake, but one day he orders a specter detector that can really detect ghosts. This leads him and his best friend Dandy to investigate local hauntings.

Wandering Falcon - "Okay, I really wanted to like these books and I really didn't. As we read on they started to grow on me but they were definitely aimed towards young kids. The passages on Cocoa's make-up misadventures were funny."

Optimus Prime - "They were okay. The two kids were good at doing it."

Bumblebee - "They were good. The ghost dog was named Spooky and he was silly and he just yip, yip, yiped whenever he appeared."

Ghost Detectors by Dotti Enderle

1. It Creeps!
2. I'm Gonna Get You!
3. Tell No One!
4. I Dare You!
5. Draw!
6. Don't Read This!

Two Week Review: August 3 - August 16

If you've been following my other blog then you know why I haven't been posting lately. If you haven't, well, it's not a topic for this blog. However, I'm determined to start catching up, so here is a post that should of gone up weeks ago.

Our first two weeks saw some new things and some old things. New things? Religion lessons. We learned about Isis and Osiris. Sort of newish things? Some Sign Language. Okay, that's it, I'm out of new and newish things. I guess it was just one new thing.

For our Concept Week we covered Life Cycles. Hopefully there will be a post up about it tomorrow. Don't hold your breath. English was a bunch of reading comprehension. Math was reviewing numbers, shapes, counting by 5's and 10's, as well as basic addition and second grade addition. Optimus Prime insisted on doing second grade addition even though he wasn't ready for it, then was miserable and complained the whole time we did it. Fun. Not. Spelling has a bunch of new (easy) words. This whole year it'll be based on words that end the same or have similar sounds. They had some pages in one of their workbooks that I'm basing the entire years units on. It'll be easy units, but I think it'll be good for them. Art was a project, of course. Painting it was, though we are doing something neat soon that I look forward to posting about.

Then, of course, we practiced Handwriting, did some fun Logic (there was picture finds, mazes, and even hangman). We learned about farm animals in Science, prompting Bumblebee to beg me to buy a beef roast and some mutton. The mutton is in the freezer for now, and against my better judgement I bought and cooked a beef roast. They didn't touch it. Of course. I knew that was the way it would go down...

As for Reading, Optimus Prime has been switching back an forth between Level 1 and Level 2 books and he's doing great. Bumblebee is jealous and is working on Level 1 books while insisting he should be reading Level 2 books. However, he struggles so much with Level 1 I don't see that happening anytime soon.

What is Scooby-Doo up to? Numbers, Letters, Coloring, Logic (this week it was shapes). He's doing good. He's also turning into a little chatterbox. Soon speech therapy will start up for him again and I'm not sure he really needs it anymore... Which reminds me, Optimus Prime started physical therapy for his feet and right leg, which is longer than his left. It's for 4-6 weeks.

That's it for tonight.

2nd Grade Reading List Part 1 & Book Reports

Okay, this quarter we have some reading goals:

• Optimus Prime just learned how to read and is ready to move beyond Level 1 books, so he'll be working on Level 1 &2. I don't want to completely cut off Level 1 yet, I want to make sure he has it down a bit better, he still stumbles on a word here and there. I'm thinking a 1:1 or 1:2 ratio (Level 1:Level 2). He'll also work on reading completely on his own. Right now I hold the book, help him out, etc., but I'm going to hand the book off to him and see how he does all on his own.
• Bumblebee needs to work on getting Level 1 down on his own, but to be honest I don't see that happening this quarter.

Then, we also have our chapter book goal list. And, SOMEHOW, we missed a book AGAIN from our February-April goal list:

• Ballpark Mysteries: The Fenway Foul-Up

I would say we are doing that one first, but the problem is I just took the last two Ghost Detector books from the library, so clearly we will be doing THOSE two first. However, the Ballpark Mystery one will be next, I mean third, I mean... I promise... ?

Anyway, here are our book goals for this quarter:

• Ghost Detectors: Draw!
• Ghost Detectors: Don't Read This!
• Clue Jr: The Case of the Missing Movie
• Magic Tree House: Hour of the Olympics
• Magic Tree House: Tonight on the Titanic
• Magic Tree House: Buffalo Before Breakfast
• Magic Tree House: Tigers at Twilight
• Magic Tree House: Dingoes at Dinnertime
• Magic Tree House: Civil War on Sunday
• Batman: Arctic Attack
• Batman: Harley Quinn's Shocking Surprise
• Batman: The Man Behind the Mask
• Batman: Catwoman's Classroom of Claws
• Batman: The Maker of Monsters
• Wonder Woman: Creature of Chaos
• Wonder Woman: The Fruit of all Evil

Two things:

(1) We're still doing book reports. Right now it's really easy, just a sentence about the book and a picture from the book. I've written up 14 of those forms (each), then after those 14 are used up I'm going to change things a little. They'll have to name their favorite character from the book and their favorite scene in addition to what they already have to do.

(2) I've upped our reading goal. From Day 1 it's been 1 book a week for a total of 13 books, though we've always read AT LEAST double (and usually triple or more) that. I've added 3 books to our goal (raising it about a quarter). Maybe I'll raise it again next quarter, maybe not. Once they are reading chapter books on their own I'll be reading longer, harder books to them so I won't be reading as many titles a quarter. So it's not like 13 is a forever number or anything.

Two Week Review: July 20 - August 2

Final Two Week Review for this quarter AND for 1st grade!!! YES!!!

I'm just excited because I have big, big, BIG news! Optimus Prime just mastered reading!!! (It was a few days ago now...) He's got level 1 books down and is doing really good on level 2 books! Not so much for his VERY jealous brother Bumblebee, but, like I told Bumblebee, he's good at math, his brother is good at reading.

So, on another note, they had a week of fitness class, followed by a 1k race on the 2nd. Their first race! I didn't realize it would be so easy or I would of signed Scooby-Doo up too. However, they are having one again in September, so I'm signing up all three kids!

Final notes! No schoolwork for Scooby-Doo. I decided we'll restart Week 2 of next quarter.

In Math all we did was review money. In Spelling all we did was our review words. Optimus Prime did so good he didn't have Spelling for the last week! Bumblebee was jealous... again. In English we did a "Three Billy Goats Gruff" unit followed by riddles and periods. Finally in Dinosaurs we did the Cretaceous Period. I already covered reading up above, so I think that's it...

Second grade, here we come!