Summer School

While everyone else is finished with school and gearing up for the summer, we are still finishing up 1st grade curriculum. I decided that a year-around approached works better for our family because we like to take LOTS of breaks during the year. I think, after two years of homeschooling, that I've finally come up with the best schedule for our family: year-around with 3 weeks on and 1 week off, with that week off being whenever we need it to be. The hardest part to homeschooling is probably breaking out of the public school mold and realizing that we don't have to follow their schedule... so we aren't! During the summer, there will still be lots of time for play. But when it's too hot outside to do anything and we would just be inside anyway, we'll be here, having school.

Here are just a few of the projects that we've done so far this year, mostly in history class:

Sugar-Cube Pyramids

The Nile River: we built a channel down the middle and lined it with foil. Then we spread grass seed all over the surrounding dirt. Instead of watering the seeds directly, we only watered the river until it flooded all over the dirt. This was the result.

This was a math project when we were studying the different times of day.

These are our Anansi spiders when we were studying ancient African legends.

Here are the kids in their homemade beards, which we made when we were studying Queen Hatshepsut.

Here is a sticker project that we did with Moses and the Ten Plagues. The best part about homeschool is that we have the opportunity to include religious historical events right where they belong in world history. It has really opened my eyes when it comes to reading the Old Testament.

These are the Greek sculptures that we made out of bars of soap. The top two are more of a bas relief while the bottom is an actual sculpture. The top one is a fish, the middle is Egyptian hyroglyphics (yes, it is a greek sculpture of egyptian hyroglyphics), and the bottom one is a turtle.

Well, those are just a few of the fun things that we've had the opportunity to do this year! I can't wait to do more... school is just as much fun for me as it is for the kids.