Catholic Schoolhouse Tour 1: Week 14
Religion
- Pull out your Saint Damien de Veuster Fun Pack and complete the activities for Week 14.
Saint Damien de Veuster of Molokai Fun Pack
Math
- The Identity Property of Addition is an easy one, and easy to incorporate into everyday activities, especially meals. Throw this property out there however you can during the day just for fun “If you have 10 chips on your plate and I add 0 chips, how many do you have?” “What property is that again?”
Language Arts
- Teach the four types of sentences this week: declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamatory. Most writing is done in declarative sentences, so have a sentence finding race this week to find the other types of sentences. Get a newspaper, three colors of highlighters, and a timer. Have your students highlight the different types of sentences in different colors, and at the end of the time (depending on your students- 10min, 15min, 30min?) see who has found the most of each type of sentence. Which sections of the newspaper are more likely to have interrogative sentences? Which tends to have more imperative, and which section has more exclamatory? Some good sections to make sure your students get to read may be the “letter to the editor’ sections (for interrogative), sports for exclamatory, and sometimes finance for the imperative.
Music
- Listen to (or blast loudly!) Sousa Marches this week while you and your students are doing chores and cleaning the house. Some studies suggest that listening to music may increase productivity and efficiency in the workplace. Maybe listening to marches will help get the house clean faster! Here is a Sousa Playlist on youtube in case you don’t have a Sousa CD lying around.
History
- Wealthy Industrialist Dinner Party: Have each student (and you and Dad/Mom/Grandma whoever else is in your house) choose a wealthy industrialist to learn about in depth. Give each student a note card (or a few) to take some notes on about their Wealthy Industrialist character in preparation. Have a Wealthy Industrialist Dinner Party (which could just be a regular dinner, Wealthy Industrialists eat Hamburger Helper right?), and act like your chosen character. Have conversations about how you each made your fortune and how you plan to spend it. How do you feel about the term ‘Robber Baron’? If you want to make it fun, let your students ‘dress up’ for the dinner, Wealthy Industrialists are almost always wearing a suit and tie in their pictures, and they probably have really good manners. The History Cards describe four of them (Henry Ford, Andrew Carnegie, Cornelius Vanderbilt, and JP Morgan). If you need a few more because you have a lot of students, consider adding John Rockefeller, Andrew Mellon, and James Buchanan Duke.
- If you need something educational to watch on TV this week, Netflix has a short series called The Men Who Built America. I’ve watched the first one on Vanderbilt and Rockefeller and thought it was good. It tells the story of these men who helped shape America’s industry. Instead of focusing on one person (like a typical documentary), it tells the story of American industry during this time period focusing on each character as they come to power in the history timeline. It is somewhere in between a documentary and a historical narrative.
- Buffalo Bill certainly changed the view of the wild west and made it entertaining and fun. If you’d like a fun book about him check out Buffalo Bill by Ingri Parim D’aulaire:
(Using this affiliate link to make a purchase helps CSH continue its mission!)
I think the story and pictures are quite cute. (Not all of them are in color). This would be great for your older students to read on their own or would be perfect as a read-aloud for your younger ones.
- Cameras have changed ALOT since Eastman first invented it in 1888. Show your students what an old camera looks like and how it worked. Show them how you had to load film into it, and the small shutter that opens quickly to expose the film to light when you take a picture. The film then had to be developed in a series of chemical baths, in the dark!
- You can still buy disposable cameras that use film at Walmart (and probably other drug stores and general stores). Have a photography day with your students. Use a disposable camera to take pictures, and have them developed. Then take some pictures with your phone or digital camera. Have a discussion on how technology has advanced in the world of cameras. (Please do not take apart your disposable camera. It has a battery and capacitor that can potentially shock you. )
- Check out this book, Click: A Story About George Eastman. It was recommended by one of our CSH moms!
Click: A Story About George Eastman (Creative Minds Biography)
( Using this affiliate link to make a purchase helps CSH continue its mission!)
- Write a narrative essay as if you are an immigrant. Encourage your students to use descriptive words. Think not only about what is happening in your essay (the who, what, when, why), but also HOW the events make you feel, your thoughts and emotions. What are your dreams for arriving in America? What do you hope to do with your life? The essay could be about any part of immigration, from riding on a boat across the ocean, to checking in at Ellis Island. Be creative!
- One of the steps in immigrating to the US is taking a US Citizenship test, which covers US History and government. There is a free Kindle app called US Citizenship Test 2023 Edition, or you can click here and take a practice test provided by the US Citizenship and Immigration Services. Can your students pass the test? Would they be allowed to immigrate?
- You may do this already every week, but while we’re learning about the public library this week Visit your Public Library! Have your students choose a book from the card catalog (or online system), then find the book using the dewy decimal system. Challenge them with a scavenger hunt to find specific books in different areas of the library.
- Library employees often are happy to give tours and teach your students about the library, the organization of books, the different types of materials they offer (not just books! audiobooks and movies) as well as activities and programs.
Geography
- Be sure to check out the Great Lakes States Lapbook Part 2 for the little flip pages for each of the Great Lakes! We put them in the lapbook in the order to spell “HOMES” as a helpful memory tool!
Science
- If you have a CSH group or are doing the Tour 1 Science book on your own, you’ll cover the brain pretty well in this week’s activity (I LOVE the brain hat btw). So to cover some other information about the Nervous System, I created a simple Neuron Printable so your students can learn the parts of a nerve cell:
- And if you love the brain hat and want to make it even more ridiculously awesome looking, print this sheet of tiny nerve cells. Cut around each pair of nerves. Get some yarn, fold each nerve pair in half along the solid line, and tape or gluestick together around the yarn. Create a long nerve chain out of these and tape the bottom back of your brain hat! Be sure to discuss how neurons work, they are connected like a chain and transmit an electrical signal to the brain all the way from your finger/stomach/toes, etc.!
- You may have a great textbook already on Human Anatomy, but if you don’t, I really liked How Stuff Works article on the Nervous system. Read for some ideas on what to teach your little students this week.
Thanks for reading! See you next week!
Did you miss week 13? Check it out here!
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