Catholic Schoolhouse Tour 1 Week 3 – Getting into the school groove

How was week 2? Starting to get in the school-groove?  I hope so, and I hope that these ideas are keeping your teaching and learning, fun and interesting!  Here’s more for week 3!

Religion/ Math/ Language Arts

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Are you almost done with your Saint Kateri Fun Pack?  Finish it up this week!

Math Ideas:

• This week practice your skip counting by 6 by counting legs on insects!  Go outside and skip count butterflies, lady bugs or beetles crawling in your yard or garden.
• Did you know Honeycomb Cereal has 7 holes in each cereal piece?  Get some Honeycombs for breakfast or snack time today and skip count the holes by 7s.
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• Skip counting by 7- Have you ever seen this riddle?

As I was going to St. Ives,

I met a man with seven wives,

Each wife had seven sacks,

Each sack had seven cats,

Each cat had seven kits:

Kits, cats, sacks, and wives,

How many were there going to St. Ives?

Share it with your students and see if they can figure out the answer!  (Answer is at the bottom of this post!)

Language Arts:

• Possessive nouns are the topic this week!  Go through your house with your kids, naming the objects you see and their owners using possessive nouns.  Examples: “Kristen’s desk, Eva’s toy, Daddy’s chair, Ben’s fishing pole, Sally’s ball etc.”  Now go through the house again, but change the owner to God!  “God’s desk, God’s toy, God’s chair, God’s fishing pole, God’s ball etc”  You can use this week about possessive nouns to discuss how nothing is truly ours, and that all belongs to our maker!

Music

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This week mix music and art–  Have students listen to some of Bach’s pieces and draw how it makes them feel.  If students are having a difficult time sitting still to listen and think, try dimming the lights and have them close their eyes.  Listen carefully- How does the music make you feel? What does it make you think of?  Does this music remind you of a place you’ve been before?

You can use this simple Music Notebooking page to have your students record their thoughts!

Music Notebooking Page

History

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•  Find your map from last week with the explorers’ routes mapped and add Father Marquette and Joliet’s exploration of the Mississippi!

• Check out scholastic thanksgiving website.  It is a fun way for students to learn about the daily life of the pilgrims and Native Americans, their clothing, what they ate and many more aspects of early colonial life.  Best of all, it’s free!  Your students will have fun listening to the path the Mayflower took with the little videos on the website.

Scholastic’s Thanksgiving Website

• Make a Mayflower “Compact”- Your girls may like this better than the boys, but it is still easy and  fun to do!  Find an old make-up compact or better yet a toy-make up compact, print the Mayflower Compact in a narrow column (or use the printable).  Fold back and forth and tape into your compact.  Not only will it help them remember the name ‘compact’ but carrying it around in their purse or bag will ensure they read it at least once!

MayflowerCompact- Printable

Don’t forget to explain how this just uses the word ‘compact’ in a fun way.  Compact is a homonym- in the Mayflower Compact, it means an agreement or promise.  In our make-up it just means ‘small.’  In a few weeks we will study homonyms in Language Arts and you can pull these out again!

You may need to be a little creative depending on the compact you use… see if you can take advantage of those funny little compartments by adding the title, year or location for the Mayflower Compact:

• •  Book Recommendation? Try Father Marquette and the Great Rivers by August Derleth.  It’s an easy read about a cool Catholic who explored the Mississippi!

Father Marquette and the Great Rivers- Amazon Link 

(Using this link to purchase this book helps Catholic Schoolhouse continue it’s mission)

Geography

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• Check out the Water  Geography Blog Post!

•  Print a map of the USA and find as many lakes, islands, bays, isthmuses, peninsulas, and straits as you can!
• Do you live near water?  Maybe you don’t have easy access to an isthmus or island, but most of us live in driving range of a lake, bay, or peninsula!  Take a field trip!  Make sure you print an aerial view of the water feature you are visiting to bring with you (try google.com/maps or bing.com/maps using the aerial view).  Once you are there, discuss the characteristics of the geographic area.  Is it easier to tell what geographic feature it is in person on the ground or from your aerial picture?

Science

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• This week students learn about fish!  There are more than 30,000 species of fish and so much to learn!  Pick a specific fish or even a type of fish (like sharks!) to research. Make a presentation about your fish, their characteristics that are the same as other fish, what makes them different, where they live, what they eat and any other details you can find!

• Take a FIELD TRIP! What better way is there to learn about fish than to go to an aquarium this week!
• Don’t have time or money or a convienent aquarium to visit? Go to a pet store.  Some them have entire walls of fish to look at, um I mean consider buying as a pet.  Plus you can talk about what the different species of fish eat, and how some are salt water and some fresh water.

• Check out this post about making an Ocean Layers Box.  This project was originally slated for the Year 1  Science book, but we decided it may take too long.  If your students just love being crafty, consider making your own Ocean Layers Box.

• Don’t forget to add Fish Facts to your Animals Lapbook!  Check out the Animals Lapbook Part 3!

Answer to the St. Ives Riddle: Just one- Me! (I met all the rest on my way to St. Ives!)

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