Catholic Schoolhouse Tour 2: Week 7

Catholic Schoolhouse Tour 2: Week 7

Ready to start your second quarter? We get to dive into string instruments in music, chemistry in science, and Greek art this quarter- it’s going to be a fun one!


Memory Work Idea

Do your kids brush their teeth? (I hope so) Write some their memory work on the mirrors in the bathroom.  Instead of mindlessly brushing their teeth for 2 minutes, they could be reading and cementing that memory work in their brains right before bed.  Dry erase markers work just fine for us, or you could get these fancy Crayola Glass Markers.

HINT- don’t stress yourself out by adding this to your own to-do list. Make it the responsibility of an older student to write a new memory work sentence each week for the younger ones. It can be a fun privilege to write on the mirrors, and it will help them memorize the work even better for your kinesthetic and visual learners!


Religion

The next three weeks look at Daniel for our saint focus!  Read the story about Daniel and complete the activities for Week 7 in the Daniel Fun Pack.

Daniel Fun Pack

This quarter we focus on the Mass.  In Week 7 specifically, we look at the objects used in the Mass.

  • Write down the list of objects in the tourguide on a notecard or small piece of paper for each student.  Go to daily mass, and as they see each object used have them cross them off.  It’s sort of a “can you find it activity” but in real life!  It’s also a great way to keep them focused during mass.
  • Use these handwriting and match up pages I made for the mass objects!
  • Create a mass kit!  Catholic icing has instructions for making a mass kit for your students to play mass with, AND instructions for making a mass kit for your peg doll saints.

Math

  • Circles are everywhere! Go on a scavenger hunt and find as many circles you can around your house.  I bet there’s more than you think.  If your students get stuck, tell them to check out the kitchen cabinets- cups are circles from above, so are bowls and plates.  Look in the bathroom- I bet you have some shower curtain rings. ๐Ÿ™‚
  • Have fun with snack time this week- make all your snacks circular!  Some ideas for this are orange slices, oreos, crackers, slices of bananas, some cheese slices, and cheerios (among many circular cereals). Have pizza for lunch! What else can you think of to eat that comes in circles?
  • Want a fun picture book? You need Sir Cumference and the First Round Table. I think these books are hilarious, witty and educational (and who doesn’t love that in a kids book?).

Language Arts

  • Review your adjectives this week around the table.  Have everyone take a turn to describe something specific, like the weather, a piece of furniture, the day you’re having, their clothes for that day, the meal you’re having- anything! How many adjectives for the object can they think of? If you have a competitive group, make a game and see who can write down the most adjectives to describe something in 60 seconds.
  • Mix your subjects and ask your students to think of as many adjectives as they can for a circle! Expand and ask for adjectives describing other subjects.

Latin

  • Practice your 1st declension using the word terra in this cut and paste printable!

Latin printable 1st Declension – terra


Art

  • The art focus moves forward to Greek art this quarter.  Throw in some poetry with Ode on a Grecian Urn by John Keats. Read it aloud, listen to the sound clip of someone reading it, or have your students read it. (Sort-of-warning: It alludes to adult behavior but doesn’t say anything specific- read before you have your students read and decide if you think it appropriate- you could skip that part if you wish).  Then have them each illustrate what they think this Grecian Urn might look like based on the description in the poem. If you have trouble drawing an urn, just photocopy the one in the Art book onto white paper, then color it in.
  • If your kids love art, and you want to do another art project this week on Grecian Urns, make one from Paper Mache. The Unlikely Homeschooler has instructions with pictures to help.
  • Just a parent warning: If you love art, and decide to look into Grecian Urns for more study, do so without little eyes around! A lot of Grecian Urns depict adult behaviors (as well as male and female genitalia) than most of us want to expose our young children to.

Music

  •  Music this quarter focuses on string instruments, the first being the ancient lyre.  It’s plucked vs rubbed with a bow as we see later in violins, cellos and bases.  The lyre is a lot like a harp, but sounds a little different.  I made you a lyre music playlist in youtube! You can listen to it in the background as you do your other homeschool work or watch as the musician plays the lyre.
  • Have a discussion about the lyre: What does it sound like? How does it make you feel? (personally, I feel really sleepy when I listen to it) What does it make you think about? How is it different from the percussion instruments you’ve learned about last quarter? Can you imagine kings asking for musicians to play the lyre? Now can you imagine David playing the lyre for King Saul?

History

  • Read the story of Elijah and Elisha in your Bible or Children’s Bible this week.  Elijah starts in 1 Kings 17 and his story finishes at 2 Kings 2.  Elisha succeeds Elijah in 2 Kings 2 and his story goes until 2 Kings 9.  Then he comes back into focus in 2 Kings 13:14-20 when he gives a final prophecy and dies. You could read these out loud to your group, or have your students read the stories of Elijah and Elisha during independent study time. Get together and have your students summarize their favorite part of the story.  If you have older students, have them read the Bible, and then tell the story to the younger students.  Retelling the story or teaching it is a wonderful way to really learn material.
  • Try a craft after you teach about Elijah this week:
    • I like the looks of this paper chariot. You could add some orange and red streamers for fire and make it into a mobile, since Elijah went up to heaven in a chariot of fire. (We cut out an Elijah from a coloring page linked below)
      elijahchariot
  • Jonah and the whale is a really popular bible story.  He’s not difficult to find in your real Bible; he has a whole book to himself, though it is only 4 chapters long.  Read the story in your Bible or Children’s Bible and then have a discussion or writing exercise for your older students.  “Have you ever ignored what God was telling you, like Jonah did? What happened?” or if your students have a hard time with that, “Have you ever ignored something your parents told you to do? What happened?” Who’s punishments are worse? God’s punishment of Jonah or your parents’ punishments? ๐Ÿ™‚
  • Here are a couple crafts for your younger students who maybe can’t do the writing exercise.
  • Isaiah also has his own book in the Bible, although it’s much longer.  Unless you have some students who just love to read, you may want to choose just a few verses or chapters to read, or  read a story from your Children’s Bible.  To narrow your focus even more you could pick a few verses from Isaiah to memorize or practice writing. Here are a few favorites in a printable, if you need a quick and easy activity.

Isaiah handwriting practice

  • Incorporate some history in your play time this week.  Collect toys of like characteristics (super hero figures and army men, stuffed animals and soft toys, dolls and barbies) and cluster them together each in their own area’s of your playroom or play area.  Then come up with Greek City-State names for them! The super heroes and army men could be “Power-opolis,” the barbie dolls might be “Pretty-opolis” etc.  Let your kids choose an adjective that describes that group and just add “-opolis” to the end.  Then decide what each city state specializes in.  Obviously the army men are like the Spartans- strong warriors! Maybe your stuffed animals could be great philosophers and the Barbies focus on beauty.  Have fun discussing how the early Greeks had lots of city states and many of them specialized in something.
  • After you teach about the first Olympics, hold your own Family Olympics!  Select as many events as you want, make some of them silly (you could even let your 4 year old come up with something).  At the conclusion of your events have a celebration! Serve some celebration food (click here if you want to go all out). Hand out palm branches and red ribbons like the first Olympics.  If you don’t have palm leaves, do some pruning and hand  out whatever leaves/branches are native to your area (after all these are the silly Olympics).  If you have crafty kids, you could even craft crowns of olive leaves for your winners.
  • Check out this 5min video about the Olympics. Point out the parts where it shows the discus and javelin, most students don’t know what these two sports look like!
  • If you’re looking for some books to go with the Olympics, there’s a Magic Tree House book about them! Book 16 is called Hour of the Olympics If you’ve never heard of them, the Magic Tree House books are great for your students who are into short chapter books (probably 2nd grade and up).  They’re exciting, interesting, and often talk about something educational in a fictional story.  In Hour of the Olympics, Annie and Jack go back to Ancient Greece to see if women really weren’t allowed in the Olympics!
  • Another cute story about the Olympics is Geronimo Stilton Saves the Olympics . It’s a graphic novel, so it could be more fun for your students who still really want pictures to go with the story. Geronimo has to back in time to keep the cats from ruining the first Olympics using modern sports equipment.  I don’t know how authors come up with this stuff. ๐Ÿ™‚

Geography

  • Continue working on your Europe Lapbook. 
  • Keep exploring the world with food this week using Western Europe for inspiration! (I’m hungry just typing these).
    • France: Check out Food in France, and have baguettes, croissants, or onion soup this week!
    • Netherlands: Try some pickled herring on crackers, or make a Dutch Baby for breakfast (don’t worry, no babies will be harmed).
    • Belgium: Chocolate or waffles! Or even better, chocolate waffles!
    • Luxemburg: This site has lots of recipes (although the colors make my eyes hurt).

Science

  • This quarter we study Chemistry! The age of your student should determine how deep you go in this subject.  For the youngest teach that everything is made of something, and that something we call matter. Matter when broken down into the simplest form is made of atoms. Then go around point to everything calling it matter! (ok so I do know that science has found smaller building blocks than atoms- but this is for little kids)
  • For your older students introduce the periodic table and elements this week.  Discuss that atoms are made of protons, neutrons and electrons.
  • A great book that will give your students a wonderful foundation in chemistry is  Real Science-4-Kids Chemistry pre-Level I. It has lots of diagrams and pictures, almost a little like a textbook but for younger students.  If you get it now, not only will you use it for this quarter of science, but your students will also want to look at it in their free time just for fun.  If your student’s are a old enough (like 2nd grade-ish), just go ahead and get the Level 1 book.
  • Pick an element from the periodic table to illustrate- finger print style!  You will need 3 different ink colors, or washable marker colors.  Choose an element to model.  Find the number of protons and neutrons for your element and thumbprint those in the center of your sheet, each in their own color.  (To fingerprint with a marker simply color your finger and press it on your paper!) Then fingerprint some electrons, orbiting the nucleus you just created. Draw some orbits if you want! (Have your kids choose an element with a small atomic number! Otherwise you might be thumb and finger-printing all day.) Write some other information about your element on the page.
thumbprint element
  • One way to become familiar with the elements and Periodic table is: Periodic Table Battleship I think this is awesome- but then again I love games and I love chemistry.


Did you miss Tour 2: Week 6? Check it out.

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