A Net in Time

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Magnificant Moon – Day One

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Today I worked on Magnificant Moon with the lad. Some of what we learned was kinda interesting, some of it well…wasn’t, at least to a boy child age 5.

One of the questions asked as “would you like to go to the moon?” and his very prompt response was “NO!”
“how come” I asked.
“Cause I”m interested in cats and bunnies, not the moon!”.

We learned about Neil Armstrong and his interest in planes when he was a lad. We learned that the moon is dust and rocks (Boring said a boy child). And considering what his interests are…do you blame him? 🙂

He found the rocket video interesting, so I pursued that a bit. interesting to see how a two stage rocket works. I found this as well as this (a PDF) which outlined a study one could do using a film. It was useful as a question generator.

We did find this experiment on making a two stage rocket using balloons that the lad wants to try. You need a long balloon, a paper cup and a round balloon. We’re going to add a long piece of heavy string and a straw, because we want to direct it’s flight up the stairs. 🙂 You cut the bottom out of the paper cup, put it around the long balloon small end toward balloon tip and blow it up. DO NOT TIE OFF. Hold the balloon end against the cup so the air can’t escape, then put the round balloon between the balloon and the cup and blow it up. Once it is sufficient size to hold the first balloon tight release that end, then blow up a bit more. Should show the effects of a two stage rocket. We need to find the long balloon yet…but otherwise we’re set to do it. Hopefully will get pics to share.

Oh… I used this copywork sheet generator to make some copy work for the lad. I made it a bit too long for a five year old, but otherwise I was pleased with my efforts. You need to print from the site, the work does not copy over well…even as a save image file.

He had fun discovering and then singing “J is for Justin and for Jupiter” over and over again when learning that Jupiter has 63 moons. That was one thing that simply astounded him… 63 moons!!!! It’s good to see a lad being amazed at something that God himself created. 🙂

Library Day

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Today we had plans to get lots done, but everyone got up late today so that didn’t quite work out.

So we managed to get some homeschool done using a book that I have upstairs. The lad learned about reading book titles, how to take care of them, and did some letter recognition work. He did some good thinking today, and some, at times, easy work. “I know how to do this mommy, I’m good at circling”. He also is starting to see that some words not only sound the same, but they are spelled the same as well. 🙂

We went out for lunch to subway as I needed to go there anyways to pick up my pay stubs and what not. Had a bit of a visit with the girls. 🙂

Then off to independent to pick up a couple of items and then over to the library where we picked out moon books, some reading books, and played with the train table.

Over to Dollerama to get some experiment supplies and got sidetracked by a couple other things. 🙂

Did laundry throughout the day. Talked with the boy a fair bit and played some.

At home we had a “grub it meal”…as in we found food, we ate it. Nothing fancy by any means.

Tomorrow is another day indeed. 🙂

Winter Wonders

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We started working on the Winter Wonders unit study/lap book from DownLoad N Go.

We actually completed all of this unit study and I was certain that I had posted on what we had done for days 3-5 but alas, I cannot locate it, or maybe the computer glitched or something. Anyways, day one and two are here. 🙂 Day 3-5 are in hinterland.. but they inspired us to do make this bird feeder which is here. 🙂 Day 3-5 consisted of lots of drawing, nature walks, examining snow and what not.

Now what can I tell you about downloadngo unit study/lap books? They are super easy to do. They come loaded with links, videos (embedded youtube for safety), suggested reading, lap book activities and materials and much more. They are NOT highly indepth, they are overviews of studies. Going in depth of course, is not an issue since lots of reading materials are suggested.


This particular unit had tons of drawing which an art minded lad thoroughly enjoyed AND…. it had BUNNIES!!!!!!!!!!! We studied the snowshoe hare. We did it more in-depth than the unit called for but my boy and bunnies…what can say.. he LIKES THEM. 🙂 He found it fascinating watching the videos of them… and there lies my one complaint about this study. Putting a video of an artic hare in with the study on snowshoe hares is just a trifle confusing…similar colour and adaptive abilities but DIFFERENT animal. One is bigger than the other, and they have somewhat different behaviours and locales. An update: my comment re the artic hare was noted by one of the powers that be and they acted on it immediately. No more artic hare video in the study on the snowshoe hare. How’s that for proactive service? I thought it was very cool. 🙂


Each day we study something different.

Day 1: What Is Winter?
Day 2: Science Secrets of Winter
Day 3: People and Places of Winter
Day 4: Time for Tips and Treasures of Winter
Day 5: Goodies and Gadgets of Winter

I find it funny that he often talks about the bird thieves .. the sparrows and blue jays of the world. And how the squirrels can be bad squirrels stealing the birds food.
j -“Do you think mommy that they are playing tricks on the birds”?
m -“Yes, buddy, I’m sure that’s what they are doing. Silly squirrels, silly birds… why can’t they just share”?
j -“They should all be friends mommy, and not steal from each other.”One of the things that I liked in this study was taking nature walks. We went to a local park and on a 30 minute walk found turkey footprints, rabbit footprints, and deer footprints as well as lots of people footprints. We watched birds at a bird feeder…one very pretty grey and red one was there. Don’t know what kind it was, and lots of sparrows and chickadees. We spent time outside tobaggoning and examining snow. We even froze some to see if it would change in the freezer – it didn’t expect when we took some out and it melted a little bit, but it still tasted like snow.

To find this unit go to Download N Go where you will find it here, listed for $7.95. 🙂

You can read more reviews here. And if you want to read more about Amanda Bennet the creator, you can go here. 🙂

I received this study in return for my fair and honest review. This so far has been our most enjoyed study from DownLoad N Go. It was just FUN. 🙂
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Bird Feeders

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as part of the winter wonders unit study we made a bird feeder,
My lad being the boy that he is, decided that making a simply bird feeder was NOT what he wanted to do. He wanted to make a bunny hotel.

so we put three pop bottles side by side and attached them together using a long branch. and then tied it all together using an old shoelace.

We put individual sticks and bird feed holes in each one as well.

We got ideas from these sites: How Stuff Works. Ehow. Helium. Home For Wild Birds.

The young one is curious about how long it will take before the squirrels become thieves and chortles with anticipation. I’m merely curious about how long it will take the local blue jays, sparrows and chickadees to arrive. Time will tell.

Father and son left afterwards to go tobaggoning at the local hill. Hoping they have fun while I enjoy a quiet house for at least an hour. 🙂

London’s Art Museum

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Did you know that London has an art museum? Parking is $2/hour. Admission is by donation.

It is housed in what looks to me like an old horse barn, but that’s neither here nor there. We headed there as a family today since I decided that since my lad likes art (always has pen/paper at hand) that exposing him to different types of art would not be a bad thing. I hope to go every other month, just for an hour or so to let him see new ways of doing art, and to try to show him different ways of doing art as well.

He found it interesting. I pointed out the difference between water colours and oil.

He’s not a stand and stare at things kind of lad, but if you ask him what he thinks, or what he thinks the painting/object is trying to say he’ll give it this look and try to come up with something.

We each found something that we liked, and it was all different.

Jim found a painting that looked like trees/tree stumps all jumbled that he liked.

I saw a painting with oxen pulling a hay wagon that I thought was good, and a more abstract one that to me looked like lines dancing on water. The lad thought the same picture was worms in water so we had a different interpretation. Which is part of what art is right?

The lad liked the colours in a group of painting on a wall, but he didn’t like what was painted on them. 🙂

They had this children’s art area, the lad chose to make feathers for the cats. It was a collaborative effort since he had trouble tying the string. So he held, mommy tied. The cats enjoyed their feathers when we got home. 🙂