Nim, Catapults and Tolkien - This Week in Young Explorers

Wow, what a whirlwind week! We had two full mornings with YE this week; I had some shopping to do for a Xmas party; my hubby was away all week; extra practices for show choir ... so I'm a bit exhausted and this post is a bit late but its ALL good! Ha!

Here are some highlights from our week.

Icebreakers and Oh Canada continue to be a big hit with the kids and they are getting better at both! I taught them some basic "conducting" and we all conduct ourselves during Oh Canada. And I have to laugh because Alexa is singing our national anthem all the time. What kid does that?

Socratic Discussion
We have dived into Tolkien's short (but long) story, Farmer Giles of Ham, which we will finish next week. This is an AWESOME story to discuss the topic of what is a hero, in literature and in real life.  Throughout reading this story, I keep hearing comments from the peanut gallery such as, "I can't believe Tolkien wrote this!" These kids are all familiar with The Hobbit, and LOTR, and all of Tolkien's elements (dragons, knights, giants, and lots of dry humor) are present. Yet, they didn't expect that he wrote short stories too.  I have A nice little collection on my handy dandy kindle but I think you can probably find the stories free on Gutenburg.

Something that worked quite well this week during socratic discussion was to get the kids sitting around the table, give them a pencil and a piece of paper, and let them sketch while I read. I think many of us homeschooling moms let the kids play quietly during a read-aloud, and so why not here too?  Normally we sit on the couches and while that is cozy and heartwarming and all that, the kids can get fidgety.  The tables were set up for science anyway, and so now I'll keep this practice going forward.

Composer - William Tell Overture by Rossini
Can you picture the bow and arrow as you stand with the apple on your head? Great music, great opera and very fun story about a Swiss hero who was such an expert with the bow and arrow he could shoot an apple off his son's head. Yup.  You can hear this piece and learn more about Rossini over here at Classics for Kids.


Living Math
We focused on logic puzzles/brain teasers in our living math this week and the kids LOVED it.  I used this book as my inspiration.

Have you heard of the classic game of Nim? There are many variations. We used the version for two players where you set up 16 toothpicks in rows - the first row has one pick, the second row has 3 picks, the third row has 5 picks, and the last row has 7 toothpicks. You can use buttons, beans, whatever you have on hand.  The object of the game is to NOT be the one to pick up the very last toothpick. Each player takes turns picking up as many or as little toothpicks as he wants, but you can only take from one row at a turn.  You can pick up an entire row on your turn if you want.  First, I had the kids play against me to get the hang of the game, then I turned them loose.  I found this was a game all ages could play and enjoy.  There is strategy involved, and I'd encourage your kids to keep playing it in order to figure out the pattern to win.

From there, we moved on to similar logic games using a "gameboard" of 16 dots placed in a 4x4 square.  The first game, take turns linking two dots either vertically or horizontally. You can only link 2 dots together, and then you can't touch those dots anymore. The goal of the game is to NOT be the one with no dots left to link.

Using the same 4x4 dot gameboard, two players can play "Up and Over." The game starts in the lower left corner, and to win you need to get to the upper righthand corner.  The players take turns joining dots either vertically or horizontally, as many dots as they want but ONLY vertical OR horizontally at a turn. You win if you are the person to reach the upper righthand dot.

Logic puzzles and brainteasers are an important part of a math education, yet somehow it feels like cheating because they are just so fun. You can find some great puzzles at Archimedes' Lab. You can also play the computer at Nim, but I will forewarn you its highly addictive and the computer always wins. They even explain why :)

Living Science
We continue our love of all things physics.  Building upon our study of motion, we learned all about catapults and then built our own out of popsicle sticks, rubber bands, plastic spoons and clothespins.  I was glad to have my son to help us out with this project!  You can find a ton of catapult instructions online, but I was happy to have the whole package from Supercharged Science, our escience program.

And that's a wrap.  We didn't make it to an art picture study because the science was quite intensive this week, but not to worry, we will be back at it next week.  Next week also marks the LAST DAY of Block 2.  I love wrapping up school-y stuff in order to slow down (a bit) for Advent.  The big kids do have some online classes well into December, but for the little girls it means a nice change of pace.  Looking so forward to it!

Have a lovely weekend!

Puzzling Pyramids and other Fun Adventures with Young Explorers

It was wonderful to get back into the swing of Young Explorers, especially after having to cancel last week due to the storm. We had a few new faces this morning and they fit right into my group of guinea pigs, as I fondly call them.

Here's a recap of what we did today. By far there were two highlights - listening and dancing to Grieg's music, and getting puzzled with ping-pong-ball math!

1. Icebreaker
The kids were all excited to stand up and tell us what costume they are wearing tomorrow evening, one by one, and our new kids were absolute pros with the icebreaker.  You know, its only a few seconds that they each get up and speak to us, but gosh they are getting good at it, and they do seem to enjoy it.

2. Oh Canada 
Led by Brittany, we all sang Oh Canada. I know I know. But my kids don't really know this very well and its much more fun to learn in a group, so we sang our little hearts out. I thought it would fit in well because this month we celebrate Remembrance Day, and we mentioned that. We talked about what that holiday meant, and how singing our national anthem is a way to show respect for our country.  Next week, we will be reading In Flanders Fields.

3. Socratic Discussion: 
Today, I introduced the kids to The Ziz in The Hardest Word by Jacqueline Jules.  The Ziz is so much fun, and there are a few of Jules' books featuring the Ziz! He's a REALLY large bird whose great big wings are always getting him into trouble, and in this case they knocked down a tree, which knocked down another tree, which knocked down another tree .... which fell over and destroyed the children's garden.  So the Ziz heads to Mt. Sinai to have a little chat with God - he does this frequently in fact - and told God about his mistake. God tells the Ziz to go, find the hardest word, and bring it back to God.  The Ziz has an adventure trying to find this word, and brings back words like "goodnight," "spaghetti," "rock," and so on, but each word he brings back is not the hardest word. In exasperation, the Ziz tells God he was sorry but he couldn't find the hardest word. "What was that?" God asks.  "I'm sorry, I couldn't find it." "Oh, you did it, you found the hardest word!"  That's right, sorry is the hardest word. The Ziz goes back to the children's garden, says sorry, and offers vegetables from his own garden as a token of apology.

This story made us ask the question: Why is saying sorry so hard?  We had to dig deep.  I got all sorts of reasons, like saying sorry is embarrassing, you don't want people looking at you, you feel bad that you hurt someone; but none of these are the real reason.  I kept asking the kids, "BUT WHY?"  And it came down to this (and they discovered themselves): Saying sorry means you have to face the fact that you are not perfect in the eyes of others.  Its hard to humble yourself.  Really hard. But you have to "just do it" as one of the kids said.  You have to have "courage and just say it," another said.

I have read this book with my own kids recently, and I have to tell you Maria has a MUCH easier time saying sorry as a result.  Normally she is so stubborn.  I felt it had a positive impact, and now the running statement in our home is "You have to say the hardest word."

We did some role-playing with saying sorry.  How to do it properly, how to accept an apology.

4. Picture Study - Gustav Klimt's Tree of Life.

Isn't it wonderful? This is a very complex oil painting where the subject matter is probably rooted in most religions one way or another. This painting is quite famous and you will probably see it everywhere now - its fabric, its iphone covers, coffee cups.  It is full of so much detail, the kids spent quite a bit of time examining the details and doing narrations for the group. Everyone had a different interpretation of the branches, the "eyes" in the branches, the people in the painting.

Klimt looks like a very interesting fellow!! We did NOT discuss his biography at all, its probably a bit x-rated :(.  But his paintings are superb and his sketches are fantastic as well.

Thought you might like to explore this video of a six-year-old showing how to draw Klimt's Tree of Life, with help from her ipad.  Also, check out this Pinterest board for several links to some amazing art activities based on the Tree of Life.  We may even do some Tree of Life artwork this block, it just looks so fun.

5. Composer and Composition - Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" from Peer Gynt.

Peer Gynt is based on a Norwiegian fairy tale (in English it would be Peter Gynt), and depending which version you read, Peter is either a good guy or rather immoral. Dramatist Ibsen loosely based a 5-act play on this fairy tale, and asked Grieg to write the score.  The Mountain King scene is the most famous.  Click here for a neat Classics for Kids activity sheet to give you a feel for the drama and the music.  Check out link on Peer Gynt as well, an interesting blog about various fairy tales.

Last block we primarily listened to piano compositions, but today we dove into an entire orchestra. You can hear the London Philharmonic playing this version here.  The kids were dancing to it and rocking out; I also played the motif for the kids on the piano and some of them were trying to play it by ear on their own. Did a great job.  Its a catchy little tune, so I apologize because you won't be able to get it out of your head :).

6. Living Math 

Today we pretended we were Pythagoreans. The kids wanted to choose their own Greek name and I had to remember to call them by it! Anyway, after listening to some interesting facts about Pythagoras, we pretended to be part of his "inner circle behind the curtain."  We pretended that ping-pong balls were pebbles and "played" on the ground with them.  Hey, we discovered odd and even numbers! Its so much nicer to have a fun manipulative to SEE odd and even instead of a boring worksheet.  We talked about how the Pythagoreans were the first to put numbers into "families," like odd and even, squares and roots; and they were the first to think of numbers as having shapes like triangular, squares, oblongs, hexagonal, octagonal.  

Using the ping-pong balls, we experimented. What happens when you put two odd numbers together?  What about an odd and and even?  Two even numbers?  You and I take this for granted, but to be able to concretely SEE how this works is so much more effective. 

Then, we tried to figure out patterns in building both triangular and square numbers.  We began with 3 ping-pong balls in the shape of a triangle.  How many more balls to make the next biggest triangle?  The kids kept adding balls to the triangle and soon enough it became apparent that you just need to keep adding an extra row that is one ball bigger than the previous.  We kept track of the pattern on the white-board.

We also did this with square numbers. This is the easiest way to explain the concept of squares and roots.

Can a triangular number also be a square number? I asked the question, some kids immediately said no, but if you're looking for a little enrichment activity, have them build a set of both triangular and square numbers (or use dots on paper to build the numbers), and see where the overlap is.  

Finally, I had them try a pyramid puzzle and sent them home with it as well.  Given certain ping-pong ball shapes, their challenge was to work with a partner to build a pyramid.  This is called the "20-ball pyramid puzzle."  Its from Historical Connections in Mathematics, Volume 1 (the book is available as an e-book download if you click that link).  And here is a free excerpt of the lesson we used today.  Its geared for grades 7-12 but my young explorers are real smarty pants :).  So are the moms.  Because one momma called me to say she solved it within a few minutes! And in the next instant, I received an email that two more kids solved it. Yeesh. My whole family has been tinkering with this for a couple of nights already :(.  Did I mention I'm really more of an artsy person at heart?

So that's a recap, dear friends. So glad you joined us today! Have a great week :).

Young Explorers - Block 1, Days 5 & 6

So I had every intention of getting a recap of both days of Young Explorers, but gosh, the days have just gotten away from me! So this is more of a "week in review," which is what I'll probably switch to from now on.

1. Icebreakers
... were very casual for us - no standing in front of the group - we just shared interesting things. There were lots of visitors at your houses this weekend; lots of nanas and papas and grandmas and grandpas ... the kids enjoyed telling all about it.

2. Habit #5 from the 7 Habits of Happy Kids - "Seek first to understand, then to be understood.  Listen first, then talk."
Jumper Rabbit asked Goob to play, but Goob was not in the mood; he had lost his butterfly net. So, Jumper moved on to Tagalong Allie's house. Allie was very upset and kept saying some phrase which Jumper couldn't decipher.  Lily listened hard to Allie, not just with her ears, but with her heart and eyes, and figured out that Allie's sweater was on backwards.  This inspired Jumper to return to Goob, and really listen to why he was sad; they found the butterfly net together and all learned an important skill - a way of really listening.

3. Habit #6 - "Synergize!" In other words, use your strengths and talents to work as a team. Together you are better.
This was a cute story involving most of the Oak Street Gang.  They were playing soccer when the Big Bad Badgers came along and challenged them to a soccer game. The story describes each of the Oak Street character's strengths and how they made a big comeback to win the game by working more cohesively as a team. We had a good discussion about teamwork, which led to discussions about sports teams and being a poor loser or a good loser ... the kids had lots of interesting perspectives here. I was very touched by their general attitude of compassion towards the pouting poor sports. One sweet sixer said:
    "If someone is being a sore loser, and pouting, you should go and talk to him and make him feel better. You should tell him, "Its okay."
Then, a sevener said:
    "Everybody is going to make mistakes sometimes."

Next week we will read the last story from the Habits book. The kids are all hoping the main character is Tagalong Allie (but it is not).  I have to say, the kids have really taken to this book - maybe its the animal characters that everyone can relate to, not sure, but I highly highly recommend checking this one out of the library.

3. Socratic Discussion with Dramatic Classics for Children - The Fox and the Crow
In this fable, the Fox outsmarts Madame and Miss Crow, and gains himself a piece of cheese. Miss Crow is holding the cheese in her mouth, and Fox flatters the crows with compliments. But ... what a pity Miss Crow is unable to speak, bemoans Mr. Fox.  That's not true, replies Madame, and tells her daughter to "Caw like she has never cawed before."  To prove she can indeed speak. And out falls the cheese.

Like all fables, this one was excellent material for socratic discussion. Who is responsible for the crow losing the cheese? So the fox is sly ... but wasn't Madame Crow full of pride? Did Miss Crow also suffer from pride, or was she just super-obedient to her mother? We talked about the saying "Pride goes before the fall."

Then we acted out the play, several times so that anyone who wanted to could have a turn to play a role. The great thing about this play is that Miss Crow doesn't have any lines except to caw. This was a perfect role for our young-non-reading girls. And eventually, we were one big group acting out the play because we made it into a family of crows (Madame and her many daughters), outfoxed by several Mr.Foxes acting at once.  The kids seemed to really enjoy this activity; we kept it casual (just sat around the couch and read/acted) and also we laughed alot!

4. Picture Study
We starting to compare different artists' sunflowers; this week we looked at Monet's Sunflowers.

5. Composer
We listened to Freddy Kempf's version of Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata. We heard the 1st Mmvt. on Monday and the 2nd on Tuesday. I think we are all in love with the playing style of the Kempffs!  Next week, perhaps we'll listen to some symphonies as a little change from the piano sonatas.  They're just all so good.

6. Living Math - Citiblocks and Estimating
Have you ever heard of Citiblocs or Keva Blocks?

Well they are absolutely hands-down positively one of our family's favorite go-to toys that spans ALL ages! I first heard about them on the Living Math website, and happened across a couple of boxes on clearance for a steal. I don't think many people know what a goldmine they are and maybe they aren't big sellers? We have built up our collection over the past few years.  There are educational lesson plans online, citibloc galleries, and just so many possibilities.

After the kids got warmed up with building using the blocks, we used the educational lesson plan on estimating. Teams were given a basket with a specific number of blocks and asked to build either on edge, on end, or flat; they could build whatever they wanted using this guideline. Then, we estimated how many blocks were used. 

These boys were attempting the Leaning Tower of Pisa. 

So proud!

Babes and toddlers love citiblocs too. This is an older pic of Maria and Kate.

7. Living Science

We are progressing through experiments about force; and today talked about gravity. We performed the classic experiment of seeing which objects touches the ground first - the heavier one (golf ball), or the lighter object (ping-pong ball).  Everyone got to try this out firsthand, after making our predictions. Some of the older kids were already familiar with the concept (good job you homeschooling moms!). However, we put a bit of a twist on the experiment when the kids were asked if the same result would happen if you throw one ball (completely horizontally and not "up") and drop the other straight down at the same time. Which will hit the ground first?

Same principle applies, my friend! Even a bullet shot directly horizontal will land at the same time as a bullet dropped straight down.  Is that cool or what. The only glitch is if you drop a feather and a hammer - the feather will not hit the ground first due to air resistance.  However, if you are on the moon, both will hit the ground at the same time - you can check out a You Tube video of an astronaut performing this experiment on the moon.

Gravity is such a neat force.  Its the only force that pulls exclusively, versus push and pull.  It accelerates every object equally (but it pulls harder on the heavier objects).  

So ... after these experiments ... the kids asked if they could have a little more time with citiblocs as they had enjoyed them so much during the living math component.

8. Poetry. POETRY!!  Was so fun this week!

We read limericks! Good clean ones!! Then we did some group composition of limericks so they could get the feel of it.  Here is a taste of what I recall we composed:

There once was a superhero from France,

Who had a really big lance,

He ran into a rock,

And got a really big chicken poc,

... and they finished this limerick with something about pooping his pants.

There were several others we composed, so have fun making up limericks with your children :)

9. Wolves of Willoughby Chase

Its getting good ... Bonnie's parents have left and Miss Slighcarp has turned even more evil - wearing Bonnie's mother's best dresses, firing the servants, selling the horses, boxing up and selling the toys, and locking Bonnie in the closet for protesting the wearing of her mother's dress.  We also met Simon, the boy who dresses in animal skins, lives in a cave in the nearby woods, raises geese and lives on chestnut-flour cakes.  Simon saves Bonnie and Sylvia from wolves. We also find out Mr. Grimshaw is in on the shenanigans ...

I'm sad to say I don't know if we will finish this book by the end of next week ... so you may have to put in a hold at the library ...

And that's a wrap!!!