Birds and Bees

REST STOP: It was a Musikgarten day. The kids learned a new song, which they both sang and played on their glockenspiels, and they played a fun musical game in class. One person would face a wall with their eyes closed and sing, "Who's that tapping on my window? Who's that knocking on my door " while another student came up behind them. The person behind would sing "I am tapping on your window. I am knocking on your door," in response and the one with their eyes closed would have to guess who was singing behind them.

And in their workbooks they practiced writing the rest symbol - a wonky little thing. The teacher suggested they remember zig-zag-zig-c as a guide while writing it.

LET'S GET IT STARTED: At the kids' request, we returned to the Scholastic site today to use their story starter "machine." I had them click on the second-grade level this time (before we've done K-1). CJ's spin ended up with an assignment to "write a funny story about a stubborn penguin who wants to be invisible." Annabelle's spin produced a directive to "list five things you would do if you met a grouchy banana who eats muffins all day." She wrote:

One i wood say hallo ar you haveing a grrochy day?
Two i wonder what he or she wood say naxt.
Three mabe he or she wood greet me ncie becuse i gave he or she a grouchy
hallo.
Four i wonder what he or she was doing all day Five i wood say have a
grouchy day maybee he or shee wood say have a grouchy day back to me

CJ's was shorter: "This stubborn penguin wants to be invisible so no predators can see him. He will go in his invisible machine."

CAST A SPELL: In the "no duh!' moment of the day, while the kids were working on their "story starter" assignments, it occurred to me that it would be easier for them to write their stories if they knew how to spell. ;) (See, I told you it was a "no duh!" moment!) But seriously, I guess I have been banking too heavily on the spelling by osmosis approach. They're both really good readers and we read A LOT, so I figured that would be how they learn to spell. And it does work to a degree, but I'd like to move things forward faster.

So, I hopped online (of course) and did a search for "spelling word lists first grade." The first hit I got was a site I'd never seen before - Super Teacher Worksheets. (BTW, they've got lots of good stuff there, for free. We'll be back for more.)

I printed out one of their first grade level lists and had the kids write each word twice (the words being an, man, can, ran, fan, ten, pen, hen and land). To me, the words seemed too easy, but then again, I'm not 5 years old. ...

When the kids were done, we played spelling bee to help cement the words in their mind. (And can I just say that CJ's handwriting is like textbook fantastic?!) During the spelling bee, however, Mr. CeeJ flubbed 'ten' and 'land' on the first go through, but nailed 'em the second time. We'll do it again tomorrow, and if they ace them, we'll move on to another list. I think I'll use frequent spelling bees with cumulative lists to help them retain the words they're learning to spell as we go along.

MYOB: So we make a run to QFC at around 1 today to get a few things and when we're in the checkout line the cashier asks loudly, "Did school get out early today?" Sigh. I so dread these exchanges. I know he wasn't trying to be rude, but I really don't feel like explaining my kids' present educational path to strangers in grocery stores. (Ironically, I have no problem throwing the doors open via the Internet. Me = weird, clearly.)

Anyway, to his "did school get out early?" inquiry I replied, "Theirs did," thinking that should be enough to shut him up. But no. "So is that private school?" he continues. And I say, "Yeah. Private." (Thinking to myself, "So private, in fact, there are only two students.") And he says, "I thought maybe I didn't get the memo about early dismissal. So where do they go to school?"

Finally, mercifully, Annabelle looks at him and says loudly, "We are home schooled. HOME SCHOOLED," she repeated. "We go to school. At home," she explained, presumably in case he didn't get what that meant.

He quit asking questions after that.

IT'S FOR THE BIRDS: With spring and March just around the corner, we thought it would be an appropriate time to tackle a project we've been sitting on since Christmas Day - assembling birdhouses. Specifically, a GreenBird House. Sized for House and Bewick Wrens, Nuthatches and Titmice, it's made of very heavy stock recycled paper, is 100 percent biodegradable and water resistant.

Shocking as it may sound, before doing any construction, we actually read through all of the directions. : ) It looked simple enough to put together - and it was, once I abandoned the instructions we'd so carefully read ahead of time. I would suggest the folks completely redo the weird perspective and wildly unhelpful illustrations that are printed along with their directions - either that or be a WHOLE lot more wordy, because the drawings were really not helpful at ALL. (In fact, what they should have are PHOTOS of the assembly process.)

Anyway, we did manage to get them together in under five minutes, and the kids had lots of fun decorating them. In poking around their Web site, I found the company has even developed lesson plans to help students connect with the great outdoors. Cool!

APPLES' WAY: About a week ago, CJ, who had just finished eating an apple, approached me with two seeds. "Can we put them in a glass with a wet paper towel and grow an apple tree?" he asked. I said "of course," of course. I've glanced at them a couple of times and saw a whole lot of nothing. In fact, I darn near threw the experiment away yesterday. Glad I didn't, because this afternoon, CJ said, "I want to check on my apple seeds." I told him to go get a stool and climb up onto the kitchen counter to retrieve his jar. He did and low and behold, both seeds had sprouted. So now CJ is thinking we won't have to buy apples at the store any more. :) I told him we'd probably still have to supplement our harvest for awhile. I *think* they're Galas.

We inspected the sprouting seeds and transferred them to a peat pot full of organic potting soil. Hopefully they'll continue to grow!

FUNNY STUFF: Around noon today Annabelle asked, "Why did the whale cross the road? To get to the other tide! Get it? Get it?!?!