Old World, New World

 For presentations this month, Jared decided to give a presentation for his Reptile and Amphibian Merit Badge.  He was supposed to present the facts about three different reptiles or amphibians and he chose, the Horned Toad, the Frilled Lizard and the American Alligator.  He was very creative about it and pretended to be an officer presenting the facts for these three suspects which were at large. 

 This was his rendition of how the frilled lizard runs.  It was pretty funny.  We also watched a video of the frilled lizard running, which had everyone laughing.

 Clarissa was inspired by our studies of the New World explorations and the Ancient Americas.  Jaguars were important to the people of the Ancient Americas and she wanted to know the difference between a Jaguar and a Leopard, so she studies that and presented the identifying marks of the four great cats: The Jaguar, Leopard, Tiger and Lion, all of which are part of the Genus Panthera.  One interesting thing we learned is that there is really no such thing as a black panther, it is either a black jaguar (if it's in the New World) or a black leopard (if it's in the old world).

 Krystal gave a short report about William Shakespeare.

Then we did a short Reader's Theater called "Which Shoes do You Choose," it was really cute.

Protestant Reformation

Today we learned about the Protestant Reformation and the effect that it had on religions around the world today.  We talked about the different men who were part of the Reformation like Martin Luther: known for his 95 theses, William Tyndale: translated the New Testament into English, John Wycliffe: new teachings differing from catholic church and translated Bible into English, and John Calvin: wrote many commentaries on the Bible and taught teachings differing from catholic church.  We also talked about the role of the printing press in making the Bible accessible to the world and not just the priests.  As our activity, we did potato printing to get an idea of what printing would have been like, not quite as easy as typing these days, but still easier than copying everything by hand.

It's Safari Time

On this beautiful spring day, we took a break from our normal school schedule, met up with some friends from our LDS Homeschool group, and went to the Ft. Chiswell Safari Park.  We spent the first little while in the petting zoo where the goats were very friendly and seemed to think they were human. 

Then it was time to load up on the Safari bus.  The bus took us on a tour of 45 acres to see animals from 6 different continents.

One of the first things that happened is that an ostrich reached it's head right into the bus and stole Amber's cup of food, then while I was trying to help her get more food, another bold ostrich reached it's head in on the other side of the bus and dumped Jared's food all over his lap.  We learned pretty quickly to guard the food as the animals were not at all shy.

Krystal is looking on with trepidation, not sure what this ride will bring, but glad to be with her friends.

Amber and Liam are happy to watch the animals from afar, but are a little more cautious when the animals stick their heads in the bus windows.

I had to help feed the animals or the kids would have lost all their food, but they enjoyed seeing the animals, like this water buffalo, come right up to the bus. 

 The ostriches were very bold and obnoxious.  They tried to take everyone's food and with those long necks, you really had to watch them.

 Cody the American Bison was rather large, but very gentle.  He would just hold his mouth open and wait for you to pour the food in.  Amber still seems a little nervous about him being that close though.

Then came the camel.  He was not at all shy and really had the whole bus in an uproar of either crying or laughter.  He was very big and very friendly.  Most of the kids enjoyed petting the camel and trying to avoid being slobbered on.

 

 

 Clarissa and Cailin were two of the ones in fits of laughter over how close the camel kept getting to them.  By the end, everyone was really having and good time and realized that the animals were just fun.

 There were some more calm animals to see as well, like the turtles and the zebra.

 Once we were done with the bus ride, we spent some more time at the petting zoo.

 These are mama wallabies with joeys in their pouches, but unfortunately they wouldn't show them off.  Jared enjoyed feeding peanuts to the monkey and the monkey enjoyed trying to catch them.

 Clarissa's favorite animals were the pigs.  She saved some of her food from the bus to feed the baby pigs, but the mommies wouldn't let the babies get any of the food.  We all had a great time with friends and animals alike and enjoyed being out in the beautiful weather.

Save the Truffula Trees

 In honor of Earth Day coming up, our library did a special story time based off of Dr. Seuss'  The Lorax, which happens to be my favorite Dr. Seuss book.

 After a very lively reading of the story, Krystal and Amber made their own little Truffula Trees.  The library also gave them each their own copy of the book.

They ended the day with watching the animated version of the story.  The library also gave away a free composter, but I wasn't the lucky recipient.  Still, I love our library.

Double, Double, Toil and Trouble

 For our study of Shakespeare and the Renaissance, the kids reenacted the Witches scene from Macbeth.

 They had fun practicing the scene, throwing in the different ingredients for Eye of Newt soup and cackling like witches.

Eye of Newt Soup

Kitchen Experiments

In between Grammar, Reading, Spelling and Math we worked on several projects/experiments in the kitchen today.  Jared has been wondering what was the difference between butterscotch and caramel, so after a little internet research, we determined that it's the type of sugar used that makes the difference.  Butterscotch is usually made with brown sugar and caramel with white sugar.  In both cases, they are cooked with dairy products such as butter or cream.  In our searching we also discovered that we could make caramel from a can of sweetened condensed milk, in this case it is the lactose in the milk that caramelizes and combines with the dairy to make a perfect caramel.

 The kids just thought this was great because you actually cook it right in the can.  You simmer the can for 2 1/2 hours, making sure the can is always covered in water.

 After the can cools to the touch you open it and voila! Caramel!  Our caramel was very runny, we really needed to have our heat a little higher, but it was still tasty.

 Everyone enjoyed dipping their fruit into the caramel for a nice snack and we decided that it was healthier than caramel made from white sugar.

 

Jared wanted to make caramel candies with the leftover caramel dip so he cooked it on the stove until it started to get thick and then put it on wax paper.  Yummy!

 

Another experiment we've been wanting to try out is the naked egg.  The idea is to put an egg in vinegar and the vinegar will slowly eat away at the egg shell and leave just the egg inside of it's membrane.  This takes about a day, but even a few hours later you can see that the egg is all covered in bubbles and there is a layer of calcium from the eggshell at the top of the vinegar.

Finally, I have been baking and freezing meals for our busy days and the days after the baby comes and have been wanting to make and freeze some bread.  I found a recipe for 1 hour bread and thought I would try it out and compare it to my normal dough recipe to see which one I liked best.  In the end, I made four loaves of yummy wheat bread.  Of course I had to taste both kinds of bread to see which one was better (nothing says heaven like bread right out of the oven with a little homemade peach preserves spread on it.)  In the end, I determined that the 1 hour recipe tasted better.  Sounds like we have a winner and a successful day of homeschooling!

Death, Despair, and Easter Eggs?

For history today the unit was called "The 1300s - The Age of Despair."  Sounds fun huh?  The video introduced such topics as The Black Plague, The Hundred Years War, The Battle of Agincourt, and Joan of Arc.  So, how do you make topics about death and despair interesting for a young audience?  We used Easter Eggs.  We got the idea from the Story of the World Activity book.  We hid eggs filled with a few chocolate chips out in the yard.  Then we talked about the Plague and how it was spread.  As a reminder that it was the fleas on rats that spread the disease, the kids had to go out into the yard to look for "rats" and find all the "fleas" inside and "get rid" of them. 

 Here's the crew with their rats and fleas, they look pretty happy to be in the depths of despair.  Another thing they remembered from this unit was the origin of the song "Ring Around the Rosies" and the fact that "we all fall down" is in reference to the Plague.  We also learned that 1/4 of the people in the country died of the plague, while 1/2 of the people in the village died from disease and 8/10 of the clergy died from exposure while tending to the sick and giving last rights to the dying.  Hey! Did that count as math for the day?

 For lunch we ate currant buns, lenten pea soup (no meat, in honor of lent) and a green salad which we learned people started eating around this time period. 

Here's the crew enjoying their lunch and time spent together. 

On Friday the 24th, we watched Shakespeare's Henry the V and enjoyed learning a little about the reasons for the Hundred Years War and the amazing outcome of the Battle of Agincourt, which we later compared to the Stripling Warriors in the Book of Mormon as in both cases, those who fought on the outnumbered side of the battle were protected by God.