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Exploring Egypt: Week 1

Oct62009
October 6, 2009 by Leave a Comment

We started out our tour of Africa by studying the country of Egypt. Honestly, it can be rather daunting planning a ‘quick’ tour because there is so much to do and cover. From pyramids, to mummies, to pharaohs, and the list goes on. Needless to say this isn’t an exhaustive list and there will be two more weeks to follow this post

Monday

  • Introduce new song about Northern Africa
  • Use atlas and globe to locate Africa and Egypt
  • Mapping activity
  • Independent reading {pick from the bookshelf ~ see carousel below}
Click on thumbnail to download pdf file

Tuesday

  • Review geography song
  • Learn about some new geography terms: delta, desert, oasis
  • Learned about the Nile River: originates in Ethiopia, flows South to North, talked about the Nile Delta
  • Watched Mystery of the Nile IMax movie on Netflix ~ available to watch instantly

Wednesday

 

Thursday

Resources and Websites

Books We Recommend


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Filed Under: Africa, Egypt, Geography, Geography Printables Leave a Comment

Our Studies of Italy: Week 2

Sep292009
September 29, 2009 by Leave a Comment

While there is so much more that we could do in our studies, we kept it fairly simple this week. In all honestly, Italy is a place we could spend waaaaay more time learning about ~ ancient Rome, the Roman empire, Pompeii…the list goes on! We started our study of Italy last week and that post also has some other great links and resources, so be sure to check it out!

Here are the things we focused on this week and some links we liked and used.

Monday

  • Quick review of last week’s studies: capital, major cities, geography features {i.e. Italy is a peninsula, Sicily is an island}
  • Took a virtual tour of Italy
  • Geography song about Eastern Europe ~ point out countries while singing
  • Color & learn about the flag of Italy

click thumbnail to download the pdf flag activity

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

  • Review geography song
  • Read Michaelangelo by Diane Stanley
  • Had fun trying to paint while laying on our backs {a little messy and tricky…poor Michaelangelo!}
  • Stamped our passports, put our papers in our notebooks and packed up since our trip to Italy is done!

Resources and Websites

Books We’re Using

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Filed Under: Europe, Geography, Geography Printables, Italy Leave a Comment

Our Study of Italy: Week 1

Sep232009
September 23, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Our last stop in our tour of Europe is Italy. We found some great {and fun} books to read this week and Laurianna decided toward the end of the week that she wanted to learn more about the Colosseum…until she found out more of what went on there ~ and then not so much anymore!

Monday

  • Geography song about Eastern Europe ~ point out countries while singing
  • Locate & map country features
  • Color & label map of Italy {see map activity below}
  • Use atlas to learn more about Italy

click thumbnail to download the pdf map activity

Tuesday

  • Review geography song
  • Major cities in Italy and the capital of Italy
  • Visit National Geographic for Kids site: Italy
  • Story from Around the World in 80 Tales

Wednesday

  • Review geography song
  • Geography features ~ seas/oceans around Italy, island {Sicily}, peninsula
  • Read Katy and the Mona Lisa

Thursday

  • Review geography song
  • Read Papa Picollo
  • Watch some videos about the colosseum on YouTube

Resources and Websites

Books We’re Using

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Filed Under: Europe, Geography, Geography Printables, Italy Leave a Comment

Geography Songs: Sing Around the World

Sep172009
September 17, 2009 by 2 Comments

Several of you have emailed and asked what we are using when I mention our ‘geography songs’. Last year I purchased a song book and CD set from Rainbow Resource that is called Geography Songs: Sing Around the World by Kathy Troxel/Audio Memory.

Amazon just made the entire cd available as an mp3 download for $8.99. While the download doesn’t come with the book, that is considerably less than the $21 that I paid for the book/cd combo. You can also listen to clips of the different songs and get an idea of what the cd is like before buying it. Right now we’re using the ‘Southern Europe’ song {#5} if you’d like to hear it! :)

Now while the songs are super-catchy, you will find yourself humming various songs ~ especially if you wake up in the middle of the night and can’t fall back asleep.

Not that I speak from experience or anything.

We try to sing the song that goes along to the area we are studying every day or every other day. The first few days we get the country names down and then move over to a map and point out the countries while we are singing the song so we can get a bigger picture of where the countries are. I can honestly say that the kids aren’t the only ones learning something using the songs!

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Filed Under: Geography, Opinions and Reviews 2 Comments

Learning About Spain: Week 2

Sep162009
September 16, 2009 by 1 Comment

We continued on our journey through Spain focusing this week a little more on the culture and also art {Picasso}. We also spent time learning about Columbus {and yes, I know he wasn’t from Spain, but Spain was generous in supporting his trip, so we tied it in that way}. :)

Here’s a look at how we spent our second week learning about Spain.

Monday

  • Quick review of main stuff from our first week studying Spain
  • Geography song for Southern Europe
  • Look at the currency for Spain
  • Read story from Around the World in 80 Tales {link in book carousel below}
  • Visit National Geographic for Kids site

Tuesday

  • Review geography song
  • Talk about Christopher Columbus {from Italy, but trip funded by Spain}
  • Story of Ferdinand on You Tube


Wednesday

  • Review geography song
  • Talk about Picasso
  • Picasso art project ~ Picasso faces. We pulled out oil pastels and created a collage of faces with cubistic/abstract design. They had a little trouble understanding how to make the faces ‘mesh’ at first, but LOVED it once they got going!

Thursday

  • Review geography song
  • Running of the bulls and bull fighting ~ YouTube clips
  • Put together food from country {pico de gallo}

Resources and Websites

Books We’re Using

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Filed Under: Europe, Geography 1 Comment

Learning About Spain: Week 1

Sep82009
September 8, 2009 by 3 Comments

We didn’t quite squeeze in all of Europe last year, so we are continuing our tromp through Europe with Spain this fall. There is so much that we could cover and literally spends weeks upon weeks studying the country, but we’re trying to stick to a two-week study of each country.

Here’s a look at how we spent our first week of learning about Spain.

Monday

  • Introduce geography song about Eastern Europe ~ point out countries while singing
  • Locate & map Spain {wall map, atlas, and globe} ~ find capital and major geographical features
  • Use atlas to learn more about Spain
  • Read The Story of Ferdinand
  • Color & label map of Spain

click thumbnail to download the pdf map activity

Tuesday

click thumbnail to download the pdf map activity

Wednesday

  • Review geography song
  • Geography feature ~ Pyrennes Mountains
  • Read about Picasso and visit website @ his art {talked about cubism and looked at some funky art}
  • Read Story of Ferdinand again
  • Watched video collage with Picasso’s art

Thursday

  • Review geography song
  • Read about Ponce de Leon {the kids were so sad he died from an arrow hitting him}
  • Story from Favorite Fairy Tales Told in Spain

Resources and Websites

  • Time for Kids Spain – Includes a sightseeing guide, history timeline, native lingo, fact file and teacher’s guide
  • Travel for Kids – gives some great suggestions for actually traveling Spain with kids along with books that are recommended by regions in Spain
  • Spanish Explorers – Ponce de Leon, Cortez, Magellan, and more
  • Mr. Picasso Head – hilarious online ‘game’ where kids create their own Picasso-like work of art
  • My Kids Art – talks about Picasso and his life


Books We’re Using

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Filed Under: Europe, Geography, Geography Printables 3 Comments