We’re squeezing in geography and normal school time as best we can, due to the ‘s’ word.

{standardized testing}

Our study of France has been a little bit here, a little bit there ~ and we did get it all in this week. Just maybe not exactly like I had planned it. Rather than tell you how it all worked out in real life, I’ll give you the ‘how I intended it all to be’ instead. :)

Monday

• Geography song (kids are singing it to me while pointing to the countries on the map)
• Locate/map France using wall map and atlas
• Find France on the globe (which hemispheres, what continent, etc…)
• What countries (and how many) border France
• Bodies of water around France
• Read a few chapters of The Little Prince

Tuesday

• Geography song
• Read story from 80 Tales Around the World
• Rivers in France
• Highest point (mountain) in France
• Completed map activity (click on thumbnail below)

Wednesday

• Geography song
• Flag of France worksheet (click on thumbnail below)
• Type of government in France
• Landmarks in Paris
• Read a few chapters in The Little Prince

Thursday

• Geography song
• Children Around the World and worksheet
• Virtual journey
• Played some online games via French embassy

Resources and Websites

• AmbaFrance – French Embassy in the UK has a little ‘kiosk’ that kids can access fun information about Freance
• National Geographic Kids – facts on France and video clip on truffles
• Oxfam – virtual journey of France to help you experience the culture
• Kidport – key facts on France
• Woodlands Jr. School. – homework help and links on France for kids
• Mapping France notebooking sheet
• Flag of France notebooking sheet

Books We’re Using

This week we started reading a new book, Boxes for Katje, and focused a bit more on a few artists, Vincent van Gogh and Rembrandt. We also are learning more about Corrie ten Boom and reading a book called Keeper of the Angels Den about her life.

My mom is talking to the girls about her too, since she was a secretary for Corrie for a few years and Corrie ten Boom married my mom and my dad. The girls think it’s great to look through scrapbooks and see pictures of Holland and everyone way back when.

Here’s a peek at how our week looked:

Monday

• Review geography song
• Show where Netherlands is located on a map
• Talk about capital of Netherlands (Amsterdam and also Hague as seat of goverment)
• Type of government in Netherlands – visit royal website
• Read Boxes for Katje and talked about time book was written

Tuesday

• Review geography song
• Talk more about how WW2 effected the Netherlands
• Started reading Keeper of the Angels Den – a book about Corrie ten Boom. We love it!
• Talked about Holland’s geography features

Wednesday

• Looked at art from both van Gogh and Rembrandt and compared their styles.
• Picked one of the paintings by van Gogh to copy using watercolors (Sunflowers)
• Talked about the process of creating Delft porcelain (we have some at our house from our trip to Holland)
• Had some gouda cheese. We like it sliced thin on toasted bread (our Costco carries a great brand)
• Continued reading in Keeper of the Angels Den

Thursday

• Printed off the recipe for Olliebollen (it’ll be our Sunday evening treat!)
• Visited the van Gogh gallery site and talked about the life of van Gogh
• Visited the RIJKS museum site
• Continued reading Keeper of the Angels Den

Resources we used:

Websites we visited/used:

• European Central Bank: Poster of various Euro coins and bills. I was going to make one, but why when they have so nicely done it for me? :) Shows images of the fronts of the countries coins also. You can download images of the coins and paper, information on the Euro security features and more.
• YouTube: link to a video that shows Rembrandt’s self portraits. Pretty neat since they morph each one into the next.
• Royal Delft site – has a document you can print off on the production process of delft pieces
• Holland.com – lots of great links on this site. Main tourist site for Holland/Netherlands
• Corrie ten Boom museum – gives a look at the ten Boom house
• RIJKS museum site
• Vincent van Gogh gallery site
• Olliebollen recipe – appropriately Olliebollen means “oily ball” – that it is!

We’ll be moving onto Germany over the next few weeks and continuing with our reading of Keeper of the Angel’s Den. I’m hoping to get some fun pictures posted soon too of my trip to Holland several years ago. I also have some pics of Corrie ten Boom to post too – especially the ones of when I met her….ok, I was one, but still! :)

Both of the girls were looking forward to our time in the Netherlands because my mom is from Holland and Laurianna visited there when she was just a little baby. I will have quite a few video links in this post and next weeks post and also share some of the fun things we did ~ including learning a easy Dutch prayer that we are saying at dinner time. It was one that I said growing up, and it’s been fun listening to our oldest three say it each night now.

Here are the words (and a little video clip) of the prayer we learned: “Dank u wel, Here Jezus, voor dit eten. Amen.” {translation: Thank you, Lord Jesus, for this food. Amen.}

The minit books that we are working on are not for a lapbook, but the girls enjoy doing them so we are putting them on a piece of cardstock and adding them to their geography binders. There are quite a few video clips at the end of this post – sorry if the page takes a bit to load for you.

Here’s a peek at how our week worked out:

Monday

• Introduce new geography song
• Locate and map the Netherlands (both wall map and minit book)
• Use the globe to find the Netherlands
• Read Hanna in the Time of the Tulips

Tuesday

• Practiced our geography song
• Learned about the flag of the Netherlands (notebooking sheet below)
• Talked about some of the symbols of the Netherlands: windmills, wooden shoes, and tulips (minit book)
• Read a story from Around the World in 80 Tales

Wednesday

• Practiced our geography song
• Read Hanna in the Time of the Tulips again
• Talked about the life cycle of a tulip (cards for a minit book)
• Watched a video clip on windmills
• Started our windmill craft
• Learned our new prayer in Dutch (video clip above has pronunciation)

Thursday

• Practiced our geography song
• Finished up our windmill craft
• Watched several video clips about the Netherlands (courtesy of Matt Lauer’s trip around the world)
• Kept practicing our Dutch prayer and Dutch phrase: “Ik hou van jou” ~ “I love you” (see video clip above for pronunciation)

  
  

  

Resources we used:

Websites we visited/used:

• Homeschool Share: Where are the Netherlands minit book and Symbols of the Netherlands minit book. There is an entire unit on Boxes for Katje available here (we are going to read the book next week)
• DLTK windmill craft: fairly simple craft using a toilet paper tube to make a windmill. Kids can either color their own or cut out a pre-colored sheet to make one.
• Bry-Back Manor – stages of a tulip cards
  
• Learner.org – parts of a tulip bulb. I printed this image 4 to a page so we could put it inside one of our minit books along with the life cycle of a tulip cards

Intro to Netherlands with Matt Lauer: some great info on how flowers get around the world and quick facts about the Netherlands

Last week we moved on (not very quickly) in our study of Great Britain and the United Kingdom. I’m personally a little overwhelmed with just how much we could really do if we really wanted too. :) That said, we focused more on the flag this week and had fun watching some different videos on YouTube and learning about the British currency.

Thanks so a friend of ours, we were able to see first hand what counterfeit currency looks like (she wasn’t passing it off, but unfortunately was on the receiving end of it!). McKenna started her first official chapter book this week (Christmas at Camelot) and Laurianna is reading through the Fairy Tales book still and together we’re reading Knight at Dawn to prepare for our studies on knights and castles in a few weeks.

 Monday

• Colored flag of UK
• Talked about how flag of UK was created (see notebook page below)

Tuesday

• Looked at the palace guards and had way.too.much fun looking for videos from Trooping the Color (the ceremony marking the birthday of the Queen), the changing of the guard, singing of God Save the Queen and also a guard laughing
• Started reading aloud Knight at Dawn by Mary Pope Osborne (we’ll be studying about knights and castles next week)

Wednesday

• Used Draw Write Now, Book 1 to draw sheep and had the girls write their own information about sheep
• Reviewed the difference between the UK and Great Britain
• Read aloud more from Knight at Dawn

Thursday

• Finished Knight at Dawn with the girls
• Looked at the currency of England and also had fun trying to figure out if the money we had was counterfeit or not (it was – thanks Christin!)
• Made the DLTK palace guard craft (link below)

Resources we used:

• The Royal Mint – official page of the Royal mint/coinmaking
• Bank of England – interactive bank notes. We learned how to tell a counterfeit bill
• Changing of the Guard – info page from the Royal website
• Enchanted Learning – printable coloring sheet of UK flag (members only)
• Travel for Kids – breaks things down by city and also provides some great literature ideas based on where you are looking
• DLTK – British Bobby craft and Palace Guard craft – too cute!!

Notebooking page: UK Flag Notebooking Page