Multiplication tables are more fun with a clock!

I'm in catch-up mode today... This photo is actually from early Winter...

Learning the multiplication tables was one of our goals for Grade 2. Once I learned about Robinsunne's Multiplication Clock, I knew S had to make one of these! The problem was that I was more enthusiastic about the concept than he was. Together, we persevered.

One learning we soon made was that there's a reason that your paper should be large: if, just hypothetically speaking, of course, you use an 8.5" x 11" sheet, your circles and numbers get awfully crowded. This is especially true for still-emerging writers, whose handwriting is big.

Also, despite mothers' advice to the contrary, permanent markers are exciting to use, but they bleed into the paper, causing the numbers to run together. When this occurs well into the project, you either start over (not a popular suggestion), or you find an alternate solution. In this case, that solution was to White-Out the problem, to photocopy the page, and then to rewrite what's needed [using something other than a permanent marker ;-) ].

To extend the lesson, S circled all of the square numbers - this is difficult to see in the image below, however. He discovered that the circles form a spiral. Neat!

Anansi inspired a whole page of writing and drawing!

I came home to the most wonderful surprise tonight:


Last night, I wrote a short assignment list for S. He and I discussed his primary task, writing a summary of Anansi Goes Fishing. (More about the book later...) We talked about how he'd write a sentence or two about the story, draw a picture (with background to fill the entire space), and make a border. My note to him included a diagram of the these features. :-) He listened, and then decided that he wanted me to do this work with him. Well, that meant that we wouldn't get to it until Friday evening.

Lo, and behold! My reluctant writer wrote this lovely summary (all by himself), drew a beautiful picture to go with it, and remembered his border! (He even included a list of characters at the bottom.) Yes, there are some, er, creatively spelled words in there, but I'm more than willing to look the other way on those.

The back story to this book is that S had checked it out of the library, and read it. Yesterday, we put it into our pile of books to return. The library was closed when we got there, so we put our books into the Book Return slot. Except for Anansi. When I asked S about that book, he generously offered to read it to me - right then and there, standing next to the Book Return slot! Seizing the moment, I thought it would be an ideal addition to our Grade 2 work on animal stories and fables, which is where this blog post begins...

St. Patrick

I went to the library in search of, among other things, a book or two about St. Patrick -- this was both in preparation for St. Patrick's Day, and also for S to read for his Grade 2 saints...

The requisite section of the stacks was very picked-over. But, there -- right in the middle of an otherwise bare shelf -- it was: Tomie de Paola's Patrick: Patron Saint of Ireland, exactly what I had scoped out for S at the beginning of the school year, and about which I had promptly forgotten. Gratefully, I scooped it up, along with Petook: An Easter Story for T.


I offered to read the book to S, but he wanted to read it himself. For our MLB, we printed out a map of Ireland. S dictated his summary to me, and then recopied my sentences. (This was a compromise, since he would otherwise have refused to write anything.)

I thought he'd give me something about one or two of the legends associated with St. Patrick. Nope! What caught the attention of my little dog-lover was this: "Als er ans Boot kam, sind die Jagdhunde still geworden." (When he [St. Patrick] came to the boat, the hunting dogs became still.)

And, check out that border! It's green and orange, and S researched to learn that these two colors mixed together make brown. So, the middle line is brown. As far as he was concerned, he was just making a nice design... how's that for some unintentional form drawing?


And, to celebrate the day, we made this "Dark Irish Soda Bread". Of course, I substituted ingredients. :-) Instead of buttermilk, I used homemade yogurt. And, per the wishes of my bakers, we left out the caraway seeds. I thought the outcome was just so-so, and was disappointed that the loaf was so (relatively) small. For me, the recipe was on its way to the recycling bin. However, the bread got very positive reviews over dinner. So, I guess I'm keeping it...

On Valentine's Day Eve

S's afternoon class was canceled today, due to the weather. (I wish I had known that *before* we drove over there...) Anyway, that gave us an unexpectedly free afternoon, perfect for "teatime."

By request, we sipped hot chocolate instead of tea. And, instead of something seasonally appropriate, S and T polished off some (yummy) Christmas cookies we still had stashed away. But, I digress...

We attempted this tongue twister from zzzebra:

Zehn zahme Ziegen zogen zehn Zentner Zucker zum Zoo.

We sampled some Valentine's Day verses, and this one was the overwhelming favorite:

Wenn die Flüsse aufwärts fließen,
und die Hasen Jäger schießen,
und die Mäuse Katzen fressen,
dann erst will ich dich vergessen.

And, we talked a little about the origins of Valentine's Day.

And, did I mentioned we had hot chocolate?

More on trees, and Tuesday Teatime with Pumpkin Pie

The interest in tree and leaf identification continues...

The back story to today's activities is this: at least month's nature center class, S was so taken by the nature hunt (ok, so he liked the hunt and he was a little put-out at not having been able to be in charge of his group's clipboard) that he came home that day and created his own nature hunt.

This morning, we pulled out his version of the nature hunt, and went hunting! Our first task was to find ten different trees. We got a good start with the ones in our own yard.

Once again, I learned something, too! That tree in the front yard (being measured by my trusty arborists in the photo), which I'd thought was a white oak, is actually a red oak -- oops! By S's measurement, it's 67 years old (one year per inch of circumference). In this case, that age reference is on the optimistic side; the tree is about 2/3 younger...

After lunch, we turned our attention to Tuesday Teatime! Since I had some pumpkin in the refrigerator, it was a simple decision to try out Kristie's 10-Minute Pumpkin Pie. With two bakers predisposed to kitchen rivalry, it took us a little more than ten minutes to assemble. Still, about an hour after we started (that includes the baking time), the house smelled great, and we had a fine-looking pie, fresh out of the oven. It's a good thing I snapped a photo right away -- as I write this post this evening, there's, um, a good bit less left in the pie dish.

The pie's flavor and texture are wonderful. Our version didn't form much in the way of its own crust - I prefer pies with crusts, as it turns out - but that's certainly not a deal-breaker for this recipe. Thanks again for sharing it, Kristie.

For our Teatime reading, we enjoyed "Der Herbst steht auf der Leiter", by Peter Hacks. Here's a sampling of this poem:

"Der Herbst steht auf der Leiter
und malt die Blätter an,
ein lustiger Waldarbeiter,
ein froher Malersmann."

The poem took us back to Google: the poem says "kommt ein frecher Zeisig". S asked what this was, and I didn't know. A Zeisig, as it turns out, is a bird. :-) In English, it's a siskin, a member of the finch family.

How a walk to Storytime at the library turned into a discussion about decision trees

So, we attended our library's preschool Story Time this morning. T tags along to so many of S's activities that I wanted to go to something just for him. It had rained, and I wasn't sure if more was on the way, so I packed umbrellas and we walked (as opposed to biking) there. (I considered driving, but really couldn't justify driving that one mile, especially since we had the time.)

The program was... just ok. T didn't want to participate at first, but then warmed up to it a bit by the end. It seems like the more we do outside of the "conventional" sphere, the more critical I'm becoming. Or, maybe I'm just getting crotchety in my advancing age!

After the program, we hung out in the library for a little while - S read books, T picked one out to "read" as well, and I poked around in the craft section, finding two kids' knitting books that look promising.

S's assignment for his Nature Center class is to write an origin story. Coincidentally, I found a book along those lines as well. I showed it to him, and he immediately launched into the first chapter. Coincidentally (are you sensing a theme here?!), this book looks like it will tie in well with the legends/fables/animal stories for Grade 2. So, it could be a win all around.

On the way home, I asked the boys to collect leaves they thought were nice. The leaves are dropping in earnest now - the trees and the ground beneath them are lovely. My plan was to use the gathered treasures for leaf rubbings.

We made the rubbings, but then I was curious about what some of the leaves were. (See, I'm learning right along with the boys!) So, I suggested to S that we hit the Internet for some tree identification. With leaves in hand, we started clicking, and soon located the very, very handy and easy-to-use "What Tree is It?" from the Ohio Public Library Information Network.

We used this tree ID tool to identify (thornless) honeylocust leaves, a red maple leaf, and some others. And that's how S and I ended up talking about the decision tree model on our way to karate (him) and yoga (me) tonight.

Those saint stories really do hit the spot with second graders!

With Martinmas coming up, we went into high gear on reading about St. Martin.

We read through this particular set of stories last year. But this time around, S has been particularly taken with the "take home message" that being a Christian means serving others as Christ - and Martin - did.

This morning, we went past our local Starbucks to see whether they had any coffee grounds available for pickup. I had promised S that, if they did, he could have the entire bag for his own compost pile.

Well, there were grounds to be had! T cheerfully took the bag, and insisted that he would carry it to the car. Problem! *S* wanted to carry the bag... Such differences of opinion are not uncommon. Only this time, it wasn't the "normal" situation of both brothers wanting to do the same thing at the same time. S was upset because *he* wanted to be the one doing the serving; he didn't want to *be* served!

Hours later, I'm still amazed.

*The* resource for Martinmas preparations / Martinstag Vorbereitung (in German)

From the Elephant Child to Encarta

So, we are a little behind the schedule I set for ourselves. That means we're still doing a block on animal stories.

Today, we read "Wie das Elefantenkind seinen Ruessel bekam", by Rudyard Kipling. (That's "The Elephant's Child.") The elephant child made its way to the Limpopostrom. The boys found that quite amusing, and curiosity finally got the better of us. S and I hit Google, to learn that the Limpopostrom is the Limpopo River in English.

And this is why homeschooling is so freeing: From knowing that Limpopostrom (isn't that fun to say?!) is the Limpopo River, our next question was where this river is located. Back to Google, and off to Encarta we headed! We learned that the Limpopo River flows through southern Africa. When S zoomed out on the map, we were left with only the country outlines. That, of course, was an opportunity for us to give ourselves a pop quiz: did we remember all of the countries touched by the river? We did!

And this is where homeschooling is even more wondrous: I stepped away from the computer, only to return to S's cruising around on the map, only now he was looking at the map of our own region! On his own, he knew to "travel" up to the North American continent. He'd then used strategies to narrow his location down to our state, and then to our city, and then he "visited" some other locations of import to him.

We then set to finishing the story. On this beautiful fall day, we simply had to use our hammock. And, so we did. :-)

On the way to karate (and yoga for me!), S and I brainstormed various possibility for making a "moving picture" of this story. He had some interesting ideas... stay tuned!

Some Fabel resources for Grade 2

• http://literaturnetz.org/gedichte
• Drachenlied
  

• http://literaturnetz.org/fabeln
• Fünfzig Fabeln für Kinder - gereimt
• http://www.hamburger-bildungsserver.de/welcome.phtml?unten=/faecher/deutsch/gattungen/fabeln.htm
• http://www.kinderreimeseite.de/50185293cb009ac05/index.html
• Hekaya - Fabeln aus aller Welt
• http://www.udoklinger.de/Deutsch/Fabeln/Inhalt2.htm
  

Let the games begin! - how we started our Grade 2 homeschooling year

Last year, I had a clear starting date in mind for our school year. As it turned out in retrospect, I didn't communicate this clearly to S., and so he didn't have that "hook" on which to hang his "first day of school" for the year. (Read: opportunity for improvement!)

We discussed what a good starting date would be... One consideration was to start on a new moon... That gave us August 12 or September 11... August seemed a little early, but mid-September seemed a little late, especially since his fall classes would have started during the prior two weeks...

We settled on August 12, conveniently a Sunday. The plan is to begin Grade 2 gently, starting with some form drawing and catch-up on art projects we've been thinking about but not yet executed. Then, we'll move on to a block of fables/nature stories.

To mark the occasion, S. agreed that we needed a special Grade 2 candle. On Saturday, he and I went out to the backyard, armed with our supplies. He crafted; I assisted as needed.


On Sunday evening, we had a special dinner to go with the special candle. Among the ingredients was a wild rice mixture I'd purchased for use at whatever occasion warranted it. We lit the candle for dessert, which was ice cream and the last of our self-picked blueberries. Mmmmm.....