Our ninth week in review: October 25-29

Report cards anyone?  LOL

Another great week of school for Daisy!  However, the weather is messing with her seasonal allergies (frost last Friday, pouring rain, unseasonably warm temperatures--up to near 80--for a few days, with a high of only 60 today) so she's ending a great week by feeling cruddy :(

On Monday we enjoyed our long-anticipated field trip to The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.  We visited the traveling Cleopatra exhibit  (see my report with oodles of fascinating pictures right here) then spent a few hours exploring the other exhibits.  Please excuse the cellphone pictures.  I managed to forget that I had the proper camera in my bag---only flashless cellphone pictures had been allowed in the Cleopatra exhibit.

Most of our time was spent in Sir Isaac's Loft "where art and physics collide."  Among other activities,  Daisy compared the energy needed to lift herself with the help of a few pulleys vs many pulleys:

                                               

She explored pendulum motion by viewing patterns created with sand (I swear this exact pendulum display was at The Franklin Institute in the 1970s):

She set up gigantic domino relays--check out the stairs they had!

We then moved to the bioscience exhibit, home of the giant walk-through heart.  Daisy does not enjoy the heart experience (just a smidge claustrophobic!) so we skipped it as usual.  Instead she explored the Health and Wellness section and the Blood section, learning exactly how much blood is in her body based on her mass:

After a foray through Electricity (I miss the old electricity exhibit with all of Ben's equipment, sniff sniff), we returned to  Changing Earth to see what we had missed before our Cleopatra ticket time.  Daisy spent a long time selecting times in history to see how coastlines and sea levels have changed.  The little Statue of Liberty model was either submerged or exposed with the sea level changes.

Daisy was struck by how the coastline of the United States would change should the ice of Antarctica and Greenland melt.  Yikes, that's a lot of water!

Unfortunately, we had to leave after Changing Earth.  Our 5 hour validated parking time was at the limit and rush hour would be starting soon.  No time for the planetarium, Franklin Air Show and Flight Simulator, for the Train Factory and for a visit to KidScience.  We'll see those next time!

For "regular" school this week we covered

Math
Pre-algebra review this week covered word problems involving ratios, rates, unit rates, and proportions.

I had tried to find patty paper locally but the kitchen store was out of stock for two weeks so I finally ordered a box from Key Curriculum Press, the publisher of Patty Paper Geometry.  Their price including shipping was considerably less than other online sellers and shipping was incredibly fast (2 days from NYC).   The proper paper will be much easier to use than the differently-sized origami paper we had been using.

Today (Friday) we'll do some competition math assuming Daisy's sinus headache doesn't reappear by math time.

Science
We started chapter 5: Atmosphere in CPO Earth Science, finished the ground water and wells project (homeschool FAIL--separate post), watched Bill Nye Atmosphere, and built our own barometer (Investigation 5A).  Topics included the composition of Earth's atmosphere as compared to nearby planets and the layers of the atmosphere.

Last week I managed to upload all the pictures for a bunch of science posts yet neglected to add any text, so the posts still sit in draft mode.  I will get them posted today.

History
It was a history-filled week with Cleopatra, regular history and the state park Earth Explorers program which focused on local history this week, specifically local agriculture.  The kids pressed their own apple cider!  This week only two other kids, one boy and one girl, were there for the oldest group time (9-15yr).  They were both around Daisy's age and got along very well, if the amount of chatter and laughter at pick-up time is any indication :)

We've moved from Egypt to the ancient Indus valley.   The Human Odyssey devotes a whopping five pages to the topic, so I added the first ten chapters of The Ancient South Asian World and the Jan 2008 issue of Calliope: Spark Along the Indus 2600-1750 BC.  I adapted a mapping activity from the K12 Student Pages (p 118-119 for those playing at home).

Next week we'll start ancient Chinese civilizations.  The Human Odyssey also devotes only a few pages to this topic, thus she'll be reading from The Ancient Chinese World in addition to some other library resources.

We've stopped making a timeline.  Daisy felt like it was busywork, essentially duplicating the very good timelines between each section in The Human Odyssey. 

English/Language Arts
Daisy's gearing up for the start of NaNoWriMo on Monday!  She finished adjectives in grammar with adjective phrases and a chapter test.  No more grammar until December.

She worked more on the NaNoWriMo workbook and spent many hours writing on the computer.

I usually don't keep track of Daisy's free reading, but this week's book list is notable.  She (re)read The Hobbit, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King!

French
We finished Chapter 2 in SYRWTL French (Galore Park French Prep 1).  Now we can discourse on important topics like what school supplies are in our school room and who is in our class LOL  Today (Friday) Daisy is going to make flashcards for all vocabulary up to this point.

Other Fun Stuff
It's been a slower week for outside events, just the usual ballet classes and Saturday Nutcracker rehearsals.

The Sunday Halloween parade downtown and trick-or-treating down Main Street were so much fun.  Mike wore the Nutcracker head at the ballet studio's table while Older Sister handed out the candy and coloring pages.  The weather was perfect, too.  I forgot the camera.

Older Sister has Arsenic and Old Lace performances tonight, tomorrow night and Sunday afternoon.  No rest for the drama weary---A Christmas Carol rehearsals begin on Monday afternoon!

Older Brother spent much time and effort this week honing his college list and writing his applications.  There is light at the end of the tunnel.

The Best of the Week:  the day spent at The Franklin Institute!

The Worst of the Week:  my mood :(  I've been very short and snappish with the entire family as next week is the anniversary of my mother's death.  Last Halloween I spent the day holding her hand as she slipped in and out of consciousness.  I really wish we could just skip to mid-November.

Looking ahead to next week:  It will be a tough week emotionally.  On top of that, Mike is having knee surgery next Friday to repair his ACL and to fix other issues related to surgery two decades ago.  For fun, Daisy has a Girl Scout meeting on Tuesday.

Sorry to end on a down note.  I hope you all had a great week and will enjoy a very fun weekend!