My Summer Vacation

August 4, 2013

9:30 Sunday morning…a knock on the door…inside laughing and footsteps…Cannon opens the door. With a big smile and sparkling eyes he greets me. He is eager to share his summer adventures, his new skills and to start another year of learning adventures. We put the cover over the table, gather our materials, the white board and markers and begin to make our list of activities for the day.  Now we are ready to unpack the rolling cart.

Mining for Words

First, bright colored tissue paper peeking out from a gift bag, Cannon pulls each piece of paper out of the bag until he finds a very heavy package.  It is a very large heavy book of words, dictionary with 1,000 illustrations.  A word mine!  Cannon is eager to find some words.

 

He opened the book to a random page and put his
finger down.

 

 

 

 

 

 Our first word is “file”.  We find five different meanings for that little four letter word. I write the word on his forehead to “put it in your brain” and then we find the next word.  We collect six words: file, aircraft, paddle wheel, pansy, panda, and sweet potato.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunflowers

Next we take out the vase of sunflowers from my garden.  Cannon gets out his magnifying glass for a closer look. 

 

Then we look at a dried sunflower seed head.  Cannon explores each flower with his fingers and compares the two. There were lots of textures to explore from the “hairy” stem to the tiny individual flowers packed together in the center and finally the bumpy feel of the dried seeds.

 

He used his left hand fingers to pry the seeds from the seed head while his right hand held the stem.  When Cannon was finished there were sunflower seeds everywhere.  Maybe he can take them to the parrot that lives in the store across the street.

 

 

 

 

 

A New Language!

 This year, I explained, we are going to start learning a new language.  ASL! American Sign Language.  We are going to use total communication!  Cannon will use his spoken words, his own gestures and signs, written words, his talker, and now his ASL signs.

 

We started with “my summer vacation”, the title of the little book he was writing for his first day of school.  We learned signs for other words or phrases as we went through our session. I couldn’t write them down fast enough.  When mom got back from the store he told her the title of his story about his summer vacation.  He used the sign for coffee and asked mom to make a cup of coffee for me. Later when he heard the church bells he learned to sign “hear bells”.  At the end of our session he told mom he was hungry.  Cannon makes very close approximations of the “signs”. They are very “readable”.  

 

Note

Here is a link to the ASL website.

http://www.aslpro.com/cgi-bin/aslpro/aslpro.cgi

You can see the signs Cannon learned and learn them yourself.

 

 

Captain Underpants

We took a break and enjoyed reading two chapters in the new Captain Underpants book. The title is Captain Underpants and the Invasion of the Incredibly Naughty Cafeteria Ladies from Outer Space (and the Subsequent Assault of the Equally Evil Lunchroom Zombie Nerds).  Then we started making a Captain Underpants board game.

 

In between all of these activities Cannon put on his painting apron and created his impression of the sunflower.  He selected the colors and applied the acrylic paint using an easel brush and his apple core.  He used long and short brush strokes.  He worked in layers separating the colors and allowing one layer to dry before applying the next layer.

 

It was a very full and fun day. Cannon wipes the white board clean and we put all of our materials back in the closet and fold up the easel and the table cloth. Next week a field trip! 

 

ASL words

My

Summer

Vacation

Forgot

Know

Hear

Bells

Hungry

Coffee

Rollercoaster

Water

 

Vocabulary from dictionary search

Aircraft

File

Paddle wheel

Pansy

Panda

Sweet potato

 

 

 

 

June 2, 2013

Stopping to Smell the Roses

 

After a long month apart Cannon and I reunited for more creative adventures. There were big smiles at the front door and we wasted no time in getting started. We had exchanged pictures during the month and Cannon explored real life samples of some of the images.

First the yellow roses from the abundant yellow rose climbing outside my window. We smelled carefully so that no prickly thorns were encountered.  The thorns are the way the plant protects itself. We found  a bud (baby), a toddler sized flower, a child sized, an adult sized one and a fully opened one – fully mature one. 

Cannon was eager to see what else had been gathered into the basket from the garden.
There was a handful of golden oregano which Cannon crushed in his right hand to release the fragrance of the herb – just right for one of mom’s special dishes.  We took a close look with the magnifying glass at some blue gray mushrooms that had come up overnight in the grass.  We also looked at the “wings” from the silver maple tree and a few of the pine tree seedlings that had started to grow between the patio stones. From the cherry tree we looked at one small yellow cherry beginning to form where a blossom had been. 

Making Something Special

 

Cannon looked at the index of the book The History of Beads and independently found the chapter dealing with African beads.  Then we spread a bag full of West African beads brought back from my time in Ghana all over our red shallow work tray. Cannon enjoyed running his hand over the bead of all sizes, shapes and colors. We found pictures of some of the beads in the book. Then he began picking out those beads that he wanted to use to make a necklace for mom. He picked out one special bead for the center. He wanted to used lots of different kinds of beads so he picked three more different ones. He picked up each bead and put it into my hand to add to the design tray. Then he chose beads to use as spacers between beads.  When we had the design the way we wanted it Cannon assisted in the stringing of the beads.  Then we attached the clasp and next week we will wrap the package.

Paste and Stamp

Two special cards were made using our special stamps and papers. First Cannon selected collage papers for each card and covered the papers edges with glue from the glue stick.  Then he used the Red Baron to smooth the paper down, next he selected his message (not Boo! What a sense of humor he has) and then inked the stamp and placed it on the card. He added some finger prints for a personal signature as well as his name stamp.

 

 

Fun and Games
We played a short round of math slam, read a couple of chapters from Captain Underpants vol. 2, and put the continents and oceans map together reviewing the names of the continents.

Knock, knock!  Who’s there?  Mr. Dan – Bye, bye Miss Beth

So good to be back working together again.

 

 

April 28, 2013

Portfolio Day!

We started our day looking through all of the work that Cannon has done since we started working together in October.  What fun it was to find things we had forgotten about and to see them with fresh eyes. Some papers we put aside to add to or to use as collage papers for future projects. 

We put the artworks aside and spent the morning drifting pleasantly from reading, playing with numbers – making a number bead set for eight and nine to working with puzzles, the large one of the continents and oceans and the audio map of the United States.  We used Debbie the Dove’s feather to tickle our chins and Cannon exercised his mouth muscles blowing the feather and making it move.   Cannon showed me the book he made at school and we read it together.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cannon looked through the scrapes of different colored and textured papers and found some that he added to one of his water color painted papers. Then we tucked all of our supplies back into our new supply closet and finished our time together playing with banana-gram letters making words and playing with rhyming words

We found lots of yellow, green and blue papers to go with the
blue green painting. Now it is time to arrange them on the paper.
 

 

I took the pussy willow starts with me to plant in my garden. We shall see how they grow. Cannon’s pizza garden herbs have sprouted, soon it will be time to transplant them. 

April 21, 2013 

“In the Dream-time all the earth lay sleeping. Nothing grew.  Nothing moved. Everything was quiet and still.  The animals, birds and reptiles lay sleeping under the earth’s crust. Then one day the Rainbow Serpent awoke from her slumber and pushed her way through the earth’s crust, moving stones that lay in her way.  When she emerged…”

 

And so begins the Australian Aboriginal legend of The Beginning of Life as told by O. Noonuccal.  Cannon and I read the story together.  Then we looked at some examples of Australian Aboriginal Art that used small dots of color to fill in the shapes and designs. Then we began our interpretation of the Rainbow Serpent. Cannon rolled red yellow and blue inks onto a strip of bubble wrap and then pressed it onto the paper using the baron tool. Next week we will use the paper of rainbow dots to cut out the shape of our serpent.

 

Nesting Time

It is spring and birds are returning to Indiana. It is time to make a new nest or repair an old one. Remembering the Ghanaian story of the how a spider showed the people how to weave Kente cloth we looked at the nests woven by three different birds.  Cannon showed me his weaving from school.

A friend saved these nests that had fallen out of a tree
 for Cannon to look at. We never take a nest out of a tree.

Two of the birds had cleverly woven their nests around a tree branch and even wove some of the leaves into the nest.  We could see thin strips of light blue plastic along with the natural materials. The smallest nest was very soft inside. It was lined with fine hairs.  It was a perfect place to hold the fragile little eggs that would be laid there.

Cannon is taking a closer look

 

Helping the Birds

We wanted to help the birds build their nests so we made a “nesting wreath” to hang in my cherry tree.  Cannon filled the spaces in the grapevine wreath with lint from the dryer, hair from our hair brushes, strings, and wood shavings. We added some dried sunflowers from last summer to give the birds a snack while they worked.

 

 

The wreath is tucked into the branches of my cherry tree waiting to be discovered.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The wreath is tucked between the limbs of this tree.

 

Each blossom will turn into a cherry.

Yum, cherry pie!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vein of Gold

Blue, yellow, orange and green were the colors Cannon selected for this weeks water color experiment. When Cannon had filled the paper with color we used the yellow orange glitter glue and added a “vein” of gold threading through the colors. 

 In Between

We made another set of number beads – we are up to seven now and read a chapter of Captain Underpants.

 

 

 

April 14, 2013

Where are we? 

After we unpacked the rolling box of materials and made our list we got down to business. We started our morning by using the inflatable globe to review the continents and oceans then we focused our attention on North America and our country the USA.  Cannon explored his new “flat” map of the United States and located Indiana, Michigan and California.  Then we got out the “talking” map puzzle.  Cannon picked up each piece and when he moved it to its proper place heard the state name and capital repeated. Dad helped identify states where friends and family either lived or had visited. We both thought it was funny that the puzzle maker decided to put Alaska south of California closer to Mexico than Canada.

 

 

 

Vaporizing!

One of the words we added to our vocabulary last week was “evaporate”. We found a definition* and then with mom’s help we made a little experiment. Cannon is used to helping in the kitchen and one of his jobs is to let mom know when the water is boiling. This time we made careful observations – part of the scientific process – and just before the water started to boil we could see clouds of water vapor rising from the surface of the water. We “caught” the vapor with a clear glass pie plate and we could see and touch the water droplets.  There are more questions about vapor but we will save those for another time.

* Evaporation is when the sun heats up water in rivers or lakes or the ocean and turns it into vapor or steam. The water vapor or steam leaves the river, lake or ocean and goes into the air.

 Numeracy - Playing with Numbers - Counting by sets – 2-4-6-8

 

Cannon uses his "long arms" to choose the colors.

Cannon used beads to make strings of number sets. 

He selected the color for the set then we worked together to string them.  The hardest part was keeping the beads from “jumping” out of our hands and rolling onto the floor where a certain baby sister might find them.  We counted the beads and then we looked at the number “squares” to see another way of counting by sets. These are both ways of “fast adding” leading up to multiplying. 

 

 

Counting them out and
putting them on.

Stringing them up!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are so many fun things to do with numbers.  One of them is playing hide-and-seek.  Cannon enjoyed my story about learning to count by 5s by playing hide-and-seek so we demonstrated. We used the front door as the “base” and I hid my eyes and counted 5-10-15-20-25-30 all the way to 100.  When I turned around Cannon was gone. I search everywhere, under, behind and around.  I searched in the shower, behind the bed in grandma’s room – no Cannon.  Finally, I peeked in the dark pantry and there he was!

It was lots of fun and we will have to do it again.  Next time Cannon can be “it” and do the counting and I will do the hiding.

 

Another Visit to Ghana

Earlier we had looked at Adinkra symbols that are used in Ghana. The symbols are used to decorate cloth.  The spiral shape is used in different ways and represents lots of ideas in many cultures. In Ghana it is Adinkrahene (Adinkra king). “Chief of all the adinkra designs, forms the basis of adinkra printing."

We looked at the design on the cloth of one of the Ghanaian dolls and saw the spiral symbol there.  Cannon used the spiral stamp design to print on the blue paper he had made earlier.  This design represents the indigo blue cloth that is made in West Africa.




Spiral Stamping on Printed Paper Inspired by Indigo Cloth by Cannon Hoops

We read a chapter of Captain Underpants the Attack of the Talking Toilets and a chapter from Frog and Toad.  Cannon demonstrated his skill with a round of Math Slam.  Cannon shared his new tickle book with me and we both put on the “tickle” mitts and tickled along with the story.

 

 

 

 

 

April 7, 2013

Mad Scientists!

We put on our aprons and set out to experiment and discover.  Our first question - what simple things found around the house can turn a piece of coal into a garden of growing crystals? 

We read the steps of the experiment and then assembled our supplies and equipment. We needed:  chunks of coal, bluing, ammonia, salt, water, food coloring, a tablespoon measure, and a glass pie plate.

 

 

Cannon arranged the pieces of coal on the pie plate. Then we measured 2 tablespoons of the ingredients to a jar and mixed them until all of the salt was dissolved.  Cannon poured the mixture over the coal.  Then we started the stop watch so we would know exactly how long it took for the crystals to begin to grow.  It took 37 min. for the first tiny crystals to appear and 2hrs and 30 min.

for them to get large enough for a good look through the magnifying glass. 

 

While we were working we found more questions than answers.

What is the difference between growing crystals and growing plants?

What is the difference between a chemical and an element?
What is coal?
What is a crystal?
What does the word dissolve mean?
What is evaporation?
What does absorb mean?

And we just added the word research to our list of words to define and understand next week.

On Monday mom sent this picture of  "The Invasion of the Crystals"

Planting a Peat Pot Pizza Garden

 

Since we were in a growing mood Cannon selected some herb seeds to start for his “pizza” garden. We added warm water to the peat pellets. They absorbed the water and expanded until they were two inches tall.  Then Cannon carefully added a few seeds to each pellet. We put the “greenhouse” cover over the container.  It will sit in the warm sunshine and in about two weeks we should see some nice little leaves emerging from the little pots. When the plants get big enough we will plant them in a large bowl.  Cannon can harvest fresh basil and oregano for his pizza and a few mint leaves for his favorite summer drink.

 

Painting Time!   
This time Cannon painted with a brayer and printing inks. We added two different colors of blue and white to the ink tray.  Cannon got a good grip on the brayer and began loading the roller with color.  Then he rolled and dragged the brayer across the paper. He overlapped, changed directions, dragged the colors and tilted the brayer to “draw” lines on his paper.  He used all of his paper going right to the edges. 

 

For his second composition he chose red and yellow for Avalon.  Both compositions show a variety of textures and intensity of color.

We used the Fast Fact Flash Cards to practice adding four to numbers 1-12.  We enjoyed a Frog and Toad story and a chapter from Captain Underpants.  Then we used the Banana Grams and the Phonographics words to make some fun sentences.

 

 

 

March 24, 2013
Geography - Continents and Oceans

Cannon enjoys exploring maps.  This week he took on the challenge of putting together a giant floor map (2'x3') of the world.  We used "stick-tac" to temporarily fix wooden spools to each of the giant puzzle pieces. Cannon easily picked up each piece and found its place. When the puzzle was assembled we reviewed the names and location of all seven continents and six oceans.

Cannon adds the last piece of the puzzle. Africa!

Painting Time!  Cannon loves to paint.  He selected warm liquid water colors - red, yellow and orange and applied them with energy to his paper...oops! Too much energy for the brush, it popped out of its holder mid-brushstroke. 

 

 

Happy Easter!

 

Cannon used his stamping skills to design some special Easter cards. Here he is getting ready to use his name stamp to add his name to the cards. 

 

 We practiced addition facts by playing a few rounds of Math Slam and enjoyed a few chapters of Captain Underpants Volume 2 - The Attack of the Talking Toilets.






And then it was time for opening Easter Eggs gathered at his teacher's egg hunt.



Cannon pretends to "crack" the plastic egg on the side of the bowl.

Out pour all of the goodies the Easter Bunny put in the eggs.