Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs Junior Novelization

Marcus and Lella loved reading this book based on the soon to be released movie and famous book Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs by the Barretts . Marcus even laughed out loud at certain parts of the story!

Enjoy!

Books Recently Completed

Marcus: Apollo 13, The Movie Storybook, Around the World in 80 days (Great Illustrated Classics)
Lella: Three More Stories You Can Read to Your Cat (Sara Miller), Margarine and Marbles (A Go Bananas book), Moby Dick (Great Illustrated Classics)

Both: The McElderry Book of Grimm's Fairy Tales (Saviour Pirotta): The Sleeping Beauty, The Magic Bear and the Handsome Prince, The Golden Haired Girl in the Tower, The Princess and the Seven Dwarves, The Twelve Dancing Princesses

Tangrams

I recently picked up this book from the library:

The Tangram book : the story of the Chinese puzzle with over 2000 puzzles to solve
Slocum, Jerry.

Marcus loves to look at an image, create it using one set of Tangrams, and then check his answer. Gabriella likes to play with all of the Tangrams and create pictures (shown here). Either way, Tangrams are an easy, creative, smart activity for children.

Enjoy!

Choose Your Own Adventure Series

We recently purchased several "Choose Your Own Adventure" books from ebay and Marcus and Lella LOVE them! There are so many books in this series to choose from.

Gabriella recently finished Return to Atlantis and Marcus recently finished By Balloon to the Sahara. They eventually read the entire book, as they choose different paths each time.

Most of these books seem to be approximately 100 pages.

Harry Kitten and Tucker Mouse

Gabriella and Marcus recently finished this delightful book and requested more from this series.

The author is George Seldon.

Summary:
This book tells the story of a mouse, Tucker, and a cat, Harry, who become friends, share food, and search New York for a home of their own. Their wanderings take them to the basement of the Empire State Building and to Gramercy Park, among other places. Eventually, they settle down in the Times Square subway station.

Books Recently Read, Handwriting Article, Hall of Presidents

Marcus' recent completed readings: Journey to the Center of the Earth (Great Illustrated Classics), Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D, Andrew Jackson (Steve Potts)

Lella's recent completed readings: Swiss Family Robinson (Great Illustrated Classics), The Jungle Book (Great Illustrated Classics)

Books they have both read recently: G-Force, The McElderry Book of Grimm's Fairy Tales (Saviour Pirotta): The Magic Gingerbread House, The Girl Who Spun Straw into Gold, Little Mouse and Lazy Cat, The Swans and the Brave Princess, The Naughty Princess and the Frog, Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (Wenzel and Wheeler): Little Snow White, The Three Sluggards, The Shoemaker and the Elves

This is an interesting article on handwriting:

Cursive writing may be fading skill, but so what?

Marcus is learning cursive this year and it's one of his favorite things we do in a school day. We use Handwriting Without Tears, Cursive.

This part of the article encourages me that this is not a waste of time: "...[A]ccording to Vanderbilt University professor Steve Graham, who cites multiple studies showing that sloppy writing routinely leads to lower grades, even in papers with the same wording as those written in a neater hand."

Finally, a few months ago, Marcus and Lella asked me to buy them a place mat (it was $1.00) that showed all 43 U. S. Presidents, the time they served, their party affiliation, and various facts. They both took it upon themselves to memorize all 43 presidents! Marcus also memorized their party affiliation and is in the process of memorizing their years of service.

At Disney, The Hall of Presidents was recently redone and Marcus and Lella thoroughly enjoyed it! It was fun to see them find so much joy in our country's history. If you ever have the opportunity to view this exhibit and show, I highly recommend it!

Starry Starry Night

Although the children and I have no "formal" art curriculum, we often look through art books or "youtube" slide shows of famous artists. We recently studied Vincent van Gogh and this was Marcus' masterpiece.

If you have younger children, there is a delightful three series program called Classical Baby (art, music, or dance) that introduces children to various genres of art, dance and classical music. My children still love to watch these sweet shows every now and then!

Classical Baby

Paddle Dolls

As promised, here are the paddle dolls Marcus and Lella made after reading Senefer (see post below).

After they made their dolls, they created a short play for Steve and me to watch.

They have since requested to color more paddle dolls!

Enjoy!

The Fairy Tale Detectives (The Sisters Grimm, Book 1)

If your children are familiar with any of the Grimm Fairy Tales, they will love this book by Michael Buckley. Marcus and Lella are listening to this book on CD and so far, they have enjoyed this book more than any others we have listened to... even Magic Tree House!

We will definitely read more books in this series! I say "we" because I plan on reading more with the children. I am afraid I am hooked! There are currently eight books in the series and the reading level is 4th - 6th grade. Each book looks to be about 200 pages.

Enjoy!

Literary Devices

My husband recently started teaching Marcus and Gabriella literary devices using scripture as examples. So far, they have learned metaphor, simile, hyperbole, personification, and understatement; up next, metonymy and synecdoche. He gives them weekly quizzes and we are both amazed at how quickly they are catching on! Below are sample quiz passages. Can you match the literary device being used to the passage? Give it a try! :-)

Psalm 42:1 - As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.

Psalm 114:3-4 - The sea looked and fled; Jordan turned back. The mountains skipped …

2 Chronicles 1:15 - the king made silver and gold as common in Jerusalem as stone …

Deuteronomy 1:28 - are we going up? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying, "The people are greater and taller than we. The cities are great and fortified up to heaven …

Matthew 4:2 - And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.

John 6:51 - I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

Mark 10:25 - It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God."

Steve also fell in love with Tapestry of Grace, and as soon as it arrives, will officially be Marcus and Lella's humanities teacher. As a math major, I am extremely grateful!

Quick Summary:
'Young Genius in Old Egypt' is the exciting story of Senefer, an African child in ancient Egypt. Senefer was a carpenter's son who became a famous mathematician and engineer. The story of his adventures brings to life the rich culture of ancient Egypt and the African tradition to excellence in mathematics and science. Senefer's mother, Nefert, sells paddle dolls at the market and this is where Senefer shows off his mathematical talent to the scribes.
~~~~

When I read this to Marcus and Gabriella, we compared ancient Egyptian Numerals with Roman Numerals. We made a paddle doll similar to those Nefert sold at market. The children then used the dolls to act out a play. If you're interested, here is an image of a real paddle doll. I'll post their paddle dolls soon!

Books Completed in July and August, Great Illustrated Classics

I came across 45 Great Illustrated Classics books at a garage sale and bought the whole lot for $20. Each time you turn the page, you see a page of text and a sketch of what is happening in the story. These books are a wonderful way to expose children to classic literature and although they are abridged, the essence of the original text remains. Below is a list of books Marcus and Lella have recently finished.

Marcus: Flat Stanly (series), Swiss Family Robinson (Great Illustrated Classics), Island of the Blue Dolphins, The Invisible Man, Diary of Wimpy Kid (series)

Gabriella: Robin Hood (Great Illustrated Classics), The Jungle Book (Great Illustrated Classics), Diary of a Wimpy Kid (series)

Books on CD are grand!

I have terrible TMJ, and often when I am reading to the children, my jaw begins to hurt. Most of the time I just ignore the pain because I find so much joy in reading alound to Marcus and Lella. Recently, the children and I have been listening to some of their favorite books on CD (We are almost finished listening to Island of the Blue Dolphin).

I simply check out two actual books from the library and one sound recording. We sit on the couch and read along with the CD. The kids LOVE hearing other voices read to them and because they are also reading along, they are able to incorporate two learning styles in this activity. This is especially important for my daughter who is a kinesthetic learner.

We are about to embark on Freddy the Detective by Walter Brooks. Should be fun!

Firework Art

It is July 20 and Independence Day was a couple of weeks ago, but we, nevertheless, embarked on an Independence Day project. My daughter insisted we do this project after reading about Independence Day and seeing the project online.

Simply dilute paint with water, drip the paint on a piece of paper, and blow the paint drip with a straw.

The kids LOVED making fireworks of their own and even made sound effects! Enjoy!

The Velveteen Rabbit

The Velveteen Rabbit

A dear friend of mine gave Marcus and Gabriella this classic tale and suggested that as I read the story, to let the kids make their own illustrations. They enjoyed this activity so much that they made a front and back cover to their pictures! What you see here is their interpretation of the little boy playing with the Velveteen Rabbit in the garden. Gabriella's picture is on the left and Marcus' is on the right.