Art Lesson: Watercolor Apples!

Art Lesson:  Watercolor Apples!

 

Supplies needed:

Water colors with a brush

Cup of water (if needed with your water colors)

Black or brown oil pastel

A sheet of paper

 

 

I started the art project with explaining about different perspectives of a given subject.

Todays lesson is on the perspective of the birds eye view.  I placed an apple on a plate and had son stand on the chair and describe what he saw.  One thing he notices was the shadow at the bottom side of the apple.

 

If child doesn't see it, this is your time guide them.  The younger bunch may need you to guide them through the lesson a little more.

 

 

 

Next, I presented all the supplies to Son and explained that we need to draw a plate on our paper.  Using oil pastels over a pencil helps child to think BIG.  Before I let Son draw, I explained to him that we are going to need room for 3-5 apples on his plate.  With that info, he drew a fairly large circle instead of his normal tiny circle (think of a dime) on a big paper.

 

 

Now I had Son water color the table or background.  You might want to guide them away from using really dark colors or colors of apples that are similar, in case they want an apple on the table as well.   Just let them go.  It's ok if they get some on the plate this is their project.

 

Now we talked about different colors and shapes of apples before moving on.

Son wanted 4 apples!

Now you will want to have them make a fist so they can see how big their fist is.  At that point you want to tell them that their apples need to be that size or bigger.  Again this is to help with not getting super small apples. 

Which at this point it just looks like circles on paper.  They can put their apples where ever they feel like this is their art.

 

Now we want to add some dimension by adding the shadow that was seen while we were looking down at the plate of apples in the beginning of the lesson.  You will want to guide child to basically add a smile at the bottom of the apple with a darker color water color.  We used Black!  It doesn't matter if its a thick or thin shadow.

 

When we got to the point we talked about how the shadow was formed.  I have a 3rd grader so this was a concept that was easy for him to understand.  For a younger child you might want to show them more examples to touch upon the concept of shadows and how they are formed.

 

Now your going to let them dry for a little while.

 

 

Now that your apples have dried for a little bit its time to add the stem.  Start with having all the shadows facing towards child.  Now your going to add a smile in the middle of your apple.  Once your apple is smiling go a head and add the stem.  Repeat on all your apples and enjoy your (their) art work. 

 

 

This General Idea came from here
 The lesson plan and photo's are MY work so please give credit back to my blog please.

Nasa Education Night

School on a Saturday!!!! Yes, ma'am we did count this as a school day ;O)

 

We are blessed to have NASA in our backyard and get to enjoy launches a few times a year.  Its Amazing to watch rockets to shuttle(2 yrs ago it retired though) and yet NASA puts on programs such as Education Night.  Truly amazing!

 

We started the night with signing in and getting a treat bag of NASA goodies.

 

As we walked the path to all the fun things they had some great FUN FACTS.  Those where fun to read.

 

 

Here K is starting his Astronaut training.  Building some cardio w/ jump roping, crab walk, squats, bear crawl, push ups and running back.  He was having a great time!

 

Here K was making an airplane with a foam plate and a penny.  Once it was built he had to test it out.

 

Next stop was learning about how the inner ear works in space and how it affects how you work in space with the big gloves.  Tough if you ask K.   K lost his screw and nut in space before he had a chance to work with it.  "Those gloves are too big." said K.

Entering the Asteroid field.  K thought this was going to be so easy.  Yeah, this was more of a challenge then he thought.  He redirected 2 asteroids.

The 3D printer was fascinating to K and his dad.  They sat there watching one printer making a bracelet and the other printer making a rocket thing (Little Black rocket)

Learning about how they are testing in space to be able to grow fresh food in space at the ISS. After we learned about the plants we went to listen and talk with an Astronaut.  Wow, talking to the Astronaut was fun we all learned some neat things.  Once thing we learned about that we thought was neat was how the space shuttle has to speed past the ISS and once the shuttle is pass the ISS the shuttle has to use its boosters to go up an orbit and slow down so that the 2 can connect up.  At the end the kids all got to meet the astronaut if they wanted and get a signed photo of him.  K's favorite part from the talk was the Astronaut told all the kids to "FIND WHAT THEY LOVE to do; AND NEVER GIVE UP." (NO PHOTO was too dark)  

Now we headed in for a treat of make your own comet treat (Marshmallow dipped in chocolate and graham cracker)
Then we went to explore the freezing temperatures of space.  The Marshmallows frozen were really cool.  Isaac and I had the most fun with those.  Take a bite and blow out the vapor when we talked.  Was just fun to see and experience.  K wasn't all that found of the frozen marshmallows.

Building a rocket and Launching it.  This was K's favorite part of the night.

 

 


K's 2nd favorite station was building his own spacecraft from recycled parts.  K ended up making his own ISS.  Loved watching his creative self come alive with this.

Feild Trip: Mason Bees

Cocoa Green Market

Sept 27th 2013

 

We started off with a short educational video of different types of insects that help our gardens and wild plants.

The kids learned mainly about Bees and how they gather Pollen from plant to plant.  Kids also learned some main identifying traits of bees, butterflies, moths, flies, beetles, stink bugs etc.

 

 

 

Next we went outside to explore the garden looking at all the different types of bugs in the garden.

 

While outside the kids and adults got to learn about native Florida plants and how to keep our Gardens full of life (Bug life).  As the kids found Insects our guide would come and collect it into a collector so the kids could see the insect up close but the insect was safe. Insect is only inspected for a minute or two and placed back where they were. 

 Found some caterpillars and a few cystitis, stink bugs, bees of different types, lady bugs to name a few.

After the garden we were shown a Mason Bee house and told how to build one.  Now we are in the search of a nice piece of wood to build a house with to put into our garden.

The neat thing is each hole can can fit at least 5 baby bees.  As the babies are ready they come out 1 at a time with the front being the first out (last one in) male bee.  The first egg laid will be the last bee out and the bee will the a SHE.

Did you know that 55% of all insects are female??  So next time your calling a bug a gender say SHE, your more likely to be right.

 

We ended our trip with exploring the farm and looking at the cows, goats, European Honey Bee hive, lots of Chickens  and some fresh Pumpkin Ice cream.

If your in the area this is a great farm to visit and try some yummy treats in the store

Geysers

I saw this kit at the toy store on making a geyser so of course I had to plan a lesson around geysers.

 

When I was 8 my family traveled to yellow stone so learning about geysers wasn't just for K.

 

 This is a diagram of how a geyser works under ground from a 8yr olds perspective from a video that we watched (forgot to write down the name of the video)

 

 The best way to finish our study was of course having our very own coke geysers.  Note to parent/teachers don't let child pull the string.  K pulled it and bolted. however, the string only came out half way.   I got a nice coke shower :o)

Math~ Place value cups

I was trying to think of a fun way to make a number dial to work on place values.  I simply wrote the numbers 0-9 on each cup and than added a zero/s behind depending on which cup/place value.

 

I wanted something that I could call out a number and he could easier move like a dial that didn't take too much time to play.  This is perfect on the go as well.  I can call out the number and he can just show me in the mirror.

 

Here he is working on the hundreds (127)

I made cups all the way up to the thousands.

 

I like that I can review number sense and place value all at the same time and son has fun reviewing.   Takes 2 minutes to make and takes 2 Min's to practice a few numbers.

 

also a great way for the Little's (under 6) to learn number sense with the ones and tens cups

 

A ittle bit of Math~ Working on fractions

 

We are covering fractions currently.  I love to teach math in a way that son is able to grasp the material both from hearing what I am saying but also visual and hands on.  When I first asked K which part was bigger the 1/2,1/3 or 1/4 he said 1/4.  Without seeing anything he thought umm 4 is bigger than 2 and 3 so must be 1/4.  Than I drew it on the board and now he was able to see it.  When I drew it out is started his brain into thinking how could he be wrong; 4 is more than 2 and 3.   

 

 

 

 

We didn't have candy bars so we used snack cakes. This is where I let son do the work and than I asked him which piece he wanted and of course went for the half. At that point I asked him why "Because it's bigger" Oh!! so what fraction was that? "1/2" so do you still think 1/4 is bigger than 1/2? No! BINGO the concept is now sticking

Than I asked what was smaller and he said 1/4.  Why?  Because, you had to take the same size cake and cut it into 4 parts not only 2 parts,which makes each part smaller than just half of the cake.

 

Here is K making fraction problems with 12 straws

Working on his math sheet

Daily 5 the homeschool way

Here is K reading his daily 5 book.  Yes, I stole the idea of the daily 5 from some really amazing public school teachers.  I use this time to teach K that he can read to himself quietly.  When he's reading I am getting things for school ready for the day or reading myself.  We just started this 2 weeks ago so we are still in the learning stage.  One thing that son loves is that he can read ANYWHERE at our house.

 

 

When the reading to self is mastered (when we reach 20 Min's) I will start to introduce other area's of the daily 5.

 

Read to self

Listen to reading (Books on tape)

Word Work

Work on writing

Read to someone

 

Its a great way for student to work on some independent skills and gives me some prep time in the morning

 

Planbook and a Giveaway

DUE to no one entering the contest I am going to run this again around the holidays

 

 

 

Year after year, I have tried different methods and planners for school.  The planners that are sold in stores just didn't seem to work all that well for me.  Not enough space for all the details I wanted to put in my planner. Well, for me it's so much easier for me to type out my plans than writing them out.  I came across planbook and have been in love ever since.  One feature that I LOVE is that if something comes up such as a sick day I can just move the lesson to another day or another week,whatever works for us. When you move a lesson all the lessons that followed also move.  So basically you don't have to worry about teaching out of order just because you missed a day or two; or having to earse everything and write it out again.

 

Lets dig right in and see screen shots from my account on Planbook

 

 

This is the start up page which you have to log in from, so if you share your computer esp. with young children they cant just mess with your school plans.  If my son knew my password he might change reading lessons for game time :o)

 

 On this screen you can see your lessons by the day,week or month.  I find it nice to view our schedule in the week format.  I also like to have the times (start to finish) with each subject on our schedule.  There are lots of options within the program to make your planner work for your needs.  This helps me to see what we need to get done with a quick glance.  When the week is over I can just put print and add it into my teachers binder for future reference.

 

 This page shows  the different subjects (our core) that we are currently covering.  Right not I only have the 1 student so I can leave the colors as they are.  However, as we have more kiddos joining the school ranks I will just continue on with my color code system; which I have started to teach myself this year.  My 2nd grader is my green student so all of his subjects will all turn green once another child is homeschooled.  When planning more than one  grade level you can just add different subjects and grade level or students name next to subject.  This helps so you know which student should be working on what area of study.

 This is the page that I can enter all our PLANNED breaks through out the year which will automatically put these dates into our calendar.  This is where I can also add field trips and all our lessons will get bumped to the next day. Which in turn leaves little work for me to do in the long run.

This is what a lesson plan edit screen looks like.  You click on what lesson you want to edit and this screen pops up.  You can write out your lesson however in depth you want.  I don't put much under lessons, just a basic title.  In notes is where I will post the link of my source if I got an idea online or a book w/ page number.  This is also where I will write the supplies needed.
There is a homework tab as well if you want to give homework.  I don't give homework all that often being a homeschool family, only if something doesn't get done or I want student to work with a friend/sibling or the NON-teacher parent.

 

Now onto the giveaway

Planbook has given me a ONE year subscription to giveaway to a lucky reader of my blog.
The giveaway will be open from September 18th-September 28th.  I will draw a name on Saturday September 29th using random.org.  I will post the winner on the blog as well by Monday the 1st of October

You do have to be a teacher Homeschool,Private or Public.  I wont be checking this but lets be honest please


All you have to do is
1. follow this blog
2.Leave a commet on this post with your email address so that I can contact the winner


Bonus entry
if you post about this on your facebook/blog or twitter account just leave another comment with a link of where you posted.  You will than be given another entry.

You can enter once a day

Check Planbook out and sign up for a free 30 day trial

First Day of Tennis 9/14/12

K had his first tennis lesson yesterday.  They worked on holding their rackets correctly and how to drop the ball and hit it all within the first 10 mins of class.

I didn't get a photo but they also worked on hitting the ball coming over the net; at a slow speed of course from the instructor. 


The last few minutes of class the kids grouped up and played a little of doubles.  Fun to watch the newbies playing.

Art ~ A different way to weave paper

A few weeks ago we did some standard weaving with paper which caused me to do some thinking.  Today I cut some paper strips and showed K how he could weave paper.  He thought it was neat and wanted to learn how to do it.  He picked his paper and we started weaving.

 

 

Great for working on fine motor skills

Here is K's finished paper weaving strip.  I saw his creative wheels turning.  Wasn't long before he was hauling out some construction paper, googly eyes, stars and grabbing his scissors and glue.

Meet googly eyes robot and now he wants to make a video with him.

Art Lesson Idea ~ The color wheel

This week we pulled out the paint and started to learn about the color wheel.  We started with a talk about our 3 primary colors.  K filled his cups and while doing this he was listing things of that color.  Such as a red apple,fire truck.the sun,banana, the sky and so on.  I than had already prepped a blank coloring wheel, that he would fill in with paint.

 

Now that the Primary colors where done we talked about mixing colors.  Before actually mixing the colors we did some guessing of what colors we were about to make.  We than started the mixing.   I lead him on this one but he got to add the amounts of each color and do the mixing.  As he did this we again listed things that share the same color. Pumpkins,grapes and palm trees (LOL only my kid) were his main answers.  Of course we painted our intermediate colors onto the color wheel as well.

 

for the middle I just let him mix whatever combo he wanted to so nothing fancy here other than he had a blast mixing the colors.  I could just see the wheels turning as he kept trying to get a different color by mixing yellow into the orange :o)

The finished color wheel to help us the rest of the year of art class

9/11 we remember you

 

We wont forget this day!

WTC,Pentagon, PA

 

My son wasn't born but he WILL learn about this day in our history

 

Always in our prayers to the families and victims of this tragic day

Math Centers

On Fridays we don't pull out the workbooks.  Instead I pull out centers, which are fun learning games!  Here are a few of the math centers we have for Friday funday.

 

This game is from Hobby lobby.  which is a great game to use your 40% off coupon on

Great for the 2nd grade and up students

This game is a hoot!  Trying to make seven with your cards and whats been played.

This is a mind bender game.  You place the pegs as the book says and than you have to figure out how to use all the pieces

 

skip counting mazes.  I heard a lot of Hey that's not right every time he had to switch directions.  we teach our kids to count going from left to right.  Make them think when they suddenly have count in the opposite direction or up and down as the number builds.

 

Skip Counting work pages

This was FUN.  A great way to work on number sense.  Knowing where to look when finding a number.  If you need 47 you should be looking up in the teens :o)  K loved figuring out the picture

Fundred charts from teacher tipster

Just a quick quiz.  I plan to just put a book in our math center tub and let K pick which page he works on.  As long as he's working on something Math than he's learning

a great book for working on multiplication by himself

 

Math centers can be FUN!