A Few Extras

Sunshine!  Quick!  Everyone in the garden!  

We've reset Grandad's Veggie Patch and sown some new bulbs and flower seeds ready for the coming year.  Monkey Girl planted her Bee Garden seeds which were her Christmas present from Nanny.  They are sprouting already and she is delighted.

Here's my tiny Monkey Girl introducing her Division at the Commodore's Pennant Presentation at her Sea Cadet Unit.  She is Leading Junior Cadet First Class and she is also very cool.

I collected boxes for a week, after which the kiddies went shopping...

We were given a round, white cushion and I challenged the children to see how many things they could turn it into.  They came up with:

frisbee

hat

moon

planet

sun

nose

eye

foot

spaceship

door

plate

button on a giant

and a thousand other things I cannot remember.

The children turned the garage doors into a night scene!

In the mornings the kiddies have chores to complete before we start anything fun (aka school work!).  They each make their beds, each have a set of curtains or blinds to open around the house and The Boy has his inhaler, then puts on a wash for the day.  He does it without any help at all now.  I put the laundry in the machine ready the night before and every morning off he trots to the utility area and gets it all going for me. He's brilliant.

He's also pretty smashing at washing up too :)

The water table stayed out for a week and changed from cafe area to fairy land to pony washing station to pouring and mixing.

Racket-ball

Vitamin D fishing

Designing a nature bag

Off to nursery in the fog.

These two had their Grade 3 Ballet Exam

 And this one had her Grade 1 Ballet Exam

Last week my most wonderful, polite, endearing, testosterone-fuelled favourite Boy of them all turned FIVE!

Papa took the day off work for The Boy's birthday and we all went pond-dipping.

And then at the weekend, The Birthday Boy had a Gymnastics Acro-Batty Party with all his friends.

The Continent of Africa Thematic Unit

I chose this unit to highlight the huge number of countries in this continent and to give the children an opportunity to cover the geography, culture, traditions, current affairs, languages, history and art in several of these countries.

A Trip to Morocco

Our trip around Africa took us to Morocco, where the kiddies had their hands tattooed with Henna (we looked at Morocco on the map, listened to Moroccan music all morning, danced, discussed and I used my eye-liner for the designs - hey!  It's almost the same as a full trip to North Africa!)

We discovered that Moroccan Henna designs are more geometric than Indian ones.  There wasn't much hand washing going on throughout the day, it has to be said and they enjoyed showing them to their friends at their dance and gym lessons.

My most favourite boy in the whole wide world is recovering from a nasty bout of tonsillitis.  He has rested a lot this week, but joined in with sand and camel play :)

Design Engineering with Boxes

The kiddies finished their masks this morning. 'Love them!

We talked about poverty today and its impact on communities in various African countries.  On a basic level we discussed the cycle of lack of education and low-paid jobs = further poverty.  We also chatted about clean drinking water issues, reduced access to medical care and drought and famine problems brought on by civil wars and government corruption.  

With this in mind,  the children designed and created inventions that might help a community struggling with one of the aforementioned problems.  They came out with some great ideas, and some cool and wacky inventions including...

...A Water Filter System

A Sound Identifier for the African Bush.

 A Rain Catcher and Water Purifier

A Bucket for a Well (complete with lid for ease of transport)

A Sand Blaster (to blast insects off of the sand - My Boy invented that one - he's insanely cute.)

We have some attractive African jewellery which the kiddies have in their play box for role-playing...

...My Boy used the jewellery for inspiration to make an African keyring (please note the giraffe pasta shape).

Monkey Girl makes great bracelets from scratch with wool and beads.  She has taught herself all sorts of funky ways to plait the wool and I am in awe of how she does it.

Crayon & Water Colour Zebras and the Beginning of African Masks

Today Monkey Girl and Ballet Girl made these awesome zebras with white crayon and black water colour paint.  I stole this fabulous idea from this cool website.  

We began forming our African masks this morning using foil, PVA glue and tissue paper.

Monkey Girl added some big cat facts to her Africa book.

And Ballet Girl completed her Guide to Africa.  

Lent

 We put our Alleluia away in our Lent box until Easter Sunday...

...And we used pink and purple paint...

...to make our Lenten promises.