Wonder World Classroom

Image courtesy of Stock Xchg

I was reading posts on one of my homeschooling groups (CA-Homeschooling-HSC, a wonderful bunch of folks and information), and someone pointed out, "I challenge people to try and have a day without math."

My eyes popped wide and I thought, "What a great idea!" The more I thought about it, the more I decided we are going to try this out as a home school activity.

What's "No Math" Day? Just a typical day, but the rule is the family cannot do any activity that involves math. What a joyous announcement THAT would be for the math-haters in the house, eh?

But then, let them see what happens when they try to live out the day.

1. TV? How can you watch it when channel selection involves numbers? So that's out.
2. Cooking? Can't measure ingredients. Only food that needs no measuring can be eaten that day.
3. Fast food instead? Money's out of the picture, so forget that and any other shopping as well.
4. Games (video,board games, sports)...not if points have to be added up for it, etc.

Sorry, no-can-do that restaurant milk shake if there is no math!

The level of strictness applied toward defining "math-related" activities can be adjusted based on the age/maturity of your child and your own interest, but even in broadest terms what an eye-opener this could be! This could demonstrate much louder than any lecture just how much of our lives are dependent on math. The activity might not make converts out of the anti-math brigade, but it will get them willingly participating in the very subject they're not allowed to DO that day!

I'll post back once we've done this activity at our house with a status report. Granted, Bri is not a math-hater by any stretch, but her eyes do glaze over faster at times in this subject than most others. I'm curious to see what we all learn from it.

Among our other Earth Day projects this year, I decided to make a bulletin board to display the calendar items I've been using to help Bri get a better sense of time than she was getting from her Jonas Brothers calendar (though she digs the kewl photos!).

Here's the "plain" bulletin board before her calendar was added. It was simple to make, and she absolutely adores it! It's fun, yet isn't too busy for the display items to stand out.


Here's the finished product after adding her calendar stuff. For fun we also included a little weather report. Click on the photo to enlarge it and you'll see the calendar items sit inside a clear pocket along the bottom. This was the trickiest part of the whole thing, but it wasn't too hard.

This could have been done as a flannel/felt board, but I opted for a wipe-clean base for three reasons. First, this sits on our dining table (resting against the wall) and I didn't want a spill wicking up and ruining it. Two, I already had the laminated weekday/month/date cards, and didn't want to redo or alter them for a fabric board. Third, I was hoping to get away with using items I had on hand.

Here's how I made this:

1. I used spray adhesive to glue construction paper to represent grass/sky/sun/tree onto a standard sheet of foam core. (With Earth Day in mind, I "recycled" paper that already had been used on one side.)

2.To add the pocket, I cut a sheet of clear shelf paper a few inches over the length of the foam board. I folded the top down lengthwise about 2/3 of the way to make the double layer pocket, yet still leave a single layer of "sticky" paper along the whole bottom edge. I positioned the long pocket, folded the edges around to the back of the foam board, then secured it using packaging tape.

3.The sets of calendar items (obtained courtesy of childcareland.com) are stacked in order and slipped into the pocket. Each day we pull the prior weekday/date/etc out and slide it to the back so the current day is displayed.

4. The mini "weather report" is available at Sprout Online's coloring pages. I cut it out and laminated everything with clear vinyl. Using the same basic idea I did for the board, I made a clear pocket for the little weather signs to slip into. This I attached to the foam board using brad fasteners. Each day the proper sign (sunny, cloudy, etc) is slid into view in the pocket.

There's still room to display other special items of interest like photos, theme letters/numbers/words, etc. Meanwhile, since we live in a tiny apartment and space is at a premium (not to mention our fondness for teaching Bri about recycling/reusing things), I want to spray-adhesive fabric to the entire back of the board so we can flip it around for use as a felt board.

As with most homeschoolers, Wonder World Academy enjoy numerous field trips. Whether to the library or post office, museums, parks, or Disneyland, our class room is constantly on the move. But there are times when it is not feasible to go a-roaming, such as when our schedules are overworked, the weather uncooperative, or our child is feeling poorly and not fit for public consumption.

Enter the internet, land of a million opportunities to discover new things about our world. While we frequently "visit" different places online, it can be most fun to visit "live" via streaming web cams piping in the latest and greatest adventures of wildlife, farm life, etc. This has become a great educational opportunity whereby we can snuggle up together on the couch, then visit any number of locations to watch polar bears swimming at the zoo, hummingbird babies in their nest, or puppies entertaining the world with their antics. Questions always arise while we watch, so this "couch time" is always educational. How many schools out there can boast one field trip per month, let alone every day? And I love that we can learn even on days when our child is not feeling the greatest, days she would ordinarily have to stay home from regular school and "miss out." Instead, these opportunities help cheer up an under-the-weather youth.

To find live web cam opportunities, try http://ustream.tv OR Google "live web cam animals" or a specific location. PARENTS: Due to the adult nature of many web cam internet broadcasts, do be sure to supervise searches for live feed field trips.

Here's a favorite a fellow homeschooling family shared with us recently:
Live TV : Ustream

If your household acquired an iPhone or iPod Touch for the holidays (or prior), you can use it to enhance your family's homeschooling experience. There are tons of add-on applications you can install for your child's (and your!) learning. Best of all, many are free or cost only a dollar or two.

Here's a rundown of some of our favorite iPhone apps:

1. Stanza
Read books anywhere, right on your iPhone/iPod. This free ereader app not only allows you to download ebooks off the web, but you can transfer files and books from your computer as well.

2. ABC Tracer
A great activity game that teaches the mechanics of writing letters. Your child traces over letters, and the program colors the line red or green depending on whether they are tracing the right direction. Fun and effective for emerging writers.

3. GoSkyWatch Planetarium
An awesome astronony app. Point your iPhone/iPod at the sky and this app will identify stars, planets, and constellations where you are. Also has a full 180-degree rotating display to "see" the night sky in other parts of the world. Over 200 images of planets and more. At $5.99 it's the most costly of the apps on this list, but worth it.

4. Google Earth
A 3D map program that shows landmarks and lets you zoom in on any spot on the planet. For a lighter version of this, try Pocket Earth.

5. Moon Globe
Same 3D idea as Pocket earth, but for the moon. Highly detailed, with over 1800 landmarks identified. Very cool.

6. NASA app
Very cool linkup to space agency news, videos, mission info, photos, and more.

7. Art
View thousands of famous works of art by more than 200 of the world's greatest artists. Link off to websites for artist biographies, play quiz games, and more. This is only 99 cents, but there is a free "lite" version as well.

8.A Bee See Sight Words
Darling talking flash card game that introduces over 300 words. There is a free lite version that you can try out to see if your child likes it.

9. iReadMusic
A fun app that teaches your child to read musical notes via a series of games. Multiple instruments to choose from, including guitar, piano, and mandolin.

10. iWriteWords
Teaches kids to write upper case letters (there's now a lower case version available too) by a set of games. A good progression game after ABC Tracer.

11. MathSplat
A game set that teaches addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.

12. Mathemagics
Mental math tricks that will let your kid pluck complicated answers from thin air!

13. Japanese Phrases
Yes, you can learn languages on your iPhone--a lot of them, actually.


So how do you get these apps? Visit the iTunes store (using the app store button on your iPhone, the iTunes program on your computer, or Google it online) and search apps to find a ton of educational and fun experiences for the whole family. Enjoy!