2/28/12 Introducing Our Science Teacher!

Miss Cherie’s 1st Science Lesson

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lets talk about acids and bases…..

How can we clean dirty pennies?

 

 

 

 

We put some vinegar on some clean pennies to see what it would do over time…dirty pennies! Vinegar speeds up the oxidation process on pennies.

Look! When an acid like vinegar, and a base like baking soda mix, a chemical reaction happens (acids and bases are opposites). Bubbles!

Pennies are made out of metal–by the way, little people, what is metal? Silverware? Foil? A spatula?

We soaked dirty pennies in orange juice (acids), water (neutral), soap(base), baking soda (base), vinegar  (acid), and even ketchup to see which would clean our pennies the best. The acids work the best when cleaning the metal pennies and surprisingly ketchup does the job too because it has vinegar in it! Who would have thought?

We are blessed with God given scientific minds eager to discover His world!

What a fantastic lesson Miss Cherie! May God use you to unveil the mysterious wonders of His universe into the hearts of our Little Lambs! Great job!!!

Giving God the Glory

February 2012 Reflection:

Love and Friendship

I want to testify to the work of God in my Little Lamb this past month to give God the glory. The whole reason we are homeschooling, even starting up our own school, is to bring God glory. I had the thought today that if we keep stories of His goodness to ourselves, we contain his glory; if we speak out, we unleash it. So here are my stories of love and friendship incarnate– to encourage you on your path and glorify God. I think the end of each month marks a good time to share what the Lord has done in Little Lambs. We would love to hear your stories too!!

Where friendship seemed to blossom the most this month for us was between brother and sister. Sister has now become interchangeable with friend, and for the first time ever Noah and Faith are self declared “friends”. Noah, not the most naturally affectionate guy, has surprised us this month with a new tenderness. Watching Noah and Faith play, I have enjoyed many “awwww” moments while simultaneously whispering “Thank you God!!” One day I couldn’t help but smile as Noah leaned down to Faith’s level and asked so sweetly over and over again, “Will you be my friend?” Today I overheard him murmur in his funny 3 year old language, “I can’t play because my friend is gone,” when Faith had wandered into the other room. I call them two peas in a pod now because they seek each other out and want to be doing the same thing–like run around in jubilant circles while eating peas out of a snack cup. I have seen Noah’s patience, respectful tone, and delightfully cute “parentese” (especially when I am not around) increase this month with Faith. And Faith just digs her brother and pretty much copies everything he does.

We have the privilege of babysitting Tayler outside of school sometimes, and I have witnessed the most precious exchanges between two preschool friends that I have ever heard. Last week, Tayler goes into Noah’s room with him to help him put on his shoes and they come out holding hands and smiling precociously. I needed a picture. The other day I had to whip out the video camera because “book time” before nap was just too sweet. On their own, Noah and Tayler decided to read to each other sitting on the couch, holding up the pictures for each other, and asking questions about the story just like a mommy would. Then Tayler goes and gets Noah her blanket and stuffed animal and you could see the warmness of being loved by a friend on Noah’s face as he wrapped up in Tayler’s precious lovies. It was funny because Tayler’s original intent was for them to share the blanket, but she looked on happily as Noah innocently kept it all to himself. Then a few minutes later, she announced matter of fact, “I am cold,” and I saw the need for my interception. “Noah, Taaayyyler is cooold,” saying it real slow to let it sink into his boyish mind……”Is there something you could do?” Ah! Success! Noah offered Tayler to use his beloved brown blanket that he usually never shares. Ok, so he told her where to go get it from instead of hopping up, but we can work on chivalry later. 😉

 During the month of February there was a special anointing, or you could say an open window, or a stirring in the area of love and friendship…..and I saw it happen here with my own eyes. We know that God works in seasons and I believe our Little Lambs master plan of themes is a God given, prayer birthed, marking of seasons that he desires to work through. Every month we put our faith out there believing that our children will grow in the themes of the month and God meets our demand (a request made with proper authority). As much as we request, he fulfills, and then some. I made some petitions in the area of love and fully expected some results, because after all, God has proved that He is intimately involved in Little Lambs, so why wouldn’t He want to respond to what He Himself has already put in motion? He responded to my request for growth in love and friendship. However, in retrospect I feel that there is more that God wants to do in us each and every month, but that it depends on the demand we place on the anointing. For example, my prayers, and the ways I stepped out in faith this past month, may have fallen somewhat short of what He was offering.  In the story of the widows olive oil in 2 Kings 4, what if the widow had been able to bring more jars to keep the miraculous oil flowing? And what if I had put more vessels of faith, or prayers, out? What if I had asked for more? Yes, God does abundantly above what we ask for, but our level of faith, the number of jars we put out, also determines what is given. So in the future, I know that I can and should believe for more.

How can we believe for more both individually and together as a group?

What are you personally expecting in March as we enter a new theme surrounding the work of the Holy Spirit and Easter?

 

Thank you Lord for answered prayers in February. You astound me.

1 Cor 1:31 (NKJ) …As it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.”

Season of Lent Begins Today

Ash Wednesday, February 22nd

“From dust you come and to dust you shall return” (Genesis 3:19).

For the Christian, the Lenten season is meant to remind us of our common mission to walk the path with Jesus toward death. It invites us to lose our lives in order to find them anew, resurrected with Jesus on Easter morning.

Whether or not one actively observes Lent, the season can serve as an invitation to evaluate our own lives and to examine the invitation of Jesus to “die” with him. We can enter this “deathly” contemplation with the anticipation of resurrection on Easter morning. But Christ’s path to resurrection is the path of laying down lives, the path of relinquishment, and the path of self-denial. This path feels entirely unnatural, for it takes us in the opposite direction of self-preservation.

Yet, Jesus said that if anyone wants to follow him, if anyone really wants the kind of life he offers, the kind of life he modeled for us in his own, then we must “deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him” (Mark 8:34). Following Jesus will lead us all to the Cross, and will lead us all to the place of death. For the Christian, that is the downward journey of Lent.

Following the downward path of Jesus can lead to a renewed, hopeful, and restored vision of life. For as we embrace our inevitable deaths and declines, as we embrace the downward path, we have the opportunity to let go of the false things we think make up our lives. We let go of thinking that the accumulation of wealth, power, and resources make up a good life; we let go of thinking that busyness makes us important; we let go of thinking that our personal safety and security are to be preserved at all cost. And as we let go, we can embrace those who make life fullest, we can put others’ interests before our own, and exist for the sake of others. And what is done on behalf of others for the sake of Christ will indeed endure beyond our deaths.

The season of Lent is the season of dust and ashes. It is the journey toward one man’s death on a Cross and toward our own. Jesus understood this as he bore the weight of suffering, misunderstanding, shame, and death at Golgotha. The way to resurrection life is indeed not by saving our lives, but in losing them. Whether one observes Lent or not, the call to “take up our crosses” is issued to all.

Excerpt from Ravi Zacharias International Ministries

March Lesson Plans by Carol

Week One:

Center: Stamping Numbers

Supplies: paper with sections labeled with numbers, stamps, stamp pad.

Math Activity: Fishing for numbers-Children will use a magnetic toy fishing pole to “catch” numbers.  I will have cut out egg shapes (with numbers written on them) and will attach a paper clip to each egg shape.  We will take turns finding numbers with the fishing pole.

Week Two:

Center: Baby and Mommy animal flashcard matching (http://1plus1plus1equals1.blogspot.com/2012/02/mommy-baby-animals-matching-printables.html)

Supplies: printed flashcards of mommy and baby animals.

(I will also bring a R is for rabbit coloring page if another center activity is needed to go with the letter “r” for the week) from (http://www.1plus1plus1equals1.com/abccolorbynumber.html)

Week Three:

Center: Animal Habitat Sorting (www.notimeforflashcards.com/animalhabitatsorting)

Supplies: A Home for Hermit Crab (book), various animal toys, matching habitat pages.  Children will place the animal on the matching habitat paper.

Week Four:

Center: He is Risen magnet page (www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/holidays/eastermagnetpage.pdf)

Supplies: He is Risen page, magnets, cookie sheet

March Lesson Plans by Cherie

Week 1

Center: Science – Kids will use an eye dropper to move vinegar from one cup to baking soda in another cup.

Supplies: Paper cups, eye dropper, baking soda, vinegar

Week 2

Center: Power tool screw driver. Make different designs with colorful screws using a power drill (kiddy drill).

SCIENCE EXPERIMENT: How can we make homemade, safe all-purpose cleaners? (Vinegar and baking soda) How else can we use these chemicals…to clean yes, but also to blow up a balloon and to bake bread!

http://scienceforpreschoolers.com/archives/17

Week 3

Center: Sort plastic Easter Eggs by color…maybe size, etc.

Supplies: Assorted plastic eggs, baskets with colored construction paper on the bottom

Week 4

Center: Sensory (hearing) – Plastic eggs will be filled with different objects.  Kids will be given objects and by shaking the eggs they will have to guess which object is inside each egg. For example, one of the objects might be a jingle bell.  One of the eggs will be filled with jingle bells.  The children can open the eggs to see if their guess was correct.

Supplies: Plastic eggs, jingle bells, rocks, pennies, cotton balls, etc.

SCIENCE EXPERIMENT: Egg Experiments…  Using vinegar (again!) we will make an egg feel like rubber! We will also explore the differences between a hard-boiled and raw egg.

http://www.preschoolexpress.com/discovery_station05/discovery_station_apr05.shtml

 

Together we carry our children to the cross

In family and school this Easter season, we will be all wrapped up in the incomparable glory of the cross. Won’t you join me on this 40 day trail leading to the cross?

(Quotations and full descriptions can be found at aholyexperience.com–a most beautiful and heart wrenching blog written by Ann Voskamp)

Lent

Trail to the Tree

February 22—April 8th

“Lent. It’s the preparing the heart for Easter. Like going with Jesus into the wilderness for forty days, that we might come face to ugly face with our enemy. Our sacrificing that we might become more like Christ in His sacrifice.” Let me be crucified with you Jesus.

Lent traces its roots to this earliest tradition of Christ followers. Wanting to emphasize the power of the Cross and significance of the resurrection, we set aside this season to reflect on life, sin, love, God’s intervention, sacrifice and victory for humankind.

Today, Lent is sacred for some, ignored by others, and for some it may have become an empty and lifeless practice. Like anything good, it is only as good as it is meaningful to the practitioner.

Each night through Lent, families may choose to read devotionals, pray, journal, light a candle, etc. Choose 1 thing to give up. Ingratitude? Selfishness? Worry?

Repentance Box

At the Foot of the Cross

“As the day rolls out, and snags here and there, we find ourselves, Mama and Dad, big kids and little, taking a moment to confess our sins on small cards, slipping them into our box of repentances.

In this practice we are experiencing it afresh: Confessing sins is a cleansing, emancipating grace.

Come Easter morning, we’ll burn up our cards of sins confessed.

Because they are, astoundingly, no more, because of Christ who did it all.

And we’ll walk home with an empty box of repentance, giving thanks that He has written our names, not our sins, in His book of remembrance.”

Easter Garden

A Visual Parable

A miniature remembering of the resurrecting wondering of the all-things new beginning…..A basket, some dirt, some plants, moss, a wee pond, miniature garden torches, a tomb, a cross, a path. Each day light another wick for the Light of the World is coming….until Good Friday, when all goes dark. This is the path we walk from Lent to Easter, from dark to Light, from death to life, and the Easter garden will unfold, a parable, a living visual of the metamorphosis of all the cosmos…

Easter Garden, another way to walk out lent each family evening, us again with Him in the garden in the cool of the evening.

Passover Meal

The Last Supper

A desire to recover the sacred, 3,000 years sacred.

“It is about keeping something worth preserving: emblems pregnant with the fulfillment of the New Covenant.”

“Why keep the Passover, that day that God said “shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the LORD; throughout your generations, as a statute forever” (Ex. 12:14)?”

Interested in preparing your own Passover Meal?

 

The Cross

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Galatians 2:20

Come crucify flesh at the foot of a cross nestled in the garden, nail sins to the tree, scrawl repentance into a wooden box, worship thankfully and knowingly, be still and know.

How many times will my flesh drive me back to this place? Do numbers matter when all is grace? Run to the cross, be crucified with Christ.

 

 

 

March Lesson Plans

Week 1:

I am a hardworking helper

Letter:

“h” is for helper

Circle:

Who is the Holy Spirit? What does He do? He was sent to helps us. Children are made to be helpers to their mommies and daddies.

Centers:

Gross and Fine Motor: Helping Mommy—dusting, washing dishes, sweeping, folding laundry

Group:

Spring Art: Clay and Twigs Birds Nest (Brainstorm)

Math: Dump it Out (p.101), Taking Turns (p.117), One More (p.114)

Week 2:

I am hardworking and obedient

Letter:

“r” is for rabbit

Circle:

Jesus said if we obey him, we are like the man who built his house on the rock. If we don’t obey, we are foolish like the man who built his house on the sand and saw all his hard work wash away.

Centers:

Math and fine motor: Helping Daddy—sorting tools, screwing nuts on bolts, pounding nails into a stump

Group:

Science: Miss Cherie’s lesson

Spring and Holiday Art: Dying Easter Eggs & Making Baby Birds for Our Nests (Brainstorm)

Week 3:

Oh, the Wonderful Cross

Letter:

“c” is for cross

Circle:

Take all our burdens, all our sins to the cross that we may truly live. We will literally and physically move toward the cross as we take the children to a sacred place that we will build in our garden. We will humble ourselves at the foot of a homemade cross, unload our written burdens and sins into a repentance box, and then burn them around the time of Easter to symbolize Christ’s atoning work.

Centers:

Art: Cross Necklaces

Group:

Spiritual Traditions: Build an Easter Garden (Brainstorm)

Spiritual Traditions: Passover Meal

Week 4:

Easter

Letter:

“t” is for tomb

Circle:

We will continue what we started last week, read another version of the Easter story, and introduce Resurrection Eggs.

Centers:

Math and Story Re-telling: Resurrection Eggs (Brainstorm)

Group:

Science: Miss Cherie’s Lesson

Holiday Party: Easter Celebration—Easter egg hunt, special snack, ?

Week 5:

Review

Easter Lesson Planning

Easter and the message of the cross really moves me and I am SO looking forward to digging into at Little Lambs with you all. I was a little teary as I caught a glimpse of how God will move on us while teaching the cross in March. Take a look at the blog (in)courage and the post “5 meaningful ways to celebrate Easter”. I hope it inspires your planning too and moves you toward the cross. I will definitely incorporate some of these ideas in March and if any of the activities especially interests you, I would love to work together on the project. I am so excited about Easter!!!

Love, Lynn

http://www.incourage.me/2010/03/five-ways-for-a-family-to-celebrate-easter.html

2/14/12 Loving Our Friends

Happy Valentines Day!

Making Friendship Necklaces Together

Miss Carol helps Noah make a popsicle stick frame al naturale, just the way he likes it.

David puff painting his frame with mommy.

       

Funny little things make us laugh at Little Lambs…..

How did a train track get in my PJs??

Awww the rewards of having a friend who loves me.

   

Tayler and Noah hugging…..and hugging…..and hugging……and hugging……..and hugging…..ok, now I think we are slow dancing.

Thank you sooooo much for my friendship necklace Tayler!

    

   

Setting up for the Tea Party Friendship Picnic

2/9/12 Loving Our Family and Our Elders

Friendship is sweet

Circle time!

Centers for the day…

David making a Valentine for his “TT”. You can never have too much glue can you?

Madelyn making a special necklace for Noah.

Pretty Faith practicing letters already!

Kids who can make friends are able to see what someone else needs.

Yeah Madelyn!

Cooking up some homemade goodness to take to the elderly at Miss Cherie and David’s care home!

White chocolate chip apple banana muffins

Recipe compliments of Miss Sheila 🙂

Where did all the kids go?