Weeks 7 & 8 Canada, eh?

We departed from Mexico and headed by plane , this time, to Canada with our passports in hand.  As we crossed the border, we listened to some Canadian music to set the mood.  Wee Sing  track #10 Going Over The Sea.

It was an interesting study, as we learned about Native Canadians; Inuits.  The Eskimo way of life is very intriguing.  We decided we would try to build an igloo this winter if we get enough snow!  Good luck with that, right?! 

Canada has two official languages; English and French.  So we learned a few phrases and words in French. 

"Comment vas-tu?"

"Je vais bein, merci."

We also caught a glimpse of the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) while we were there!  Fascinating!

We learned about the food chain.  Carnivores, Herbivores, and Omnivores, oh my!  We learned about scavengers, and decomposers, parasites, symbiosis, and mutualism, yep, fun stuff.   I skipped animal reproduction- just not ready to go there, yet!


Our Hero Tales hero's were Catherine & William Booth founders of the Salvation Army.  If you have some time to invest in a biography study, do look them up.  We also read about George Muller, a man of faith.  This book is a great read aloud as the children snack, or work on craft projects.

We are also reading The Book of Matthew and memorizing verses from chapter 5:11,12.  Jesus' own words of blessing and reward for being hated and despised for our belief in Him, just as He was persecuted. 

We continued playing the Geography Game in North America.  I just love sneaky education ;-)

We had a little experiment to learn how plants and trees take water from the soil and move it up to their branches using stalks of celery, water, and a bit of food coloring for visual effect.  We had to remove the Xylem (stringy veins) on one and leave the other intact.  The Xylem carries water to the leaves.  It was amazing that the celery I used was actually a bit soft, so I was worried it wouldn't turn out right.  But it was incredible, the celery stalk intact actually turned out harder, crisper, after leaving it in the water for 24 hrs. We peeled it open to reveal the stained xylem inside had obviously carried water to the leaves.  The leaves had red tips.  The celery with the Xylem removed became very wilted and soft.  Here are the pictures of our results...



Day 1



Day 2



We got silly a bit to avoid going out of our minds at one point!  Here is a little glimpse of our random wackiness!

...trying to teach Luca how to cross his eyes at the School of Hard-knocks! 

SUCCESS!!

Unrelated to our studies, we flew back to the US on a field trip to Washington Park after dark with my awesome sister. We enjoyed the splendor of more than 2,000 illuminated jack-o-lanterns surrounding the Rees Carillon and Botanical Garden.  An hour and a half flew by like nobody's business!  It was a great time!

We will be going to Brazil on Monday.  Ah, the life of a world traveler!  ;-)