FREE Science Journals for Grades 4 & Up!

Download, view, or order copies of the Investi-gator, a FREE science journal designed for grades 4-8!

Read about Forest Research, Wildfires, Climate Change, Bioenergy, even about the Winter Olympic Games!

With 32 issues to choose from you're bound to find something for everyone!

Planning My Next Mini-Unit Study - Animals!

   So here I am, another week, another mini-unit. Last week was about the life-cycle of plants. This time, the next chapter in our Science book is about Types of Animals. Now since I am doing this unit with M6 & L8 I can just go with the basics for now & do a more in-depth unit with them at a later time. 

Some of the things covered in this section are:

• What is an animal?
• What are mammals & birds?
• What are amphibians, fish, & reptiles?

    This unit may take more than a week since I am going to get more in-depth with their history studies this week. We will be alternating each week between science & history so we (*I*) don't get burned out!

   My 1st step is to look through the chapter & see what each section will cover. Then I go to HomeschoolShare.com to see if there are any lapbooks covering any of these. Usually, I don't find one specific lapbook that covers all of the sections so I will then pull pieces I need from different ones. Also, some great places to look that have decent priced ones are AJourneyThroughLearning.com, Unit Studies by Amanda Bennett, & Knowledge Box Central. 

• WOW...my 1st search resulted in a ton of great lapbooks! Now to sift through them all!

   Doing a search for the specific subject & adding "unit study" or "lapbook" along with it works great. I use my Swagbucks search bar so I can get points for planning my unit studies!! woop woop!  You can find activities, crafts, books, videos, & tons of great ideas to go along with it!

Here is what I've found so far:

Animal Needs

• I just found this cute game to go along with the habitats lesson! 
• What Animals Need Graphic Organizer
• Exploring the Basic Needs Unit Study
• Animal Needs pdf (This one has a few lapbook pieces with it)

Mammals

• Mammals resources
• free Mammals lapbook!

Birds

• Birds resources
• Bird Characteristics

Amphibians & Reptiles

• Amphibians Unit
• Label Reptiles & Amphibians worksheet 
• Amphibians resources
• Reptiles resources
• Frog Life-Cycle printout & Label Me worksheet 
• Virtual Frog Dissection

Fish

• Free Fish Lapbook! 
• Fish resources

   Now it's time to collect & print all of these great finds that I want to use. I usually store them in a file folder that I will end up using for our lapbook. Each day, I will do a read-aloud from our book & then do a lapbook piece or activity that corresponds with that section!

Happy Planning!

Weekly Wrap-Up/Homeschool Mother's Journal

  We had fun this week studying plants with M6 & L8 while J12 continued her Victorian Era unit study. Click below for free resources for each of those units! Next week we will be starting a unit on animals & continuing our Middle Ages unit w/ L8 & M6.

    J12 wrote her own blog post on here Thursday. You should check it out! We want this to be a weekly post for her & maybe even have a link-up for other kids/teens. How's that sound?? She's loves writing so I thought this would be great for her! If you know how I can get this started or of anyone else hosting a linkup for this please let me know in the comments!

  She is also still working on her Money Doesn't Grow On Trees Lapbook from Knowledge Box Central.


 

M6's art project....she made a large paper cut-out of herself! Just realized the arms are missing...maybe she isn't done after all??

   
   The hubs & I have been going through our things & de-cluttering/organizing. It's amazing how often we do this & STILL have so much stuff!! I'm even going through all of my boxes of school books to see what I really need to hold on to since it's all getting carried away..lol.

Thanks for stopping by!

Until Next Time,

   

Our Plants Mini-Unit Study + Free Resources

   This past week, M6 & L8 have been studying the life-cycle of plants. This all came about when I found a Harcourt Science textbook in an old box of school books in my garage! 

   The first chapter is How Plants Grow. Since we learn better with hands on projects & lapbooks, I decided to do a bit of research & found some great (free!) resources online to go with our unit! If you aren't familiar with lapbooks/lapbooking, check out these How-To videos. We lapbook any chance we get!

Lapbook pieces on bulletin board

Finished lapbook!

The Needs of a Plant (song for kids)

Learn About Plants - Photosynthesis

• Plants Lapbook from Homeschool Helper Online
• Flowering Plant Life Cycle Sequencing Cards from Enchanted Learning
• Photosynthesis Coloring Page from Education.com

    We also read one of my personal favorite books as a kid, The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein.

    Another thing we did was the colored water & flowers experiment. (No pic!?) We took 3 white flowers & put 1 each in a jar of water colored w/ food coloring (red, blue, & green). This shows how a plant carries water from the roots to the rest of the plant! Check on it the next day & notebook/journal about your findings. You can find free notebooking pages here. 

I had done this experiment before with J12 when she was in 2nd grade with celery & red food coloring. It was so neat to see it with red stripes the next day!

Winter Olympics, Urinary System, & Muscular System Lapbooks starting at $1.00!

Knowledge Box Central is having a special on some of their lapbooks this week only!

2014 Winter Olympics Lapbook - EBOOK

$5.00     $1.00

Save: 80% off!!

Urinary System Lapbook

Starting at: $5.00      $2.50

Save: 50% off!!

Muscular System Lapbook

Starting at: $5.00      $2.50

Save: 50% off!!

Weekly Wrap-Up/Homeschool Mother's Journal

It's been about a month since I wrote up a Weekly Wrap-Up post. I can't believe it! I have some posts up in between this time so instead of a 'weekly' wrap-up I can do a 'monthly' wrap-up. (I'll make it quick so I don't bore you!)  ;)

• Christmas was great for us. It usually lasts about a month since we have so much family that we can't get together with all at once! You can read all about that here & here. 

• We started back to school this week. It actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be! Usually it takes a day or 2 to get things back in order after taking time off but we were in full swing Monday! 

• J12 started working on a Victorian Era unit (at her request) so I was able to throw together a Webquest for her. It's my 1st one ever & so far she loves it! When I heard, "Mom, you made this?!", it kind of made me feel awesome!! She has until the end of this month to finish it & has to come up with a Powerpoint (unless she can think of another way that we both agree on) to show all that she learned. She is reading The Importance of Being Earnest,  Sherlock Holmes, & The Time Machine. You can find all of them FREE for Kindle!

• L8 & M6 are continuing on with our Story of the World studies. 
  

• And also their science. I found an old 2nd grade textbook recently in my garage & thought I should put in some more 'formal' science lessons. I added a little lapbook to go with our chapter on plants. You can find that here ------Pinterest. And I found a cute little copywork book of a poem about plants but can't remember where I found it! :/

• J12 is still working on her Money Doesn't Grow On Trees Lapbook from Knowledge Box Central.

 

     I have been splitting my time lately between family, homeschool, housekeeping, & blogging a TON more! I'm still trying to get into a routine that works somewhat for us! Along with this blog, I also have my deals blog at Daily Deals From A Nerd Mom AND I am now blogging on freetailtherapy.com!

Thanks for stopping by!

Until Next Time,

 

Weekly Wrap-Up/Homeschool Mother's Journal

(contains affiliate links. See my Discolsure Policy here.)

  This week we started a few different things. Since Thanksgiving is next week, we have been working on a large Thanksgiving Day Lapbook. It's a mix of a few different lapbooks that I pieced together, The Pilgrims Project Pack, Thanksgiving Day Speedy Lapbook, & Thanksgiving lapbook. This thing took 3 file folders!

  We also watched Squanto and the First Thanksgiving, Told by Graham Greene with Music by Paul McCandless & did some activities from my list of resources. You can find those here.
  Another thing we started this week is Write From Medieval History Level 1. This fits perfectly with our Middle Ages theme this year & the kids love the stories! Watch for my review on this in the next few weeks. It is manuscript for M6 & L8 so to have J12 involved I have her write it in cursive.
  You can see our volcano project that we did earlier this week here.

  The beginning of this week was very exciting for all of us. My baby sis had her 1st baby! A baby girl! We got to visit her Tuesday at the hospital & then went to her place to help get it ready before she came home. She is so tiny!

  Next week we will be doing some more activities from my list of resources, especially since M6 was on a roll & did this whole weeks worth in 2 days! We will also be getting the house more organized for Thanksgiving & of course we can't forget to watch A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Linked up with:

Volcano Project

(Contains affiliate links. See my full Disclosure Policy. )

  To go along with the Ancient Rome theme (Pompeii), we had our volcano eruption Monday! It was so much fun! Each of the kids took a turn mixing in the ingredients.

  J12 started out but we had a dud. Well, not really but the top of the volcano was too tall above the bottle inside so dad had to cut the top off.

  L8 cracked us up by being over-dramatic....as you can see by the bottom right pic!

  After we were done, the kids came in & journaled a bit about what happened & drew a pic of it erupting. We found the pages for free from NotebookingPages.com.

 To make the 'lava' we mixed 4 tsp baking soda, 1/2 C warm water, 5 drops dish soap, 5 drops red food coloring, & 1/2 C white vinegar last.

  We are going to try it out again later today but this time I want the kids to use different measurements of ingredients & see if it still 'erupts'. They will journal again with their findings.


Hope you have a great day!

Linked up with:

Works For Me Wednesday, Inspired Wednesday