Summer Session..Walk Like an Egyptian!

We have had a VERY spotty summer session with church camp and errands to do, but we have finally made it through Ancient Egypt and we will begin Ancient Greece just in time for the Olympics!

The kids really enjoyed doing all of the hands on activities that I choose to go along with this lapbook. We used the In The Hands of A Child Project Pack Ancient Egypt, several books from our local library and a few I picked up at the book store and book thrift shop.

Here is the book list we used to go with this great lapbook project pack:

Book List for Ancient Egyptian Study

The Crafts and Culture of The Ancient Egyptians by Joann Jovinelly and Jason Netelkos

Pyramids! 50 Hands-On Activities to Experience Ancient Egypt by Avery Hart and Paul Mantell

Peoples of the Past The Ancient Egyptians Life in the Nile Valley by Viviane Koenig and Veronique Ageorges

Visiting the Past Valley of the Kings by Rob Alcraft

Ms. Frizzle’s Adventures Ancient Egypt by Joanna Cole and Bruce Degen

Pyramid by David Macaulay

First Facts About Ancient Egypt by Jacqueline Morley

My books:

DK Eyewitness Books Ancient Egypt by George Hart

INSiders Egypt by Joyce Tyldesley

Egyptology Search for the Tomb of Osiris by Dugald A Steer

Cleopatra of Egypt by Leonora Hornblow World Landmark Books

We made lego pyramids.

Belle's had to be white just like the real pyramids and Josh's was mulit-colored, but had a sarcophagus inside it! =)

Royal nemes to do battle in!

Upper Egypt battles Lower Egypt

Making wadjet bracelets.

They pretended the colored string were precious stones!

Making canopic jars for mummification

We used seedling pots cut down to the shape need and then modge podged brown paper sack strips to make the jars.

Painting their canopic jars. The kids used air-dry white clay to form the heads and then acrylic paints.

Found the idea on Pinterest! We used flour sack towels cut up for the mummy linen.

And finally mummifying Ken and Barbie! =)

I wanted to make a mini Egypt so we could demonstrate the flooding properties of the Nile, but I was REALLY afraid the cats would think they had a new place to potty, so we didn't make the mini-Nile. The kids were sorely disappointed!

There were so many fun and educational hands-on activities that I found at our local library, we could have studied Egypt and crafted til our hearts were content! But Ancient Greece calls, and there are just as many crafts and activities in store for Greece!

The summer is coming....but not for The GreenHouse.

This year has not gone the way I had imagined it at the start of the school year in August/September. I had planned for an uneventful year filled with plenty of growing and learning. With figuring out how things should go and how they should not. And to have a summer vacation of sorts. The year started off as I had expected; full of giddy excitement to delve in to the curriculum my Dear Hubby and I had prayed about and purchased. The kids really were apprehensive about everything, but that is how they are. All play and no learning! LOL! Most kids are like this, I have come to terms with this over the year, and most parents are super excited to get started and see their children learn all of the 'goodies' they have found! By mid-year, burn-out sets in and the end of the year cannot seem to get here fast enough! I do feel like this, this year.
Our year was turned upside down when I began to watch my wonderful niece and nephew in the fall. It was a learning experience for everyone involved. I realized pretty early on, before Christmas, that I was going to be behind with the kids work. And that is a stress that I am still working through. I have had to adjust our plans for a summer, to a plan without a summer. This is what happened last year also. It will not be too terrible though, when I truly think about it. The summer has already come to our part of the country and if this summer is anything like last summer (we had a massive drought and several weeks with 100 degree or better days), staying indoors doing school work will not be such a bad idea!
My Dear Hubby and I have planned out several lapbook studies in history and a doubling up on the science curriculum will be attempted, math is always an on going course. I believe firmly in use it, or lose it! And I am torn on the spelling/grammar curriculum. I am looking at several, but I cannot nail it down! With so many wonderful choices, and very little capital to spare, I am reluctant to buy something and it not work.  So the Hubby and I will pray about it and trust God will lead us to the right one for our family.
As for this year, even though we are behind in the academics, my children have learned more valuable lessons than I could have ever taught them from a curriculum. Lessons from the heart. Learning to get along with drastically younger children and how those children think, react, act and play has been a lesson that I could have never been able to give them had we not watched them over the past 8 months. My children have grown so much in responsibility and character watching these two precious little children that I hope this year will always be a fond time in their lives and that they will use these lessons in their futures no matter where their lives lead. Even though it means we will school through the summer. Somethings are worth it.

Blogging is not my forte....

It has been a millennium since I last blogged about the kid's school day! A quick run down is that I started watching my brother's youngest children in November and the day has been WAY too busy to write about our schooling day. The curriculum I wanted to use all year has not exactly worked out the way I had hoped, but one lives and learns.
The school year is winding down and I am already preparing for next year's curriculum. We will probably school through the summer like last year because I did not have the pace I would have liked this year. Not a heavy loaded day, just a light day. School Lite! =)