Filling the Physics Gap

Part of my science stash

I am SO excited to have discovered that Life of Fred is coming out with an elementary physics text in a week or so. Science is my last big planning hurdle for the upcoming year. I have a crate full of science-y books, a couple of awesome science encyclopedias (see above,) Evan-Moor "Read & Understand Science" units, Physics Experiments for Children, Snap Circuits, and a couple of building kits. What I didn't have, though, was a cohesive plan to make sure El got a basic understanding of middle school physics.

Thank you Stanley Schmidt!

I was already going to have El work through the first 2 Life of Fred books, Fractions and Decimals & Percents, sometime this year. I had no idea that the author was writing a book to fit in right after D&P for grammar/logic stage physics. This works out perfectly. I will work through my "hither, thither, and yon" DIY science with both kids and then hopefully El will have finished the 2 math books and be ready for LoF Physics sometime in the spring semester.  

CLICK HERE for a sample of Life of Fred Elementary Physics which should be released mid/late August 2012.

Elementary Physics

And, hey, while I'm here and on the subject, I'm might as well add some awesome science links, right? Here are a few of the science websites we continue to enjoy:

• BBC's KS2 Bitesize- Middle School Science 
• Frostbite theater (and really everything else over at the Jefferson Lab website)
• Sciencebob.com
• Brainpop Science (the freebies) 
• Howstuffworks Science
• Internet4Classrooms Science Resources
• Also, Bill Nye and Magic School Bus shows on YouTube

Reader's Response Notebooks

Today I put together Reader's Response Notebooks for both kids. I chose the inserts and sections from a variety of sources which I wanted to share here.

First of all, the notebooks are based loosely on the Fountas & Pinnell Reader's Notebook. If you don't mind that they come in a 5-pack, don't want to deal with putting together your own, and don't need to customize every little thing, this printed reader's notebook is the way to go.

The following sections are included in the F & P Notebooks:

• Reading List with columns for title, author, genre, and date completed and a column to rate book as easy, just right, or challenging. 
• Books To Read page 
• Genre list with descriptions of each 
• Guidelines for preparing for a group discussion about the book
• Letter from the teacher about how she and the students will communicate with each other by writing response letters 
• Letter form to refer to when writing letters 
• Revising and Editing Tools page
• List of ways to respond 
• Section for writing letters
• Section for guided reading

For everyone else, you can put together your reader's notebook using the many resources available online, including:

• The Reader's Notebook page from Scholastic.com describes what one classroom teacher includes in each section of her notebooks.
• Reading Graphic Organizers and Printables
• Reader's Notebook downloads from Mrs. Newingham's third grade classroom (I used most of these, but some had to be tweaked to fit a homeschool environment)

My notebooks turned out like this:

Decorated covers, with El's cover left blank for him to decorate. Sticky tabs on the side for the main sections.

Reading Log

"Lists" section includes things like "Books I Plan to Read" and "Authors I Like"

"Genres" section includes a short definition of the different types of literature as well as a genre graph

Reading Goals. If you don't know where to begin with these, a great starting place is the Reading Informative Texts and Reading Literature guidelines in the Common Core State Standards for ELA.

Again, most of the pages pictured were downloaded from this page. 

At the end of the notebook you can include a reference section with commonly used things like character traits, a cursive letter reference, or anything else your child might find helpful. What you include or exclude from this section (and, really, the whole notebook) is totally up to you and will depend largely on your child's grade and ability level. My 2nd grader will get a cursive reference page once she learns cursive, whereas my 4th grader has this Thinking Stems document to help him come up with writing ideas.

If you don't want to bother with the notebook at all, here are some awesome reader response task cards you could print out, laminate, and stick on a metal ring (or put in an index card box, or whatever.) These were written for a third grade class, but they could easily work with homeschooled 2nd graders up to fourth or fifth graders.

There you have it! I am once step closer to being ready for the new school year... and have once again killed an ink cartridge <Grrr!>

Homemade School Supplies

The 50 cent composition notebooks were fine and dandy for El last year, but apparently Em expects more from her school supplies. Here are some cute notebook covers I made for her yesterday:

And a binder cover...

I didn't use a pattern or tutorial, but there are plenty of resources online if you want to make something like this. (Here is a cute one.) Em doesn't know about these yet; I plan on giving them to her on the first day of school... which is a date still to be determined (probably August 23 or August 27.)