Expedition Earth- China

This year we're using the Expedition Earth curriculum from Confessions of a Homeschooler.  This is actually our 2nd week.  The first week was just an intro to geography- learning the continents and oceans.  This week the real journey began!

*we stamped our passports with a China flag
*learned basic China facts- religions, currency, population, etc
*Read about an average Chinese kid- food they eat, clothes they wear, school
*China map worksheet
*Flag of China worksheet
*Watched videos about Chinese Acrobats


We made our own China paper dolls.

We studied Pandas and made panda masks.  We also watched the IMAX movie China- The Panda Adventure.  Good movie!

We learned about the ancient Chinese puzzle Tangrams and made a swan.

For each country we will make a pin to represent that country.  I made a "suitcase" to place all of our pins on.  The suitcase is just a piece of felt with a cloth handle that we hung up on the wall.  China's pin is a mini version of the Tangram swan we made.

We learned how to say and write our names and numbers 1-10 in Chinese.  We learned Hello, goodbye, please and thank you as well.

To end our trip to China we went out to eat at a China buffet!  It was delicious!  Although they didn't have Chinese music playing, just some good ol' American rock and roll!  Oh well the food was really good! :)

This week we travel to South Korea!

Thank you Picasso!

I can see the writing on the walls!  And the desk..... and the door... and the table....

For some reason Matthew, who is 6, still draws all over everything. Isn't this something that supposed to happen during the terrible 2s?   Every week or so I find a new scribble or drawing pop up.  Today, him and I spent an hour scrubbing the walls in his room.  But I may have a solution thanks to Picasso!
While we were studying about Picasso, we read a book about Picasso as a kid.  Apparently, he was a pretty naughty kid- always drawing on everything, painting on his sister, and carving pictures in the living room walls.  His dad was a painter and thought that little Pablo just needed a creative outlet.  So his dad handed over all of his paints, brushes, paper, canvases, everything he had to create art with.  Picasso began painting and painting and stopped driving his mother crazy!  
This week (after the walls are scrubbed)  I'm going to cover Matthew's bedroom walls in paper and velcro crayons to the paper.  Now he'll be able to draw all he wants and not get into trouble!  I'm also going to paint his school desk white and let him have at it!  When the desk gets too full I can paint it again. It worked for Picasso's parents, hopefully it will work for us too!  And maybe, we'll have a famous artist someday.  Who knows?

Frank Sinatra says it best!

This goes with my previous post! Thanks Frankie! :)

NO! No way, No thanks, Not now, NO NO NO!

Nope, I'm not yelling at my kids!  If you're an overcommiter, people pleaser like me, these are the hardest phrases to say!  I discovered recently (after agreeing to do something I didn't want to do) that I can't say no.  Since I say yes all the time (or some form of yes- sure, I suppose, I guess, no problem)  I get asked to do things all the time.  Along the way of pleasing others, I found that I don't do things for me.  If you aren't taking time to do the things you enjoy, you will get burned out and become miserable.  I found a great book called How To Say No Without Feeling Guilty by Patti Breitman and Connie Hatch.  It's ok to say no sometimes!  It's ok to not want to do something!  If you're too busy, life will pass you by and by the time you notice, it will be too late.  Stop to smell the roses or if you don't want to say, "No, thanks!"