Outdoor Adventures--2/26

Gerrick wanted to hunt for some more big rocks for his rock garden today, so we pulled the wagon out of the garage and headed out to the empty lots behind our house.

On one of the rocks I picked up, I spotted (what I believe to be) a praying mantis egg case.


After finding a few more rocks and playing in the field for a while, we decided to leave our wagon at the edge of the woods and explore them too.


Gerrick spotted what he was convinced was "some kind of diamonds or emeralds or something."


Eventually I convinced him it was broken glass. Any ideas about what this might have been?


Looking up and watching these trees sway in the breeze was magical. I love when he notices things like this and points them out to me. :)








Along with the rocks, we also brought back a few branches for the birds. (Now we just need to get more seed!)

I went inside to make lunch while he finished up getting his rocks just right. When I was done and looked out the window, this is what I saw. :)

The Frist Center

We had an amazingly artistic day at The Frist Center with some of our best friends. There was no photography allowed in the galleries, so I'm not even going to discuss the exhibits except to say that they were thoroughly enjoyed by all of us.

The Art Quest Gallery, however, was photo-friendly. This place is amazing (on an empty school day), and we will definitely be making return trips. The large room is full of interactive art stations.


Contour drawing? Nah...he'd rather draw this:


Sunset at the Beach



Oil pastels and a wooden stylus were used to make Greek pots.







He made is first stop-motion animation films!


(A stegosaurus chases a spider while a brachiosaurus eats.)


(Cars move slowly around a construction site.)


He built Greek temples...






...and made a robot (with a little assistance).



Immediately when we got home he started working on the other pot outline that we brought back with us (even though it was past dinner time).


Then after dinner he went straight to the exhibit brochures.

When Rick was putting him to bed, Gerrick said that he'd still be there if they hadn't closed. :)

Art Lesson 6 : Artists Make Landscapes

Way back in November I read lesson 6 from our Artistic Pursuits book: Artists Make Landscapes. We then headed out with our art supplies and ended up at a nearby park. We had an excellent day, but we didn't make landscape drawings.

I let it slide and it really never crossed my mind again until we were riding back home from our January trip to Cheekwood. While in the car, Gerrick said, "Cheekwood would be a great place to make a landscape painting."

"Why, yes, yes it would," I replied, and again I let it slip from my mind.

Then last Thursday, Gerrick woke up looking very pale and said he didn't feel well. After eating a waffle he turned on the TV and sat on the sofa. After a few minutes he jumped up and said that he wanted to make a landscape painting. He got out the paper and paints and spent the next 3 hours working on this painting while watching PBS Kids. It obviously has mountains, a waterfall, a rainbow, and a tree. There are also animals in the cave, a bridge/dam, and a bird nest in the tree.




Then on Monday afternoon we watched Nature: Violent Hawaii. Later that night I remembered that someone had given Gerrick a calendar recently of photos of Hawaii. The next day I reminded him that he had it, and we ended up talking about the fact that these were landscape photographs. I asked him if he'd like to draw one of them and he said, "Yes, after while." Later that afternoon he made this using oil pastels:

Reading & Writing Update

Gerrick is still playing Reading Eggs and has completed 71 online lessons. He has 19 more lessons to complete the program as it exists today. (They are continually adding more to it.) Our subscription ends in early April. He is just now beginning to seem to get a little bored with it, so I think the 6-month (vs. 12-month) plan was the right choice for us.

We have also been utilizing the free program Progressive Phonics. After printing the first book of the Beginner level, we decided to just read the rest on the laptop. These are not something that Gerrick wanted to read more than once, so printing them would have been a waste of paper and ink. I have printed the word cards and he does enjoy playing the word matching games with those.

I have pulled out the readers from the Hooked on Phonics Learn to Read Kindergarten kit that I had originally planned to use before I found Reading Eggs & Progressive Phonics. (If you are interested in these, check your used bookstores. I've found the first grade box already for next to nothing.) He reads at least one of them to me daily. We keep them in a basket on top of the workbox drawers. The new ones are kept in a rubber band (in order of difficulty). He always has the option of choosing a previously read book or the front new one.






We didn't use the writing sheets included with Progressive Phonics for very long. Gerrick just didn't enjoy them and I convinced myself that he really doesn't need them either. They were just too much for him. Instead, I bought a lined dry-erase board, and he is copying one word of his choice a day. He only has to write it once to the best of his ability, but sometimes he chooses to do more.





But, as always, the most important things we are doing to encourage his literacy development are talking, taking time to enjoy books and magazines together,...



...and filling our home with good quality books. He was thrilled to be able to pick out all of these recently at a local used bookstore after I exchanged a bagful of books I didn't want anymore for store credit!

Nature Walk--2/2

"This is an Indian pictogram; it means danger."