The National Geographic Atlas

P has been reading the "Habitable Earth" chapter of the National Geographic atlas, using the map legends to determine where on the globe certain things are, like mild summers/cool winters (finding where in America has the same temperatures as western Germany), and determining what the temperature is in Florida.

Yesterday, he went through to locate where the major religions in the world are located. He also looked at the maps showing how plate tectonics have moved the continents over the past 600 million years. Each of these maps has a paragraph description that he's been reading to us, which, when ran through a SMOG readability calculator is apparently college-level reading!

Like his father, P just loves looking at maps and seeing how things are different in different places.

HP1: Quidditch and The Mirror of Erised

P and I took a little break from Harry Potter, Book 1. I'd thought we would be finished by now, but we both focused on other things instead. I am looking forward to selecting another book soon, so I hope to finish this one within the week.

World War II

While we were out today P pretended cracks in the parking lot near the restaurant were tectonic plates.

We continued our discussion with P about the causes and chain of events of World War II. Watched interactive maps on the year-by-year history of the campaigns.

European Theater Map





Afterwards we practiced the th and f sounds.

Tectonic Plates and World War II

We looked over the atlas with Parker and described the events of Word War II in general terms, and talked about all of the places where there were battles. We then talked about tectonic plates and shifting, looking at maps of how the Earth looked up to 250 million years ago, and the projected maps of what earth will look like 250 million years hence. P used his grits this morning to make 'continent plates', which he pushed together to make mountains.

New Life!

We were lucky enough to get a phone call from a friend who had a pregnant cat who was starting to have her kittens. We got to see the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th kittens born and latch on to nurse. P asked for the date, and then let us know that this would always be the kittens' birthday. It was a magical experience.

Alien Names

Based on an entry off of the Art Projects for Kids website, we created "Alien Names" for both P and K, which they then colored in to make their "aliens". We used both watercolor crayons and oil pastel crayons.

HP1: update

We've read three more chapters -- Chapter 8: The Potions Master, Chapter 9: The Midnight Duel, and Chapter 10: Halloween -- since the last time I mentioned it. We're just really loving the story, though there is much to be desired in some of the interactions between the characters.