Oh, how I love School Days...

It has been quite a month.  We've done some great learning around here and the best part is the FUN we had while doing it!!!

January was a full month ~ Here are some of the things we did in school:

I love to read books to my kiddos, I especially love it now that I know what it is like to not have the ability to read out loud after being so sick.  So this month we read Mr. Popper's Penguins ~ ADORABLE!  And it was a great addition to our unit study on Penguins and Polar Bears!  We also read The Trumpet of the Swan ~ LOVED it! 

Not sure what we'll be reading for February, but we gotta choose some good ones, cause those were a blast!

Our unit study, like I mentioned above, was on Penguins and Polar Bears...can I just tell you again, how very much I LOVE doing Unit Studies!? 

What a fun way to learn! 

Some of the fun things we did for this unit study include: 

Reading Mr. Popper's Penguins,

Watching the movie March of the Penguins,

Awesome drawings of penguins and their habitats,

how they live their lives as "Husband and Wife" raising little ones and the wonderful care that they give to their chicks,

map work (the kids really learned a lot...it was fun to see them point out the locations as they would shout out,  "All South of the Equator")

we learned of their predators (which are now "the enemies" to my little ones),

we also talked about what they love to eat,

what penguins do for fun (and then we tested out some of the fun they have!!! ~ tobogganing being at the top of the list, we would have loved to try out the surfing or cliff diving and swimming, but it's a touch cold this time of year for that kind of business!) 

We went a field trip to the Boise Zoo to observe the penguins...they were quite entertaining, but not quite as entertaining as the drawings produced by my kids while watching them!  

An enlightening fact for us to learn was that  the Polar Bear and the Penguin will never actually meet up!  That is unless you are Mr. Popper and you are traveling to the North Pole to introduce the penguin to the polar bear...but in the "real world", they live on opposite sides of the earth. 

We ended our month of study with a Stand & Deliver moment for each of the kids...they each prepared a "report" to go along with their unit study book containing all of their artwork and facts they had learned.  This Unit Study was a huge success...I'd totally rate it a 5!!!

Our Devotional Theme for the month was "Tell Me the Stories of Jesus" ~ I loved this!  In fact, I think it merits another month...so we'll be continuing this one for February.  How can one possibly highlight His life and teachings in one measly month???  We also thoroughly and completely covered the values Integrity and Charity.   

For my older boys, I assigned a research paper to them.  Since we were already deep in the study of Ancient Egypt, that seemed like the perfect topic.  I was so impressed with the papers they produced.  Dare I say the best work I've seen from the both of 'em!!!  Hooray!

I would have to say that the one thing my younger kids feel we didn't do enough of was SCIENCE!  They just eat it up...so February will be a month full of science experiments...that is what they are loving right now! 
I'm also really looking forward to spending some of our time working on Early American History...this is a true passion for me...and I am lucky enough to share that passion with my kiddos as well as a small group of other families once a week during our little Tuesday (used to be Wednesday) afternoon co-op. 

During January, I hit my goal of at least two field trips!!!  We visited the Planetarium for a morning and then the Zoo for our Penguin Observations. 

Sooo Looking forward to Tuesday...Why? 
Well, because it is the beginning of a new month!!! 
And with the beginning of a NEW month, come a whole host of NEW things to learn about!
And we must have a PARTY to bring in the NEW month properly!  So Tuesday will be a fun-filled day around this house as we introduce:
A NEW unit study.
A NEW Theme for the month.
NEW Values to work on.
NEW Science Experiments.
NEW art projects to tackle (sure to be full of mushy-gushy love stuff, since it is the LOVE month!)
NEW field trips to look forward to.
NEW books to devour.
A NEW, fresh outlook for a fabulous month!

I'll be sure to post what fun things we'll be working on during February after I make the formal announcement to my kiddos!!!  SO if you are looking for ideas, check back mid-week!  AND if you have any fabulous ideas, please throw them my way...I'm always looking for NEW things and I'd LOVE to hear from YOU!  ;0)