Ivory Soap Experiment

This year we are homeschooling our kids (David) grade one and (Jaclyn) pre-k. We have decided to home school for this year for many reasons but mostly because our family has been in transition. That story will have to wait for another time, today we are talking about school.

One wonderful thing about homeschooling is that we are able to be a part of the kids experiments. In fact we get to decide what experiments they will do. I, for one, love the wonder of the kids faces as they start to discover what cause and effect means and how different objects can change shape when there environment changes. Really this list could go on but for now I will tell you what we did today. 

Ivory Soap in the microwave. 

First I started with asking them what I was holding? They both yelled soap! 

We talked about its shape, size, texture and smell. Then I asked them if they thought that the soap could change size. 

They both answered "yes, it gets smaller". 

Then I told the kids we were going to put it in the microwave and see what happens to it.

Both David and Jaclyn thought it was strange thing to do with soap but were also curious as to what would happen to it. They both predicted it would either melt or just get smaller. 

 As they watched it turn around on the plate they were excited to see that it was getting bigger and not smaller. There was pure delight on their faces as they watched it almost fill the inside of the microwave. I then brought it over to the table for them to explore. 

We talked about how it smelled, looked, felt and what size it was now. 

Here are some of the things that they said about the changes. 

Jaclyn said: "It still smells good!"

 David said: "Its a LOT bigger now!"

Jaclyn: "It looks like a pile of snow!"

David: "It looks fluffy!"

David & Jaclyn: "It feels cool!"

 After we talked about the changes that the soap made, we split it into two and they both had a chance to play with it. They made a snowman, igloo, pyramid, snow and Neverland (with pirates).

As we were cleaning up the comments I got from my kids were.

David: "good, super-good, it was fun making stuff and it was just cool"

Jaclyn: "good, awesome, best part was making stuff"

 Now to decide what fun experiment will we do next?

Ivory Soap Experiment

Weekend Plans

Tomorrow is a inservice day at Davids school, which of course means no school.

This evening as the kids and I started to plan what we would do tomorrow one of the suggestions that David had was "cleaning". Yup you read that right cleaning!

David loves to clean, he always has. I have had both my kids a part of my daily cleaning their whole lives. David has always loved it and get energized by cleaning and organizing. Which I understand because I am the same way. Where as Jaclyn is more like her daddy in were they will clean when it's needed but they won't go looking for something to organize just for fun.
It made me giggle that out of all the things that David talks about missing when he is at school such as playing with his sister, staying in pjs for the day or even watching a movie the one thing he wants to make sure we do on his extra day off is clean.

So it looks like our day tomorrow will include things like, a picnic in the living room, puzzles, reading books together, a movie and cleaning!

Weekend Plans

Kindergarten

This post is a little late but I still wanted to post about David's first day of kindergarten. 

As some of you may already know I was planning on homeschooling our kids. We were thinking that because of Chris' work schedule with homeschooling he would be able to have a larger part in their life, this along with other reasons we were all ready to start the school chapter of our lives with homeschooling. 

However over the last year my health has not been the best and both Chris and I decided that instead of  homeschooling it would be best for David and Jaclyn to go to school. The kids and I were away on a trip for most of September and so we were a bit late for getting into a school when we got home. Luckly the school was up for working with us and we enrolled David into kindergarten at a French immersion school. He was a little sad to be away from me at first, but then he heard he would be in class with his best friend in town he started to get excited. Because of David's late enrollment it took him a little while to get as comfortable with school as his classmates were. 

He now loves school and looks forward to going most days (sometimes he wants to stay home because he thinks that he might miss something happening at home). 

David really loves his teacher and looks forward to playing with his friends. His favorite time of day is, not surprissingly, recess. He has also been teaching the rest of us French, he is doing really well now that he has adjusted to his new schedule. 

Here is David on his first day of kindergarten. 

I still can't believe he is old enough to go to school. Crazy how fast time has gone.

Kindergarten