Feild Trip Fail.

As part of our Fall Unit Study on Leaves, I had planned two Field Trips for the Professors, Apple Picking, and a drive to Sheanandoah. We accomplished Apple picking (right in the nick of time) and had a great trip on a beautiful day. As part of our trip we had lunch at an amazing park nearby and got in some leaf rubbing. We even brought home some of the leaves and dried them out to do more. Don't have any pictures yet on that project.

We were not so fortunate with Sheanandoah.

Apparently last weekend, October 21st, was the peak weekend for leaf viewing, and we were not able to get out there on such short notice, and decided we would try to go the following weekend.  It was a disapointment, because it was a beautiful day, perfect. To console ourselves we took a trip to a new park and wound up having a great day. Its a good thing we did not try to go this weekend, as there are several inches of snow in the moutains today, and a historic October snowstorm is bearing down on
the area, though we just have rain at our house so far. I'll bet its beautiful up there though. In the end,  the Professors are none the wiser, and I'm hoping we can make it out there next Fall, and many after that. 

Building Blocks

Building Blocks are one of my favorite Early Childhood manipulatives. Simple, Complex, Imaginative. I came down to the playroom one morning and found Professor #1 trying to build a wall with the baby's blocks, which he had been doing for a few days, and I thought, its about time we got out our building blocks. The Professors had never shown interest before that, and since it has over 100 blocks, it was hiding in the closet until the time arose. Below are some of the Professors creations from the first two mornings of block play.

Professor #2's 'Airport'

Professor #1's 'Castle'

Professor #2's 'Train Ramp and Station'

Sometimes baby professors get in the way.

So we just rebuild : )

Professor #2's Cargo Train.

Someone's Castle, good balance Masha' Allah.

Professor #3's 'H' He insisted I get a picture of this.

Another train ramp and station by Professor #2.

A small town by Professor #1.

Leaf Puzzle

As part of our Fall Unit Study on Leaves, I decided to do some coloring pages, that we would make into a lap book.  One of which was a mosaic 'color by number' style worksheet. The child is to color the dotted mosaics green, and the blank mosaic's blue. I glued each worksheet to a piece of green construction paper and set out a small jar of green and blue crayons to complete the project.

I thought this would be a great project on several levels. The first being the opportunity to practice following instructions. The second being, taking a structured approach to coloring, something we normally don't do.

The project didn't go over that well, and I had to scale back my lesson plan, which was to do this every day for a week, to have them really master the coloring and instruction, then use this as a practice page, then eventual page of our lap book. I even thought about making one to cut into puzzles pieces!

The first wrong turn came about when the glue didn't fully dry on the worksheets when we were ready to start.  My oldest twins paper was the worst and tore in several places which you will see below. Also, they only gave the project a go two days, and that was after a lot of prodding. They just were not interested. I plan to reintroduce it again soon.

Here is my oldest twin fighting with his soggy paper. Masha' Allah, he got the concept pretty quickly, but was a little grossed out by the wet glue.

My middle son is 2. He participates in lessons at will. This was not one of those days.

This is my youngest twins paper.  Part of the instructions were to 'color the circles green.' I'm not sure what he took it to mean, but he circled all the dots, and declared the project done, lol. I had to really work with him to make him understand he needed to color in the leaves, not just circle the dots.

He would not color in the blank mosaics at all. I think you can faintly see a blue dot on the bottom of one of them. 

As I said I wanted to do this over the entire week, and had the station set up at the breakfast table so they would get into it first thing. They groaned when they saw it, but I tried to work with them. This is my dot circlers second day page. Masha' Allah, marked improvement.

This is my oldest twins second day page. I wish they would've tried more days, but it was clear, this project was done.

Close up of our soggy paper. I'm not a fan of glue sticks, so I think next time we will color first, then glue.

Favorite Fall Books

We are currently working (at a snail's pace) through a Fall Unit Study on leaves. Here are our 3 favorite books from the suggested reading list. I have the link to, and more information on, the complete unit study, which I will put together in another post, insha' Allah later. For now, we thought you might enjoy reading these books. They must be popular, bc we were not able to renew them!

Apple Picking

On the third weekend of October 2011, we took the boys apple picking, on what turned out to be a wonderful Fall day at, Homestead Farms in Poolesville, MD. This was one of the field trips I wanted to incorporate into our Fall Unit Study, and after a few attempts, we finally made it out. I'm sure glad we did, because I received and email from the farm this morning saying due to large crowds, they had run out of apples!

The farm offers year round 'pick-ur-own' seasonal items such as flowers, fruits and vegetables. It was a gorgeous place, and we can't wait to go back each season. Please click the 'Read more' link, on the bottom left, to view all the pictures.