Weekly Wrap-Up: China Week 3

We’ve finished up our tour of China.  I have to admit I am rather sad that we are moving on ~ we have had so much fun learning about China! 

It was quite a busy week!  I had a bug of some sort on Tuesday and ended up calling our substitute teacher~ my Mom.  I  really am blessed that my family is supportive of my decision to homeschool and willing to help me out.

The Three Rs:

Nothing much to report ~ we are moving along with reading, writing, and arithmetic.   Emily really could have completed her math this week in two days or just skipped the lesson, which was a review of skip counting by 2s.

Geography:

We reviewed the following weeks and the Asia geography song.  The kids pulled out our Asia continent box and talked about the Chinese abacus, money from China, animals from Asia, and Asian landmarks.   

Family Reading:

Emily made a dragon hat, which is very cute, after we finished reading the Magic Tree House: Day of The Dragon King.  We found the instructions to make the dragon hat in the book Multicultural Art Activities.  

Chinese Shadow Puppets and a Theater:

We learned about the legend of how shadow puppets were created and then we made a theater and Chinese shadow puppets.  You can read more about it here.

   

Lapbook: Giant Pandas

I had no intention of doing a lapbook this week, but Emily asked if we could do one on Pandas after we finished reading Giant Pandas by Gail Gibbons.   How did Emily even know there was a Giant Pandas lapbook?  She loves to look over my shoulder when I’m reading Jolanthe’s blog, Homeschool Creations.  I was looking at her lessons plans for China and Emily commented on the lapbook, so I printed it from Homeschool Share, and we put the lapbook together in two days.

           

Art:

To go along with our lapbook Emily learned how to draw a Giant Panda using Draw Write Now – we love these books! 

We finished our Giant Panda study by watching The Amazing Panda Adventure on Netflix and the kids ate popcorn with chopsticks.  

The entire family loved this movie.  It was about a young boy who goes to China to visit his father, who is helping to save pandas in their habitats.  While out on the preserve,  the father is separated from his son and a young girl who is their translator, when poachers attack and harm a mother panda.  The young boy and girl are left with the baby panda as they make their way through the wilderness to safety.

Our Book Basket:

 

Next week we are going to take a break from our geography studies so we can talk about fall ~ one of my favorite times of the year!

I hope everyone else had a good week!  To see what other homeschoolers have been doing this week, visit Kris at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.

~Cindy

Chinese Shadow Puppets and Theater

We are having so much fun learning about China!  This week we learned about the Legend of how Chinese shadow puppets where created and made our own shadow puppets and theater.  

The Legend says….Once upon a time, a long time ago, in Han times, the favorite wife of the emperor became ill and died. Her husband, missed her so much that he lost interest in ruling after her death.  Everyone wanted to help the emperor, but nothing seemed to work.

One day, a priest in the palace passed some children playing with dolls. The dolls made shadows on the floor, shadows that seemed to dance as the children played. The dancing shadows gave the priest an idea. He hurried away to work on his idea. 

First, he made a puppet from cotton balls. He painted the puppet to look somewhat like the emperor's wife. When his puppet was ready, he invited the emperor to a special puppet show. 

The emperor appreciated all the things his court had done to cheer him up, but really, all the emperor wanted was to be left alone. He knew the priest would be insistent. The priest was a old friend. With a sigh, a very deep sigh, the emperor agreed to attend the show. 

That evening, the priest placed a light behind a curtain, along with himself and his puppet. As he moved the puppet behind the curtain, it cast a dancing shadow. The priest told stories of the emperor's wife. They were wonderful stories, wonderful memories. Even though the priest was there, and the puppet was there, it seemed as if the shadow was telling the story. 

The emperor was delighted. He clapped his hands in joy. Every night, after a busy day of taking care of the business of being emperor, the emperor looked forward to hearing "shadow stories" about his wife, and her day, and of their life together.  

And that, according to legend, is how shadow puppets were born.

~from www.china.mrdonn.org/shadowpuppets.html

We found instructions for making the puppet theater here.  The link also includes a very cute YouTube video ~ Jack and the Beanstalk Shadow Puppet Show.  My kids loved watching this!

What You Will Need to Create a Theater and Shadow Puppets:

• Cereal box
• Pen or marker
• Scissors
• Utility knife
• Tape
• Wax paper or thin white paper
• Optional:  black construction paper or paper of your choice to decorate the front of the theater
• Shadow Puppets Template (we reduced these and copied them on cardstock so they would fit our theater)
• Makers and/or crayons
• Totally optional: glitter, sequins
• Craft sticks
• Brads 
• Desk lamp or some other lighting source

   What You Will Do:

1. Tape up the ends of the box.
2. Use a pen or marker to trace a line about 1 1/2 inches away from the edge on the front and back of the box.
3. Cut out your openings with scissors or a utility knife.
4. Tape a sheet of wax paper or thin white paper over one of the openings.
5. Optional:  We decided to frame the front of our theater with black construction paper.     
6. Color the shadow puppets and add glitter and sequins if you are daring!  (Yes, my kids had glitter EVERYWHERE!)                                    
7. Cut out the puppets and join them together with brads, where ever you want the puppet to bend.  Tape remaining parts together.
8. Tape craft sticks to the back of puppet.
9. Add light behind your theater (we used a lamp without the shade) and have fun putting on a puppet show.        

   

This was a super easy craft ~ except for the glitter clean up!  The kids already have plans to cut some puppets out of black paper to go along with their favorite books!

~Cindy

Chinese Moon Festival

We have been learning about China for the past two weeks. Today we talked about and celebrated the Chinese Moon Festival. 

What is the Moon Festival?

In China and throughout many Asian countries people celebrate the Harvest Moon on the 15th day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar.  The date in the Western calendar changes annually.  This year, the Mid-Autumn festival was today, Wednesday, September 22, 2010.

The Moon Festival or Mid-Autumn Festival is a day of family reunions much like our Thanksgiving.  It is believed that on the day of the Festival, the moon is the roundest and brightest signaling a time of completeness and abundance. During the Mid-Autumn Festival, children get to stay up past midnight, parading multi-colored lanterns as families take to the streets to moon-gaze.

How We Celebrated:

We read The Moon Lady which is about a girls adventures on the night of the Moon Festival.

On a rainy afternoon, Maggie, Lily, and June listen as their grandmother tells a story from her childhood. Long ago, during the Moon Festival while waiting for the Moon Lady to appear and grant wishes, Ying-ying discovers the best wishes are those you make come true yourself. 

We made Chinese paper lanterns

and Easy Chinese Moon Cakes.  This is a simplified recipe not at all like traditional Moon Cakes, which often use red bean paste and are formed using decorative molds.

This evening as the sun went down we enjoyed tea and our moon cakes

and when it was dark we headed outside to enjoy the beautiful harvest moon!

~Cindy

Continent Boxes

This year I am using Galloping The Globe for both the kids.  I have been trying to include books and ideas that will keep Aiden interested as we study each continent.  While I was searching for ideas I found a blog post on Montessori For Everyone about continent boxes and fell in love with the idea. 

Continent boxes are a great way to keep items from each country together in one place.  You can include books, music, pictures, small plastic animals, fabric, money, stamps, flags ~ basically anything you can find from the continent.

I used black photo boxes and made labels for each continent ~ using traditional Montessori continent colors. 

• North America  ~ orange
• Europe ~ red
• Africa ~ green
• South America ~ pink
• Antarctica ~ white
• Australia ~ brown
• Asia ~  yellow

I have our boxes where the kids can get to them any time they want.   As we study each continent we will display the items in the box and talk about them in more detail.

Where I Found Items to Fill Our Boxes:

• I started out by looking around the house (and my mom’s).  I was really surprised at the number of items we already had from other countries.
• Thrift stores are a great place to find dolls, souvenirs, and books.
• I found some cute souvenirs online at Happy Mall.
• eBay – is a great place to find some very inexpensive items (stamps, money, flags, etc.).  I only buy from sellers with 95% or higher positive feedback.
• Each of our continent boxes contains a book about the continent.  I found continent books on Amazon for $7.99 each.  They ended up being cheaper because they are eligible for the 4 for 3 promotion, which brought the cost down.
• I would like to include Continent Kits from Montessori for Everyone but right know I only have one for Asia.  The kits include:
  • Maps
  • Animals – 3 part cards
  • Plants – 3 part cards
  • Flags
  • Places – 3 part cards
  • Pictures - 12 pictures of people and daily life
  • Fact Sheet
  • Arrows (one for each country)
  • Instructions for making & using this material
• Toob animals from each continent – I got my from Amazon and Michaels.  I was able to use a 40% off coupon at Michaels.

Our Continent Boxes:

Some of our boxes have more items then others.  We will continue to add items and crafts as we study the continents.

     

     

  

Our continent boxes have been a great way to get Aiden excited about our geography studies.  

To check out more Preschool ideas and activities visit Preschool Corner!

~Cindy