I have not blogged here iin awhile, but keep this for archived posts.
If you want to read my current homeschool blog go to:
http://kabersblog.blogspot.com
It’s easier for my parents and inlaws to read and note us there.
THANKS
I slept in this morning. I had a headache.
We did some chores around the house to get ready for Breakfast. Even Manuel did work. Connor and Gavin made Breakfast.
The school day started with Brain Gym. With my headache, I put the boys in charge. Ki led Criss Crosses, Connor led Body Scales (these are not a Brain Gym activity. It is a sensory activity made to help Ki’s dyspraxia.). Ki always wants to lead these, but I only can let him lead them if I do a round first. (to make sure it gets done as needed to work, LOL). Manuel led Lazy 8s with arms. Gavin led Hook Ups.
I made word worksheets for Ki while they did this. I used Puzzle Maker(free to use website) and plugged in Ki’s spelling words for this week. I made a word search and a crossword puzzle with his spelling words.
During Brain Gym., I also used Babelfish to give Manuel his writing assignment. Babelfish is a free language translator online. Id does dozens of languages , but it’s not perfect. You have to think carefully about your wording. If you type. I was right (meaning correct) it will translate the ord RIGHT ad the directional word. (right or left). So I have to think carefully about how to word things. and sometimes it’s still a bit off, but if I use the correct wording it does a good enough job that Manuel can understand it.
After Brain Gym, I gave the boys their writing assignments. They had to choose an event from a short list I provided, as I have learned long ago, an open ended choice leads to 3 hours of trying to decide for my younger 2. They had to write a list of what happened in order. Gavin needed 25 things, Connor 20, Ki 15. Tomorrow they will turn their list into a story. I will Ki make a comic book story- less words, yet he gets the story writing concept. They all wrote more than needed. The seemed to enjoy iy. I had Manuel write 10 sentences about going to Danny’s house on Sunday. (The boys’ friends). Ki also choose their day at Danny’s house.
Manuel was done first. I found a book with instructions on dinosaur origami. I started with the easiest in the book. The dinosaur snapper head. I helped a lot with the first time. He thought it was SO NEAT that flat paper made a 3-D toy! So we did another one, with him doing most of it. Then he did one all on his own. Connor loves these snapers and son all the boys were making them.
Link to Video of Connor folding Dinosaur Snapper
Then it was time to do Manuel’s therapy and my boys to do their reading. it keeps them occupied and focused while I am off with Manuel.
That brings us up to lunch.
The rest of the school day will be boring to report. Miquon, Math Detective CD, Beyond the Code, Ingles in 10 Minutos, Online Science Study.
I put the online science studies together for my boys. Here is the CELL one that Gavin just finished.
Lesson 2 Cells
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Go Here- read, take notes, explore-
http://www.tvdsb.on.ca/westmin/science/sbi3a1/Cells/cells.htm
Click on the link for Unit Membrane- Read and click NEXT to get to the next page. Continue this. Some pages have little animated diagrams with a PLAY feature. Make sure you watch them.
At the end is a quiz, Take it. Record your grade- Correct if needed.
Click on the Studying Cells Tutorial-
read, click Scientific Method and read.
List the 7 steps in your notebook.
Click- Size & Biology Read
Click Major Events Read
Click to Test yourself
Click on each of the 4 areas to test. record your grades I your notebook.
NEXT- Go the following Site- http://www.cellsalive.com/cells/3dcell.htm
Read, take notes, follow links
GO HERE- http://www.cellsalive.com/gallery.htm
Read and explore
NEXT URL- http://library.thinkquest.org/3564/
CLICK ON LESSONS- Do one at a time, starting with the first- Take all of the quizzes and record your grades in your notebook..
CLICK ON VIRTUAL CELL LINK- Explore- Click the PLAIN links and watch.
NEXT URL- http://www.usoe.k12.ut.us/curr/science/sciber00/7th/cells/sciber/intro.htm
Read, take notes, don’t do the Enrichment Links
PROJECTS to DO-
http://library.thinkquest.org/19037/making_a_cell.html
We went for a walk at the nature reserve place . Lots of nice pics. The boys skipped rock, caught insects, looked at fossil, climbed trees and swang on vines. I locked my keys in the van. Brian’s dad had to come take us hone, I got the spare, then drop me off at the van. I took the boys to lunch. everyone wanted Panera except Manuel. So we went to Panera (becuase we almost always go where Manuel wants and I think it’s not fair to my own kids if Manuel is always chosen instead of them and it’s not good for Manuel to always gethis way)
So he sat and pouted the whole time and refused to eat. Kids are kids no matter what country they live in….Ki is like that, too when we don’t go where he wants. Now he is crying. Poor kid.
Conor was reading in the bedroom and I didn;t think I should always kick Connor out of his room everyday. He’s been getting upset and sad that we always kick him out of room 2 times a day to do Mannuel. So I let him stay and did Manuel’s massage and therapy on the sofa. I told the boys to make sure they didn’t come into the room.
This tree had long thin roots that were just drapped across the path!
SHELF fungus put to use!
A big, fat lightening bug That crawled on Ki for half of our walk. He had a little green inchworm on his face after this.
There was some large shelf fungi at this place!
Swinging on a vine
A better vine !!
Connor had wiped most the blood from his finger already.. Manuel and Connor got cut skipping stones…
A cool tree!
–Kimberly
Manuel is SO MUCH happier than last week. As you can see in the picture- he was pretty sad. He could barely walk and was having lots of pain from his skin graft.
Now he is able to ride a bike and do all his therapy and it doesn’t hurt. He can bend his knee 120% which is EXCELLENT!
He loves listening tomusic. I bought two Spanish CDs for him. A Child’s Bible Songs and Alex Rodriguez. Manuel requested Spanish Christian Music. He seems to prefer my tobyMac, though. He calls it “C.D. muy rapido” and goes around singing lines from it, thathe doesn’t understand.
He now will ask for food if he’s hungry and ask for medicine if he hurts or is itchy. He also asks to borrow my CD. He can make his own corn tortillas (even though it’s the ‘woman’s job’ )
He LOVES the Star wars movies. Infact, we are renting SW6 tinight for him to watch. We have a few, but some are on VHS and don;t have the Spanish. So we rent the DVD so he can listen toit in Spanish.
He pretends to use “The Force” to change traffic lights.
Sometimes he talks to me and gets frustrated. Poor Kid. I do know a LOT more Spanish than I used to, though. (which was none). Most tiimes he can get me to understand, sometimes he doesn’t and gets upset and tells me “Yes you DO understand me!”.. well, he just says “KIMBERLY SI COMPRENDO!!” but I think that’s what he’s conveying…
and sometimes I realy do- well, once I remember what the word he used meant. Sometimes Ihave to search mymemory back befor a word comes tome.
I like how he says my oldest son’s name. His name is Gavin. Manuel says “Gabi”.. well, he almost says the final ‘n’, but it usually just sounds like Gabby. He spells it with a b, as well. Though Gavin has shown him manytimes it has a v. He thinks of Vs and Bs as interchangable. Or actually, he sees them BOTH as Bs.
He has been working to earn money. He has over 1,000 lipera (is that the spelling of their currency??)
He is good at math. But like a normal kid, he never wants to do school. And like a boy he loves to burn things with the magnifying glass!
He swears our boy cat is a girl and the girl cat is a boy. It makes Connor mad. I think that is why Manuel contiues to tell Connor his cat is really a girl.
I need to go read what he wrote today. If babelfish works….. I actually think I figures most of it out myself.
This is what he wrote:
1. Connor y Gabin estan en una fiesta.
2. Brian esta tomando foto.
3. Tambien esta la amiga de Brian.
4. Kimberly esta sosteniedo la camera.
5. connor le esta pegando a la piņata
6. los amigos de los muchachos etsan viendo.
7. La piņata esta en el arbor.
8. el arbor es de color verde
9. un muchachos esta can una pelota de basket boll
10. Brian, Kimberly, Gabin, Connor, y los amigos estan feliz.
most of the words I know, some I ‘get the drift of’ and some I guessed becuase I know what the picture was.
Don’t forget to read my other blog from today:
The only reportable events from yesterday are the Mentos Experiment and the fact that we were given a pop up camper trailer. It sleeps 8 and has a fridge, stove, sink….. The man is a friend of my husband and was thinking of asking $100 for it but decided to just give it to us. He said his family got more than their money’s worth out of it and hopefully we will get lots of fun, too.
Yes, I know- this expeirment was the big thing about 2 yrs ago…. And we just NOW finally got around to doing it…
MENTOS: 
Gavin-
SODA BOYS & MENTOS
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Manuel-
Today we watched a few videos of the Mentos Experiment and read an explanation. So now we know ways to make our Mentos Experiment better. We will try it with diet coke and Mentos nd also try it with salt. I think I will assign the boys the task of figuring out how to implant a delayed trigger (like on the videos- whish are AWESOME and linked at the end of this blog)
And Manuel was singing a Tobymac http://www.tobymac.com/ song. He only knows 2 lines and slurs the third line all together. It’s funny because he only speaks Spanish (he does know a handful of English) and he has no idea what he’s saying. He sings “Shake it—Don’t break it….” the next line is “took your momma 9 months to make it”- but he can’t quite say that line. He calls the Tobymac my “CD Muy rapido”
Soksey brought a bird to us. I guess he thought we were hungry. I really wish he’d eat what he kills.
Ki got a 95 on his spelling test. I told him to study his words, he did, said he was done studying. I asked if he was sure, he said yes and told me to ask him his words. So I did. He spelled them all except for one. I gave it to him again and he got it correct. I figured he spelled them for me out loud and it counted as his spelling test. He missed 1 out of 10- then corrected it and got it right- so I gave him 5 points for it. Told me had a 95%. Later I had him spell a few words with his feet; using his foot to ‘draw’ the letters on the ground. I think I’ll add that activity to his spelling routine- It will be good for his SID. After that, Ki made French Toast. He made the batter and made his French Toast, then the other boys cooked theirs. Ki helped Manuel with his. Connor finished book 5 from Cat Warriors.
His reading has gotten so much better. He’s been able to read since he was 4 or 5 (it’s hard to tell exactly with autistic kids). He was always able to read on grade level. but he was very, very slow and had very poor retention and comprehension. I changed his Language Art program around _I used a reading program that was 2 grade levels lower than his reading level- but on his comprehension level. It is a Silver Burdett book and workbook-Going Places) and I added lots of things like doing puppet shows, dioramas, drawing book covers, etc… for each of the short stories. And now he just ZOOMS through books on his reading level with great comprehension. He thought he couldn’t read this book 5 on the 3 weeks you get from the library- so he bought the book. He read it in 6 days. Ki has started reading ‘real books’- no longer those 10 words a page kindergarten readers. He wants to read the Cat Warrior books, too. He reads the titles (this book is called ‘The darkest Hour’) but he can’t read much more. He has read a couple other books that are about 3rd grade and he reads a passage here and there or bigger books.
This is why I don’t force my dyslexic kids to read 30 minutes a day of books that are a bit too hard. I do not push at all. I let Ki read simple Dick and Jane type books over and over and over and over and let him progress when he was ready and wanted to. same with Gavin). and it happens. One day (towards the end of 4th grade, they just decide they are now ready to go very simple Kindergarten pre-readers to reading on level AND the WANT to.. They are excited to read, they have the desire. I know they wouldn’t have the reading desire if I was continually pushing them to read before they were ready. Today was spelling tests and math tests and Science Experiments.
For Math tests- well, lately I have the older two doing Saxon- but JUST the examples and practice problems for that chapter (and make up 3 of their own problems), so I decided on Fridays they will do the Problem Set at the end of the last chapter they did. I’ll grade them later- we’ll see if this works.
We did more science fun today.These are things we have doe in the past, but i thought Manuel would enjoy. He says science is no fun,,, boring..
Last night I put a little water in one of the 2Liter bottles and topped it with a balloon.
but the ballon and bottle are both shriveled. 
Then we put it in a pan of water and watched the balloon fill with air as the hot water melted the ice in the bottle.
a little more air into theballoon
enough to make it stand upright!
a little more air…..
It’s getting quite full now…
The balloon at it’s max. Though I think it would have gottenbigger once the water IN theballoon boiled. At the end the bottle itself was swollen with air so I turned off the stove. I didn’t want it to explode.
Not sure if you can tell, but the upper portion of the bottle is expanded and fat with air. It was bulging quite a bit.
Then we did the Ghost in a Bottle trick…. Here is a poor video. You can’t see the coin hop- but it does.
You can hear it.
It does tiny hops as the ghost is trying to escape. Freeze a glass cola bottle (we used IBC) then take it out the next day, put a drop or two of water on the rim. Put a coin on it. As the air warms and tries to get out, it pushes the coin.
URLS for cool Mentos videos! MENTOS & COKE
DON’T Do this one at home with your kids- but neat to watch- MENTOS ROCKET
Three Strand Chord