Weekly Wrap-Up: Short and Sweet Version

This week has been perfect weather for getting outdoors and we have taken three hikes out in the bright sunshine. It certainly has lifted the mood around our house. :)

As noted last week, we are in our "exams week" which for our family is not all that big of a deal. Week 18 brings the close of a few books and the culminating of a couple big projects. My boys continually blow me away with the level of quality they are producing in their schoolwork this year. This is not a brag but rather an assurance to others that you can get great stuff from teen boys when you keep them interested and that is the trick.

Update on Chemistry: Sarah sent us THIS LINK and it is awesome! Just the sort of thing I am trying to find for my boys to make chemistry alive and real. There are short videos in a sort of Mythbusters style for every element on the periodic table, down by a few very passionate and interesting British scientists. Thanks Sarah!

Robotics: Mr. B finished his self-parking car and got started on his new project from the Lego Mindstorms NXT One Kit Wonders book. This video shows how the robot uses sensors to park itself between the two boxes.

Videography: Mr. B wrapped up his videography project from the last eight weeks which was a video report on Ancient Egypt, tying in his research on this topic into a visual narration.


I am putting together a new Squidoo lens for this course and you can see what I have together so far here:
Videography for High Schoolers.


Baking: Last week Mr. B surprised us with an extra baking project from the Betty Crocker Cookbook, Lava Babies. (This recipe looks very close to the one he used.) I will not be exaggerating if I say that these were my all time favorite dessert ever. Warm chocolate oozing out all over the place....yum!



Art: This week is the final week for our current composers and artists.
Mr. A = Pablo Picasso and Gustav Mahler (He made it through the six weeks with Mahler...extra credit!)
Mr. B = Thomas Eakins and Edvard Grieg


YouTube.com Arthur Rubenstein playing Concerto in A Minor, 1st Movement. This was Mr. B's focus piece for the six week period...enjoy!

Astronomy: Mr. B is working from The Self-Teaching Guide right now as his main source of information for this course. He likes the no-nonsense approach of this book. He is also looking up the Astronomy Photo of the Day, picking something to research related to the photo, writing an entry in his notebook about his research, and picking a current event for the week to print out and share at our Friday meeting. This week he researched crepuscular rays.....click over and see what they are. I know you will be surprised. (We call them God Rays.)

We spend informal evening time viewing the sky together....nice.


We also found a series of DVDs on Netflix that he is going to work his way through, one each week. The series is from The History Channel and is titled The Universe. I am having him watch, record his notes and three questions to research for each episode on a notebook page. I like simple and this way he is really teaching himself by asking pertinent questions and then answering them by doing all the work himself. :) 

I am off this weekend to spend some girl time with my sister. We are packing up the snowshoes and scrapbooks and heading for the mountains just the two of us. Funny thing is that my men are all looking forward to this weekend without mom around. They have plans to do some guy stuff while I am gone.

We have officially reached the halfway point of the school year. Did I mention lately that I have one graduating this June? I am trying not to think about it too much.

Hope you enjoyed our short and sweet edition of the Weekly Wrap-Up.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom