Grandfather’s Journey {FIAR}

We started Five in a Row late last week.  If you have been skimming through my blog, I am a fan of this curriculum.  Mavi was around 3years old, we did Before Five in a Row (Caps for Sale, Goodnight Moon, Going on a Bear Hunt) and both of us enjoyed learning through literature.  If you want to know more about Five in Row curriculum, visit their website here.

This 2015, I am including it once again in our homeschool. So last week, I came across Grandfather’s Journey in the library and I was a bit hesitant to start FIAR with this book  (more of that in my book review). But because Mavi wants to read it, I gave in. It is the story about the author’s grandfather who moved to California from Japan.  We read the story every single day before we would start our activities.

Note that I did not purchase Five in a Row manual.  Because of my location, I have no access to it and can’t afford the shipping cost.  So what I did here is create my own activities that’s in line with the book and borrowed other activities from FIAR Moms as well. 

Family Relationships

Expose your child to your genealogy! We talked about how the author Allen Say loves his grandfather and how close they are as a family. So I told Mavi that we are going to trace his family(maternal side) starting from my grandparents.  Here’s how we worked them out.

Mavi was enchanted by this activity.  He enjoyed putting up together photos of his grandparents (and great grandparents!) and wished he knew his grandfathers even more.

Geography

The story’s settings are in Japan and United States.  So we traced how the grandfather travelled to California from Japan via a steamship in the Pacific Ocean.  I have to explain to Mavi that long time ago, there were no airlines yet, so travelling is quite difficult. 

 Social Studies:  Japanese Culture

We explored the Japanese culture using our Asia in a Nutshell fact cards.  Then we made kimono paper crafts which we printed out from Crayola.  We also tried origami (the art of folding paper in Japan).  Mavi’s origami was a flapping bird (in yellow) and mine was a crane (in red), and it WAS NOT EASY!!  The chopsticks in the picture was from Japan, given to me by my brother (who also travels a lot!). 

Landmarks of United States

We have not been to the United States yet.  So he was interested learning about the famous landmarks that was mentioned in the story.  We traced the places the grandfather visited in the story. The book did not mention any places but he only describes them.  And that’s what we did, we looked for those places in the web and identified each of them.

Math: Calendar

The grandfather travelled for 3 weeks to get to United States.  As a review of his knowledge with the calendar, I asked him to arrange the months in a year.   After which, we talked about the number of days in a month.  We identified the months with 30 days, and those with 31 days.  February is always a special month because it’s neither 30 or 31!

Math: Multiplication

Using the concept of multiplication (Montessori multiplication), we counted how many days did the grandfather travelled.  In the story, it took him 3 weeks. So how many days are there in 3 weeks? 

More of this Montessori Multiplication soon!  You can get this Montessori Multiplication board from Amazon or from Tower High Learning (UK)

Science: Learning about Birds

Birds  play a special role in the story.  So we reviewed parts of the birds using Montessori concept. This Bird Puzzle can be purchased at Amazon or from Tower High Learning.  We also checked our bird figure collections.  This set is from Safari Toob Exotic Birds. How I wish I have the Backyard Birds so we can explore birds that you can find in your yards or at home.  The cards are from here.

You might also want to check our past activities on birds, Bird Unit.

History:  World War II I got Mavi some books about World Wars to give him a little bit of idea what it is all about. We would skip the rest of the topic and go straight to the war in Japan.  Here I’m showing Mavi the effects of the nuclear bomb in Hiroshima and Nagasaki Japan. 

Here are the links for the books in case you are interested:

• Usborne World Wars from Amazon.
• The Second World War (Young Readers series) from Amazon.  I HIGHLY recommend this book.  It is easier to read for a 6 years old and got lots of beautiful pictures. 

You can also get the books from Book Depository, Abe Books or Barnes and Noble.

Pin this for later!

And that’s about it! Next on our list is The Glorious Flight and we’ll be exploring France, UK and airplanes!

ASIA in a Nutshell

One of the most interesting continents to look into is Asia.  Oh yes! It is the biggest continent and with some of the most interesting countries like China, India, and Russia!  Now if you want to explore this wonderful continent in your class or home, checkout my ASIA in a Nutshell learning material.

What’s included?

Artist Study ~ Leonardo da Vinci (Making Portraits)

I am rebooting our Artist Study and we’re starting with portraits.  Now this project was inspired by Leonardo da Vinci. See our previous activities with Leonardo da Vinci here.

To know more about this genius artist and for inspiration, we first examine his life. We used this amazing book from the library, Levelled Biographies: Leonardo da Vinci[aff. link].  We enjoyed the book, and Mavi loved learning about Leonardo, not just as an artist but as a scientist as well. The book is appropriate for kids as it has a simple way of telling a biography and has lots of pictures in it.

Aside from learning about Leonardo, we also talked about portraits. I showed Mavi random samples in the web.  Then I took some photos of him outdoor to demonstrate what’s the difference between a portrait and an ordinary picture.  (You can also do this with your kids!) After which, we started making our portraits.  We used the DSS lesson for  the tutorial and some inspirations.

To create portraits, we used two mediums:  oil pastel and tempera paint.  Mavi wanted to use oil pastels (I never liked them!) as this is what they mostly use in school. So I guess he’s quite confident with it.

As you can see I also tried creating my portrait using the pastel but the black which I used for the outline started to mess with my peach coloured face! I just have to stop because my portrait is starting to look messy.

Now this is Mavi’s portrait made from oil pastel. He’s so happy with his work :D 

Second try, we used tempera paints.  I like using paints! Easier to handle and less messy. 

And this is our finished product :) 

Tempera paints, oil pastels and other art materials can be purchased through Amazon, Target or any craft store available.

Mavi pointed out he doesn’t know how to make a nose and a mouth … so we’ll he'll be practising more.

Now this is an activity that you can easily do with your kids.  You can use any medium available, pencil, crayons or watercolour.  Discuss what is a portrait and what do they imagine to be in that portrait.  You can also talk about the back of your portrait, whether they wanted to be indoor or in the park, under the sun, the beach etc.

Like my post? More activities here!

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Book Review: Grandfather’s Journey

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From Amazon: “Lyrical, breathtaking, splendid—words used to describe Allen Say’s Grandfather’s Journey when it was first published. At once deeply personal yet expressing universally held emotions, this tale of one man’s love for two countries and his constant desire to be in both places captured readers’ attention and hearts. Winner of the 1994 Caldecott Medal, it remains as historically relevant and emotionally engaging as ever.” 

I was forced to read this book because this is the first book in the FIAR list that’s in our possession.  Forced in a sense that, it doesn’t look interesting at all. The cover is lousy, with dull colours and doesn’t look like a children’s book at all.

But oh boy, I was wrong. It is true indeed that you should not judge the book by its cover.  Once Mavi opened the book and started reading, we were glued!  The story is so simple, yet it touched our hearts.  Mavi and I immediately fell in love with story as we see ourselves in the character.  We are expats, and we both love two countries.  There’s depth and emotions in the story.  After reading this book, we were so overwhelmed with emotions that we began missing the Philippines.

A very good book for kids.  The book has large pictures with easy to read texts.  I love the simplicity of it and how easily a child can read this.  Now I understand why it received a Caldecott Medal :) 

This book can also be purchased at Book Depository (free shipping!).  Seen in the picture: Japan flag using LEGO, transport counters from Learning Resources and a bird origami. 

Now listen to my 6 years old son, narrating the story: