Weekly Review - Weeks 16 & 17

Hello!  Brace yourself for another epic post!!!  I've been really, really, really, really busy the last two weeks learning, reading, and completing projects.  Let's jump right in!

Poetry - Language Arts

I read about some famous poets, all of whom lived during the 1800s (the time period I'm studying in History) - Henry David Thoreau, Robert Frost, Walt Whitman, and Emily Dickinson.  I also read a few of their poems.

I also wrote my own Guyku Haikus.  Here they are:

Honeysuckle grows
Wild, crazy, free, orange, white, green
The air smells so good

Baseball is awesome
I love to pitch the baseball
Baseball makes me smile


Statistics and Geometry - Math 

My mom says she NEVER had to statistics and geometry in the fourth grade!!!!  But I do.  I did.  I can tell you about mean, median, mode, range, and coordinate graphs.  Now my mom can too!  I've started my unit on geometry.  I know all about shapes, angles, and congruency.  This week I'm learning about perimeter, area, symmetry, and more!  It's a good thing my mom went to college!!!


Energy - Science 

In Science, I completed a unit on Energy.  I made a lap book report of what I learned:

American Westward Expansion - History

I finished reading all of my books on the Westward Expansion of the United States.  My mom went a little crazy, and checked out about 20 books from the library on the subject.  I read 11 of them.  My favorites were from the Dear America series.  I read the ones about The Donner Party and The Oregon Trail.  I also liked the ones from the series You Wouldn't Want To.  I read You Wouldn't Want Explore With Lewis and Clark and You Wouldn't Want to Live in a Wild West Town.

I wrote an essay about some of the things I've learned so far, and how they apply to my own life - especially my upcoming move to Bangkok.  My Mom helped me with the outline/structure, with the opening and closing paragraphs, and with transition sentences; otherwise, it's all my own words.  Here's the essay:

During the 1800s, thousands of American pioneers set toward The West to find gold, adventure, and farming land.  Like those pioneers, I will soon move with my family thousands of miles to a new land, Bangkok, Thailand.  My journey will have some similarities and some differences, but despite the differences, I can apply a few lessons from what I’ve learned from the pioneers.  

Pioneers needed to pack food, guns, clothes, cooking and eating ware, a tent, tools (like an axe), heavy coats and blankets, and maybe a toy, a pet, and a few books.  They would transport these items by wagons pulled by mules, oxen, or horses.  Sometimes they would use pushcarts powered by people.  It would take about 6 to 8 months for the pioneers to start and finish their journey.  

When I move with my family to Bangkok, we will pack almost anything we want to because we don’t have to fit it into a wagon and keep it light enough for an ox to pull.  I want to take our TV, beds, books, phones, electronics (like my DS), movies, and toys.  My mom will want me to pack some clothes too.  

My move will be way easier than the pioneers because I don’t have to move my own belongings like the pioneers did.  I will have hired movers to do it for me.  My move will also take less time - about 2-3 months on a truck, then a boat, and then a truck again.  I won’t have to worry about diseases, hemlock poisoning, buffalo stampedes, oxen crushing me, drowning, falling off cliffs, accidental gun shots, Indians, freezing to death, snake root poisoning, starvation, dehydration, and/or wagons crushing me.  Wow!  That’s a lot of things I don’t have to worry about.  

Lewis and Clark were some of the original pioneers who blazed the trail West to find a water route, establish good relations with the Indians, and document new animals and plants.  I learned some lessons from studying Lewis and Clark that I will remember and apply when I move to Bangkok.  First, I will try to make friends with the local Thai people, and I will ask them to guide us since they know the area.  Lewis and Clark made friends with Indian tribes along the trail.  They used Sacagawea to guide them along the way.  Second, I will work as a team with my family like Lewis and Clark worked together with their Corps of Discovery.  Third, I will explore safe things in the city and suburbs of Bangkok, and I won’t go looking for danger.  Lewis and Clark didn’t always do this, so they had some troubles (like bears).  Sometimes you learn lessons about what not to do!

Another example of pioneers who taught me what NOT to do on my move to Bangkok are The Donner Party.  The biggest lessons I learned from them are:  don’t stray from the path and beware of people who claim to have a shortcut.  The Donner Party followed a man named Hastings who claimed to have found a shortcut West with clean water and plenty of food.  They took the shortcut and to their surprise there was no water, limited food sources, and they became stuck in the mountains during winter.  Many of them starved.  Some of them resorted to cannibalism to stay alive.  When I am in Bangkok, I will make sure to follow people who know what they are talking about!

In conclusion, studying the pioneers who journeyed West to expand America taught me valuable lessons that I can apply in my own life as I move to Bangkok, Thailand.  There are similarities and differences between our moves, and I am grateful that I have an easier journey with less danger.  I will try to have the pioneer spirit on my move to The East.  

National Sports and Physical Fitness Month - Physical Education

Did you know that May is National Sports and Physical Fitness Month?  It's also National Bike Month.  In honor of this, I got to count one of my travel league baseball tournaments as a day of school!  Yay!

I've been playing baseball for three years.  I like to win.  But sometimes I lose.  I've learned a lot from playing baseball almost year-round.  I wrote a lapbook about some of the things I've learned:

Buying Lunch with Reading - Language Arts

And finally, I took my mom out to lunch with the money I've earned from reading in my free time.  When we started homeschool, my mom said I would earn 1 penny per page of reading I did on my own time.  I earned $30.  That's 3,000 pages!

I took my mom out to a restaurant I've been wanting to try.  It was really good!  Especially the strawberry shortcake we ordered for dessert.

That's all!  Pat yourself on the back if you actually read this whole post!  

Peace Out - 

Ollie and Mom

Week 13-15 Review

Sorry for the wait.  It's been a little while since we wrote a weekly review.  Ok.  It's been a long while.  Three weeks to be exact - but, better late than never!

Aside from the projects I already posted about:

My Poetry
My Atom Model
My Sign of the Beaver Animated Book Report

I've actually been learning about a lot of other subjects.

In Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math (STEAM), here's what I've been up to:

I learned about ecosystems.  In nature club, I made a terrarium.  It's an entire ecosystem enclosed in a bottle.  When my Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunts came to visit me, we got to go on several field trips to see ecosystems around Georgia.  This is a picture of one of the alligators we saw at Magnolia Springs.  It is a natural hot spring and a habitat for snapping turtles, alligators, and other swamp loving creatures and plants.  We were able to get really close to the alligators and snapping turtles.

After visiting Magnolia Springs, I did an acrostic report on alligators.

If you can't read the picture, here is what I wrote:

An alligator can weigh as much as half a ton! (1,000 pounds)
Living fossils.
Length is around 13 feet.
Ironically, they are gentle mothers even though they look big and scary.
Gators usually live in swampy areas.
Alligators' eggs become male or female depending on the temperature.  Male in warmer and female
            in coolor.
Two different species of alligators: the Chinese and American Alligator.
Often alligators are hunted.
Reptiles.

Another ecosystem we visited was a Cypress and Tupelo grove in a lake at George L. Smith State Park.   This is a picture of me and my Aunt Lindsey canoeing around the groves.  At one point, my head was right by a bush growing in the lake, and when I looked at the leaves by my face, I saw a water moccasin (or cottonmouth) snake curled up on the leaves!  I screamed!

Grandma and my mom wanted to go take pictures, but their respective canoe partners disagreed!

At the different parks we visited, I identified a lot of birds and saw many birds' nests.  I've been reading about John Audubon, and I wrote up this Top 5 report on Ornithology.  If you can't read the picture, here's what I wrote:

Top 5 Things for Watching Birds:
1.  Eyes - for looking for birds.
2.  Ears - for listening for birds.
3.  Feet - for taking a walk.
4.  Field Guide - to show you what bird it is.
5.  Hands - for drawing birds.

Top 5 Dos:
1.  Do feed birds.
2.  Do buy bird baths.
3.  Do draw birds.
4.  Do take notes about birds.
5.  Do grow trees for birds to live in.

Top 5 Don'ts:
1.  Don't try and catch birds.
2.  Don't be mean to other bird watchers.
3.  Don't scare birds.
4.  Don't walk in other peoples' yards.
5.  Don't try and touch baby birds.

Top 5 Facts about John James Audubon:
1.  He tied a piece of string to a baby bird to see if it would return.
2.  He collected stuff that birds left.
3.  He failed every exam he had taken.
4.  He loved the outdoors.
5.  He survived and earthquake.

And a bonus fact (because my mom said I forgot to write the most important fact about him):
6.  He is famous for drawing very detailed pictures of birds.

I also went to the Georgia Aquarium to learn about different ecosystems and habitats.  Here I am with my FAVORITE animal, the penguin.

To wrap up my Georgia ecosystems unit, I went to a junior rangers camp about how to survive outdoors as a contributing member of an our Georgia ecosystem.

I also did a STEAM unit on electricity.  I can tell you all about: atoms, electrons, nucleus, protons, negative charges, positive charges, neutral charges, static electricity, conductors, current, circuits, batteries, volts, vibrations, frequencies, decibels, and dry cells.

I went on a field trip around my house and played with the circuit breaker.  I also saw our electric meter, and the transformer in our neighborhood.

I applied everything I learned doing different experiments and playing with Snap Circuits.

I love this kit!  You should buy it too!  You can create closed and parallel circuits to power lights, a fan, an alarm, music, and space wars.

Still part of my STEAM, I started learning the guitar and completed a unit on sound and wave energy.  I still have a long ways to go on the guitar!  However, I really enjoy playing it, and I hope I get to take lessons soon.  Here is a picture of my sound and wave vocabulary words and anchor pictures:

While I was learning about sound, I really liked watching youtube videos of jets breaking the speed of sound a creating a sonic boom and vapor cones.

Ok, my mom and I feel like this is an epically long post!  But one last thing.  I planted cantaloupe seeds at Nature Club in March.  I grew them in my window sill and then transplanted them (after researching how to transplant them) outside in a container.  They have been in their new home for about two weeks and they are doing well.

One more last thing for STEAM.  I totally rocked my unit on decimals on IXL.  My mom says I am a math genius.

But we are not done yet.  (I do a lot of work in three weeks of school!)  This is what I've been up to in Language Arts and Social Studies:

My family and I took a field trip to Martin Luther King's birth home, church, grave, and National Historic Museum.  Dr. King is inspiring to me because he stood up for what is right, and he did it the right way because he didn't fight back with violence but he fought back with peaceful speeches.  It was neat to visit the places where he spent his childhood, and to learn more about the work he did during his life.

I also took a field trip to an historic plantation home in South Carolina.  It belonged to James Henry Hammond, who is famous for telling congress, "Cotton is King!"  I do not think he was a good man.  He owned hundreds of slaves and was one of the major leaders in favor of slavery before the American Civil War.  I want to be like Dr. King, and not Mr. Hammond.

I've started my learning unit on Westward Expansion during the 1800s.  I've watched a PBS documentary about Lewis and Clark, and I've read two books about their expedition.

I finished up my Huck Finn vocabulary and wrote a story using all the new words I now know.  The prompt my mom gave me for my story was, "a person, and his nemesis."  Here's my story:

One day Harold was told to gather stuff for his company's party.  His boss told him that there was two of everything, but only one of the thing they needed most, and that another company was having a party too.  Harold rushed to the store right when the other company got there.  To make things worse, his arch enemy was the one shopping for his company.  "Sam . . ."  Harold thought, "My arch enemy!"

They were both ornery now.  They both rushed into the considerable store.  They were now ignorant of where all the party stuff was.  Harold wanted to spite his arch nemesis right now.  Harold and Sam were both impudent toward each other.  When Sam saw that someone else was taking something he needed, he told them that he was a pro in baseball and that he would give them his autograph if they gave him the thing they just pulled off the shelf.

Harold saw what was happening and told them that Sam was an impostor.  The lady thanked Harold and gave him the ingredient instead.  Harold rushed passed the alcohol because all the people at his work practiced temperance, but the people at Sam's work did not, so he had to stop there.  Harold now had the head start, but when he accidentally broke something, someone told him to reform it.

When Harold was reforming the thing he broke, Sam passed him!  Now Sam had the head start.  When Harold and Sam only needed one more thing, they both ran to it and started fighting over it.  When they were fighting over the thing they needed most, someone picked it up and went away with it.  Sam and Harold ran after them.

Sam told him to give it back, but Harold's soliloquy won the person over and the person gave it to Harold.  Hooray!  Harold won.

The End.

A couple of other things I've been working on are IXL grammar, learning Thai, and poetry.

And just for fun - and because this post isn't long enough . . . .

I went to Disney World!!!!

I have mad skillz on the trampoline!

Peace Out,
Ollie and Mom

I am a Blasting Baseball

Hello.

Did you know April is National Poetry Month?

My mom loves poetry.  I thought I hated it, but after my mom taught me all about it and read me a lot of poetry, now I kinda like it.

My favorite poetry book she read to me is called Guyku.  It is a collection of Haiku poetry for guys.  You should check it out!

I learned all about literary tools that create poetry.  I can tell you about rhythm, rhyme, repetition, alliteration, hyperbole, simile, metaphor, personification, imagery, and onomatopoeia.  BOOM!  I can also tell you about narrative poetry, lyrical poetry, free verse poetry, haiku poetry, and line breaks and stanzas.  My mom says I am a poetry genius.

We're not done studying poetry yet, but here's a little taste of some poetry I wrote.  My mom wrote the first two words of each line, and I wrote the rest.  All by myself.

I am a Blasting Baseball
by Oliver

I am a blasting baseball brilliantly basking in the game.
I wonder what it would be like to be a free fish frolicking in the sea.
I hear everything for miles - booms, crashes, and zaps.
I see lush green trees.
I want a frosted donut.
I am a blasting baseball brilliantly basking in the game.

I pretend I am a pro baseball player hitting a homerun.
I feel like a cheetah when I run.
I touch a baseball bat like diamonds.
I worry about my dog when he whines.
I cry if I get hurt.
I am a blasting baseball brilliantly basking in the game.

I understand that I will have to go and care for my own family one day.
I say that I want to be a pro baseball player.
I dream that I will be successful in life.
I try my best to get a hit every time I am up to bat.
I hope I get into a good college.
I am a blasting baseball brilliantly basking in the game.

Peace Out -
Ollie and Mom

Don't Trust Atoms - They Make-Up Everything

I've been learning about atoms and the role they play in electricity.  For a wrap-up of everything I learned, I created a candy model of an atom and diagramed how an atom creates static electricity.

Everything is made up of atoms.  Atoms are made up of electrons, protons, and neutrons.  When you apply force to an object (like rubbing a balloon on your hair), the electrons move from atom to atom, creating positive and negative charges.  Matter with like charges repel one another, and matter with opposite charges attract one another.

Electricity is the flow of moving electrons.

The best part of this project was that I got to eat the skittles after we took this picture!

Peace Out -
Ollie and Mom

Sign of the Beaver - Stop Motion Animated Book Report

Ta - DAAAAA!  I am proud to reveal my first stop motion animated movie - a report on the book, Sign of the Beaver.

Here are the steps I took to complete my movie:

1. I created a storyboard that showed the series of scenes I would film.  The storyboard included a list of props for each scene.
2. I created the props.  I made figures for Matt, Matt's father, Ben, Saknis, and Attean.  I also received some art lessons from my mom and painted the backdrops for each scene.  
3. I played around to learn how to use the stop motion animation app.
4. I took pictures of the small movements that create each scene.
5. I added words, theme cards, and sound.
6. I rendered the movie and uploaded it.

This whole process, along with reading the book, took me over two months.  I worked really hard.  I hope you enjoy it!

Peace.  Out -
Ollie and Mom