Snowflake maths

Just for the records, we have had non-stop snowing over the weekend, so it looks like we are not going anywhere far for a while.

With the examination of the properties of snowflakes from our previous science lesson on snowflakes, we followed naturally onto the mathematical aspects of this interesting phenomenom: symmetry.

We have previously touched upon the idea of symmetry so we did a quick revision with a ruler and the snow crystal prints to determine the number and types of symmetrical lines we could find in each snowflake print.

Using a protractor, we explored a little about the 60-degree angle that were very prominent in the snowflakes we examined.

Once Tiger grasped the basic understanding of the protractor and angles, he used it to mark the location of the lines of symmetry in a circle before cutting it into a hexogonal snowflake.

Next, we learned about three types of symmetries: vertical, horizontal, and rotational.

There was a lot of cutting involved in this series of lessons, as we learned about different ways to fold and cut our papers to achieve design we wanted.

One way to think of the line of symmetry is to regard it as the line where a mirror would be placed. With that in mind, we used a mirror to prove that the reflection in the mirror was the same as the symmetrical pattern we made.

Still working along the concept of the mirror-image/reflected image, Tiger did more excises which comprised of:
1) cutting out letters that can be formed from mirror images (capital letters A, C, E, H)

2) drawing a symmetrical figure

3) constructing symmetrical figures using T-square and different-angled triangles, then colour them in.

The ideas for this lesson come from these books:

Besides the hands-on activities, we also watched a clip about the application of symmetry:

This post is linked up to:
1) Look What We Did: January Link-Up
2) All Year Round Blog Carnival: Winter
3) Share it Saturday
4) The Sunday Showcase 1/19/13
5) Math Monday Blog Hop #83
6) Hip Homeschool Hop - 1/22/13
7) Hearts for Home Blog Hop
8) Weekly Wrap-Up: The One with the Renewed Motivation
9) Homeschool Mother's Journal: January 25, 2013
10) Collage Friday - Feeling Like a New Person
11) It's a Wrap
12) Hobbies and Handicrafts - Jan 25
13) TGIF Linky Party #60 

A Snowy Day

It has been sub-zero temperature here in England where we are for the past two weeks, and we were warned by the weather man yesterday about the coming snow, so we have all been watching out for the first sign of snow with eager anticipation.

We saw the first flurry of snow at 10am.  Tiger was all excited but he managed to stay indoors until he has had his lunch before going out.  During the wait, we managed to get some maths problems and Chinese done.  Tiger also spent some time making paper sculptures of castles as part of his battle scene.

After lunch, we went outside to catch some snowflakes on a piece of black card to look at them under a magnifying glass.

After that, I didn't have the heart to keep Tiger indoors anymore so he spent most of the afternoon playing in the snow.

The snow is expected to go on for 12 hours, and we are expecting more snow over the weekend.

The boys have already made plans to go sledging and do other fun things in the snow tomorrow.

This post is linked up to:
1) Look What We Did: January Link-Up
2) All Year Round Blog Carnival: Winter
3) Weekly Wrap-Up: The One with Sunshine
4) Homeschool Mother's Journal: January 18, 2013
5) Collage Friday: It's Raining, It's Pouring!
6) It's a Wrap
7) Hobbies and Handicrafts - Jan 18
8) Share it Saturday
9) The Sunday Showcase 1/19/13
10) Homeschool Science Share & Tell - January 2013

The tallest spire in England

The most famous thing that King John did was to sign the Magna Carta, which formed the basis of the English Law.  We watched an episode about the circumstances surrounding King John's signing of the charter from this DVD.

There are only four original copies of this document in England, one of which is held at the Salisbury Cathedral, where we visited to see the actual document.

While we were at the cathedral, we had a good look around to admire its history, architecture,

and effigies of many medieval characters.

The Tower Tour was well worth it, as we went to up the spire (the tallest in England) under the guidance of a very knowledgeable guide.  On the way up, we went through various sections of the cathedral that were otherwise inaccessible to normal visitors, and saw the buttress close up, complete with a full historical account by the guide of how various sections were put in place in the medieval period.

13th century wood nails not completely nailed in by workmen back then.

The tour has been very useful in bringing to life all that we've read about in the following books about the structure and construction of a cathedral in the Middle Ages,

as well as the documentary below:

You can find all our study related to the church in the Middle Ages here.

What about the Magna Carta?  We did see the actual copy there:

But the actual study was done at home, which I shall blog about in another history-related post next week.  Stay tuned!


This post is linked up to:
1) Look What We Did: January Link-Up
2) All Year Round Blog Carnival: Winter
3) History and Geography Meme 58
4) Weekly Wrap-Up: The One with Sunshine
5) Homeschool Mother's Journal: January 18, 2013
6) Collage Friday: It's Raining, It's Pouring!
7) It's a Wrap
8) Share it Saturday
9) The Sunday Showcase 1/19/13

Cursive handwriting

For a long time, I have debated with myself on the issue of how insistent I should be with Tiger in terms of producing good handwriting.  There are many arguments against pushing handwriting, especially for boys:

• boys, more often than girls, struggle with fine motor skills required to produce handwriting;
• boys are less inclined to sit still for the amount of time needed to produce good handwriting;
• handwriting has become irrelevant and obselete with the availability of word processing software.

While all of the above call for consideration, I still think that there is value in being able to write legibly and beautifully.  Being able to type need not negate one's ability to write a hand-written note should the need arise, and my personal opinion on this matter is that if a child can make a mark with a writing instrument (as an early step to drawing), then forming legible letters and joining them together is only a matter of consistent practice.

With that in mind, we have resumed our cursive writing sessions after having taken some time off from handwriting practice.  We are doing the handwriting sessions twice a week, using Aesop's Fables for Children as the basis for our copywork.

This is how we have been doing the lessons:

1. Tiger reads one fable to himself, then closes the book and narrates it to me.
2. I print off the handwriting worksheet and copy in pen the moral of the story.
3. Tiger copies in pencil as neatly as possible.

The lessons are painless (Tiger hasn't complained about it yet anyway) and takes only 10 minutes each time.  I can see some improvements in his writing after a few lessons.

I would not suggest this method to be applicable to every child.  As always, my best suggestion about handwriting is to observe the child to determine what the real obstacles to good handwriting are.  In Tiger's case, I have seen on several occasions that he can write beautifully if he can be bothered to.  Hence, the real learning for Tiger in this case is more about the importance of patience and applying more care in his work, than about forming letters.

This post is linked up to:
1) Look What We Did: January Link-Up
2) All Year Round Blog Carnival: Winter
3) Enchanted Thursdays Blog Hop #43
4) Weekly Wrap-U: The First One in 2013
5) Homeschool Mother's Journal: January 11, 2013
6) Collage Friday - A Great Start to 2013
7) Share it Saturday - Linky Party
8) The Sunday Showcase 1/12/13