Elizabeth’s Blog

Well, as you know I am not a big blogger but I thought I should do a follow up from the fall and provide an update on our recent adventures.

Our New Zealand experience was wonderful and full of lots of nature filled adventures. It was a huge shock to go from India (3^rd world) to NZ (really 1^st world). No sacred cows roaming the city streets — only on the menus and behind fences in the pastures.

Our school work in NZ became more essays oriented. The kids wrote essays on all sorts of topics, most of which did not make it to the blog. Our educational ?field trips? included a highlight of taking a helicopter to the top of an active volcano and looking down into the cauldron. Then we had a children?s book author lecture on volcanoes and dinosaurs in New Zealand.

On the North Island of New Zealand, we had a wonderful guided tour of the Rotorua Museum and learned about the huge eruption that occurred there. The exhibit took one family and told about their experience — ironically it was the Hazard family. It is a small world. Unfortunately the Father and 5 of the children perished but the mother and one daughter survived and went on to start a school to educate the Maoris.

Other educational experiences were the Charles Darwin exhibit at the Auckland Museum which was perfect preparation for our Galapagos trip. Gibson?s interest in photography has blossomed this year and we were lucky enough to connect with a professional photographer who gave the boys a morning lesson. We attended a Maori performance and learned about their culture and the history in New Zealand. We were interested to see the arrival of the Beatles Music group on tour listed as one of the major historical events listed in one book.

Post NZ we arrived in Vancouver and officially started winter break for the kids. Yeah- schools out! The kids had a blast skiing in Whistler and then visiting my sister and family in Seattle. It was an opportunity for us to restock supplies, buy Christmas presents and generally get organized.

After New Years school resumed.  Since we basically completed most of the 4^th and 5^th grade requirements in the fall, we have had a chance to do some more creative school work. Some people will be bored with this school work summary, but it has been interesting for me to create the curriculum for this year and we spend so much time on school that it seems worthwhile reviewing it.

It was tough getting back in the swing of school in the Galapagos because we had such full days exploring with naturalists and learning about the area. However, I feel like we have settled back into our routine of 2 -3 hours of school a day 7 days a week. The kids are doing reports usually weekly (most are on the blog).

We started using a book called Writing Strands to continue improving the kids writing quality. Currently we are using lots of descriptions; recently Sterling described a lily and lily pad as looking like the top of a floating cupcake with a cherry on top — a description I love. Gibson described a lizard as the length of a new pencil, as thick as a glue stick and as heavy as a tube of toothpaste which really captured his size for me.

Both kids are doing a basic Economics workbook. It is a different way for them to learn about businesses and understand issues some of the crafts people and other entrepreneurs (including street peddlers) have to deal with. In Lima we noted what the street venders were selling at stop lights, everything from hard candies to packages of sewing needles. Each person decided what they would sell and how they would market it.

In vocabulary, we have continued using the Worldly Wise program and are expanding what they require with extra activities using the words. Both kids are also working on reading comprehension books which include root word sections. I also have a book on Latin and Greek roots and think this may be the way that I can finally include that.

Spanish is a big push right now. We are trying to have the kids at least comfortable in basic conversation. We have been using a couple of books but also working with guides and just trying to have basic conversations. Ted is quite proficient and the leader. I keep reverting to Italian.

Gibson is doing a book called Baseball Math — a perfect match for him. It uses baseball situations as word problems to solve math problems. Sterling is also doing a book of word problems. Each page takes a specific type of problem (i.e. long division, percentages),includes a story then poses word problems which the student must then solve.

One thing we did not have in the fall was a good spelling book. However, we found something that seems to be working really well now and I also have a new list of most frequently misspelled word that we are working our way through.

The first couple of weeks we mapped Central America and the major islands in the Caribbean. We start South America this week.

Now for the fun stuff. Field trips include: walks with a naturalist and native (the son of a Shaman) through the Amazon basin, studying the Incas and go to several ruins including Matchu Picchu. In Chile we took a tour of the world?s largest open pit mine and learned about processing copper, we floated in a pond seven times saltier than the ocean and learned you cannot sink in it — salt water is definitely more buoyant than water. We soaked in hot springs warmed by volcanoes and could detect the smell of the sulfur. We met with an astronomer and studied the stars in the area that has the clearest air in the world. We learned how salt marshes are formed and how salt leaches up from the ground turning the land white at Moon Valley. We also saw the area that 40% of the lithium in the world is located. For ?gym? we learned how to sand surf — Sterling has great form, Gibson has a future — Elizabeth does not!

Wow- it has been a busy January.

Finally, I just want to add that India was my favorite place until we went to the Awasi Lodge in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile, located in the driest desert of the world. All of you who know me must be as shocked as I am to imagine that these two places have topped my chart. I hesitate to recommend these two locations because they are obscure but their natural beauty and warm hospitality awed me.