If you have a 5th grader.. I need ideas Please.

[Maddysmom26]

Okay.. so today is day 2 of our homeschooling journey.. day 1 was not bad.

I felt a little lost but Im just taking it day by day & hoping we will find our groove.

 

I do however feel I need ideas for projects and activities to keep her happy and so she doesnt feel like all we are doing is reading from text books.

Im kind of drawing a blank.. I want her to have fun and enjoy this new experience!

 

Any help is greatly appreciated! :D

[Capt_Uhura]

Museum visits. Visit the sewer plant, if you have one, to see how sewage is processed. WE did that and it was great fun! Hands on science. Look for plays and performances in your area.

[BlsdMama]

Nature study, nature study, nature study.

 

Memorize something enjoyable.

 

Learn calligraphy.

 

Hand work - embroidery, carving, knitting, drawing...

 

Music. Lots & Lots of music... Listening, playing, composing....

 

Geocaching

 

Journaling

 

Map-making

 

Trips to the library....

 

Field trips

 

Nature study - Did I mention that?

 

Nature study

 

:D

 

Do a google search of free activities close to you. I almost guarantee there is some kind of harvest festival, faire, pioneer... something.

 

Nature study

[Maddysmom26]

LOL thanks!

You know how when something is all new, and before you start you have such great ideas.. then you get nervous and it all goes out the window!..

 

Im feeling a little nervous like I should have planned thiings better.. :001_huh:

[calandalsmom]

Throw out the textbooks!;)

 

Buy some high quality crafts which relate to what you are studying or teach her simple skills like cooking and sewing.

[i.love.lucy]

I have found that not every day has to have "fun" stuff, or it dilutes the times I do have it and I run out of ideas. How about getting your 5th graders ideas? I can always throw in helping me cook/bake as an easy activity for my 5th grader and it keeps her happy. I also always have craft/art supplies on hand and freely allow access and creative juices flow.

 

Can you tie in some things with your science or history study? If you take an hour out of your day and start googling, I bet you will find all kinds of ideas.

 

I also throw in math games and practice online, and typing lessons online for something that breaks up the monotony. Read aloud or use books on tape too, like during lunch.

[ktgrok]

pop popcorn and watch a documentary on Netflix or Nova.

[FaithManor]

Nature Scavenger Hunt - (i.e find leaves from five different species of trees, use tree guide to identify, identify five different birds, tracks from two different animals, etc.)

 

Make a Terrarium

 

Make a Pressed Flower album

 

Experiments from "The Book of Totally Irresponsible Science Experiments: 64 Daring Experiments for Young Scientists". (Sounds scary but it really isn't and completely fun, albeit, messy many times.)

 

Mavis Beacon Typing - can be purchased cheaply on ebay

 

Sister Wendy's Art History programs - usually around 9 minutes in length and can be streamed from Netflix (you may want to review them first - some families may not want a child that young to see any of the paintings containing nudes - we've found that our boys think this is all just funny because Sister Wendy is a brilliant HOOT and during the Renaissance, saggy women were the lovelies so it doesn't have a negative effect on them...but each family needs to make their own decision based on each child.)

 

Stories of Art along with the Veritas Press Art Cards which are absolutely gorgeous!

 

Drawing Basics by Thomas Kinkade (DVD's with basic art instruction plus workbooks - available through Alpha Omega but I got mine on ebay brand new for less than half the regular price including shipping.)

 

Buy her a digital camera and allow her to begin photographing nature and keeping a journal.

 

Faith

[anneofalamo]

I have two 5th and a 6th that do history together...using SoW and oh how I love Evan-Moor History Pockets, you get in a groove (a good one for us) make a pocket, do vocabs (cut and glue) find answers in handouts, puppets with that civilization, a fun layout, a pop up or map that is cut, colored and glued, and we finish it off with post cards to Gramma (who is against HSing, but loves to critique in a good way what they learned).

We also pop in video's for science/history, and just fun things, beetovan for example. We have Discovery Education, and it is a blast finding the videos.

She might enjoy a computer or online game?

 

or

recite your grocery list and have her copy it, head to the store and enjoy shopping, while she figures out the best deal?

[johnandtinagilbert]

pick 2 days a week and work on activities, rotating between science and history and also life skills (cooking, sewing, etc. )

 

Smile a lot. :D It makes everything much more joyful.

[SilverMoon]

My fifth grade daughter wants to go through the Cub Scout's Webelos handbook herself this year. Webelos is the rank she'd be in if she were a Cub Scout, rather than a Girl Scout. She decided on her own last year that GS are way too indoorsy, but she'd miss cookie selling and other GS stuff to much to quit. :001_smile:

 

The Daring Book for Girls has oodles of fun things to do, too.

[Pippen]

Hi Maddysmom. I was in your shoes last year with my 5th grade daughter. The first few weeks felt awkward until we settled into a (flexible) routine that fit us both, but we had a great year.

 

What are you studying specifically for history and science? We could point you in the direction of specific ideas with more info.

 

Some things my 5th grader enjoyed:

 

Friday afternoon Netflix documentaries, with snacks, for those first few weeks to help us end the week in a postive, relaxed way. :) With watch online and streaming video you may be able find something last minute if you haven't planned ahead. Later it was PBS History Detectives that she never wanted to miss.

 

My daughter really likes cooking so she got a lot out of studying foods from the historical period we were in, and then preparing a lunch for us.

Here's a good place to start for that, and googling will surface a lot of ideas as well. Through the year she made theme meals for explorers, Pilgrims, colonial, westward expansion, etc.

http://www.foodtimeline.org/

 

Field trips! We lived for field trips around here last year. :D I basically drew a 2 1/2 hour drive's radius from home and searched within that area.

Here's a place to start for that:

http://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/field-trips/

 

I also googled, used the GPS (which actually surfaced more options than google), and when we arrived at our primary destination I asked the people working what they would recommend seeing in the area. If it was a longer drive I prepared a light day's schoolwork for the trip there only and I always packed a lunch.

 

Science Activities--My original plan for science was getting the job done, but what wound up working the best was Bill Nye DVD's combined with the Reader's Digest How ____ Works series. It didn't look anything like the original plan I had but by the end my science hater was actually enjoying herself, and she's constantly bringing up stuff she learned from Bill Nye. Lots of hands on is what did the job (and yes, Nature Study wound up being the favorite in spring).

http://www.amazon.com/How-Nature-Works-Parents-Secrets/dp/0895773910/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1283954003&sr=8-3

 

Brainpop has short instructional videos, that you can get a free trial of:

http://www.brainpop.com/

 

How stuff works videos are short, and can be helpful for a brief demonstration of a subject.

http://videos.howstuffworks.com/

 

My daughter is crafty so occasionally we'd work papercraft or another activity in.

http://cp.c-ij.com/en/contents/1006/

 

She really liked doing the Jamestown paper model at Home School in the Woods. The site has a lot of other ideas on the sample curriculum for history-related activities.

http://www.homeschoolinthewoods.com/

 

Read aloud. We read together for history each day and got in a lot of great discussion time that we wouldn't have had we gone a straight textbook-worksheet route.

 

Find something to build on all year. History timeline, memorizing states, US presidents, etc.

 

Have fun! The most memorable day of homeschooling last year was the day I forgot to call ahead to see if a museum was open and we drove two hours to find it locked up. So we went shopping at IKEA and a nearby mall and had lunch at Panerra. We caught the museum another time, and refer to the first run as our Shopping Field Trip.

[lisabelle]

I'm new to this too, but I like to think I have a pretty good idea the things that ds(11) would enjoy for a break, that can still be educational:

 

--Board games/card games

--Open ended art supplies (ds is really into the whole steampunk thing right now, so dh and I have been trying to build up a collection of old copper and brass plumbing supplies for him to build things with)

--Going out for some kind of PE. Yesterday was our first official day of hs'ing ever, and since the dh bought me a bike for my birthday last month, I let ds take me out on a ride and show me the routes he and dh use to get places. We're also members at the local Y. And we're also doing the Couch to 5K program so that we can run the 5K race in the Seattle Marathon. We'll take dog walks that turn into nature walks, etc.

--Cooking. Ds is at an age where he'd like to help in the kitchen and be more independent about preparing food.

--Field trips. We'll go to the museum, aquarium, places like that.

--I second the Evan-Moor pockets. I think Matt will enjoy the ones we got for our Ancient Civilization studies this year. He loved arts and crafts-type activities until he started kindergarten. I think he'll appreciate the opportunity to work at his own pace and do what he wants rather than what the teacher tells him to. I'm expecting the Evan-Moor pockets to really just serve as a jumping-off point for his ideas. Fortunately he has a mom who collects scrapbooking supplies (with the intention to scrapbook someday...really!) so I have some really cool papers, embellishments and tools for him to get into. I figure if after a decade of collecting, even though it pains me to share my pretty little treasures, *someone* should be enjoying them.

--Make a fort out of blankets/pillows (I think you've got a few years where that's still fun--I was surprised to find that it still is for my ds) and do lessons in there.

--Every once in a while, just flat-out ask dd what *she* would like to do, and if it's reasonable, do it!