Summer of Year 1 - Autumn of Year 2

A list of some of the things we've done over the last few months... No time for proper updates! SubhanAllah, my youngest brother was diagnosed with stage 4b lymphoma and things were a bit busy and a lot of going back and forth between Bristol, Birmingham and Ipswich. Alhamdulillah, he's finished his chemo course and seems to be doing well (and MashaAllah, the work we've done in Science recently on infection and the human body was really useful in the girls being able to understand pretty quickly why I was upset to hear the news and why we need to make lots of dua that Mamu gets better soon). Next time we visit will be next month, inshaAllah. 😄

So aside from the usual Literacy and Numeracy, guided by the Year 2 NC (going through the list and filling in all the gaps), we did the following:

1) Definition of habitats: research in non-fiction books, identify from fiction books, create a poster of a habitat of choice (including marking locations on a world map) which contained examples of plants and animals found in that habitat. Rehearse and give a presentation of their poster to each other, giving feedback on how to improve, then give an improved presentation to Papa. Convert their posters to PowerPoints (skills: typing, text boxes, inserting images, animations) and show this as a presentation to Papa.

2) Art trail around Ipswich, looking for Elmer statues. Map reading, walking, exploring, checking off a list, art appreciation & discussion... The girls then designed and named their own Elmers on pieces of scrap paper and compiled these into a booklet each. They tried to copy the art trail Elmers and came up with puns where they could!

3) Visit to a working water mill, where they grind their own flour and make their own bread - Tide Mill in Woodbridge. We took the train there with Nani, which was an experience in itself! The mill itself was really educational and child friendly. Definitely worth a visit if you're in the area! The girls got to help start the water wheel by turning a handle and follow all the ropes and pulleys to the top of the mill. They were able to identify where the old pulleys should have been connected in the roof for the bags of flour to be lifted through the hatch, and also understood the mechanism behind the cogs turning and affecting each other. While there we also did some bird spotting from the lookout area and talked about how the mill was connected to the river. This led onto discussions to do with water sources and the sea, which inspired some more visits whilst in Ipswich...

4) We went to Felixstowe beach twice - once on the train with Nani during the daytime and another at sunset by car with Papa. Both experiences felt completely different despite being to the same place, which led to some good discussions. On our first trip they had fish & chips and ice-cream on the pier, played in the sand and F was brave enough to paddle in the sea. On the second trip we went for a short stroll on the beach and they played in the sand by the light of some coloured string lanterns hung across the promenade. It was interesting to watch the sunset on the horizon and see how the sky changed colour and then how the sea faded to black so it was impossible to tell where the sea ended and the sky began - the only clues the sea was there at all were a few lights from ships far in the distance. This led to talks about lighthouses and on how vast the sea is.

5) We walked down to Ipswich docks (only 5-10min from my parents' house!) and compared how the water was flowing to the river we saw at Woodbridge. Why? M had the idea that maybe both the water in the docks and the water from Tide Mill would end up in Felixstowe to meet the sea, so we checked on Google maps by zooming out and saw she was right! We didn't have time this visit to see, but I'd like to take them to Orwell Bridge so they can compare how the river looks there to how it was after the docks (and also to the little streams we saw in Holywells Park).

6) Which is the most popular car colour in Ipswich? The twins came up with a method of answering this question (watch the cars on the main road outside Nani's house) and keep a tally chart. We repeated this on two different days and compared the results (the same top three colours but not the same most popular colour on each day!) then turned these results into a bar chart (column addition practise to collate their results from both days). I helped them with this through prompts and questions and then wrote some simple questions about their data for them to answer.

7) We went to a free pizza making workshop at Pizza Express, organised by another home ed mum. The 3 eldest girls learnt a little about Italy and why a margarita has that name (the colours of the Italian flag represented by the toppings), tasted some pizza toppings then made their own margaritas on a pre-made base. The next week they wanted to make pizza at home from scratch, so I found a simple dough using Greek yoghurt and flour they could do independently. They made the dough themselves while I helped with the oven parts and making the sauce (tomato puree, oil & herbs). They put all the toppings on themselves and decided to make tuna, sweetcorn, mozzarella and cheddar.

8) Bake Off inspired baking: taking it in turns to bake cupcakes with me, one person each week. They designed their cupcake on paper first (sponge flavour & decorations) then baked with my guidance (they did measuring themselves for once!). After we all had a turn, we discussed which bake was our favourite and why. Mine was mint chocolate and my favourite lol - will need to post recipe soon inshaAllah!

9) First piece of extended writing in a while... We're currently reading the Famous Five series together and they're really enjoying them, so I used this as a basis for their writing. After a particularly eventful chapter, we did some hotseating on the characters' thoughts/feelings then I modelled writing a simple diary entry on A3 paper. Together, we discussed what the features of a diary entry might be and annotated them on the paper. Then the twins wrote their own diary entries as different characters from the book. When they thought they were finished, they referred to the poster and added to their work.

10) Bouncing ball investigation (as M asked why did the ball bounce higher in the kitchen compared to the sitting room?). Discussed in terms of energy (potential, kinetic) and energy being absorbed. Twins came up with ideas on how to test these factors (i.e. strength of throw, height dropped, floor surface) and how to measure - describe in words or use tape measure? Both ways difficult but tape measure was preferred option! One of the results didn't match our predictions, so we did some further investigations explore why. M came up with hypothesis 1 and F with hypothesis 2, with them both working together to think of how we could test each one. We put both ideas together to come up with a reason to explain why that one result didn't match.

A Healthy Diet & Pie Charts

This week, we're looking at food and diet in more detail. I was surprised to find out the girls didn't know what the word diet meant! I assumed they already did from our work on herbivores, omnivores and carnivores - but looking back, I guess I didn't use it?? At least it was simple enough to explain in that context now. 😂

We talked about foods being made up of different things and how our bodies use those things for different things, e.g. carbohydrates are mainly for energy so we can move about, proteins are for growing and healing, calcium for strong bones and teeth, vitamins and minerals for keeping us healthy/not get ill, fats for storing energy and keeping warm (they remembered about calcium and fats from previous weeks 👍).

We pointed out which kinds of food we were eating at mealtimes over a couple of days and talked about whether we were being healthy or not.

We also talked about the importance of water and the things our bodies need it for, e.g. blood, urine, sweat, healthy skin - and why we should replace all the water lost by drinking more (why do you think you feel thirstier during exercise? M said because it makes the heart pump faster so your blood needs to be able to move around easier, which I thought was interesting! I linked it to maybe because your blood is moving around more it's picking up more waste so you're making more urine... Maybe, I don't know! Then I asked them what happens when they exercise, wiping my brow as a clue, and F shouted "sweat!", so I then explained how sweat cools your body down by taking heat with it when it evaporates, i.e. dries up).

We then read the relevant pages in the book "Keeping Me Healthy" and stopped on the double page spread of the food groups:

I gave the girls an A3 piece of coloured paper each and explained they were going to make their own diagram by drawing around a plate and using a ruler for the straight lines (I marked the centre of their circle with a dot to help them). This was a good task for estimation, since they were copying the segment sizes from the diagram in the book, and also fine motor skills in lining up the ruler correctly! They then labelled each segment and coloured it in (with wax crayons) before drawing examples of foods on a separate piece of white paper, cutting and sticking in the right place. I chose for them to do it this way to further practise their estimation and spatial awareness skills, making sure the drawing they did would fit into the segment!

We labelled the smallest segment as "fats" instead of "butters and spreads" and talked a bit more about how too many fatty foods aren't good for you (the sugar in sweet foods like biscuits and cakes is turned into energy like carbohydrates, but some of it is also stored in the body as fat which is why these foods also belong in this section). It's ok to eat them now and again, but compared to the other foods we eat they should be a lot less! Then I wrote the purposes of each food group on the whiteboard and they needed to copy the correct caption under the correct label - they colour coded their labels to match the segment to make their diagrams clearer. 👌

Finally, I explained to them that this kind of diagram can also be called a "pie chart" and is used for showing proportions of something. We linked this to their work on fractions and drew some simple fractions as pie charts on the whiteboard. Then I asked them to estimate what each segment of their healthy diet diagrams was as a fraction. Finally, I gave them a maths worksheet on pie charts to complete.

Heavy & Light Letters / Venn diagrams

As part of their hifz practise and improving their pronunciation, it was suggested to us by a friend to look properly at which Arabic letters are "heavy", which are "light" and which can be either depending on where they are in the Quran.

We started by simply sorting the letters in the alphabet into the three groups: heavy, light, either.

Then I helped them make an A3 poster to help them visualise and so remember the information better (similar to how we made a poster of the "sun" and "moon" letters - which I've not written up a blog post for yet!).

You can download the letters to cut out here.

Next, we practised their sorting skills in terms of a Venn diagram on the whiteboard. I explained how the diagram worked with a couple of examples, then asked them where a letter would go before asking them to tell me a letter which fit into each section.

To check their understanding of Venn diagrams, I drew another one for them to sort the sun/moon letters with. This time, I just asked them where letters went before asking them for examples. Then I coloured in the centre section to emphasise that there are no letters which belong in both categories!

Finally, we recapped the sun/moon letters along with this new heavy/light information by sorting some of the Arabic alphabet using a two-way table, again on the whiteboard, and labelling it as a Carroll diagram.

The heavy/light letters poster is currently on display in our front room and we use it to sing the alphabet to the tune of this song: starting with the light letters, then the in between and finally the heavy letters in alphabetical order (they're kind of arranged alphabetically on the poster!). We sing it through 4 times; first with the letter names, then as if each letter has a fatha, then a kasra and finally a damma. The girls enjoy it as finishing with the heavy letters sounds good! And it's a fun way to practise for them too. 😁

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While we were there, we looked at a Venn diagram in the context of numbers, too! Just to reinforce understanding and to recap our recent work on their multiplication tables. I drew the diagram on the board and asked them where certain numbers would go, then for examples of numbers from each of them which belonged in each section. Lastly, I gave them a number which wouldn't fit in any category and asked them where they thought it would go - M laughed and F said nowhere! As a joke, she pointed in the corner of the whiteboard so I said yes, she was right - if something doesn't fit in any of the categories, then it just goes outside the diagram! And we did a couple more examples to finish.

Making Gingerbread Men

Cross-curricular Literacy and Numeracy skills in a real-life setting. 😜

Continuing with our fairytales theme, it made sense to make some gingerbread men! After re-reading the story, we looked at the recipe together (revising our work on instructions).

INGREDIENTS
For the biscuit:
100g butter (softened)
175g brown sugar
1 medium egg (beaten)
4 tbsp golden syrup
3-5 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
350g plain flour

To decorate:
75g milk chocolate
Smarties, sultanas, sprinkles, etc.

METHOD
1) Cream together the butter and sugar using an electric hand whisk.
2) Beat in the egg, followed by the golden syrup, using the whisk.
3) Mix together the ginger, bicarbonate of soda and flour in a separate bowl.
4) Stir the dry mixture into the wet mixture using a wooden spoon, a little at a time, until it begins to form a dough. Once all the flour has been added, work it together with your hands to make a ball.
5) Leave to chill in the fridge for 20min.
6) Pre-heat the oven to 180°C and line 2 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
7) Roll the gingerbread to 1cm thick, cut out shapes and place on the trays.
8) Bake for around 10min until golden brown. Leave to cool completely on a wire rack.
9) Decorate using melted chocolate as a "glue".

You can download our recipe sheet here. The ginger in this recipe is quite mild (for Papa's sake!) so you may want to increase accordingly.

Usually, I pre-measure the ingredients so the girls can just concentrate on the baking, but this time they weighed and measured everything themselves - which ties in with their next Numeracy topic on length, weight and capacity. (The cm reference in the recipe was new to them! But a good conversation starter 👌)

How I set up the table ready for them to decorate the gingerbread men:

I demonstrated how to do one: take a gingerbread man from the bowl, dip its feet in the chocolate then in the sprinkles, lay it flat on your plate, take one of the Smarties and dip it in chocolate then stick on the gingerbread man's tummy, repeat for another one of the Smarties, put the finished gingerbread man on the big plate. Then I left them to it - only helping to refill the bowl and change the big plate to an empty one - and mashaAllah they did all 26 without any problems, the 2 year old included! In the past, we've used sultanas for eyes and drawn mouths with icing... But with the baby, this was simplest for today. 😋

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While we were waiting for the gingerbread to cool down before decorating, I decided to use the Smarties as a way of practising the work we'd done so far on tallying and bar charts - simply by having the girls tally the different colours in the packet and draw a graph of the results.

I had them predict which colour they thought would be the most common before they started - which added to the fun as they tallied - and the colouring in at the end was optional, but they both decided they wanted to do it. 😊

You can download our worksheet here. Feel free to edit as you wish - I'll probably use this template myself in different contexts and will change the questions at the bottom to practise different ways of analysing data. 👍

Maths update: charts, tallying & time

Self-reference post.

Using simple explanations on the whiteboard, talking and worksheets, the twins can now:
- draw pictograms
- read bar charts
- draw bar charts
- tally
- tell the time