EMMA Arts and Sciences Night - Fall 2017

Well, another semester is gone and it was time for the EMMA classes Arts & Sciences night! This was the first time we had four kids all in classes. This term, Olivia took Spanish, Chemistry and Physics, and General Science. The boys took Geography, Science, and Art. Emma had an activities class that went for 2 hours and an art class. All the kids took PE and Music. 

 Olivia doubled up on her science this year, so she had to do 2 projects. Her Chemistry and Physics project was to make a lava lamp using water, oil and Alka-Seltzer. It was a fun one, for sure. 

 For General Science, she had to choose a famous scientist and do a presentation about him, so she chose Galileo and did very well. 

 For the boys' Science project, they had to choose an animal from Africa, the Amazon or Australia and make a posterboard. Gabe chose the Green Anaconda, the largest snake in the world. 

 Ezra, however, went more cuddly and chose the kinkajou, which is kind of like an Amazonian raccoon, only cuter and less hazardous to my chickens!

 Emma did really well for her first time taking classes. She loved her teachers and really loved doing her art.  

Kid's got a future, am I right? 

 The boys were also proud to show off their works of art.

  

The highlight of the evening, though, was the play. All 4 kids were in it. The younger 3 were singing in the choir, but Olivia grabbed a small solo part, which she was super excited about. They had such a fun time! If you're feeling froggy, you can watch the whole thing below. Beware! It's half an hour long!

If you're in the GSO/HP area and are considering a homeschooling co-op, I would highly recommend EMMA. The staff and teachers are fantastic and the kids are having a great time learning each week!

EMMA Arts and Sciences Night - April 2017

It's the end of the term for EMMA Classes and this time, the boys took Art and Music along with their PE class.

 They showcased their artwork, which we were very impressed with.

 We got to see Olivia's Pinecone Project from her Botany class displayed. She had to form two hypotheses regarding how a pinecone behaves in cold and warm weather and then do experiments to prove it. She proved that they close in cold, wet weather to protect the seeds, but open in warm weather to release them.

 Olivia also took a North Carolina History course that taught her not just history, but geography as well.

 She did a great job in the class, working hard to learn about our state's products and industries. I particularly like her depiction of beef cattle.

 At the end of the evening, the boys were part of the performance of The Agape League. They did sucha great job singing and doing the hand motions. 

 I'll admit that I wasn't sure Ezra would enjoy doing the play because he doesn't really like to be in front of people, but he was really into it and both boys did a wonderful job!

Finally, for Olivia's last day of Literature Circle, she dressed up as a character from Carry On, Mr. Bowditch, which was her favorite book of the term, and made a posterboard with facts about navigation to share with the class. In her Literature Circle class this year, they read a book about every 2-3 weeks and discussed it. Each week they chose or were assigned a role. The 6 roles were: Discussion Leader, Passage Perfecter, Character Coordinator, Creative Connecter, Vocabulary Detective, and Story Sketcher. And the books they read in the Fall were Number the Stars (*favorite), Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, Trumpet of the Swan,  Ben and Me, Sign of the Beaver, and Best Christmas Pagent Ever. And in the Winter/Spring they read Rules (*a favorite), Carry On, Mr. Bowditch, Lemonade War (Olivia devoured the whole series when we found them at the library), Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry (Olivia and I went on to read the Sequel), and The Blind Colt (we also went on to read the sequel). This was her favorite class this year along with Robotics.

 

Overall their full year at EMMA classes were fantastic and they can't wait for next fall's term. We've even signed Emma up to go!

Art Book About Color

For an art curriculum this term, we did Usborne's Art Book About Color, which has great information about art history and colors, paints and styles. Each week or so, we would cover a topic in the book, which was sometimes about a single color and had info like what it used to be made from, how artists used the color and how durable the color was over long periods of time. Other topics were about color mixing and styles like pointillism.

For the colors, we had the kids do a single-color project that sometimes included mixed media.

  Blue

  Green

  Red

  Yellow

 some mixing of colors 

 these were a form of pointillism or using dots to create a picture. Olivia's, in the middle, was excellent. The boys were good, too, but they each only did one element of the painting in dots. Gabe's was rain and Ezra's was the leaves on the tree.

Spring Term Artwork 2015

We just finished our art curriculum for this term, Artistic Pursuits. It was really fun to read about the various artists and apply some of their techniques, whether it was color or style, subject matter or methods. This particular term, we read about artists like Jean Francois Millet, Jan Vermeer, Jean-Honore Fragonard and Joseph Turner.

I think the funniest aspect of the whole thing was how the kids tended to draw the same thing, often without discussing it. The favorite subject had to be birthday parties, but trees and outdoor scenes were prominent, too.

One project they did was to put the paper on a textured surface and then use oil pastels to draw a picture. The texture underneath came right through to make a very interesting look.

 This on was Gabe's on crumpled and then smoothed foil.

 Olivia did this simple tree on bubble wrap.

Ezra did his tree on a bunch of pennies.

Another project was using tissue paper as the coloring rather than something like paint or crayons. Not surprisingly, they all did the same thing: boats. :)

In another project, the kids had to draw first with a black oil pastel and then paint it with watercolors. The effect was that the color would stick to the paper, but not the lines they drew with the oil pastel. Here you see one of the many appearances of the birthday party theme.

And finally, they did one last project as a group. It was a 3D drawing done on a platform of construction paper. Olivia did the drawing, Gabe and Ezra colored it and then Olivia and Gabe cut out the pieces and Olivia attached them to the paper.

Here you can see both the outdoor scene and the birthday party together. 

The kids had so much fun doing this art and I'm really glad I got to do it with them.