Learning about the Sun

Today was one of those days where everything just came together and clicked.  There wasn't any fighting over starting school:  I came to the table and both kids were waiting, pencils in hand to start their lessons.  I didn't have to tell them to turn off electronics, I didn't have to tell them to sit down and pay attention.  I honestly felt like I was entering an episode of the Twilight Zone. I have a feeling tomorrow will be terrible, as today was just too easy.

We quickly made our way though our daily drills and moved quickly to working on Horizon's Phonics and Reading (a review is in the works).  The kids really are seeming to enjoy this particular program and I have yet to have to fight with them to get the work done.. Today we discussed syllables and middle sounds and we quickly completed our lessons without any problems.

We're still using CTC math and have started on Multiplication.  I honestly did not know how well the kids would do with this: I had even originally planned for this week to be a review of Addition and Subtraction but they had such a grasp on both and both scored a 100% on their test last week that I changed plans and went ahead and started multiplications. Ashleigh is doing alright with it but Garrett has really grasped it well.

But without a doubt, the most fun we had today was our Astronomy lesson.  We decided to revisit Apologia's Exploring Creation with Astronomy course, since they were much younger when we went through it the first time and I figured now would be a great time to really dig into it.  Today we started our lesson in regards to the sun.


The fact that we're huge into astronomy really helps out.  Our living room, as I have mentioned before, has so much star gazing equipment that we could run a small observatory in our house (Ooh, wait, we do.. go figure!!).   So today we headed outside with a solar filter to take a quick look at the sun.

The kids were amazed at the fact they could see the sun clearly through the solar filter but that they could not see anything outside even thought it was so bright.

The Sun as seen through our Solar Filter

After looking at our local star, we headed back inside and compared the size of Earth to the sun.  Then we discussed how the earth revolves around the sun and rotates on it's axis.  Each kid got to have their turn at being the sun while the Earth (our globe) revolved around them while it rotates.

To end our science lesson today, we checked out videos of Solar Flares.  NASA has an amazing video on Youtube that shows an amazing flare that rains down on the sun.   Ash couldn't believe how big they were and she thought they were so beautiful.


To end our lesson, we looked at videos of the Aurora Borialis. Being in Southern California, this is not something we have seen in person so videos have to be our eyes to the universe.   How amazing to see the wonders of our sun.