Static Electricity

Aria read to us this morning out of our current installment of Junie B. Jones. She doing such a good job of reading with inflection and emotion. We started out at the table outside, but a visit from a bee had everyone in tense knots so we moved inside. We sat at the table and Casey colored while Aria read.

About half way through, I heard him sounding out the words on the front of the color book. "C-c-c-a-a-rrrr-e B-e-e-e-a-rrrs, I love Care Bears." He whispered. I noticed how much beginning reading is like beginning talking. You notice it a little at first and then it seems like overnight they are talking like you and me, or reading in this case.

Casey and I sat down later and typed out many words with the word processor. He doesn't have any problems with words like cat, sat, met, set, but what impressed me is that longer words don't scare him at all. He read set and said, "That's like on the computer when you push the button." I said, "That's reset." And I typed it. I had typed 'tad' and then he tried to type tadpole. He started with 'tat' and asked me how to spell pole. He was also sounding out 'broadcast' when he saw it on TV this morning. He got 'broad' all by himself.

He cracked me up, too. He's very impressed with his own abilities he said something about making a lot of money with the Amazing, Reading Six-Year-Old. I'm not gonna tell him that a lot of six-years-old kids are reading now and nobody else better tell him either. :) I can practically see the wheels turning. The comparing sounds and words. The strategies he's developing to remember them. It's VERY cool.

After reading we 'played' with static electricity. I found a cool idea on this website: http://www.sciencemadesimple.com/static.html

Step 1: Transfer some of your electrons to a balloon.








Step 2: Attract a neutrally charged object, cereal, with your negatively charged, electron-infested, balloon. :)








Step 3: Allow electrons to hop to cereal and give it a negative charge.








Step 4: The negatively charged items should repel each other.

Step 5: Wear balloons because it's fun.








Warning: Balloons are dangerous for little ones and big ones alike. If you get a balloon stuck in your throat there isn't much that can be done for you, short of a tracheostomy and the doctor who's giving it better be in the next room because there isn't time to get you to the hospital.

After our fun with static we reviewed our math facts. I think Casey is just about ready to move on to the next three facts. He should have them all memorized in a few weeks. Aria is doing well, too. I think she may need the rest of this week for these facts. She's gaining control of that brain muscle, I feel.

Then we played a game to learn counting by five's. Aria, Casey and I each had a different color crayon and we took turns writing the numbers in the five series as quickly as we could. Casey has caught on quickly and his writing is improving. Aria already knows them quite well. We have a colorful chart to look at now.

Lastly, Aria went to play some educational games and Casey and I played a cool strategy game online.