2nd Month, Ninth Day

Today in Math, I introduced Babe to graphing. I put a pile of connector blocks on the table and gave her five seconds to look at the pile. Then I hid the pile and asked her how many of each color there were. She had a really hard time estimating - she did not want to be wrong. She became physically upset when I wouldn't give her any more time looking at the pile, so I explained to her what estimating was. I told her that most estimations are wrong because they are very basic ideas. After I talked her through it and she understood, I gave her five more seconds to look at the pile, which was probably a mistake, because I think she was frantically trying to count them all (as you can tell from her "estimations").

After she wrote her estimations, I then had her put the blocks together to make bars, like in a bar graph. Then, I had her trace each bar and count how many of each color there really were. After she traced each bar, I explained to her that graphs show the information you want to know much faster than looking at a messy pile. She was able to instantly see that red had the most blocks, and that blue actually had less blocks than yellow, which was opposite of her estimation.

I may throw in another estimation exercise tomorrow so she can ease her mind about being "wrong" first, before she figures out the real answer.

After her worksheet, Math was done. Whew!

We ran right into Reading Comp. because I knew the lesson was going to take a bit of time. My sister guessed it right in her comment under yesterday's blog - I had Babe write her own book based on what she saw during her walk (wagon ride) to connect with yesterday's book, "I Went Walking" by Sue Williams. The pictures from her camera were printed and she cut them out, put them in order of when she saw each item, then authored the book mostly all by herself!

Her book.

Is.

Adorable.

Pay attention to the dedication, because it made my heart melt a little.

Creating her book took a majority of the day, but when she finished I had her read it back to me. Then I had her read "Here Comes Trouble" by Larry Dane Brimner. So cute.

When everyone else woke up from their naps, it was time to do another part of their color project, and today's color was blue. These pages turned out especially pretty.

I can't wait until nine colors later when we can officially complete the project. I'm slightly excited for it.

Anyone else excited for it to be FRIDAY!? I can't be the only one.