A Story, A Heart, and Invisible Guests-- Oh My!

So last week I told you about the milk-o-lanterns we made for Halloween.  They don't look like much on their own, but check them out when lit up. Spooky!

This week, Sathya got to write a story-- all on his own.  I didn't help him with sentence structure or word choice or how he wanted it formatted.  The kid's learning!  (I like how he is subconsciously getting grammar; look at those quotation marks!)

For our human anatomy lesson, we added onto the body and drew a heart.  We watched a short video about how the heart works and discussed its importance:

Caveat: placement may not be accurate!

We also conducted an experiment.  Does the heart work faster when we are resting or when we are moving/exercising?  We each took turns taking an old paper towel roll and listening to our hearts at rest.  Lub-dub.  Lub-dub.  Then we each ran for one minute at a time and then listened again.  We compared.  Indeed our heart works faster and quicker when we are in need of more oxygen/nutrients!

Lastly, in honor of Labor Day, we talked about what it means to work, what kinds of jobs people have, and how working enables people to earn money, which enables us to do things with it (AND how important it is to save and not waste).  To celebrate, we had a party made up of invisible guests.  We all took turns running upstairs, grabbing a costume from the costume bin, and coming down in character.  Sathya was Captain Underpants, Alex was Abiyoyo (a giant from an old African folktale), and I was a variety of things (a cow, a blonde woman named Betsy, etc.)

Whenever I get the chance, I like to encourage my children to use their imaginations.  Most of the costumes we put together are made from things around the house.  I have never bought a costume for the children.  Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's so much fun making them (and my sewing machine gets good use at least once a year).

This year, Sathya wants to be a robot. Anand is going to be Super Diaper Baby.