Moving West History Pockets

Since so many of our books for co-op this year were focusing on the western US and pioneers, I chose for additional history for Alex the Evan Moor Moving West History Pockets.  There are some fun projects (Nicolas has joined in for some activities.)  Here are Alex's pockets:

Pocket 1 - Introduction to moving West

Pocket 2 - The New Frontier and our study of Daniel Boone and George Rogers Clark

Pocket 3 - Exploring the Wilderness

We skipped Pocket 4 about Missionaries because our book - Apples to Oregon - went right along with Pocket 5.

Pocket 5 - On the Oregon Trail

And what would Alex take with him if he had to choose something he treasured to take with him and leave everything else behind if he were travelling west in a covered wagon? ....

His gameboy :)

Pocket 6 - Native American Struggle

Keep an eye on the blog for the rest of the pockets.  We are completing Pocket 7 this week and the rest of the pockets we will pick up at the end of the school year when we read the books The Gullywasher and Mailing May, which both take place out west.   (Mailing May is about the railroad expansion westward which is also what pocket 10 is about.)

Alex is also doing Indiana History this year.  I will try to get a post of that notebook so far in the near future.

Cats lapbook

Nicolas completed a lapbook last week about Cats.  This was the first time either boy has done a lapbook of their choosing that the other boy didn't also do.  Alex will be picking his own subject soon, but last week, Alex was doing Evan Moor History Pockets (see later post).  Nicolas enjoyed learning more about cats.

Moving West field trip

We went to Minnetrista yesterday where the kids learned more about pioneer life and apples.

Here are things that pioneers might have used.  Nicolas looks VERY ready to use that axe!

Then the kids got to see how an old fashioned cider press works.  Here are the boys grinding up the apples to be pressed.

Here it comes!!  Yum!!

Apples to Oregon

For co-op last week, we read Apples to Oregon, the almost true story of a family that moved west using the Oregon trail.  They took fruit trees with them in their wagon filled with dirt.  It was a humorous tall tale, although families moving west to Oregon was true.  We studied apples, Johnny Appleseed and touched on the Oregon Trail.  This week we are going more in depth with the Oregon Trail because our Moving West history pocket this week is the Oregon Trail.  Anyway, here are pictures of our small lapbook.

We cut apples in half and used them for apple printing.  This is what we used for the cover of our lapbook.  Nicolas's is on top and Alex's is the bottom.

The inside of the book.  The Parts of a wagon page is a flap that lifts.  Underneath is:

Nicolas's copywork.

Alex's copywork

The back of the book we glued our map of the Oregon trail.

 

Our butterfly!

Last week, we took off from school and did some home remodeling.  Our chrysallis opened last weekend (the end of August), but I have not had opportunity to move the pictures to the computer to post them.  Friday, Aug. 29, we saw the butterfly hanging on the chrysallis.

We let it out to see if it would be able to fly. 

It flew to the window in the dining room.  So after Daddy came home for lunch, we let it go free.

Using the guide we got from the library, we determined that this butterfly was a female.  The males have 2 dots in their lower wings that we could not see on this butterfly.  Here is the empty chrysallis.

We are ready to try this again next year!  It was fun to watch the metamorphasis.