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Apologia: Exploring Creation with Zoology 3-Land Creatures

11/3/2016

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Well!  We finished up Sea Creatures last year and are moving on to Land Creatures!  We just LOVE Apologia Science!  I still have a few chapters left to add for the Sea Creatures study but I wanted to go ahead and show you our set up for this year's classes.  
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We set up our lesson in a very similar format to the Research Notebooking Journal we used for Sea Creatures.  We used a larger binder this year since our binder last year filled up super fast.  We purchased a 1 1/2" binder to hold all the file folders, notebooking pages and activities.  There is one colored file folder for each chapter.  Check out our YouTube Video on how we put our research notebook together!

We tried to break up each chapter over a 2 week period since we studied this subject at our homeschool co-op.  Grades 1st through 4th had this class (each were taught separately by grade).  
**Click on our weekly reading schedule to the right to see how we divided up our chapters.**

I am teaching the 4th graders since my daughter is in this class.  :)  ​I taught them last year for sea creatures too.  
                                  A great group of kids!


The lessons were designed and planned out by a group of talented teachers.  I can add my own twist and supplemental activities to mold the lessons to my class though.  

It is such a GREAT book to teach!!

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Some handy items to have on hand would be: Map of the world (for animal tracking), stickers of a variety of land mammals throughout the world, and mammals of North America (or one for your continent) Field Guide.

**There are some great stickers included in the
​Apologia Student Notebooks you can use for tracking on your world maps**

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​We also placed a Map of Each Continent on our classroom wall.  

As we go about each chapter, we'll add animals found in those areas to our maps!  I got this fun idea from this site.  She provides some fun Land Animals additions to your study.  
Check them out:



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You can print out colored land animal pictures right from this site and even a classification table.  It was super helpful!

We used our Map book to print out our continent maps but she also includes links to websites where you can print out free outline maps.
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http://amzn.to/2fIxvqX
We thought these items looked fun for designing our own Field Guides this year on Animal Tracks!  We'll post once we complete this activity!
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Come back soon to check out our
week-to-week lessons and activities!
 

Happy Homeschooling!!

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Pizza Hut Book-It Reading Program

11/1/2016

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If you have a Reader or even a child who may struggle with reading, The Pizza Hut Book-It Program is a fun way to push them towards a monthly reading goal.  
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The parent and child can set the goal 
they think is appropriate for each child, and there are many fun ways to track these goals each month.  
Below is just one sample reading log you can print out. Click on the Calendar below to go to their site and see all the other options!

They have logs you can keep track by the minute or book, too.  
Check out their website.  Plus, it is FREE!  

My kids love getting their FREE pizza certificates each month if they meet their goals and they love eating their FREE pizza even more!

​I also 
LOVE how it is a great Homeschool Friendly program.  

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                                                   Check out the PIZZA HUT BOOK-IT Program today!

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​Happy Homeschooling!!!
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Sea Creatures-Crustaceans

10/27/2016

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Lobster, Shrimp, crabs, krill are all examples of crustaceans.  This chapter was truly fascinating. When we can add hands-on activities in our classes, it is so much more enriching and fun!  

Here a LIVE Lobster was brought in for the kids to learn and see the Anatomy.  Our week 1 folder activity page was to complete a Lobster diagram.  The Lobster was such an amazing visual...and yummy dinner for one of our amazing teachers.  

You can find a LIVE Lobster at a local grocery store.  Ours was purchased from Wegmans and they packed it up so nicely so it could stay alive and safe for the whole day at our co-op.  This was very helpful. 


**make sure you point out to the students that the Claws are very strong and powerful.  That is why they must keep the tight bands on them to help prevent any fingers from getting injured.**
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This cute Blue Crab Plush was added to our Ocean themed classroom.  He was super popular amongst our plushies!
 
We finished out Week 1 with our Notepage on Crustaceans to follow up the kids' reading assignment from the textbook.

We had a few extra minutes at the end of class so we watch the fascinating video on the Christmas Island Red Crabs.  Below is a link for a short version of one of the videos you could watch.  It's quite amazing!
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WEEK 2 was our first RESEARCH WEEK.  I assigned each kid a different Crustacean to Research and they needed to bring back "Two Cool" facts to share with their classmates. We all recorded them onto our 2nd Folder Activity Page.  

We also completed our 2nd Notebook page to finish out the chapter. 


Here are the crustaceans that were assigned:
  1. Lobster
  2. Crayfish-these would have been fun to bring in as they are plentiful around where we live if we had studied them during a warmer season.  :)
  3. Crab
  4. Hermit Crab
  5. Barnacles
  6. Shrimp
  7. Horseshoe Crab

**Students were encouraged to share their 2 facts with the class.  I wrote them on the board to help everyone have a guide when writing down the facts onto their folder activity pages.**
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I hope you enjoyed the information we studied for this lesson!  I'll be adding links to some of these activities soon so please be patient.  Now go enjoy some yummy Lobster for dinner!
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​Enjoy and Many Blessings!
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Sea Creatures-Sharks & Rays

10/25/2016

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Sharks and Rays was one of those chapters the boys couldn't wait to get to.  I just love the massive and beauty of the Manta Ray!  We hung this cute little guy from our ceiling to add to our "OCEAN" Room.


We started out by watching some super neat videos on Manta Rays.  There are a few from "Jonathan Bird's Big Blue World".  

​Here is one below you could watch:

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We then moved onto our note page and folder activity page.  

We designed our Manta Ray by hand (you can make a
quick pattern by hand if you need to) and label the parts
that we learned:
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  • Pectoral Fin
  • Pelvic Fin
  • Nares
  • Mouth
  • Gill Slits
  • Tail
  • Dorsal Fin

We glued the back of the Ray onto our first folder page and folded in our Pectoral Fins and folded up the long tail so it all stored nicely into the folder.

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The second week we did our notepage and then moved on to our Folder activity on Shark Teeth.  We did have a student bring in a variety of shark teeth he had collected.  The kids enjoyed passing those around and examining them.

You could also view another video on sharks if there is any time left or have the kids research different sharks.  I have added a free shark stationary to use for a fun addition to your writing project.


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Below is our second Folder Page for our "Sharks and Rays" Chapter.  
  1. We glued 2 standard sized pieces of yellow paper together to make a fold out.  
  2. Then we matched up the pictures and descriptions on the Shark Descriptions printout to the box on the Shark's Teeth page.
  3. We then cut out Teeth based on the average size of the ones recorded to have been found.
These are just Average lengths:
Megalodon                     7.5 inches
Great White Shark         2.25 inches
Mako Shark                    2 inches
Tiger Shark                     1.25 inches
Hammerhead Shark      .75 inch
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Click on the pics or link to download your copy of the Shark Teeth and Descriptions Files.  

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Enjoy and Many Blessings!
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​**Just a Note:  Our "Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day" Research Journal Notebooking pages are not ready for purchasing or download yet.  
​I am sorry for any inconvenience.**
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These Ocean Life Trading Cards were a HUGE HIT!

10/24/2016

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Trading Cards are everywhere: Baseball, Football, Basketball, Pokemon, Littlest Pet Shop, etc....you name it, there are trading cards.  

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​We purchased these at the Teachers Pay Teachers site and divided them up in our classes.  The kids loved going off and trading them for their favorites.  My class even asked if they could do more work to earn more trading cards!  Teacher for the WIN! :)

It was a simple and fun way to close out our awesome year-long unit of Sea Animals!  


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Here is the link to the Teachers Pay Teachers site:

Ocean Life Trading Cards

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Thanks Apologia for an amazing homeschooling curriculum and making our year
enriching and full of ocean fun!


​Enjoy and Many Blessings!
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Sea Creatures-Fish Ornament

10/23/2016

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Who doesn't love a good CRAFT!?  We try to add a variety of different lessons and crafts into our science curriculum.  As we moved closer to Christmas time, we found a few fun ideas for sea creature ornaments on the internet.  We took a few of the ideas we found and came up with this version.  


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Since I kept forgetting to take pics throughout the process, I will have to walk you through it.  

Here are the supplies we had on hand:
  • Clear Plastic Fill-able Ornaments
  • Plastic Sea Animal Figures
  • String of any kind for hanging
  • Blue tinted Glue (or glitter glue to add sparkle)
  • Yellow or any color Sand
  • Thin thread (for handing sea creature)
  • Scotch tape
  • Green Sharpie
  • Paint brush
  • Scissors
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  1. First thing we did was tie the sea creatures on thread long enough that we could trim the string after we were all finished up.  
  2. The kids took green sharpies to color green sea grass on the outside of the ornaments for extra affect.
  3. We painted the inside of the ornament (you can take the ornaments apart to do this easily) with the blue glitter glue.  
  4. We were able to sprinkle some colored sand on parts of the inside bottoms of each ornament to represent the ocean floor.
  5. Then we place the thread between the 2 open sides of the ornament (this took 2 people; one to hold both sides of the ornament and one to hold the thread in the spot where you want your sea creature to hand inside the ornament.)
  6. Once the 2 ornament sides are snapped into place, we placed clear scotch tape over the seams to just give it an extra seal.
  7. Last step is to put pretty string in the hole at the top of the ornament so you can hang it from your tree!  (Or on your kitchen cupboard knob where mine is currently hanging, ha)


​After we finished our ornament, we had a nice relaxing movie time with this DVD!  

​
Ocean Adventures, Volume 1
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Enjoy and Many Blessings!
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Beautiful Pearls

3/14/2016

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Wow!  I've been busy!  I haven't posted much in a while but it has been a good busy!  My girls are beautiful...I love them with all my heart!  I love that they have other girls they are good friends with, that they can play and pray with and can be "girly" with.  

They attend an all-girl, monthly bible study where they get to dress up, sing, have a lesson, craft and eat.  They enjoy this time with the other girls and they feel beautiful and have such fun!

So a friend and I came up with an idea to host an "expo" event for a whole day.  This was for moms (or grandmothers) and daughters to come and go to various booths, eat fun foods, enjoy tea, music, and make crafts!  Each mom who signed up was to host a table where the girls could go and make something.  Each mom also brought a snack as well for our food table.  
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Here was our initial flyer we posted and advertised with.  It was super fun to plan!

The first few steps were to do the following:
  • Lots and Lots of prayer
  • Pick a date & time
  • Find a location
  • Decide on Age and theme for the day
  • Decide on cost & RSVP date

After this was finalized we needed to:
  • Make a list of possible Chinese Auction items
  • Keep track of moms/booth themes/foods coming in
  • Make a list of supplies needed

So what I'm saying, we had to organize, plan, organize some more and plan again...but it all came together beautifully!


We set this event up for the girls to just have fun in a Christ-centered environment, and just be "GIRLS".  We planned for an amazing mom to come and speak with the girls, we lined up a local violinist to play for them during lunch and an area Christian Ballet Studio even asked to come dance for the girls.  It was FABULOUS!

We had many, many stations.  12 in all!  We designed the day around a "tea party" theme for fun decorations and even had a great Chinese Auction table filled with goodies from area businesses and donations from friends.

We named our day after the Beautiful Pearls we have as daughters!  Our Beautiful Pearls Expo!



​Here is a sample schedule from our day!
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Here were the list of stations the moms chose for their tables.  I think they are all so creative and the girls loved them all so much:
  1. Perler Bead Crosses
  2. Sculpey Clay pens
  3. Headband top hats
  4. Nail Design
  5. Cookie Decorating
  6. Scripture Bookmarks
  7. Pearl Bracelets
  8. Tissue Paper Flower Corsage
  9. Planting Flower Bulbs
  10. Hair Styling
  11. Hair Bow making
  12. Make a Picture Frame
and we even had a Photo Booth (I had my 4x6 photo printer to print them out right there for the girls)
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Above shows our drink table (we had hot water and tea, lemon infused water, and punch),
​our delicious array of foods, and our Chinese Auction Table.
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Above are some of the tables hosted by a few of the moms.  They all did an incredible job with their table ideas...the girls enjoyed them all so very much!
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The photo booth was great too!
I used my Canon portable 4x6 Photo printer to print out the pictures for the girls right there.
Each girls took home apaper tea cup favor I found how to make on another website.  We ordered some pearls from Amazon to place in each tea cup for the girls to wear home. 
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We were super thankful for the fun day and great turnout but most importantly is that our girls heard how special, precious and amazing they are.  That Jesus made them beautiful even before He gave them to us moms, and that He has a plan for each and every one of them.  He made them Beautiful and created in His image.  We love our daughters with all our hearts, but God loves them even more. 

It was an amazing day celebrating the "Beautiful Pearls" that God gave to us!  

​We look forward to planning another expo next year!
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Sea Creatures-Fish

2/19/2016

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This was a FUN chapter!  There are so many fish in creation that we can't possibly study even a fraction of them all!  Apologia covers them well by breaking down different fish by the most common characteristics.  

The first week we really broke the notes down by talking about the 3 main kinds of fish.  
  • Bony Fishes
  • Cartilaginous Fishes
  • Jawless Fishes

This helped the kids categorize some of the fish they have already learned.  We also ended by briefly talking about buoyancy and the amazing swim bladder that God has placed in most fishes!  So incredible!

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We did the week 10 note page and then the kids completed their folder activity.  They cut out the labels and glued them onto the fish diagram.

The last thing we did was complete the Ectothermic fish experiment.  I was a super focused teacher and totally forgot to take pictures of this!  It was pretty neat though. Here is what we did:
  • We purchased 2 goldfish (we bought our at the local fish store for .25 cents per fish
  • We collected 2 small fish bowls
  • A desk lamp
  • A large bowl filled with ice
Place one of the fish bowls into the large bowl of ice and then place the other one directly under the desk lamp.  We discussed how fish are ectothermic meaning that the body temperature of a fish changes with the changing temperature of the water.  

​This temperature change does have some effects on the fish and how it behaved or moved in the water based on if the temperature was warm vs. cold.  
                   
​                        (you can find this experiment in the Apologia textbook on page 101-102).



We used the following printout to help kids write down there original hypothesis and results throughout the experiment.  The kids placed this into their "Fish" Tab in their research notebooks.
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The 2nd week we completed our notebooking page and then moved on to our folder activity.  We really focused on the fishes defense mechanisms and shapes.  The kids were able to construct a wheel for their folder activity on the most common fish shapes and then we moved to our experiment.  
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We ended our chapter on Fish by doing a Buoyancy Experiment.  

Here are the items we collected:
  • Rock
  • Domino
  • Grape
  • Apple
  • Potato
  • Paper clip
  • Eraser
  • Spoon
  • Fork
After the kids filled out their hypothesis about each item on their paper, they each took a turn testing out their guess to see if the item sank or if it would float.  

The idea of buoyancy can be confusing so before doing this experiment, we talked about how God designed Fishes to be denser than water.  Density tells us how tightly packed the matter in an object is.  So if it is very dense, it has a lot packed tightly into it so it would be "heavier" than an object with less matter packed into it.  

​If the item is denser than water, it would sink.  

The kids realized after hearing this that if fishes are denser than water, they would sink!  God gave the fishes a specially designed "Swim Bladder" to help them with this.  AMAZING!  
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This chapter came to an end right before our Christmas Break.  The following week's class was a fun ending to the semester.  The kids made a super cool fish ornament and then we watch an amazing video of sea creatures.  

                     Stay tuned to see the post on how to make this ornament and also to check out the video we used in our class. 

I'll end by sharing the last page we used.  The kids who finished up early were given a chance to "design their own fish" and then share it with the class.  There are SO many different fish and I can only imagine how amazing and fun it was for God to design and create all the fish in the ocean...even the ones we have never seen or have yet to be discovered!  


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Enjoy your study of God's Amazing Fish!
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APPLE SUNCATCHER CRAFT

11/30/2015

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My kiddos LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Crafts...most kids do, right?!  My 3rd grade daughter really missed her Reading Enrichment class my good friend taught last year, so she sent home this craft they did in class today.  So sweet!  This is a great fall craft or one you can do along with an "apple" study or when reading about Johnny Appleseed.
First you need one sheet of red construction paper...trace the apple outline.  The larger outline and then a smaller one on the inside.

​You will also need a small piece of green and black construction paper for a leaf and a stem!
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Cut out a variety of tissue paper in assorted colors.  
​We used Dark Green, Light Green, Red and White but you can choose which you would like to use!
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You'll also need to have clear laminating sheets to make this.  You will need 2 of equal size that is larger than your apple cut-out pattern.  We used the "Duck" brank but you could use any brand...I included a link to the kind we used.  
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Once you have all your supplies ready, it is time to have fun and create your project!  

​Here is my daughter putting hers together!
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First cut out the outside line of the apple (keeping the paper folded. Then cut out the inside line. Once finished, open up your full apple cut-out!
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Second, it is time to place your apple cut out pattern onto one of the laminate sheets carefully. Then start adding tissue paper. Fill it up!
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Once all the tissue paper is in place, carefully place the second sheet of your laminating paper on top of the apple pattern (sticky side down so it attaches to the sticky side up on the bottom).
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Once the laminated sheets are in place and smoothed out, start cutting around the outside of the apple leaving a small edge of your laminating sheet around the apple.
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Finished product! So fun!
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Looks GREAT in my kitchen window!
I hope you enjoyed this craft idea!  

​Have a happy fall and yummy apple harvest!  
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God LOVES us and gives us good surprises!

11/29/2015

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It was the month to learn about Abraham for our church's preschool class in November!  

Here are the topics we learned for all 4 weeks:

1. God kept Abram safe on his journey.
2. Abram shared with Lot and God blessed him.
3. God made a promise to Abraham & changed his name.
4. God kept His promise and blessed Abraham and Sarah with a GREAT surprise!

WEEK 1 was when Abram built an altar to Thank God on his journal to the new land.  Since it is November, I put up a large tree on our classroom wall and the kids attached leaves with things they were thankful for written on each leaf!  

WEEK 2 was when Lot and Abram had to split up since their shepherds were fighting.  Well, I showed ya how we made our sheep for that lesson.  Check them out HERE!


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WEEK 3 We talked about God's promise to Abram...then God changed his name to Abraham (which means "Father of Many").  The kids made STARS and we also placed STARS on the wall with each kid's name and names of others they LOVE.  This helped show the kids how many people we all know in our own lives...there are A LOT of people in the world! 

More than we can count, just like the STARS!
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WEEK 4 was our final week!  God loves us and gives us good surprises!  He kept HIS promise and blessed Abraham and Sarah with a baby boy!  

The kids made tents out of paper showing Abraham and Sarah holding their surprise baby when you open the flaps!  
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This was the take home page from the curriculum our church uses, which is "Group Publishing, Inc."
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Here is my daughter's tent she made in class.
 We also counted out how old Abraham was when he had his first baby...100 years old!

We used kidney beans...after doing this, I knew that I couldn't just put them away!  haha...they were able to play with them for a bit before moving on to our next fun activity!
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The kids finished by making play doh creations of all they had learned over the 4 weeks of class!  ​
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Here is the recipe we used.  

We LOVE this homemade play doh recipe!  It is super easy and can be made in under
​5 minutes...super simple!
I hope you enjoyed this lesson and craft!  

God has so many great promises to show us through HIS WORD!
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Ephesians 3:20-21

20 Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
21 Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.


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