February and March have been bitter cold months. It feels like we're beginning to reach hermit status and the cabin fever is definitely kicking in! Lucky for us we were all very busy with our projects during those cold, cold weeks!
The kids are still completely immersed in the world of Minecraft. BUT we've been taking it to the next level.
We've added accounts for not only Minecraft on the Xbox, but also for the computer. We began playing on servers! The kiddos really wanted to connect with other players so that was the big theme here. We now play on the Skrafty server, and sometimes the Sandbox. We also found a homeschooling family online that has their own server and invited us to come play, so we play there a lot too. And I play WITH them, which isn't anything new but I'm starting to have a to more fun with it since they are both finally comfortable enough to play in survival mode.
We play online in Xbox as well. Which is were it has gotten REALLY interesting. You can use the Kinect to talk to the other players. It's been great fun for them, but also allowed them to collaborate and work on projects INSIDE Minecraft with other kids.
We played with various kids throughout the USA. But we also played with kids in other countries, Like Australia for one, which was interesting because it led us to learn more about what goes on there, and also to talk and learn more about TIME ZONES. Because, yes, as we are waking up in the morning our friends in Australia are in the wee hours of the night when we would usually be going to sleep! It's been interesting trying to coordinate times for them all to play together. :-)
And we played with a boy who lives n Mexico. He only spoke Spanish! So we had to communicate with text based messages and making in game signs, all while consulting our Spanish to English dictionary.
Activities for February into March:
Minecraft: Reading and reading comprehension, foreign languages with our friends in Mexico, Research (servers, mods, maps,) math,
ClubPenguin.com: Reading, typing, social skills
Youtube research on various topics
Baking and Cooking- math and reading
Helping with the weekly grocery list and shopping
Shopping with their own money - math and money management
Valentines Swap: We participated in a big Valentine's Day swap with a group of homeschoolers from around the country. They made their own Valentines, and helped address envelopes (30 participants)
We discovered the Foxes living in the backyard!
Visiting the Farmers Market on Saturdays and helping with shopping
Helping with our Goats - feeding and care
Homeschoolers Meetups in Waterville
Researching Baby goats - Our doe gave birth! We had triplets. We lost one, but still have the other two which are living in the house with us. Audrey has helped out with them tremendously and is even helping to bottle feed which is soooo much more of a precise art than I ever realized. Measuring specific feeding amounts, spacing out feeding times by schedule.
Watching documentaries - mostly on animals, the favorite subject around here.
Arts and crafts: pipe cleaner crafting, drawing,playing with imaginets (magnetic shapes), alphabet magnets.
Watercolor water balloons - filling water balloons with color to throw on the snow. Did not work as well as we'd wished.
Playing in the snow!
Lots and lots of conversations and story telling
Dancing and singing! - we do lots of this! :-)
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