Some Fun With Italy Geography and A Cool Dog Whistle App

Today, we started our fun Geography series, by starting with Italy. We love Italian food, and eat it at least three or more days a week. We already had stuffed shells this week, and today we made a boot shaped pizza. Unfortunately I didn't take pictures, sorry. It was cute, and tasty. Then we looked up some websites about Italy for kids, discussed their flag, and the meaning of their flag. I started with Italy, because Caitlin has been reading about Rome in her Language Arts books. I think next week we will move on to Germany. As part of this exercise, they find the country on a map, or globe, and discuss countries and bodies of water around it. This is a fun way to learn Geography, and hopefully one they will remember. My son loves music, so I saved some Italian dinner music for him to listen to, as well.

DJ got a little job this week. He has to feed a cat, twice a day, for a week. He has to get himself there, on his bike, and back. Sometimes, in his travels there are big dogs that he encounters. We found this nice free app, to put on the phone. If he should encounter an aggressive dog, hopefully the dog whistle will keep it away. He has not had to use it, thank goodness. Since we walk, and bike a lot, during the school year, it will come in very handy having it. It is free, too!

A Fun, Free and Easy Way to Give to Charity: Charity Miles

I found out about Charity Miles, quite by accident.  I had downloaded and app called Hip2Save, because you know I love to be hip.  While browsing through the specials, deals and such I came across Charity Miles.  I was curious so I downloaded it from the Amazon app store, to my Android phone, only to discover it had to be downloaded from Google Play to work properly.  So, I uninstalled it, and then reinstalled it.  As I was reading about what to do, I realized I could rack up miles just doing stuff around the house, like mowing, or weed whacking.  So, on Sat I tried it while I mowed.  Wrong answer, lol I was not logged in.  So, today I had my son download it on his phone, and we all went out for a walk. You can walk, run, or ride a bike for Charity Miles.  Kazaam it worked~!  We both racked up over a mile, and a dollar a piece to the charity we chose for today.  You can choose the same charity each time, or a different one from their list.  This is actually a great motivator for us to get out and walk everyday.  It is a free app in the Google Play store.  If you are on your feet all day at work, and you can carry your phone on you, or you are active this is a great way to painlessly give to a charity you love.  BTW you can download the app from Amazon, but it says right in the app you have to use Google Play.  I am not sure how that makes sense, but hey I don't make the rules. 

100 Words Every High School Graduate Should Know

Ha, I don't even know what some of these words mean, and I have been to college, and will be returning again this year.  My 9th grader will start working his way through this list tomorrow.  He will have to look up the definitions, then put them all in a sentence.  He will then study, and memorize them, with a weekly test.  Here is the list. 

Rather than continue with new spelling words each week, my 5th grader will revisit previous lists and do definitions, sentence writing, find the nouns and verbs, and alphabetical order.  This serves many purposes all centered around one group of words each week.  She too will be tested weekly on these words.

DJ will also be doing the ACT Question of the Day, and the SAT Question of the Day, each day.  This is a great way to practice and prepare for these tests.  There is also an app that I love it is shown below. The first one is free, and the one we use.  The second is not free, and I have never used it.  I have Android phones, so any apps I share should work on Android phones, but be sure and check first.