My Heavenly Father Loves Me - the Human Body

This month we are studying anatomy. This past week the kids loved all our activities to learn about the human body. This post compiles about five days of last week's learning.



We started our circle times by singing "My Heavenly Father Loves Me."It was me singing, really, while they tried to keep up. We acted out each of the references to touching the rouses, looking at the butterflies, smelling the lilac tree.



We took this picture a few weeks ago when we were studying weather and rain, and made the connection to plants needing minerals and water to grow. These are the roses my sister got for getting her second degree blackbelt, or maybe they are the roses my sister gifted my mom. In any degree, they were an impromptu connection to weather. They were so tempting, just sitting there on the table, so beautiful and fragrant, while we studied weather, so we had to talk about mud, and plant nutrition. Puma tiger told me after enjoying so greatly the sweet smell of the roses: "oh they are so sweeet! Did you put oil in it?"  They are so used to the smells of Young Living Essential Oils! they love them! So I went and got my almost empty rose oil bottle, and had her compare. We were all basking in the beautiful smell!  Blueberries said "it smells like love!"  And the scent of the roses gave my little Sweet Boy the biggest satisfaction! you could just see it on his radiant smile. I love Young Living! And so I explained to them how YL essential oils are distilled from the plants.  I love nature, and the oils, the roses, the scents, help me feel connected to the love of my Creator.



I played this video from YouTube "My Heavenly Father Loves Me" in the car on my phone as we go places. This is a beautiful rendition by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, with great pictures.







"Whenever I hear the song of a bird, or look at the blue blue sky."  We have been paying attention to the sounds that come from outside. I also got a little chirping bird at the local good will store, and they just love their little "pet."  The recorded voice of the chirping bird just makes them smile!



"He gave me my eyes that I might see the color of butterfly wings,"  This gradient color activity, where the child is to observe ever so closely the different shades and put them in order, is meant to challenge their vision and help them develop great attention to detail.  I didn't take pictures, but they had so much fun playing with a giant plastic monarch butterfly that I got at a yardsale for like $.25 cents.







Oh and it was sunny one day, and snowy the next. Sweet boy enjoys these changes a lot!

"Whenever I touch a velvet rose" ... this is an activity designed to help sharpen the sense of touch. There is a matching pair of balloons that feel the same because they are filled by the same thing.  So the challenge is to find the matches by the sense of touch. A pair has rise, another sand, yet another flour, and the last has beans.







This is a "sensory bin" with the only purpose of giving the child a sensory experience. Here we have red beans representing red blood cells, and garbanzo beans, representing white blood cells. We also have brains, guts, eyes, liver and other organs floating around, to represent how the blood carries nutrients and carries away toxins from these places. Blueberries and I played a game, after I explained to her that white blood cells are the fighters that keep our bodies healthy and fight off infections and other pathogens. She got another activity, the colored pompoms, and told me I was the germs, and she was going to fight me off as i tried to get into her "blood stream," meaning, as I tried to get the pompoms into her container.  It was fun! And Puma Tiger and Sweet Boy joined in the fun.







"He gave me my life."  We traced their own bodies on paper, cutting it and pasting it for room decoration.  Blueberries drew the lungs with the bonchiles as little dots, while Puma Tiger, being the fasionista she is, drew in fun styles of clothes.

 

That whole day Blueberries would use the name of the organs of bones to communicate what was happening to her.  She would say things like: "I bumped my spine on the couch" or "Sweet Boy hit my lungs!"



Sweet boy had fun just posing for it. After I hung his silhouette on the wall he came and said: "oh! una rana!" (look, a frog!), then he laughed and corrected: "no es una rana, es yo!"  ("It's not a frog, it is I").



During our Chinese lesson we colored, cut and practice saying each of the parts of the body, complete with signing the song Head Shoulders Knees and Toes.



"He gave me coordination, focus, and ability to create"....well that's not part of the song, but it's true :)  Each of them  cut their won shapes. It took Puma Tiger about three sessions to finish cutting hers, but it was a great exercise on focus, perseverance, fine motor skills and cutting, all which are important skills for learning preparedness! She was so proud to finish it off and post it on the wall!

We have also been creating our own Montessori addition board. I wish I had so many Montessori materials, but instead of just wishing, we will make them!

 "He gave me my ears that i might hear thr magical sound of things."  Sweet boy here performing a number.



"He gave me my heart"  Here's a heart we made. We started with this organ.  This was made with a hand sanitizer pump, left over oxygen plastic line , tape and a hot gun  (I simply created a circuit with the  oxygen line, hooked to the spout on one end, and perforated the container near the top to insert the other end of the line, then I sealed it with the hot gun, and added tape on top).

 We all enjoy listening to each other's hearts, and pumping to the rhythm on the heart pump. We went around and figured out who had the fastest beat, baby, and who had the slowest, me.







We also read from a beginner reader book on the heart.  For our reading we also worked on phonics and the parts of the body. Here we are making a game with a movable alphabet and phonics "ir, ee, ai, oy"

 "Of all His creations of which I'm a part, YES! I know Heavenly Father loves me!!! "   Here blueberries is ecstatic as she has finished weaving by herself her very own first bracelet, and is showcasing her setup for the second. The same day she made a necklace, paying special attention to making it symmetric, with a center and matching sides. This activity made her work on her fine motor skills, patterning, and focus. It is a "practical life" activity, because she is honing concentration and coordination skills needed for life.

Caring for the body, this is our "weather" and "anatomy" connection, dressing for success!

This is our French Class picture. You can see more about that class in another post for another day.

YES I KNOW HEAVENLY FATHER LOVES ME!