Acid or Base

It's been quite busy around here. Joe is back at school and work while he continues to battle a cold. The rest of us are still healthy, just pretty hectic.

Amy returns to teaching her law school class tonight and once she is ready for us, we'll all be involved in her class as litigants. Allie is neck deep in rehearsals for her play this weekend, and I am going to be assisting the production backstage for the rest of the rehearsals and the first 2 shows. I can't imagine how other families cope with tech week. Sending their kids to a brick and mortar school until 3, then have rehearsal from 4:30-7 each night. It is times like this that I reflect on how much our decision to homeschool Allie has made our lives less complicated (at times) and more enjoyable (all the time).

Sure, homeschooling is chock full of it's own challenges. Every few months when we finish a curriculum cycle we have to research our options to meet our educational needs and desires. We've had a few set backs from programs or books that just weren't working, but we've also found great resources (some free) that are wonderful. Every Sunday I go through our subjects and make a lesson plan for that coming week. I have the flexibility to change our schedule based off of other outside classes or events that influence our schedule that week. This Friday, Allie has 3 performances for her play, therefore, I have to squeeze in a little extra of some subjects in the other 4 days to make up for missing Friday.

Right now her daily courses are: Math, Vocabulary, History, Grammar, Literature, Science (Chemistry right now) Spelling, Writing, Analogies, Fitness, Art, Environmental Education. For fitness we have a regular routine that we do at our local gym three times a week. She has met with a personal trainer and has a program designed specifically for her. Once a week she also takes a Motion Evolution Class that emphasizes a broad range of movement that are used in activities. She follows that up with a 30 minute personal training session with the instructor. She takes an art class at NSAA, loves the instructor, and brings home some very cool projects which adorn the walls of our house and Amy's office. Every other week she takes a class at a local nature center and spends time outside (in all types of weather) tracking animals, learning about biomes, plants, and ecology.

It is a lot more work than I was doing while she was in a traditional school and I was regularly volunteering for the schools, and it has taken some time to adjust to the swing of things, but there hasn't been anything that I have done that makes me feel more like I am really making a bigger impact for our family. I've been out of the "normal" work force for 11 years now, and I don't miss it one bit.

Blah, blah, blah, homeschooling is great. Okay, get on with it.

Today in science we conducted a lab about how to determine if something is a base, an acid, or neutral. It is from the REAL Science Odyssey series, and I highly recommend it if you have a kid that likes science, even if you aren't homeschooling. For the lab today I had prepared a "cabbage indicator solution" by soaking a chopped up red cabbage in boiled water overnight. Then as we added different things to a small amount of that purple cabbage water solution it would change different colors if it were an acid or a base. No color change for a neutral compound. It was really neat, it was cool to see Allie's reaction as this purple solution changed to pink, or blue or green when we added a teaspoon of something into it. Although, nothing beats things that fizz when mixed like last week when we added a tablespoon of baking soda to 1/4 cup of lemon juice.

Lemon juice and Baking Soda meet- Bam! Endothermic Reaction!

Here is a picture of our little chemist with her lab sheet and cups of solution behind her with the compound that was added to the solution behind each cup.

We used vinegar, ammonia, lemon juice, water, baking soda, soap, clear soda, and salt.

Now off to pick up another kid for the carpooling I am helping with, then learn how to set the stage and swap our scenery for the play. Spin That Wheel!