Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a time to reflect on and be grateful for all that is in your life. It is a time to gather with family and friends (perhaps not this year) and appreciate one another. On Thanksgiving, we pay special attention to all that we are thankful for, it is also important on thanksgiving to think about the history that got us to the place we are today, the people that came before us and their stories. Now that you are thinking about Thanksgiving, what are you thankful for? 

On Thanksgiving people often eat turkey, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, stuffing, sweet potato casserole, mac and cheese, bread rolls, and gravy!

My family is vegan so our Thanksgiving feast is a little different. We recreate traditional Thanksgiving meals with all vegan ingredients and instead of a turkey, we have a tofurky! 

It is important to consider, Thanksgiving is a holiday that has changed a lot since its creation. There are some aspects of the history of Thanksgiving that don't feel like something to celebrate: relations between pilgrims and Native Americans were often quite problematic. However, despite this all, Thanksgiving is now more so a time to come together with family and reflect on what you are thankful for. It is important to acknowledge the good and the bad in our history, it does not have to be one or the other. This all is wrapped up in the spirit of Thanksgiving. It is a day to acknowledge the pain of the past and acknowledge that the existence of both the good and the painful is an essential part of the human experience. With this, what are you thankful for? The good and the difficult. 

Body Systems: Nutrition

Nutrition: The digestive and excretory systems

The Digestive System

Our digestive system breaks food down into small particles called nutrients! Our muscles and organs need these nutrients to give us energy and help us grow. Once the digestive system has extracted the nutrients, it gets rid of the waste. 

Now lets go through the stages of digestion!

 

1. Digestion starts in the mouth! In the mouth, food is broken down by the teeth and mixed with saliva by the tongue. 

2. Next, the now broken up food travels down the esophagus to the stomach. 

3. In the stomach, gastric juices are mixed with the food to make it a thick liquid. 

4. Next, the food travels to the small intestine. In the small intestine, nutrients from the food are absorbed into the bloodstream. 

5. After the small intestine, the food travels to the large intestine. In the large intestine, water is absorbed from the remains. What is left is faeces. 

6. Finally, the waste, or faeces, leaves the body through the anus. 

Watch this video on the digestive system and the process of digestion!

To test your knowledge of the digestive system, try this interactive quiz!

Now that you know all about the digestive system, try to label the parts below. While you are doing this think of what each part does! 

The Excretory System

The excretory system removes excess water and other waste products from our body. 

Now lets go through the parts of the excretory system! 

1. In the kidneys, urine is produced. When blood goes through the kidneys excess water and waste products are dropped off. 

2. The ureters are tube shaped organs. The urine produced in the kidneys travels down these to the bladder. 

3. Urine is stored in the bladder. When the bladder is full it sends a message to our brain. 

4. The final organ is the urethra. Urine leaves the body through here.

Watch this video on the excretory system!

To test your knowledge of the excretory system, try this interactive quiz!

Now that you know all about the exretory system, try to label the parts below. While you are doing this think of what each part does! 

Review questions: 

1. Where does digestion start? 

2. What is the name of the tube that food travel through on its way from the mouth to the stomach? 

3. What is the difference between the small and large intestines? 

4. Where is faeces produced and how does it exit the body? 

5. Where is urine produced? 

6. How does the urine travel from the kidneys to the bladder? 

7. Where is urine stored? 

8. How does urine leave the body? 

Plants

Plants are living breathing things just like you and I! Plants are born, grow, reproduce, and die. To stay alive, plants need sunlight, water, minerals, and air. Unlike humans, plants can't move. Like humans, plants can move one or more of their parts (although most humans can move much more than one of their parts). While humans have to get nutrients from the world around them, plants make their own food through a process called photosynthesis. Although plants and humans are different in many ways, humans depend on plants for life. What are some ways plants are used in or benefit your life? Do you like to look at plants? Do you eat plants? 

The Parts of a Plant

Plants have leaves, stems, and roots. Each of these parts has a vital function for the plant's overall well-being. The leaves of a plant make the food for it. The leaves make food with water, air, minerals, and sunlight. The stem of a plant connects the roots and the leaves. Water, minerals, and nutrients pass through the stem. The stem also holds the plant up. The roots of a plant absorb water and minerals from the soil. The roots also fix the plant in the soil. 

Try these activities to test your knowledge of plants! 

 Write the correct part of the plant according to the description.

LEAVES     -      STEM      -      FLOWER     -      ROOTS

_____________________they take in water and nutrients from the soil.

_____________________they take energy from sunlight and make food for the plant.

_____________________it takes water though the plant to the leaves.

_____________________it matures to form the fruit. 

Fill out this word search and identify the needs of plants! :) 

Plant Reproduction

All plants have a process of reproduction. Plants that have flowers or flowering plants, reproduce by making seeds in their flowers. Inside a plant's flower, there are various reproductive organs that allow the plant to reproduce! Here are the reproductive parts of a flower.  

A flower's corolla is made up of its petals. A flower's petals are meant to attract insects. The pistil is the flower's female reproductive system, inside the pistil are ovules. The stamens are the flower's male reproductive organs. They have pollen on the top of them. Flowers have both male and female reproductive organs. The calyx is made of sepals. Sepals are green and protect the flower! 

Plants reproduce through a process called pollination. Watch this video to review the parts of a flower and understand pollination. Parts of a flower and pollination!

Plant Nutrition

Plants make food through a process called photosynthesis. Photosynthesis is the process of plants converting minerals, water, sunlight, and carbon dioxide into food for them and air for us! Without the process of photosynthesis we would have no air to breathe. This is one of the many reasons it is so important to protect all the plants on our earth! Watch this video to understand the process of photosynthesis!

Lets review! The process of photosynthesis begins with a plant absorbing water and minerals from the soil through the plants roots. From the plants leaves it absorbs carbon dioxide and sunlight. The water and the minerals travel up the plant's stem to the leaves. In the leaves, the water, minerals, sunlight, and carbon dioxide make food for the plant and oxygen for us!  

I hope you enjoyed learning about plants! Now that you know why we need plants to survive, can you think of anyways we can help protect all the plants on our earth? 

 Locations, Positions, Plans, and Routes! 

How do we know where things are and how do we talk about the place or position something is in? From the previous blog post, we know that the cardinal points are one way we can understand the location or position of something. To review the cardinal points, or cardinal directions are north, south, east, and west. Aside from the cardinal points, we can understand the location of something by saying whether it is above, below, to the left of, or to the right of something else. By doing this we are understanding the position of one thing in relation to something else. 

Take a look at the picture of a park below and use the new vocabulary you have learned to describe the position and location of things in the picture! The swings are ________ the treehouse. The clouds are _______ the grass. The stairs are _______ the slide. The trees are _______ the blue sky. Find the answers at the bottom of this blog post. 

Plans, also known as maps, show us where things are! When you are in a new place it is helpful to get a map of the city to help you figure out where the things you want to see are. 

In this map of San Francisco can you find the golden gate bridge, the financial district, the mission district, and the SF zoo? 

Answers: The swings are to the right of the treehouse. The clouds are above the grass. The stairs are to the left of the slide. The trees are below the blue sky.

Our World

Our World 

The world is a big and beautiful place. We can understand our world by looking at different visual representations of our world, such as maps and globes. Maps are in two dimensions, while globes are in three dimensions! Because globes are in three dimensions they help us get a better sense of what our world really looks like from space.  

Important vocabulary:

 

Maps

 Globes 

Which one of these images is a map and which is a globe? 

Explore this INTERACTIVE WORLD MAP  to get a better sense of our world and all its places!

How is our world represented and understood?

 Our world is a sphere. The sphere of our world is divided into two parts. The two parts of the world are the southern hemisphere and the northern hemisphere. The two hemispheres are divided by an invisible line called the equator. At each furthermost point of each hemisphere, there is a pole. The poles are on either side of another invisible line called the earth's axis. In the southern hemisphere there is the south pole and in the northern hemisphere the north pole. 

Important vocabulary:

Sphere 

Southern Hemisphere 

Northern Hemisphere 

Equator 

Axis

South Pole 

North Pole 

The Cardinal Points

The world is also understood in terms of cardinal points or cardinal directions. The four cardinal directions are north, south, east, and west! Listen to this song to learn the cardinal points! 

Important vocabulary:

Cardinal points 

North 

South 

East 

West 

Try this interactive quiz to see how well you know our world: YOU AND YOUR WORLD VIDEO QUIZ

Halloween

Halloween

In the United States of America

A Brief History of Halloween

• More than two thousand years ago the Celts who lived in Ireland celebrated a special festival called Samhain on 1st November. It was their New Year celebration. Later 1st November became known as All Saints Day or All Hallows. The evening before All Hallows became known as Hallows Eve and later Halloween or Hallowe'en.

• The Celts believed that evil spirits would come out to harm them on Hallows Eve so they used to dress up in costumes to look like ghosts so that the evil spirits would think they were like them and not hurt them. 

• People used to make lanterns by carving turnips and putting candles inside them. When many Irish people emigrated to America to escape the potato famine of 1846, they took the tradition of Halloween with them, except that it was easier to find pumpkins rather than turnips and this is what Americans used to make their jack o' lanterns.

• Then the rest was history! Halloween progressively became more and more celebrated! Today, in 2020 Halloween is celebrated across the United States in various ways! 

Check out this video on The History of Halloween !!!

How is Halloween celebrated today?

Most American families celebrate Halloween by dressing up in costumes, attending parties, going to Haunted Houses, and carving pumpkins or gourds into jack-o-lanterns. Many choose to decorate their homes in dark, spooky fashion with props like fake spider webs, bones, and ghouls.

Trick-or-treating may be the most popular way to celebrate the holiday. Kids and adults dress up in character and go door to door exclaiming “Trick or Treat!”. This customary phrase implies that if the homeowner does not give a treat to their guest, a trick may follow. Of course, in the rare event that a child leaves empty-handed, he or she rarely makes good on this promise.

Most of all Halloween is a day where all things spooky, rather than being counter-culture, take center stage and are celebrated!

Halloween Activities

Carving pumpkins!

Trick-or-treating!

Visiting a spooky site, like a haunted house! 

These are all examples of some things someone might do to celebrate Halloween! Aside from all these fun activities, Halloween is a holiday filled with delicious treats! Below are some examples of treats a person could eat on Halloween. 

Halloween Treats!

 

  

Halloween in Half Moon Bay, California!

This is a picture of my sister and all ready to go trick or treating!
 

These are ghosts my mom made to decorate the front of our house.
 

My sister and I carving pumpkins! 

Here my sister and I are at pumpking patch to pick our pumpkins for carving.

In Half Moon Bay, there is a giant pumpkin weight off. This picture is with the winner in 2002!

My mom is dressed as a doll and I am dressed as an elephant. 

Can you match the picture to the Halloween vocabulary?

Costumes

Halloween parties

Trick-or-treating

Haunted houses

Spooky

Pumpkin patches

Candy

Corn mazes

Carving pumpkins

Ghosts

Graveyards

Jack-o-lantern

Try this English listening exercise! Listen to the song "This is Halloween" and fill in the blanks in the lyrics! If you miss any of the words scroll to the bottom of this post for the answers. :)

This is Halloween

_________ and _________  of every age . Wouldn't you like to see something strange?

Come with us and you will _________ . This, our town of _________________.

This is Halloween, this is Halloween. _________________ scream in the dead of night. 

This is Halloween, everybody make a __________ .  

Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright. 

It's our town, everybody ___________. In this town of Halloween. 

I am the one hiding under your _________ . Teeth ground sharp and eyes glowing _________ . 

I am the one hiding under your stairs. Fingers like _________  and _________  in my hair. 

This is Halloween, this is Halloween. Halloween!_________________! Halloween! Halloween!

In this town we call _________. Everyone hail to the pumpkin song. 

In this town, don't we _________ it now? Everybody's waiting for the next surprise. 

'Round that corner, man hiding in the trash can. 

Something's waiting no to pounce, and how you'll Scream! 

This is Halloween. _________ 'n' _________, and slimy _________. 

Aren't you scared? Well, that's just fine. 

Say it once, say it twice. Take a chance and roll the _________. 

Ride with the _________ in the dead of night. Everybody scream, everybody _________!

In our _________ of Halloween! I am the clown with the tear-away _________.

Here in a flash and gone without a trace. 

I am the "who" when you call, "Who's there?"

I am the wind blowing through your _________. I am the shadow on the moon at _________. 

Filling your dreams to the brim with _________. This is Halloween, this is Halloween.

Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! _________________ ! Halloween!

Tender lumplings everywhere. Life's no _________ without a good scare. 

That's our _________, but we're not mean. In our town of Halloween. 

In this town. Don't we _________ it now?

Everybody's waiting for the next surprise. Skeleton Jack might catch you in the back

and scream like a banshee. Make you jump out of your _________. 

This is Halloween, everybody _________. 

Won't ya please make way for a very special guy

Our man Jack is King of the ______________ patch. 

Everyone hail to the Pumpkin King, now!

This is Halloween, this is Halloween. Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

In this town we call _________. Everyone hail to the pumpkin song.

La la la ___ la la la ___ la la (Halloween! Halloween!)

La la la ___ ___ la la la la la (Halloween! _________________!)

Boys and girls of every age. Wouldn't you like to see something strange?

Come with us and you will see. This, our town of Halloween.

This is Halloween, this is Halloween. Pumpkins scream in the dead of night. 

This is Halloween, everybody make a scene. 

Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright. 

It's our town, everybody scream. In this town of Halloween.

I am the one hiding under your bed. Teeth ground sharp and eyes glowing red.

I am the one hiding under your stairs. Fingers like snakes and spiders in my hair.

This is Halloween, this is Halloween. Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

In this town we call home. Everyone hail to the pumpkin song.

In this town, don't we love it now? Everybody's waiting for the next surprise.

'Round that corner, man hiding in the trash can. 

Something's waiting no to pounce, and how you'll

Scream! This is Halloween. Red 'n' black, and slimy green.

Aren't you scared? Well, that's just fine

Say it once, say it twice. Take a chance and roll the dice.

Ride with the moon in the dead of night. Everybody scream, everybody scream!

In our town of Halloween! I am the clown with the tear-away face.

Here in a flash and gone without a trace. 

I am the "who" when you call, "Who's there?"

I am the wind blowing through your hair. I am the shadow on the moon at night.

Filling your dreams to the brim with fright. This is Halloween, this is Halloween.

Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

Tender lumplings everywhere. Life's no fun without a good scare.

That's our job, but we're not mean. In our town of Halloween.

In this town. Don't we love it now?

Everybody's waiting for the next surprise. Skeleton Jack might catch you in the back and scream like a banshee. 

Make you jump out of your skin.

This is Halloween, everybody scream. 

Won't ya please make way for a very special guy

Our man Jack is King of the Pumpkin patch. 

Everyone hail to the Pumpkin King, now!

This is Halloween, this is Halloween. Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

In this town we call home. Everyone hail to the pumpkin song. 

Happy Halloween!