Week in Review - Drug Awareness Week Part 1

We are still working our way through our Human Body unit. This week, we have been studying the brain and the effects of legal and illegal drugs on the brain and body.

I was able to find some very good FREE resources to help me in teaching my children about the dangers of smoking, drug, and alcohol abuse. Here is a direct link to one of the programs that I used, targeted for 2nd to 3rd grade students. National Institute on Drug Abuse, NIDA Junior Scientists Program for Primary Grade Students, NIH Publication No. 01-4575, National Clearinghouse for Alcohol and Drug Information. I also used a program targeted for older children, National Institute on Drug Abuse, NIDA Junior Scientists Program for Intermediate Students, NIG Publication No. 05-5730, National Clearinghouse for Alcohol and Drug Information. The NIH also has numerous other publications which might be helpful in a home drug-use prevention education program.

I ordered the program for grades 6-9 and plan to review and extend the children's knowledge in this area with the program next year. Although the materials for the younger children are clearly geared towards younger children in their activities, I found the information to be highly relevant for older children. For example, the beginning program focused on the effects of smoking. While I have told my children that smoking is bad for them, they have not been educated about the effects of smoking in a concrete way. Even though two of my children are older than the target audience for the younger program, I chose to start with that one. I highly recommend these Junior Scientist programs. They come with a teacher's guide, student materials, and a VHS tape. Best of all, they are completely free.

We watched a few great videos this week to go along with our Human Body unit:

• Bill Nye the Science Guy - Heart


• Human Body for Children - All About Nutrition and Exercise


• Human Body: Pushing the Limits (Strength and Sight) - only my daughter and I watched these excellent and highly interesting videos

Duncan continued with his independent reading related to nutrition. In addition to his independent reading, he completed several food pyramid worksheets that I printed out from http://www.enchantedlearning.com/ for him.

• Drinking Water by Helen Frost


• Grains by Carol Alexander


• Exercise by Sharon Gordon


• How Does Your Brain Work? by Don L. Curry


• Fats, Oils, and Sweets by Carol Parenzan Smalley


• You Are What You Eat by Sharon Gordon

One of the highlights of our week was our weekly art lesson. For this lesson from Atelier Art, the children completed color wheels and then drew and painted a hot air balloon of their design.

As usual, the children all created quite different, and quite lovely paintings. Mason's balloon was bright and colorful.

Duncan's balloon was bright, colorful, and complete with a funny face!Amber's balloon was lovely with the light blue cloud wash she chose to add to her background. She used a sponge for the background technique.Lastly, at the end of the art lesson, the children completed X-ray handprints using Biocolor white and black paints. First, I painted their hands white, then they made a print. Then, they spread black paint over the white handprints with a paint scraper. The effect was wonderful and the children all enjoyed making their x-rays!

That was our week - if you would like to read what other homeschoolers did this past week, check out Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers for the Weekly Wrap-Up.