Fall 2009

Tuesdays, Sept 22nd – Dec 15th, 2009 (13 weeks)

11:00am-12:00pm

Study and Practice of Swordplay and Knightly Weapons: Lessons focus on Longsword, Sword and Shield, Quarterstaff, Archery, Grappling
$240 +tax (ages 8-14, max class size 12)

12:15pm-1:30pm

Old World Studies: 4000BC-600AD Classical Europe and the Near East – History, Geography, Technology, Linguistics, Governments and Societal Structure, Religion and Myth, Culture and Archaeology
$240 +tax (ages 8-14, max class size 12)

Winter/Spring 2010

Tuesdays, Jan 12th – Jun 15th, 2010(22 weeks)
No Classes Mar 9th, 2010
11:00am-12:00pm

Study and Practice of Swordplay and Medieval and Renaissance Weapons: Lessons focus on Rapier, Longsword, Sword and Shield, Quarterstaff, Archery, Grappling $350 +tax (ages 8-14, max class size 12)

12:15pm-1:30pm

Medieval Studies: 600AD-1400AD Classical Europe and the Near East – History, Geography, Technology, Linguistics, Governments and Societal Structure, Religion and Myth, Culture and Archaeology
$350 +tax (ages 8-14, max class size 12)

www.LearnSwordPlay.com
Register by calling Academie Duello at 604-568-9907 or visiting our downtown location.
Distance Learning Program funding accepted

This is the local Vancouver not-back-to-school picnic.

Everyone welcome, this is a great time to meet vancouverites and see if
homelearning is for you!

We meet under one of the willow trees in the big grassy area right off 4th Ave.

When:

Thursday September 10th 2009

10:30 am to Whenever

Where:

Jericho Beach Park
West 4th Avenue (@ Wallace Street)

Buses stop just by the park.

Location:

Queens Park, New Westminster

meet at the covered picnic area near the children’s playground – LOOK FOR THE hs-ca QUILT

When

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

11-ish a.m. The first day of school, which is September 8 this year.

Bring:

• food for your family
• sun screen
• rain gear
• well labelled park toys
• musical instruments
• enthusiasm
• willingness to meet new homeschoolers
• anything else you can think of

Directions:

Queen’s park is located near the Arenex Complex in New West and is easy to find from Vancouver, Surrey/Langley and most places in the Lower Mainland. If coming from Surrey, take the Patullo Bridge and just go straight (McBride). You will see the park on your left. From Vancouver, take Canada Way to 10th Avenue in New West, turn left at the highschool and follow 10th around to McBride. The park will be on your right.

This is a very casual event. People start gathering around 11 and stay until they feel like going home. It can be very reassuring, especially for first-time homelearners, to have something special to do when all the neighbourhood kids troop back to school. If you are a new homeschooler, come out and meet some experienced folks. If you have been at this for awhile, come and share your experience with a newbie. Last year we made masking tape name tags and indicated a new homeschooler with a colour-coded N so that the rest of us would make a point of welcoming the new folks.

For information contact Melissa at infomomster@gmail.com

This note is just to make sure everyone knows there will be NO co-op tomorrow (Tuesday June 9). We are finished until the Fall. Have a great summer and I look forward to seeing everyone in September.

Acid and Base Experiments Intro

Carbon Dioxide Balloon

Blowing out Candle with Carbon Dioxide Method One

Blowing out Candle with Carbon Dioxide Method Tw

Recently at our Homelearner’s Co-op, Anja led some experiments with baking soda and vinegar. Cassius asked me if I knew that some acids, like lemons and some bases can conduct electricity. When we were at home, Cassius asked Rosalind for her meter. He stuck both the ends of the meter in a lemon and was disappointed to see no reading on the meter.

Rosalind explained that the meter just measures voltage or current, it didn’t create a circuit. Rosalind was curious where he got the idea from and he said that it was from a video he had watched on BrainPOP. They watched it and Cassius said he was confused – he was thinking lemons created electricity not conduct it.

This got Rosalind thinking about making batteries from citrus fruit. She sent him the experiments included below. As it turns out, he was right, you can power things with lemon power not just conduct electricity through it.

Electric Lemon Experiement

“Find a dime and penny dated before 1987 and wash them thoroughly. Have a parent cut two slits in another juicy lemon, about 1/4 inch apart, and insert the coins halfway into each slit. Stick out your tongue and touch both coins simultaneously. You’ll feel it tingling–that’s electricity!”

This picture is of Cassius and Anja testing their lemons. At first they didn’t put the coins close enough, but when they moved them, it worked.

I found Cassius’ original experiement interesting because it was something he tried because he had an idea and wanted to see if it worked. The fact that it didn’t work led him him learning even more to figure out how to make it work.

Rosalind and Cassius figured out that the penny had copper plating and the dime has nickle plating. We also figured out that the Canadians held on to having these metals in our money longer than the Americans so if we followed the American dates we should be safe. We had to soak the coins in vinegar for a while to clean off the oxidation.

Join us tomorrow at the Co-op for a game of Carcassonne.