Loving Berlioz the Bear!

It is so funny to me how much homeschooling has changed my perspective on life. I am always on the lookout for educational moments -- it is no longer a cloudy day, but an art lesson. Bugs aren't nearly as icky to me (although I am a far cry from calling them Beautiful like Jordan does!) because I can see how much my girls delight in them, and we can then talk about God's creation. I notice the beauty in the trees and listen to the birds sing. Everything is an adventure!!

It has also changed my outlook on literature. I was just telling my dear friend Marsha last night how I would have never noticed, much less cared about, illustrations before this journey began, but now I squeal in excitement when I see the beautiful artwork in some of these amazing stories we are sharing! Berlioz The Bear is one of those stories. Jan Brett's illustrations are life-like, interesting and just a joy to see!

This story is also about one of my favorite things -- music! I have not been the biggest music buff before, but again, since starting to homeschool, I can't get enough of it! We love playing online games where we listen to and match the different instruments, create our own orchestra, watch different people play the various instruments and make our own rhythms. I love that both of them, at the ages of 2 and 3, can name the oboe, cello, bass, viola, violin, trombone, trumpet, clarinet, flute, french horn, and bassoon -- half of which I didn't know existed until this past year! Anyway, I digress....

So this week we are "rowing" Berlioz the Bear and supplementing it with Zin Zin Zin a Violin. We have both episodes of Reading Rainbow in which they were featured, which is always a huge hit with my girls.... Jordan in particular is an auditory/visual learner and the story always "clicks" when she can see a video of it. Monday we kept it pretty simple and discussed that he lived in Germany and found it on the globe. Do you know that Tuesday morning, when I took Berlioz out, she immediately told me that he lived in Germany and wanted to find it on the globe??? How awesome is that? I don't think I knew there was such a place as Germany when I was her age, lol! We then talked about onomatopoeia and what a funny word it is, and how Jan Brett used it in the story with the word "buzz," and we had fun coming up with tons of other words, too. We then looked at how she used the illustrations to tell a story within a story, and that was when I was finally able to really appreciate the beauty of her artwork. We finished up with reading Zin Zin Zin A Violin and talking about all the musical instruments some more.

Today was Art/Music day, so we read the stories and really focused on the instruments involved. We got online and played a lot of fun music games, and then made our own instruments! I was trying to figure out what we could use since I didn't have any shoe boxes or kleenex boxes when I finally looked at the storage bins we use for their toys. We have one of those 3 level toy organizers that come with 9 storage bins, so I took two of them and put rubber bands around them... it was perfect! The girls had a blast saying they were different instruments -- first they were guitars, then they were violins, then we turned them upside down and made them drums :-)


If you haven't had a chance to read this book, or any of Jan Brett's stories, I strongly encourage you to check them out! She is very talented and has a wonderful website with fun activities and go-alongs, too!

Have a Wonderful Wednesday!!