The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge

A couple of weeks ago, my hubby and I had the chance to spend 6 days in Midtown Manhattan. We left Ben home with my mom for their yearly “staycation.” Every year, in August, my mom takes Ben for a few days and they have fun visiting places in Louisville. He had a great time with her, but I know he wishes he could have gone to NYC with us.

So when we got back home and were choosing which Five in a Row book to study next, Ben wanted to learn about NY. So we chose The LIttle Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge.

“Once upon a time a little lighthouse was built on a sharp point of the shore by the Hudson River. It was round and fat and red. It was fat and red and jolly. And it was VERY, VERY PROUD. Behind it lay New York City where the people lived…”

And so begins the story . . .

We’ve had a lot of fun learning about New York, lighthouses, bridges, personification, and compound words. But mostly we’ve just had fun reading this book over and over. Ben really loves it (and so do I!)
Yesterday we went on a “bridge hunt” around our city. We live along the Ohio River, so there are many bridges. We drove over a couple, looked at others, and then went to a park where there was a old stone arch bridge. There was also a fountain to play in, so of course Ben had to get wet!

Here are a few pictures of our lapbook covering our studies from The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge.

Here’s Ben proudly displaying our book of the week!

This is the cover for our lapbook. Ben wrote the title as a handwriting exercise.

When the lapbook is first opened, on the left is Ben’s Daymark Book and on the right, his Bridge Book. In the center, you’ll find a map of NY, one of Manhattan and information about NY’s capitol, nickname, and state symbols.

This is the Daymark Book opened up. Ben colored them with different patterns to show how lighthouses each have a different pattern to so that sailors know their positions based on the pattern of lighthouses they see.

Here you see the map of Manhattan opened up. It’s difficult to see in this picture, but there is an inset picture of the little red lighthouse in the upper left.

Here you see the minit book of the NY state symbols opened up. The state bird is the bluebird, flower is the rose, tree is the sugar maple.

Here is a sample page of the Bridge Book. We have samples of suspension, cantilever, stone arch, truss, railroad, 2 arch, and drawbridges in the book. All of the bridges were found right here in our city with the exception of the suspension. We used a picture of the Great Gray Bridge (the George Washington in NY) for our example of that one.

This is the view when the center page is lifted. At the top, there is Ben’s drawing of The Little Pink Flowers and the Great Green Oak, an example of contrast in size in art. Under that you will find a handwriting exercise and gamepieces for our compound word game on the left, and on the right, a close-up picture of the little red lighthouse and a drawing of Ben’s Beetle, showing personification.

These are compound word game pieces, which easily store in the cup at the bottom.

This is Ben’s Beetle (you know, as in the VW Beetle car), with a face drawn on it to show personification.

Here’s a lighthouse Ben built from his pattern blocks.

Below is a few pictures from our bridge hunt!

The Falls of the Ohio Railroad Drawbridge

This is the view looking upward while on the Sherman Minton Bridge, a two-span, steel thru arch bridge.

I took this photo as we approached the George Rogers Clark bridge, a cantilevered thru truss bridge. If you look to the right and left, you’ll see the sidewalks. You can walk or drive over this bridge between KY and IN.

This is the Tyler Park bridge, a stone arch bridge over a pedestrian underpass. This bridge is located in one of our lovely metro parks. You can’t see it, but very close is a playground and water fountain for the kids to play in. The next picture shows Ben cooling off in the fountain. It was hot and muggy this day and we both needed some cooling off!

Ben cooling off in the fountain water at Tyler Park.

All in all, another great couple of weeks in our homeschool!

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