Well, it is that time again… Chinese New Year and our yearly revisit to all things Chinese. This year I decided to go a slightly different route and combine a look at the country with light worksheets with a monkey theme. Instead of doing a notebook like last year (which was a blast HERE), the younger ones voted for a binder like they did for Christmas, and the twins continued their special event book they also began at Christmas. The centerpiece of our unit is a lovely large map of China that Ken created and printed out for us – 9 pieces of printer paper in all. With some star stickers I lucked out and found at the Dollar Tree last year we were well on our way.

We started with the Great Wall of China. I found a video documentary on youTube and some wonderful books. We really lucked out with a series of entertaining and educational books, for the Great Wall we used  For some other helpful books!

• 20 Fun Facts About the Great Wall of China by Therese Shea HERE
• Great Wall of China by Elizabeth Raum HERE
• You Wouldn’t Want to Work on the Great Wall of China HERE

One of the activities I came up with for the kids to do was make postcards based on famous landmarks in China. I basically Googled those terms and let the kids scroll through the list and images at the top of the search engine. I love it when they have that freedom to make their own choices. Granted we vetoed The Forbidden City and The Great Wall since we were covering those as a family in detail.

• Trinity chose the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding. Their official site HERE is adorable. Trinity got her fact about the beginning point of this amazing place off Wiki HERE. It all began with 6 panda!
• Emanuel chose Elephant Trunk Hill in Guilin. So called for its shape that mimics an elephant with its trunk in the water. We went to a travel site for amazing pictures and some great information HERE. Thanks to China Travel Guide.
• Gavin chose Big Wild Goose Pagoda in Xian City. There is a lot about this Buddhist temple and some good history to cover, so he got picked to do a mini report on it as well. But for starters, we went back to the China Travel Guide HERE.
• Zander chose Mount Sanqin in the Jiangxi Province. One of the top mountains for tourism it was chosen strictly on the amazing google search picture he found next to it HERE. We went back to our travel guide site for help with facts and numbers. Talk about and animal and plant rich mountain! HERE.

We do love our colouring pages and beyond the bounty that is Activity Village, we found some other gems… the twins love the stained glass style year of the monkey page at The Imagination Box HERE.

Sparklebox has some great stuff on their page, we specifically printed out the full list of animals and their Chinese characters HERE.

This year we spent a good week on the Forbidden City. There is so much to see and learn about, I think we could have spent a month. BUT here are the links we used:

• Ducksters HERE
• China.MrDonn.org HERE

We found two amazing books… You Wouldn’t Want to Be in the Forbidden City! by Jacqueline Morley HERE and In the Forbidden City HERE

Guangzhou is a relatively new topic for our family, but important all the same. This is the city that our dear friends and family came from. So this year I figured we needed to know more. And boy is there a lot to know! A massive place there was a wonderful official site to look through HERE. But we used so many more links, all to get a handle on the size… the lifestyle and the amazing uniqueness of a place that must be so different from anywhere we have visited ourselves.

• Trip Advisor HERE
• Kidz Search HERE
• Top China Travel HERE
• Travel China Guide HERE, HERE
• Science Kids HERE
• Wiki HERE
• Connect the dots with Connect the Dots 101 HERE
• Maps of World HERE

We covered a few cities in a relatively brief overview… Hong Kong was a rather complex concept with a few helpful links at Crayola.com for a colouring page with information of their flag HERE, Academic Exchange HERE, About Travel HERE, Travelling East HERE, Ducksters HERE, Kidz Search HERE.

One of the kids’ favourite activities this time round was to try out origami… especially once the twins figured out they could make THROWING STARS!

• Kids Gen has videos HERE
• Origami with Rachel Katz HERE

As something relatively new to our China unit we covered two people important to the shaping of China – Confucius and Chairman Mao. It was our first foray into this deep of a conversation for the twins and as interesting. Things like Communism and philosophy came up as did the concept of a rather brutal leadership. Here are some links!

• Kids Philosophy Slam HERE, A China Family Adventure HERE, Biography.com HERE, My Interesting Facts HERE, Ask.com HERE,

General China sites that were helpful:

• Science Kids HERE
• Take a peek at language differences though I warn you there is a missing resource with Discovery Education HERE. We contacted our friends who are the true pure resource for this one.
• Kai-Lan’s official printables thanks to Nick Jr. HERE

Of course we had to look at inventions. This was an exercise in the twins actually choosing inventions and searching for them themselves online to find out things like who, when, where… so I will just link the main ones used.

• China Whisper had a list of top 20 HERE
• Wiki has their own list HERE
• Did you know toilet paper was first used by the Chinese??? Today I Found Out explains HERE

And Chinese New Year itself:

• Asian Holidays by Faith Winchester HERE
• Happy Chinese New Year, Kai-Lan! HERE

Videos:

• Stone Soup… and other stories from the Asian Tradition HERE
• Beijing Travel Guide DVD 2002/2004
• Food With Friends! (Dora) HERE

Additional Books:

• A Gift by Yong Chen HERE
• China by Michael Dahl HERE
• Beijing and Shanghai HERE
• China by Christine Juarez HERE
• China a Question and Answer Book by Nathan Olson HERE
• Ancient Civilizations China by Valerie Bodden HERE
• China phrasebook by Lonely Planet HERE
• The Magical East HERE
• D is For Dragon Dance by Ying Chang Compestine HERE
• Wonders of the World by Colin Dibben HERE
• Goldy Luck and the Three Pandas by Natasha Yim HERE
• Celebrate Chinese New Year by Carolyn Otto HERE
• Chinese New Year by Alice K. Flanagan HERE
• The Runaway Ricecake by Ying Chang Compestine HERE

Two books I am dying to add to our collection:

• Little Leap Forward: A Boy in Beijing by Guo Yue HERE
• And a family favourite… The Runaway Wok by Ying Chang Compestine HERE

To add to our unit we focused on monkeys that live in China. I won’t link all the pages we used, but I had the kids check out the list on Wiki and then we did our research online. We had the Slow Loris, Golden Snub Nosed, Black Crested Gibbon and. It is always fun to add an animal connection to a unit.

I am sure I could continue on with more and more links. We really went ALL OUT on this unit this year. But I figure I will just add those to the random resource post I plan on adding to the site later in May. I would suggest, if you have not looked into China as a homeschool or personal research project, do so! The culture, the people and the country itself is AMAZING! We are so blessed to have friends who are family who are directly from there. They have opened our eyes and our hearts to an amazing new world! 

Our Special Snack Platter with the newest addition to our decorations.. lucky orange tree!

I know I haven’t posted much in the way of an update on the stitching. The time just seems to dart away with you. BUT I do have progress on the Rainbow Ripple Blanket… I am still in love with this project, though the orange in my third rainbow gave me all sorts of trouble. Progress has been spotty on it, thankfully I am not even close to out of time!

However, I did have OTHER completions come and go these past weeks. 13 Valentine themed tiny bags were done up in no time flat. Some for our family and some for the kids to gift. HERE thanks to Blackstone Designs.

I also finished some of the most adorable baby sweaters that were quickly posted in the mail to the newest twins of our acquaintance. I am making a third of this pattern for the county fair! I will share the pictures of that one too. HERE thanks to Sinead Deegan.

A one day free pattern from Snappy Tots HERE has me hooking up a Valentine’s themed scarf.

A special SUPER late birthday present was also completed and finally posted in the mail. A bag we (Ken and I) converted into a backpack. Perfect for toting a few things for school or home. HERE thanks to Red Heart.

What else, what else… well with the donation of yarn from a friend who was downsizing I was finally able to finish a shawlette I started ages ago. It reminds the girls of Frozen (colour scheme I guess). HERE thanks to Crochetspot.com … though NOT a free pattern.

The same wonderful gift has me FINALLY starting a cupcake blanket in baby pink. This is a classroom only project, for when I have down time between lessons or the kids are presenting or crafting. They love the cupcakes and I love the repetition. I have opted to have a single colour as the bulk of the blanket with the border in a second colour. Here’s hoping that there is enough of the colour in my stash now. HERE thanks to Roseanna Beck.

In honour of Chinese New Year (year of the monkey) I made a lucky orange tree. The pattern is thanks to Little Mee Creations. We made a few alterations… we put a plastic canvas base and instead of the suggested straw used a wider dowel with thinner dowels for the branches. This did alter my stitch count around both the trunk and branches but it worked. I also made mine a taller tree, which the kids LOVE. Either way… if you are a crochet enthusiast give it a go. So worth it! HERE

I have decreased my unfinished work pile and am staring temptation in the face to add more to it. 6 gifted skeins of a specific colour of Homespun sitting in a pile in my room… I swear it is taunting me… and I have, perhaps, found a pattern that I would not mind making… so let’s see if I can add that to my schedule!

That is not to say I haven’t been working on the rainbow. I am hoping to put some good time in on it during the second half of February. Short month, but lots of time to sneak away and stitch. If I am careful!

As a matter of fact, my Etsy store HERE has not been a rip roaring success these past months… I have done very well at Christmas time but not so much over the rest of the year. SO, my plan is to stop renewing my adds over the next few months and revamp my Facebook It’s a Hoot page HERE. Hopefully, over the next few weeks I can sort it out so you can view anything I have for sale there. Feel free to check it out, share the link… put someone who may be interested on the path… I would love to send some of these finished pieces on to a new home!!!