Continents and Nations Study - South America

We continued our study on Continents and Nations and this week we had to do South America and some South American Countries.

Since we had two weeks breaks we started all over again. I just asked Maimoonah some random questions with regard to Continents and Countries that we have covered so far. Then I realised she was getting a bit confused with Countries and Continents, like if I ask her in Which continent is Qatar she said Saudi Arabia. So I decided to recap everything all over again.

First we used this Continent Puzzle. Both of completed the puzzle as it was not easy for her to do it all alone.

Then I explained that Allaah created the earth and this is how it looks. Some Part of it is land and the other part water. So I showed her the land area and the water area on the map and said the land area is called Continents and the water Area is called Oceans. I explained to her Allaah has created the parts of the land far away from each other thus man has named the land that are in different places with names such as "Africa, Asia etc etc" while pointing to each of them. And said they have named like this to identify each part of the land. Then I asked her how many continents are there and she said 7 and she named all of them. Then I showed her each continent and said that inside this big area of land you get countries with different names and all these countries are situated on this particular area of land which is a continent and told her some of the names of the countries she has learnt in each Continent. Then I reminded her about the Aayah on Nations and Tribes that we started our study with and Alhamdulillaah now she understood.

Then I also asked her to trace the world map, colour and show be all the continents. I asked her randomly some countries and she pointed to them on the map she drew and told me to which continent those countries belong to.

 

Then we read about South America. We learnt about the Andes Mountains, Amazon Forest, Angel Falls and many more. She coloured the map on her Continent Book.

 

We chose Brazil, Argentina and Peru for the countries and recorded the facts. This time I asked Maimoonah to look up for each Country on the World Fact Book and find out the facts and copy write. Masha Allaah she did a very good job which amazed me too. We read about each country and the food and stuff you get there.

 

 

 

Then she pinned the flag of the South American Countries on her wooden map.

I had this Book "Jungle Fever" with me and I thought this really fitted well for our Study.

 

We have read this many times before but now that we have studied about South America it made sense to her and a nice way to keep facts in mind. ( Imaan and Umm Khidr I guess this what it is to teach through living books???!! Correct me if I am wrong) This is a story of an Adventure of a Boy who goes to visit the Amazon Forest. The book is written as a Diary Format. I explained to Maimoonah that this is the Journal or a Diary that people record the day to day happenings.

Then I asked her to write on a piece of paper and show me how she would record for today if she had a journal. And here is what she wrote!

Sweet girl, this is how she folded it and gave it me after writing!

This is what it says!
Wednesday, 11th January 2011
I played. I blew bubbles and burst them. I read Jungle Fever. I painted. (At the end it says:) I brought ummi a bouquet of flowers! 

Then the story talks about some Amazon Facts the boy has recorded. So this was a very nice thing to know about South American Amazon Forests. Then he describes that they were living in a small Village in Brazil during this trip and while he went to explore the forest he helps a native American man who was trapped under a fallen tree and he explains how the people of that man's tribe treated his broken leg through herbs and so on. And it talks about the language they spoke which the boy did not understand. Then she told me that people in Brazil Speak Portuguese as she wrote this before : )

Also the boy talks about a good luck charm he carries always on his rucksack. Now I had explained this to her before that believing in these kind of things are shirk and when she read this she started covering that part. I reminded her with the example of Hudhaifah bin Yamaan radhiyallu anhu that he always asked the Messenger of Allaah about the bad so that he can keep away from it. She was shocked. Alhamdulillaah I remembered this at this time. As I see now she is exposed to reading many things and within her she fears to even see an unislamic word on the book. And I know she goes through unnecessary stress and we spoke to her more and said that we must try to avoid these things but we read so that we know we should keep away from these things and knowledge about things that are Haraam is necessary.

So we continued with the story book. We shared reading this book :) Then at the end of the book there were some activities to do and we completed.

Finally to some it up we did a Forest Collage idea taken from here. We did not print out anything as no ink lol! So I drew the trunk and bush of the tree and Maimoonah cut. Then she used that as a stencil and drew more trunks and bushes. She cut them precisely Masha Allaah. We used construction paper and clothe. I cut the material as she refused to do so. Then we painted the trunks and made this collage!

 Masha Allaah this was a great experience as I can see Maimoonah getting more involved and able to do many things now unlike 1 year ago  where her motor skills were not developed. So this is how it looks.

Who thought a simple geography lesson would include not only geography but English Language, writing, reading, Islaamic Studies, History and Art and Crafts too.... Inalhamdulillaah for guiding us and indeed this a ni'mah of home schooling!

I think more than any other continent Maimoonah would remember more of South America so far!!!!