Rocks!

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

This year we have not been using one particular textbook so far for Science (due to relocation I have left out some science books back at home). But we have been doing from here and there using the Cambridge Primary Science Curriculum that we follow. 

We completed our study about Rocks. I was looking for a simple Lapbook on Rocks but could not find anything suitable. So dug up all the resources what I had and found some nice simple stuff Alhamdulillaah. 

We read this book and understood some of the facts about rocks and explained to her the wonderful creation of Allaah.

I got this (pictured below) book at a bargain store for almost free (it was so cheap something like less that 1 riyal). It is an Indian book but a very old edition, however the information was very clear and simple. So we used this book and studied further about.......

• Soil has Rocks

 

 We learnt that soil contains rock and did this experiment as shown above.

Then I asked her to write the experiment and the observation on her book with a picture.

• How is soiled formed? - We learnt how soil is formed. Did this experiment and then I asked her to write the experiment and observation. She also drew a flow chart explaining how this happens.

• Three types of Rocks - We learnt about three types of Rocks Igneous, Sedimentary and Metamorphic. She did some of the activities that were in the book and I also told her to make a table and write the names of each rocks under the correct type of rocks. 

 

 Rock Activity Kit

This Rock Activity kit and the Basic Rock Collection set became so handy for hands on especially because I do not know where to go and collect rocks here. I got these sets from www.rainbowresource.com The kit has 11 rocks samples, a book with scientific activities, puzzles and riddles with information about each rock. The Basic Rock Collection set has samples of all three types of rocks.

 

We had to go through the booklet and identify each rock and write on the specimen card the name of the rock. It was really fun doing this Maashaa Allaah and Maimoonah enjoyed this. 

Then we did many activities from this kit and Maimoonah enjoyed all of them. Here are some of those!

Looking at Pumice through the microscope for its holes.

Experiment - Pumice floats in water because of its holes.

Learning about Dolomite the rock used for constructing roads.

Growing Crystals by putting the dolomite in vinegar

Watching the words rising through the Ulexite!

Nature Challenge - December

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

This month for the Qatar Museum Authority Nature Challenge Maimoonah had to write a poem on 

"Imagine and look up to the sky. What shapes do you see?  What stories are the clouds or the stars telling?" 

Since her success in the last month poem, she has been into looking for rhyming words to write poems and awaiting this month's challenge. 

So I asked her to write down all what she sees when she looks up in the sky. She went to the window looked up in the sky and wrote what she sees and what she used to see. Then I asked her to write what each of them look like for her and what she would want to do with them. She wrote on her note book. Then I asked her to put everything together and make the lines rhyme. So she wrote...

The Sky Like a Canopy

I see..............

Clouds like woolly sheep,

to cuddle and keep.

Sun like the yellow bright ball,

to play and crawl.

Moon like a rocking cradle,

to nest and label.

Twinkling stars like sequins,

to sprinkle the penguins.

Far away planets like tracing dots,

to doodle on the pots.

Flashing lightening like zig-zag,

to stop all our chit-chat

Colourful rainbow peeks out like an arch,

to go under and march.

Glory be to My Lord,

and hoping for His reward.

 

QMuslimah Children's Library - Bigger Premises!

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Assalaamu Alaikum sisters!

Alhamdulillaah! QMuslimah Children's Library has yet again moved to another bigger premises by the grace and Mercy of Allaah. 

We thank the Tawar Compound Management for this facility and now we are at the Masjid Basement area. 

This is the area where books and toys are stored!

We have a separate area for cozy reading and story time! 

Little bit of Educational Toys to learn through play!

And all this for many quiet and beneficial activities Inshaa Allaah!

 

 Sisters, if you are in Doha, please do visit the library with your kids. And look out for beneficial child friendly workshops and activities every now and then Inshaa Allaah. The Library is open for sisters and kids

 ( ages 0 - 9) on Sundays 10 am to 12 Noon and Wednesdays 4 pm to 6 pm.

Crafting at the Park!

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Alhamdulillaah we had a lovely time today Crafting at the Park. A couple of great sisters have organized this event today for kids. They were given a picture with a nature scene each and the kids were asked to do an artwork using things at the park.

The kids were walking around happily looking for things to decorate, They found dead leaves, branches grass, and sand around. Here are some of the masterpieces of the kids.

This is what Maimoonah did.

 They also played and enjoyed the rest of the day at this beautiful Museum of Islamic Art Park!

Jazzakumullaah Khayr sister for organizing this nice event.

Essential Lessons for Every Muslim - Pillars of Eemaan - Belief in the Angels

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Alhamdulillaah we are continuing with the Essential Lessons for every Muslim and we completed "Belief in the Angels' few weeks ago.

Often many sisters ask me, as for other subjects there are many wonderful resources available but how to make Islaamic studies an interesting subject to teach our kids as we are restricted and cannot find anything to make it appealing to the kids like the other subjects. Well, while it is true in some way, my experience is that Islaamic Studies is indeed not a subject rather it is our life. This is what we need to understand first and try our best to come up with acceptable creativity to make this interesting. Knowledge of the dheen is for acting upon it. And actualizing it. This should be the focus in teaching our kids our dheen. It is not like doing some worksheets and hands on activities, rather you need to make the knowledge live in their hearts and that would be the greater success Inshaa Allaah. 

So what I found best that works for us is going back to the books of the scholars rather than focusing only on text books for Islaamic Studies (as some sisters say textbooks today are usually dry and boring). There are many wonderful facts and interesting information in them that makes a child live what he or she is taught. One such example you will see in this post Inshaa Allaah, just to encourage you all that Islaamic Studies need not be a boring subject. Children are inquisitive and love to learn every little information that is fascinating and Belief in the Angels is one such topic that makes kids happy if taught well Inshaa Allaah!

So we covered the following areas:

• The Definition of Angels - Linguistic Meaning 
• The Definition of Angels - Shariah Meaning
• Arabic Singular and Plural Terms for Angels

• Belief of the Mushrik Arabs regarding Angels before Islaam
• The Fruits of believing in the Angels

• What it means to believe in the Angels
• Proofs that it is obligatory to believe in the Angels

• What comprises of the belief in the Angels

• Their relation to Man

 The above details were from the book Explanation of the Important Lessons for Every Muslim. Apart from this we read the wonderful easy to understand child friendly book "Angels are Real"( Darul Kitab Learn About Series) and got some information about the Angels and their duties and what they do and noted them on one page.

 

Maimoonah used toothpicks and paints to decorate these pages before we put in the information.

 

So we learnt some fascinating facts about Angels. While she filled in some of the information we spoke about incidents that took place to prove that Angels are Real. We spoke about Haroot and Maaroot, The Angles helping the Muslims in battles, The angel who writes when we are a fetus, the angels who make dua for us, the angels who take our good deeds to Allaah, angels who take our souls, angels who come down to punish the people who disobey Allaah and so on. Subhanallaah there are so many incidents to talk about from the Qur'aan and the sunnah. 

 

 

 At the end of the lesson, she understood that Allaah sends Angels to guard us and they are real and around us and felt secured about it. She also understood that Angels remind us to do our duties when we are lazy and support us always by the permission of Allaah. I felt this is indeed eemaan in the Angels as now the knowledge she has got has helped her understand that Angels are real and Allaah is merciful and she would be accountable.This is what I meant by "Islaamic Studies is not a subject, but our life". Alhamdulillaah, guidance is only from Allaah!

Additionally for younger kids you can use this worksheet I made two years ago from" My Downloads" page Inshaa Allaah!

Stories of the Prophets - Aadam عليه السلام‎ Activity Pack!

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

As you all know we planned to do a Scrapbook for the Study of the Stories of the Prophets this year. But when I started looking into Ibn Katheer's Stories of the Prophets book, I found there is so much of information and just putting all of them into a scrapbook was not possible. And I wanted Maimoonah to know every important part of the story that is mentioned in there for each Prophet,  from the beginning till the end.

So I am hoping to make Activity Packs for each Prophet based upon the Book Stories of the Prophets of Ibn Katheer Raheemahullaah. And this one what you see is the first such pack on Aadam عليه السلام completed and ready for downloading here and the Answers for this Activity Pack could be downloaded here

                                           

This is checked and reviewed by a student of knowledge, Alhamdulillaah. May Allaah bless the brother for taking the time to do it. And may Allaah reward sister Umm Aayah one of the readers of my blog for offering her help and taking the trouble to make this simple layout designing to make it interesting for the kids. Aameen. 

It includes Context Questions, Fill in the blanks, Questions to make the kids write complete answers, stating true or false, little interesting facts mentioned by Ibn Katheer about Aadam عليه السلام, Arts and Crafts Activities, Writing a letter about the false theory of evolution, little bit of a Maths Activity, Vocabulary fun and Arabic Activities.

I have tried as much as possible to familiarize the Qu'raanic Aayahs regarding the Story of Aadam عليه السلام so that the children will be accustomed to refer back to Qur'aan.

These packs are designed for ages 5 and up, but parents can use them and teach the younger children as well Inshaa Allaah and do with them orally and also engage them in Arts and Crafts Activities.

I hope you and your kids would enjoy it and if you find any mistakes please let me know. Would also love to hear your feedback.

May Allaah accept this from us and benefit all of us.

Inheritors of the Prophets - Imaam Aboo Haneefah

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Continuing with our Knowing the Scholars  series we learnt about Imaam Aboo Haneefah Nu'maan bin Taabit Raheemahullaah.

We used the following links and read his biography.

• Biography of Imaam Aboo Haneefah
• Mistake of Imaam Aboo Haneefah
• The Madhab of Imaam Aboo Haneefah
• A Debate with an Atheist 

We learnt that his real name was Nu'maan bin Taabit but he was better known by his kunya "Abu Haneefah". His father has met Ali bin Abi Taalib radhiyallhu anhu and he has made dua for his blessings and his offspring.

We learnt the names of his teachers and his students.

We also traced the map and marked the places of his birth, death, and the cities he has travelled to gain ilm. 

We read and understood what the other scholars had to say about Imaam Abu Haneefah.

We also learnt that he was an Imaam of the Ahlus Sunnah who never called anyone to blind follow him rather he said:

"It is not permitted for anyone to accept our views if they do not know from where we got them.

In one narration, "It is prohibited for someone who does not know my evidence to give verdicts on the basis of my words."

We discussed the mistake he raheemahullaah made with regard to his saying "Actions of the limbs do not enter into Eemaan". This was a good opportunity to explain that Allaah forgives the scholars of the Ahlus Sunnah for mistakes and the other Ulama still hold him a scholar of the Ahlus Sunnaah but we do not blindly take this mistake even from a great scholar like Aboo Haneefah.

After we have done everything we got to know this incident in which Imaam Aboo Haneefah proves an atheist the existence of Allaah.

Imaam Abu Haneefah (d. 150H) once debated some atheists. He asked them: "What do you say about someone who tells you that he had seen a loaded ship without a captain and a crew amidst a strong storm, but sailing well towards a safe harbour [ thereby saving itself]? Do you intelligently accept this?" They said: "Our reasoning cannot accept this". Abu Haneefah then commented: "If your reasoning does not accept the story of a ship without a leading crew, then how do you accept a whole universe with all its varied conditions and complex nature running without a Creator in full charge?" So the atheists were dumbfounded and came to believe in Allaah.

We learnt that he refused to accept to be a judge at that time and he was jailed for it and died in the prison in the year 150 AH. May Allaah have Mercy upon him. Aameen.

The Scrapbook document we did could be downloaded here

Nature Challenge and First Poem!

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Qatar Museum Authority has invited us to participate in their Nature Challenge that would be going on for the next 4 months and we are hoping to participate Inshaa Allaah. Each month they give us a topic or a challenge and the participants Ages 4 - 12 residing in Qatar can submit (online) a poem or an artwork based on the monthly theme. A child can submit any number of entries. A winner will be selected for each month. Winners would be awarded a Nature Kit in April 2014 Inshaa Allaah.

Here is a brief detail about the Challenge taken from their website

This competition is intended to engage children in Qatar with nature and the world around them.

Our hope is that children will create a community map, showing the world as they see, imagine,

and dream it to be. Please support your students and children by helping them to understand the

monthly challenge and encourage their creative responses with artwork, poems, or short stories. 

Please remember, each entry must be a child’s original work based on the monthly theme in

order to be valid. 

More details could be found here.

This month's Challenge is 

"Imagine your favorite green space in Qatar. What does it look like? Why do you enjoy going there?"

I told Maimoonah about this whole thing today and explained to her and showed what other kids have uploaded. She was very excited and liked the whole idea. Since I know Maimoonah does not write poems, I have been cracking my mind thinking what kind of artwork would be best for the theme and in fact asked another dear sister to send me some ideas from a book that she had with her as well. (Jazzakillaah Khayr for sending me sis it was helpful for us even though we did not do them). But surprisingly she wanted to enter the competition but opted to write a poem for this month!

Now, we have been studying about few poems in the Nelson English Book for the last few months. I like the way they introduce this subject in this book, where they make it easy for kids to attempt writing poems. Especially this one!

 

But even though she writes many stories and uses lots of new vocabularies, so far she has not written any poems. Any way Alhamdulillaah I though this is an opportunity to enhance this skill as she is saying she wants to submit a poem and an artwork every month Inshaa Allaah.

So the first thing I did was asking her to choose her favourite green space in Qatar. She chose Dahl Al Hamam Park. This is a beautiful park known as the "House of the Doves". If you go to the link above you will know the history of it!

Then I told her to write down the two important things that she needs to include in the poem according to the theme and list them. 

While she was writing, we were discussing about all what she used to do in the park, her feelings, what she sees there and how well we use poetry to express this and so on... I have been thinking for sometime when is she really going to embark on writing poems and Alhamdulillaah this challenge came at the right time.

Then I told her now think of lines and rhyming words and include all what you have listed in a very nice interesting way and reminded her not to forget the Creator of all those lovely things she has listed.

So she wrote.

Dahl Al Hamam Park

A Feeling of Bliss,

Happiness in this,

Bending trees greet me,

Cats eating popcorns,

Looking cheekily at me.

Little spooky woods,

Mysterious cave,

Grass like waves,

A sandy playground,

All make me laugh.

I adore....

sledding down the hills,

Rolling over with pals,

Picnic with family,

Feeding chirping birds,

play with sand

And dawdle back home

Thanking my Lord!

Then we went outside on a nature walk to collect some items that we could use for decoration. She collected dead grass, sticks. feathers and fallen flowers. Thats all we could find! 

Then she used them to decorate her poem. This is the final product!

 

Then she typed out the information and a brief description about her entry and uploaded a picture for the competition.