Country Day Homeschool is in session! Our first lesson is based on a Reading Rainbow episode about the book “The Day Jimmy’s Boa Ate the Wash” by Trinka Hakes Noble. This is a fantastic program that highlights a children’s book, then expands on it. Unfortunately, our local PBS station moved the show from 3:00pm to 6:30am. I’m going to be upset with them about that for a long, long time.
No worries though, as the local library system allows requests from area libraries and one library in particular (Hudsonville) has a ton of these episodes. We happen to own the book, so our lesson will include watching the show, then re-reading the book.
I found a website with some great ‘discussion’ questions also. This book has a lot of cause and effect situations, so asking what caused something was the best suggestion I got from this site. You can read more here. There is even a cause and effect cheat sheet. We’ll round the first day out with a rousing version of “I’m Being Swallowed By A Boa Constrictor“.
The Reading Rainbow website also offers suggestions for activities for each episode. The two activities are making a haystack snack out of chow mein noodles and peanut butter because a haystack falls on a cow in the book. All kinds of chaos ensues when Jimmy’s Boa escapes, so the other activity is making a snake out of a paper plate. We’ll try both of these on the second day of the lesson as they seem easy and at least in one case, tasty.
In the episode, the host visits a pet shop, so we will follow suit. I know the Zoo has some snakes too, but I’m zoo-ed out at the moment. I’m not sure if this will take longer than two days, or if it will not even take up two days. Either way, it will be fun to find out!
