LR Week 8 Grade 3 - Chickens and Bulborb Plush

Answers to previous LR questions:

Thanks for the video!  I am wondering what kinds of things Kiernen does to prepare his information for the video reviews...For example, do you guys talk about some things he could say/show, does he plan it in his head, etc?

Usually he comes up to me and says, "I want to do a video," and I grab the camera and film him. He makes it up as he goes, or perhaps has it in his head beforehand.

I wonder what kinds of facts are on the cards… I notice there are numbers there in the hundreds.  What does Kiernen do with those numbers? Curiously…I see there is a sort of bar graph that compares the number values too…

The cards have the names of the players and their numbers: 1)attacks, 2)defense, 3)speed, 4) ability to escape from things. The higher the number, the better their skills at those things. (Kiernen just explained this all to me because I didn't know either).

I am also wondering what a portal is and how it works….not being a gamer and all

The portal....some marketing genius for this game had a brilliant idea that rather than have the players already in the game, then separate merchandise to buy, they would combine the merchandise and the players. So each figure has a little chip inside the base that allows that player to enter the game when one places them upon the portal. Since Kiernen always buys the figures or plush for the games he plays anyway, we figured no big deal about the investment. But it turns out it gets expensive! each player in the game costs between $10-$15 US! And of course every collector wants ALL the figures. Spendy spendy marketing brilliance in a game!

I don’t remember if I mentioned it already, but our chickens are finally layers - a few weeks ago we got our first egg! We’re now up to three layers (out of five), and because they also have a taste for their own eggs, we usually get two eggs a day, and find the other one broken and eaten. We noticed that the chickens lay smallish eggs at first, then they get larger as time goes on - which is smart! It eases them into the laying process.

This week I thought I’d give you a video of some of what we get to enjoy daily with our chickens. They’ve been playing in the leaves, taking advantage of the wonderful October sun (and dryness!) and they LOVE the leaves. SO many yummy grubs and bugs under those leaves! And do we have plenty! With our giant oak and our large maple and all the smaller trees in between, we have an abundance of leaves. And since the chicks’ coop is right under the oak currently, they get to wade to their hearts content.

And this video is less for the plush and more for the bit in it where Kiernen decides to spontaneously tell the story of the game - I thought this is a perfect example of his storytelling skills and his demeanor - when he is interested in something, he makes a point to learn all there is to learn about it. He saved his money for weeks for this plush - and was so excited to get it, because plush is his thing, and he loves having the characters from the video games he loves. Plus THIS one has an opening in it that allows it to eat other plush!

Kiernen has been spending a great deal of time this week Skyping with friends - he even made a new friend all the way in Australia! I am in an Unschooling gaming group on Facebook and occasionally parents (or older kids) will post what they’re interested in and ask for friends to play with. We will then exchange Skype info and game login info so the kids can ‘meet’ in the game and on Skype. This week, Rosie from Australia is Kiernen’s new Animal Jam buddy. And they’ve hit it off! the first day they met they played the WHOLE day together.  He hasn't even had any difficulty understanding her accent, nor she his. What an amazing tool for kids to have , Skype!