Week 7

Chugging right along here. :)

I am trying to do at least one nice hike a week. This week we kept it simple after doing Monadnock last week. We hiked Purgatory Falls in Mont Vernon and we took along some friends. It was very pretty. Waterfalls are always fun to see.
Our October Mariposa class was about Native Americans of North America. The teacher Terry is always so excited to share with the kids. She is very knowledgeable of the cultures she presents. She has a passion that rubs off on the kids...It's great!

I am really hoping to get a new camera for Christmas.
My old one died after many years of faithful service and
now I am stuck using a cell phone camera which is very blurry
and has no flash or zoom. But it is better than nothing right?

Math: Quinn is on the last few lessons of Singapore 3b. I have also been giving him a couple long division problems each day so he won't completely forget how to do them. Evelyn is doing basic multiplication in 1b.

Spelling/Dictation: I messed up last week and reported that we were on list 19. This week was list 19.

Vocabulary: We added a few more words from Elementary Vocabulary Cartoons. The kids come up with their own sentences. Sometimes they are pretty funny. The bear in Evelyn's picture has a pumpkin basket filled with candy. I guess he has been trick or treating. Quinn's picture of a highly fertile garden has one flower in it suggesting some Quinn-ish sarcasm that is very fitting...



Handwriting: Evelyn has asked me to learn cursive which she says is very pretty. Coincidentally I inherited a mound of free homeschooling books from a friend recently and one of the books was the older version of A Reason For Writing: Transitions and Cursive. So I gave her the transitions book and she has been working through the cursive lessons on her own this week.

Art: Even though the kids both do art at co-op we still do art together here. I also inherited the book I Can Do All Things and decided to do that together this week. A friend also lent me the DVD lessons. This week we worked on some of the practice lessons before the actual lessons start.

Science: This week and the next couple are learning about the skeleton. We read pages on bones from Ouch! How Your Body Makes it Through a Very Bad Day. We are waiting for The Body Book to arrive so we can start making our paper model.

Bible: CBS lessons were done.
History: We didn't do history this week

CO-OP
Quinn
Public Speaking: This week was interpretive speeches. Quinn recited Click Clack Moo Cows That type. He did a great job of having different voices for the farmer and the cows. He had some good hand motions and great volume. His memorization was pretty good too. He only got lost a couple of times and picked himself right back up.
Drawing:
Rockets:Kids did some mathematical equations to determine the altitude and velocity of the rockets they blasted off last week. then they made straw rockets and played a game where each team had to try to blow their rocket into a bucket five times. Quinn's team won with Quinn scoring two of the points.

Evelyn:
Art:
Sign Language: Game
Orchestra: Peter and the Wolf

Other
Dance:
Soccer:Last soccer game this weekend. I got a picture with a friend's camera. Will post when I can.

Week 6 : Great Weather, A Hike, Some School

We were happy to have some wonderful weather this week and we took advantage of it. The highlight of our week was going for a spontaneous hike up Mount Monadnock. It is times like these that I am reminded why I chose this path despite the many hardships and great deal of work. God has truly blessed us.

CBS: Quinn had a lot of great insight into this weeks lesson on Abraham. I feel that my decision to do the writing for him in his CBS work has been confirmed as the right choice. Evelyn surprised me during our hike by pointing out to us how God was rewarding our work by giving us breathtaking views every so often as we trudged up the hard parts of the mountain. She did this just as I was grumbling a bit about how tired I was. Leave it to a child to humble you.

Math: Evelyn is starting multiplication. She is very excited about it. Especially since the lessons require drawing. Today I had to pry the math book away from her. She had already done five pages and was going for a sixth. Still waiting for Quinn's new book. In the meantime he still has a few lessons left in 3b. They are pretty easy, I am not complaining though!

Spelling/Dictation: List 19 introduces the there their and they're so we went over that and continued with our dictation paragraphs. Quinn has a there, their, they're chart on his "wall" so that helped him. I figure he still has to use his brain to figure out which form to use so it's ok if he has the spellings of those words in front of him for now.

Vocabulary: Only did two new words this week: inhabit and culture. Quinn did correctly apply some vocab words from last week however. He pointed out how we were floundering around on the rocky slopes of the mountain and mentioned that Lot had been abducted in our Bible study. Yay for real world application!

Science:Week 3 of science was a continuation of DNA. We read Gene Machines and did a fun chart in the body book where they each checked off what traits they have i.e.: dark hair, brown eyes etc...

History: Still on vikings. Since we have already read all the stuff on vikings that was listed we didn't do much in the way of history this week. We could have made a viking long house but opted to go for a hike and enjoy some splendid fall weather instead.

Reading: Evelyn is continuing Ramona and Her Mother along with whatever else she gets her hands on. Quinn is reading Farmer Boy. It is on his list for this year. At first he was not thrilled because it is related to the Little House on the Prairie books and is therefore a girl book. But he seems to be surviving.

Read Aloud: We are on the last few chapters of Ginger Pye. The goal is to be done by Monday.

Co-op

Sign Language: The kids learned Fall and Halloween signs.


Public Speaking: No speech was due this week but the kids had to bring in the literature selection that they will be performing for next week. Quinn will be doing Click Clack Moo.

Rockets: The kids launched their first round of rockets this week. There was much exhilaration about as each team got to fill their rocket with water, pump air into it, count down and then blast off! It turns out that Quinn was correct when he predicted that his team's rocket would win. With a time of 9.4 seconds it went higher than all the rockets launched in both classes that day.. woohoo!





Drawing: Quinn did a pastel of an antique box

Art: yes

Orchestra: yes

OTHER: No dance this week...overnight at a friend's house instead.

Wordless Wednesday

Week 5

I spent this week sick as a dog. Unfortunately I don't get sick time. Life went on as usual.
We even had a lovely hike together on Monday. The only thing I didn't do was CBS. I sent the kids with a friend.

Math:
I ordered Singapore 4A workbook and IG. He will be done with 3A within the next two weeks. I have been giving him some extra multiplication and long division problems in addition to the relatively easy workbook lessons. I really wouldn't want him to forget that stuff.
Evelyn is understanding place value better. I busted out my RightStart place value cards. (I am so glad I kept them!) and had her make numbers for me. I then asked her to tell me what number was in such and such place. It was fun for her and she kept asking everybody to give her a number to make all day. So nice to have a child who is easily motivated!

Spelling/Dictation:
List 18 Spelling Plus . We did paragraphs this week. The sentences are noticeably longer now.




















Vocabulary: We added this in this week. I ordered Vocabulary Cartoons Elementary edition. I had seen the high school version a long time ago and really like the concept. I didn't know that it came in an elementary edition until recently. I figure we will do one Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. We did the first three this week. After looking at the cartoon together I had them write the word in their book, come up with their own sentence about it and draw their own picture. They seemed to enjoy this. Even Quinn didn't complain too much about the additional writing.














History: Sonlight is still on Vikings. I ordered a couple videos from Netflix since my kids both already read the corresponding Time Traveler pages. We watched Globe Trekker Iceland and Greenland. This had a tad about vikings but mostly just showed what the lands are like now. I also ordered Nova: Vikings. The kids only watched half of this since it was late. My husband and I watched the rest and decided they probably didn't need to watch the rest of it. It got a little graphic about human sacrificing and some other things. I probably wouldn't have minded if they saw it but there wasn't going to be enough time for the next few days and I figured why hold up the Netflix queue?? I think the Imax Vikings video was much better and less graphic.
We also read Eric the Red and Leif the Lucky and did the SOTW Vikings Map work.

Science: Week two of science we read about DNA. We read Have a Nice DNA. We made some DNA from Twizzlers and multicolored marshmallows. The different colored marshmallows stood for the different chemicals and we had to match them up appropriately. This project is free here. We followed this up with the DVD Unlocking the Mysteries of Life. It was the perfect compliment not only to the science topic but also to the chapter in The Case For Faith that Quinn and I are reading together on how the language of DNA points to a creator.














Bible: I have started doing the writing for Quinn's lesson for him. I have him look up the verses and give me the answers. He was so overwhelmed by the amount of writing in the junior book that he was dreading doing his Bible study. I really don't want that. I want him to enjoy it. I also don't want him truncating his answers so that he has less to write. I want him to be thoughtful about the answers no matter how long it might be. He has always enjoyed learning about God in the past and I don't want to ruin that. He has to write for several other subjects and that is enough for now. Evelyn is in the primary class and that book requires less writing but of course she loves to write so it wouldn't matter anyways.

Read Aloud: Still on Ginger Pye. I was sick all week and even lost my voice for several days which made it hard to do a lot of reading out loud. Jonathan did do two chapters so we didn't get too far behind. We also did our other standard read alouds. Windows of the World this week was about Animism and Buddhism which made for some GREAT conversation.

Co-op
Art: Yes
Drawing: yes
Dance: yes
Public Speaking: This week Quinn had to do an extemporaneous speech. His was about whether or not our town should ban dogs from being on the bike path. His memorization was great and he had great volume and even used a hand motion or two.
Rockets: The kids started building their first set of water bottle rockets.
Sign Language: Evelyn learned a song about colors and has been practicing the color signs with that song.
Orchestra: The kids were supposed to make an instrument at home to bring in. Evelyn made a rain stick and then put paper mache over it. She still needs to paint it.

Late Auntumn Nature Hike

We decided to go for a nature hike today after doing some book work. We hiked Ponemah Bog in Amherst. It is a short hike but very pretty and serene. Quinn loved the boardwalk. The moment he saw it he became incredibly excited. I encouraged the kids to use all of their senses to observe their surroundings. Evelyn drew several pictures of things she saw and heard.
We saw some really neat plants like the pitcher plant.
We tasted some wild cranberries and heard some happy birds singing. Of course the air smelled just like fall should!

Week 4

We had some fun this week. We enjoyed apple picking, a corn maze two birthday parties, some school and a few fun projects.

Math: Quinn is nearing the end of 3B and they are now reviewing "time". You would think this easy for a fourth grader but in a world filled with digital clocks he has much less practice actually figuring out the time than I had as a kid.
I am wishing that I had kept RightStart level A for Evelyn. I really liked the way it explained place value and trading or borrowing. Ah well....we do still use the abacus though and it provides great visual examples of concepts for her. She also spent some time on Rainbow Rock.

Spelling/Dictation. This week we did list 16 in Spelling Plus. I attended a class on right brain learning this week also and decided to try to follow some of the instructor's hints for making words into stories and pictures. I know that this does help for Quinn since we did Times Tales for multiplication and that is virtually the same thing. But I was inspired and decided to try it with spelling words. This week's list contained words like: talk, walk, war, warm, large etc... For walk I made the 'w' black the 'a' was bright red with an extra thick tail and had a sad face. The 'l' was green and had squiggly lines around the edge and the 'k' was wearing sneakers on his feet. I then went through a story with them about how the a was sad and the l was shaking and nervous because he is worried that you will leave him out of the word because he is silent. The 'k' of course has his shoes on because he is going for a walk. Talk was the same except the 'k' was talking, saying hello. Quinn really eats this stuff up. He loved it with Times Tales too. Both kids really enjoyed all of the stories I made(though Evelyn is a natural speller anyways and doesn't need funny stories.) Quinn really did show an improvement when it came time for the dictation. He still forgot some stuff but he remembered things he would normally forget instantly. Like the 'l' in talk and walk.

Science:We finally received our science books in the mail. We are doing anatomy this year and plan to follow this free science schedule that some very gracious woman made and posted. So I ordered the books and this week we started by reading Enjoy Your Cells . We also watched some of the Brain Pop videos about cells and played some of the recommended games:
Explore a Cell
All Systems Go

History: Vikings! The kids wee very excited to read about vikings this week. We Read from Child's History of the World, Story of the World, Usborne Time Traveler, and Usborne World History. We also watched a free online Imax video about vikings and we built viking ships from SOTW activity book. We listened to SOTW audio from the beginning up to where we are now. It was good review.














Read Aloud: We began Ginger Pye this week. This is one I never read. I hope it doesn't end the same way virtually all dog stories end :( ...Reading: Quinn read Guardians of Ga'Hoole book 1 and Evelyn read Ramona Quimby Age 8. they also read numerous other small books throughout the week. We went on our first Pizza Hut Book It trip.

Piano: Quinn's teacher and I have decided to take a break from piano lessons. He feels badly about it like he failed or something but he just needs to step back for a bit. I really feel like he needs to work on his note reading 'til it becomes second nature. Until then I don't need to be paying 20 bucks a week. I can find ways at home to help him with this. I think we will re-instate Music Ace Deluxe for a while.

Dance: Evelyn is loving dance!

Co-op
Drawing: Quinn settled on drawing one of his more complex balsa wood airplanes. This is it.He is not changing it again.
Rockets: yes
Public Speaking: This week was impromptu speeches. The kids had to pull a topic out of a hat and speak on it with only one minute to prepare. Quinn pulled the topic of education. It was brief and silly but then again so were all of them... I can see how impromptu can take some serious experience to be good.
Sign Language: yes
Art/Music: yes

Apple Picking

We did our annual apple picking day at Windy Hill Orchard in Greenville. Unfortunately they didn't have a great year and we had to use picking sticks to get the apples off the top. Of course the kids were thrilled to be armed with long spikey sticks. And it did prolong the apple picking a bit since it took them longer than usual to get the apples. I am not sure what the problem was for them because I have since heard that all of the other apple orchards around have had a plentiful crop. We had fun anyways.

The corn maze was the highlight of the day as usual. Though it seemed to be easier than last year. Several kids were out of the maze in a matter of minutes. We told them to go back in and take a different route this time.

Week 3

Things are settling in more this week. I seem to have a better handle on the schedule now. The beginning of the week was a tad rocky though. Both kids had eventful weekends and it showed with the way Monday dragged. My patience was tested several times throughout and I didn't always pass. With a lot of prayer we made it through and have some stuff to show for it.

Math: Quinn (end of 3B) seems to be grasping the concept of equivalent fractions better than I thought he would. However when it came time for a review lesson I noticed that he had completely forgotten how to do long division. (patience testing time!) Of course, the info was still in his brain I just had to find a way to pull it out. I know that it is the numerous steps involved that he has trouble with. It boggles his mind to think about it all at once. I'm trying to help him to only think about one step at a time. His memory seemed to come around by the end of the week.

Evelyn (middle of 1B) is learning double digit subtraction. It has been hard for me to fight back the urge to just teach her the way I was taught. I know that eventually she will learn that way but that it is in fact beneficial to learn the mental way first. It will help her to understand it better....right??

Read Aloud: We finished Red Sails to Capri. It was not one of the easier read alouds we have done. There is a lot of tricky dialogue. But the story is great and the kids really liked it. We looked up pictures and videos of the Blue Grotto online after. Quinn says he wants to go there.

Blue Grotto Wikipedia Entry

Spelling: We do spelling through dictation with a neat program called Spelling Plus. It introduces 20 new words every week and then you learn them by writing meaningful sentences that spiral the new and old words in a perfect way. This has been the most helpful for Quinn who is NOT a speller.



History: This week we read about Charlemagne and Alfred the Great. For Charlemagne we did a keyword outline and then wrote it out. For King Alfred I had them do a one sentence narration afterward and they drew a picture to go with their narration to put in their notebooks. Quinn read three chapters on Alfred in Our Island Story. He says King Alfred is cool...


Bible Study: CBS is going well. We all seem to be keeping up with our homework.

CO-OP
Quinn recited a joke called "These Ducks Want Books" for his humorous interpretation speech. He did pretty well. This time he even remembered to do some of his hand motions. His volume was perfect and stumbled minimally.

Evelyn is learning tons of new signs in sign language class and she loves it.

Quinn's rocket class was spent learning that rockets don't fly and why they need nozzles. There was much saliva involved..ick!




Evelyn's art class produced some beautiful butterflies that they have been working on for a while now.

Quinn brought his skateboard for a still life in art and ended up deciding that it was too difficult. I need to help him find something else. He is usually very good at drawing rockets and ships...