School - February 2011

   

Devotional

We continued to read the New Testament and spent the month focusing on Responsibility for our value and getting into a daily routine for our habit. 

Math

Continuing with Math-U-See . . . This is one subject I worry about.  A lot.  A and N are both probably a grade behind, but we have been going slow so they can master concepts before we move on.  I keep reminding myself they will catch up as their skill level improves and their ability to work independently increases. 

 

Literature

I made a deal with A and N - they get to pick a book to read, then I pick a book for them.  A has been re-reading the Percy Jackson books and Greek Myths and listening to The Lord of the Rings series, and I picked Treasure Island for him.  N has been listening to Magic Treehouse books and I picked The Secret Garden and Heidi for her. 

We spent the week before Valentine's Day reading wonderful poetry.  We are still reading Pilgrim's Progress, Minn of the Mississippi, poetry, and books for the book clubs (A-biography of Isaac Newton, N-Kirsten Learns a Lesson, Kirsten's Surprise). 

 

History, Geography,  Art & Music Appreciation

I did a major change up with these subjects.  We started using The Story of the World Volume 1: Ancient Times.  This is not a resource I am a big fan of - if you read the reviews on Amazon you would get a glimpse into some of my reasons why I don't like it.  However, of the different history spines we have tried using in the past, my kids do like this series the best. They listen to this series.  They narrate this series well.  So we are using it, but we are going to supplement with a few other things to improve the quality of this subject. 

We will continue to make a timeline as we read - I made one using a permanent marker and poster, and we hung it in our school room area.  We have always used maps with our history, but we are going to do more history related mapping projects,  and not do an additional geography book (like the Holing books we have used in the past).

I found lesson plans at Satori Smiles which list hands-on activities, movie and online suggestions, and other resources for each chapter of the book.  With the first chapter we did a short Family History book and simulated an archaelogical dig in our sand box. 

We are also using Harmony Fine Art's art & music appreciation plans - Ancient Art and the Orchestra.  I have used the Outdoor Hour Challenges and other resources from Barb-Harmony Art Mom for a couple years now, and her plans are an excellent resource for expanding our learning of Ancient Times. This past week they made their own cave art on cardboard. 

The music appreciation plan focuses on learning about the orchestra.  So,  for the next year we won't be studying individual artists or composer as we have in the past.  This is different for us, but so far these changes are working out wonderfully and the kids are enjoying these subjects.  I like having the plans all laid out for me - less work!

Science - Astronomy

We continue to read from Exlporing Creation with Astronomy finishing chapters 8-Space Rocks and 9-Jupiter this month.  We spent more time this month watching NASA TV (We watched the preparation and launch of Discovery last week - very exciting!) and visiting the Nasa website.  My kids continue to add more constellation to their journals and still enjoy hearing the stories behind them. 

Nature Study

We haven't been doing these as much as I would like, but its hard to be motivated to get out in the miserable cold weather, especially with my little girls.  We did a couple this month on days with better weather and are really looking forward to spring. 

Preschool

When I remember to do activities - learning and for fun - with O and J it really makes a difference in our day.  They feel like they are getting some of my time and don't try to get my attention through more destructive means (at least not all the time).  It also means they spend their day more constructively.  

We usually start by reading books together (Mother Goose is a favorite right now) and then do an action activity - London Bridges, Ring-Around-the-Rosies, etc.  Following this its "Blanket Time" - they each pick an acitivity or toy from a closet where I keep things just for this time and they sit on their blankets and play.  Blanket time usually lasts 45 minutes to an hour with 2 or 3 activity switches which I use to work with A and N (I learned about blanket time from the Duggars book).

When J takes her nap in the afternoon I try to school acitvities for O to do.  I have her sit next to me while I work with A and N.  Her activities are printing readiness, counting manipulatives, etc. 

But as I said before, its all contingent on ME, and how prepared (or not) I am for the week. 

Winter Wednesday 2011 #4 - Tree Silhouettes

We went on a nature walk around our neighborhood with the goal of finding as many different tree silhouettes/shapes as possible.  It has warmed up arond here, but we do have some snow and the winds are still very cold. 

 Winter is also an excellent time to see details of a tree that would be hidden by the leaves in the other seasons - trunk and branch colors, if there are buds or not, or any empty birds' nests. 

When my daughter was drawing her silhouette picture she also decided to draw the tree in the 4 seasons. 

Homeschool Blog Hop

 Heart of the Matter {Online} has "partnered with 16 of the most inspiring, lovely, and just plain awesome bloggers in the homeschool community to bring you 10 days, 160 posts full of resources for those starting out, burned out or need new ideas." 10 Days of Homeschooling Blog Hop 10 days of socialization for mom | The Homeschool Chick
10 days of classical education | Milk & Cookies
10 days of large families | Chocolate on My Cranium
10 days of special needs | Special Needs Homeschooling
10 days of struggling learners | Homeschooling the Chaotic Family
10 days of homeschooling girls | Homegrown Mom
10 days of homeschool enrichment | Confessions of a Homeschooler
10 days of building a spiritual legacy | Mommy Missions
10 days of frugal homeschooling |The Happy Housewife
10 days of Charlotte Mason | Our Journey Westward
10 days of unschooling | Homeschooling Belle
10 days of organization | Confessions of an Organized Homeschool Mom
10 days of getting started | Blog, She Wrote
10 days of homeschooling boys | The Tie That Binds Us
10 days of homeschooling Montessori | Fruit in Season
10 days of preschool | Delightful Learning 2 days in and I am LOVING it!! 

Valentine's Day

Make it a Valentine Week:

We will be learning about the history behind Valentine's Day and reading great love poetry.  I made a CD with Valentine's history, stories, and poems from Librivox, Storynory, and Lit2Go to listen to as well while we are doing our driving around.  Search for titles with "love" or "valentine."  Other suggestions:  Shakespeare's Sonnet 18, Elizabeth Barret Browning's Sonnet 43 (or any poems in Sonnets from the Portuguese), A Red Red Rose by Robert Burns, Love's Philosophy by Percy Bysshe Shelley, and so many more out there.  Scroll down on Storynory's main page and there are links to recordings of the history of Saint Valentine and 3 other stories. 

Movies with a love/Valentine theme (can you guess how excited my boy is?) - Charlie Brown, The Princess & the Frog and other Disney, Shrek (it counts right?), and whatever else fits :) 

Currclick has a couple FREE Valentine items:
Simply Schooling Valentine's Day Free Book - coloring pages and simple writing practice. 
Connect the Thoughts has a Creative Writing & History Elective - I am only going to use the history and poetry lessons.

I like to do a Treasure Hunt for my kids on Valentine's Day - I put found a couple online sources to get enough ideas to make up our own treasure hunt:
Party Games clues
Dating Divas clues - this website is for couple dates, but the clues can work for anyone.  Be aware there may be pictures/ideas not appropriate for little eyes. 

What are your favorite ways to celebrate?

PS. We are having our home school group Valentine's Party on Friday - send me an email if you live near the Salt Lake Valley and want to come!

2011 School Update

I have been trying to squeeze some free time out of my day-to-day thingsthatneedtobedone, but obviously blogging hasn't been high on my list.  I do miss it so I'm going to make some effort in the future.  :) 

Instead of trying to do multiple posts to catch up I'm going to review what we did for school in January in one post.  During our Christmas break I talked with my kids about each subject and we discussed what was working, what wasn't, and what ideas they had for improving.  They came up with some really good ideas, we simplified in several areas, and we have been mostly happy with our new plans. 

Devotional

We continue to work on learning new songs and memorizing scriptures.  We started reading the New Testament using Penny Gardner's Storied Scriptures.  They are familiar with Christ's life so they are starting to fit events into a "bigger picture" view.  I'm also surprised at how much my younger girls (2 & 4) know about the ministry of Jesus Christ.  We also read from The Book of Virtues, chapter 2 on Compassion.  We started reading from this in October with the plan to focus on each virtue/chapter per month, but took a  break for the holidays - in November we focued on Gratitude with a fabulous resource from Donnna Young, in December we did a daily Christmas devotional using a binder given to my family years ago, and in January we were back to The Book of Virtues.  I am incredibly tempted to purchase Donna Young's February Devotional.  Hmm.

 Math

We continue to work through Math-U-See, but we are playing more addition and subtraction games to improve their ability to recall math facts. 

 Literature

We are reading a new poetry anthology that is lots of fun - Sing a Song of Popcorn.  I think I picked it up at a yard sale or thrift store.  We were reading Minn of the Mississippi for Geography, but its harder to map than some of the other Holling books so we've moved it to Literature so we can finish it.  We are into Christiana's journey in Pilgrim's Progress and the kids still love it - this week we read about Great Heart killing the giant Maul, what's not to enjoy about that?   I am reading the Kirsten American Girls book with N for her Liberty Girl's club, and A is reading The Sowers book about David Livingston for his Knights of Freedom club.  Free reading - A has taken an interest in Greek Mythology and read the D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths, as well as reading other modern books like The Sisters Grimm series.  N has been listening to Magic Treehouse books, The Fairies Collections, and A Little Princess again. 

 History

We are still learning about the American Revolution.  I'm reading them the Landmark book, The American Revolution.  Its been easier for them to understand after watching the Liberty Kids tv series.  We have also been watching some related videos - the first few episodes of the Story of US by the History Channel, and some others online like these and these.

 Geography

I found the National Geographic book above at a discount store and we decided to use it as our spine book to learn about and map the journey's of famous explorers.  We started with the Norsemen - we read the details in the main book, and also read Lief the Lucky by the D'Aulaires and another short book we have about their travels.  Next I think we are going to learn about the Silk Route in Asia.  We also make sure we pull out our maps with other subjects as well, such as the journey of Kirsten's family from Sweden to Minnesota in the American Girl books.   

 Science - Astronomy

We are still reading Exploring Creation with Astronomy and using the journals for narrating, but we aren't doing the worksheet pages or notebooking projects.  We are trying to do science projects on saturday since Dad is around the help with the project or fielding little kids, so we are more likely to DO the projects. One of the changes the kids wanted for this subject was to learn more about the constellations and do more stargazing .  I made everyone a "Constellation Journal"  where we use star stickers to make the constellation and then we read the story about the constellation.  This is how my son became so interested in Greek myths.  We haven't done much stargazing yet - evening time has so many things going on - but I do want to do it during winter/spring when it is dark earlier.   

 Nature Study

We have been doing the nature challenges at Handbook of Nature Study, but I haven't blogged about them.  Maybe I'll catch up sometime soon?!? N's latest pictures for a winter tree study are above.  For our nature tales we have been reading a book called The Seven Sleepers all about animal hibernation.  It includes the usual animals you think about hibernating like chipmunks, squirells, and bears, but also has information about earthworms, reptiles, amphibians, bats, butterflies and more. 

 Artist Study & Composer Sudy

We started a new artist - Edgar Degas - and we are enjoying him.  Well, most of us - my son isn't so interested in all the ballet pictures and stories, but he's learned to humor all us girls :).  We are still listening to Sergei Prokofiev - next month we will be attending a Utah Symphony Lollipop version of Peter & the Wolf. 

  

Extracurricular

As I mentioned, the kids are still doing their book clubs - Liberty Girls & Knights of Freedom.  They are also attending art class again this semester and studying Van Gogh.  We've already focused on him in our homeschool, but they enjoy learning more about his work and doing art projects.  We are going to be attending some "Lost Art" classes this month hosted by a homeschool mom who lives on a working homestead - candlemaking, all about fiber (wool), and cheese making. 

A has been working on Cub Scout stuff - he recently earned his Religious Knot and Bear Award.  Now he is working on the World Conservation Award as something to do because he has about 5 months before he moves into Webelos.  Theyare both working on their Faith in God, a program for boys and girls in our church.  A and N just finished a Learn to Play Hockey class at the Olympic Oval and really enjoyed it.  We plan on having them do the next class as well. 

 Preschool

My 2 & 4 year old girls are demanding more "school" time of their own.  So we spend 30 minutes to an hour doing stuff together - we read books, sing and act out songs, play games like duck-duck-goose, count manipulatives and toys, go on shape or color hunts, and so on.  They love it.  I have also started doing some printing readiness with my 4 year old - while the 2 year old naps, O sits next to me working on her own "school" while I work with the older 2 kids.  I'm starting to think about phonics/reading, but we are aren't in a hurry. 

Family Cleaning

Also new to our schedule is housework! A few days a week we focus on one room in the house and do some deep cleaning - vacuuming, mopping, windows, baseboards, dusting.  It helps me out and means every room in the house gets some extra attention at least once a month.  Even O & J like having their own damp rag to wipe stuff with.  Adults in training :)