It has been a week of coughing, sniffles, blowings-of-noses (sorry!), and unseasonable weather (even for Alabama!) that caused the week to end on a stormy note.  The public schools let our early today, Steady Eddie came home early from work, and we had an afternoon of tornado sirens and just general uneasiness.  (We’re all still nervous because of last April’s tornadoes.)  Because of all of this, it hasn’t been exactly a normal week.  However, I’m coming to conclude that there really isn’t a normal week to be had.  I’m learning to be okay with that.

1.  We had to spend midmorning through lunchtime at the park on Monday.  I mean, when the temperature is in the 70s in February, it’s a must!

2&3.  I finally gave up on moving through all the review lessons in RS B with Louise and skipped ahead to about lesson ten or so.  I mean, this girl already knows her tens addition facts, so I think it’s okay to dispense with the review counting lessons already.  I’ve got to get over thinking that because I did it one way with Lulu, I have to do it the same way with Louise. 

Look closely at picture number 3.  See her audience?  This girl makes “a fresh batch” of mermaids everyday to play with while Lulu and I work on lessons.  This week her mermaids have learned to use the abacus, driven the DLM’s John Deere, and been strung up in the blind cords.  I love my creative girl!

4.  We sat on Lulu’s RS C this week.  Grasping double-digit subtraction has been challenging for her, and she has had a nasty, nasty cold (with the possiblity of an eye infection to end the week!), so we pulled back out the Math Mammoth and played lots and lots of card games.  It will click soon, I know.

5. & 6.  I think teatime only happened once this week, but don’t you love my new, red teakettle?    It makes me happy.  It was a birthday gift from my sweet husband.  Speaking of teatime, now is a good time to mention our new memory work for the next six weeks or so:

• hymn:  “Eternal Father, Strong to Save”
• poem:  “Equipment” by Edgar A. Guest, inspired by hearing a recording of George Washington Carver reciting it (in his last public speaking appearance).  I know it’s probably considered something of an old saw instead of fine poetry, but I like Guest’s optimistic poems.  I still remember parts of one of his that I memorized in high school!
• Bible: Psalm 119:129-136.  It’s probably an odd excerpt from the longest Psalm, but the quote above our schoolroom door is in this passage, so I thought it would be a good one to learn to put the quote into context.  (You can see the quote here.)  I’ve been reading Psalm 119 over and over again during my devotional time the past couple of weeks; it is so rich!

7.  Steady Eddie continued his discussion of solutions with the girls for science this week.  They made predictions about what will happen to a sugar-water solution after it sits for several days.  (Rock candy crystals are the desired result, but it’s not looking too promising several days later, so we’ll see. . . )  I still have some books on crystals to read to them, and we also read A Drop of Water by Walter Wick this week. 

8.  Lessons out-of-doors on Thursday.  Of course!

9.  This has nothing to do with school directly, but we are about to begin on a home remodeling project.  See those chairs and upturned table in the back of the van?  Those will find a home in our new dining room in the next few months.  Let the design blog perusing begin! 

We’ve had some failures and some successes this week, as always.  I hoped to do some fun stuff on Leap Day, but I ended up at the doctor’s office for a couple of hours that day, so the girls had Mamaw school.  Then we ate lunch at Pizza Hut so the girls could use their Book It coupons.  (I guess that was fun enough, huh? )  I ended the week frustrated because we never got back to doing more notebooking pages on George Washington Carver, even though Lulu read about him independently.  Sometimes I have a hard time fitting it all in.  We did make it through three lessons in FLL and WWE and one-and-a-half steps in AAS, sickness notwithstanding.  The girls have rediscovered Alexander McCall Smith’s Harriet Bean mysteries, and they have listened endlessly to Black Beauty this week.  We’ve read a lot, of course.  Louise’s reading just keeps getting better and better.  We keep plugging away at OPGTTR, but she is getting to be very fluent and motivated on her own.  Probably my favorite memory from the week was her reading Inch by Inch to me in the van on the way to the library, being very careful to “do” all the voices.  I loved it!

Little by little, we make progress. 

How was your week?

1.  With the completion of lesson 82 in RS C, Lulu has come through the geometry section of the program, at least for now.  It has been fun and stretching for both of us, but I think we’ll both be glad to get back to numbers for a while.  On her review sheet she had to identify parallelograms, rhombuses, and rectangles, and it was really neat for see her figure out the attributes of each and how the categories work.  Of course, she has also been practicing subtraction and mulitiplication daily, too.  Subtraction seems to be harder for her right now than multiplication.  We practiced subtracting nines with a card game on Thursday, and we were both challenged by it.  (Homeschooling is good for this old mama’s brain, too!) 

2.  Although this is only tangentially related to homeschooling, it definitely affected our week:  I went with Steady Eddie on a business trip on Wednesday, so all three children stayed with my parents for the day.  While they enjoyed spending time with their grandparents (and the girls got to watch Bonanza with my mom, which is her favorite and theirs), I enjoyed shopping at the mall.  I even took my book along and enjoyed it (and a bit of chocolate).  It’s hard for me to take these little breaks away from school, but as Steady Eddie has pointed out numerous times, this is one of the reasons that we homeschool–so that we can set our own schedules.  {On a side note, on this shopping trip I found a fantastic bargain–a beautiful wool sweater with a ruffled neckline that cost $100 originally that was marked down to about $17.  I bought it, and then sometime in my other shopping–plopping my packages up on counters, trying on shoes, etc.–I lost it.    I realized it after Steady Eddie picked me up, and we went back in and inquired about it everywhere I could think I might’ve lost it, but alas, it was already gone. }

3.  My mom brought the girls a couple of Disney Princess puzzles this week, and they have enjoyed putting them together.  They’ve spent a good bit of time on this.  They’ve also learned They’re also learning forbearance with their little brother thanks to the same puzzles. 

4.  We’ve done a lot of bird watching this week, and it does my heart good to see my girls get as excited as I do about the visitors at our feeders.  I’ve even been able to identify a couple of our visitors, and this always makes me inordinately happy when I can do this.  I’m planning to participate in next week’s Great Backyard Bird Count.  I count my awareness of and interest in nature a direct result of our homeschooling, and I’m thankful for it.

5.  Lulu finished the first level of All About Spelling this week!  She really zoomed through this level (this is our second shot at a spelling curriculum, so this was catch-up for her), and I’m looking forward to started level two with her.  She doesn’t love spelling with the tiles, but I can see the value in it, so we press on.  Over all, though, I think she enjoys the curriculum.

6.  Thursday night science with Steady Eddie involved lots of discussion about the various states of matter and about water in particular.  The girls made predictions as to how long it would take the two wet paper towels, one exposed to the air and the other enclosed in a zip-top bag, to dry.  I also read them a really good picture book that I hope to share for a future Nonfiction Monday. 

7.  Louise is making great progress with her reading!  She finished through lesson 124 in OPGTTR early this week, and we stopped there because lesson 125 begins a new section.  Now if we could just keep up with our shared reading books!  She was supposed to finish Aunt Eater Loves a Mystery this week, but we can’t find it (again).  We substituted Maybelle Goes to Tea instead, which is more of a text-heavy short chapter book than a picture-heavy short chapter book.  Go, Louise!    (She’s writing /oi/ words on foil up there in the picture.)

8.  This is more or less what passed for history at our house this week.  We did finish Adam of the Road, which is a fabulous chapter book read-aloud for the Middle Ages (this one will definitely be a future RAT post!)  The girls have been checking out these Graphic Library nonfiction graphic novels/comic books from the library about various historical figures.  I suspect that they might not be exactly what I consider quality literature, but I think just getting the factual information in their heads counts for something, too.  I’m waffling on history a bit right now, but I hope to get it figured out this coming week.

9.  For Fun Friday today we finished up two read-alouds (Adam of the Road and Bach), worked on a little art project using oil pastels and watercolors, and then in the afternoon we had a Valentine’s Day party with some homeschool buddies.  We all look forward to Fun Fridays!

In addition to all of this, we also plodded on in Lulu’s writing and language studies.  She has made a leap in Writing with Ease to giving her summary narrations without any leading questions.  She does quite well with this, though sometimes she wants to include all the details.  She is now tackling prepositions in FLL, so it’s time for us to really work the memory songs and chants to get those down!  We also more or less came to a good stopping place with our memory work, though we’ll continue to review it as we move on to other things.

We wrapped up quite a few things this week, which makes it a perfect time for a six weeks break.  This is the first time this year that our pre-planned break has fallen at a time when we don’t have something else planned.  The first time our break took us to Walt Disney World, and then the next time we had a break it was Christmas.  I hope to do some cleaning and decluttering next week, plus some planning, etc.  Of course, we’ll keep on reading and playing together.  It will be interesting to me to switch hats for a while and sit back and watch just how much informal learning the girls do.

We started back on our normal-ish routine on Tuesday.  I planned to start back on Monday, but Steady Eddie was extremely sick over the weekend and had Monday off anyway, so we just plain old weren’t ready to start back on Monday.  One thing that I love about homeschooling is the flexibility.  (I’m repeating this to myself to override the mini melt-down I had over NOT being ready. )

I’m feeling a little more refreshed now than I was even in the middle of our Christmas break.  I think this is mainly due to a new and much-needed perspective I’ve gained through one of the books I’m reading now (which I’ll post a review of soon, of course).  I’m so thankful to God for this!  This week has been a good one academically; I think the girls were even ready to get back into our routine.

Here are some of the high points of our week:

1. We discussed distinguishing materials in science this week.  The girls had fun learning how to determine if something is metal, plastic, wood, etc.  We discussed some great descriptive words like brittle, elastic, and moldable.  The girls even collaborated on a mini-book in which Lulu wrote how they determined what an object was made of and Louise drew the pictures.  Who says homeschoolers can learn to work cooperatively? 

2.  We pulled out the geometry/drafting tools this week.  Yes, Lulu is in the much-discussed (and often dreaded, I think) section of RS C.  I dreaded it a little, too, expecting some weeping and wailing over the difficulty of handling the tools.  So far the newness of it has won out over the frustration.  I’m hoping it stays that way!  It was fun for her to figure out the pentagon problem–that drawing all the diagonals of a pentagon results in a star, and than inside the star is a pentagon, etc.  Lulu completed lessons 62-64 in RS C this week.

3.  Finding things for Louise to do while I work with Lulu suddenly seems very hard.  I pulled out some Super Mind pattern puzzles this week, but they weren’t a hit.  Some of the pieces were missing, and keeping the DLM from getting into them was hard.  I think Louise needs more concentrated and specific one-on-one time. 

4.  One thing we did get to over the weekend was hanging a new whiteboard in the school room.  Now Lulu does her AAS lessons while standing in a chair to reach the whiteboard, which is (in)conveniently up out of the DLM’s reach (for now).    We’re still playing catch-up in spelling since we finally came to AAS so late in the game. This week we worked up through step 11 in AAS 1.

5.  The DLM is a helpful fella, except when he’s pouring fish food out on the floor (like he did this week, but I decided to spare you the picture ).  Here he is cleaning the whiteboard for me, at his own loud insistence.   

6.  We got outside after it warmed up a bit later in the week, and we were all much delighted to observe a woodpecker in our lone backyard maple tree.  This motivated me to finally fill our suet feeder.  We also have a new bird feeder in the front of our house, but I’ve yet to see a bird visit it.  I think I need to read up on backyard birding.  Any recommendations for books or materials?

 7.  On the iPod:  a new hymn, “Rejoice, Ye Pure in Heart,” as well as the chapter about Bach in Famous Composers.  The girls have been listening to various audiobooks including The Railway Children and The Borrowers series.

8.  We’ve enjoyed a new-to-us card game, which the girls received from Mamaw and Papaw for Christmas:  Monopoly Deal.  We’ve played it twice:  once at my parents’ for our New Year’s celebration, and once this morning with Mamaw.  (There’s nothing like a rousing card game to get you ready to tackle math, right?)  It’s a somewhat complicated game, but it is very similar to Monopoly.  It’s also a lengthy game; we’ve yet to actually finish playing, but it’s a lot of fun.  Lulu LOVES Monopoly, so this is perfect for her!  Louise plays too, but its ages 8 and up rating is probably about right; she requires some help.

9.  The first part of the week was VERY cold here in the sunny South.  Lulu spends a lot of her time reading in front of the space heater in the school room. 

We covered a lot of good, solid territory in language and writing this week, too.  Lulu did at least one written narration every day, and I can tell that her skills and abilities are improving.  She has also graduated to writing her own narrations some times.  We picked back up with our world history studies this week, with a focus on Charles Martel and Charlemagne specifically and life in Medieval times generally.  I think this time period will be a winner!

My biggest struggle right now is handwriting and finding the time and dedication to do it well.  Lulu is in the third Getty-Dubay book, the one that transitions to script, and I am going to have to be more diligent about this if I have any hope of her learning to write well. 

I’ve also had a hard time getting around to everything I intend to do with Louise.  She is reading well and I almost always manage a reading lesson with her, but since she finished RS A before Christmas, I’ve been sort of at a loss, math-wise.  I intend to do games and activities with her from Peggy Kaye’s Games for Math, and we did do a couple of things from it this week. It’s just a time crunch.  I plan to be much more intentional about what I do with Louise next week.

Well, it has been a good week, a stay-at-home-and-be-cozy kind of week.  (All our weekly activities resume next week, so I really enjoyed not having to do a lot of running around this week!)  We’re wrapping up today’s Fun Friday with some art and composer studies, and I plan to pull out the chalk pastels later, too. 

Of course, we’ve read a lot this week.  Stay tuned for my Week in Books post. 

I’m linking up this post to Collage Friday at Homegrown Learners, Favorite Resources This Week at learning ALL the time, and the Weekly Wrap-Up at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. 

 

 

 

Instead of doing my usual, wordy Weekly Wrap-Up, I’m trying something different this week:  a visual representation of the week.  Although I really enjoy participating in the week-in-review memes, one write-up takes me an inordinate amount of time to do.  And I keep a lesson plan book!  So this is what I’m going to try out for a while–a quick collage, a note or two about anything particularly interesting about our week, and a record of the books the girls read.  That’s it. 

• We have attended a lot of Christmas parties in the past two weeks, with at least one more ahead before the family festivities begin.  I’m tired.
• We got out on Monday and stopped by an art center on the way to one of the parties.  Each year they host a local quilt club’s themed competition, and I LOVE seeing the quilts.  That Eiffel Tower up there?  It’s a quilt!
• Lulu did a lot of subtraction this week, and she began reviewing perimeter.  This girl is champing at the bit to multiply, so I let her! 
• Louise was inspired by Lulu’s perimeter lesson to measure the width of our stove. 
• See that white Christmas tree up there?  It is decorated with 800 hand-cut snowflakes.  Beautiful!  Each snowflake has something distinctive about it (of course!)–some have animals cut into them, some have numbers, some letters, etc.  The twelve framed snowflakes are the twelve days of Christmas; the seven frames snowflakes are the seven days of creation.  All this (plus about eight more trees, including the nature-inspired one above) are at a different local art center, and all of them are created by local organizations and artists.  I am always so inspired by this exhibit.

This week Lulu read, among many other things, A Cricket in Times Square, Hank the Cowdog:  The Killer Stud Horse, and some of the girl My America books (again!).

Louise read No Fighting, No Biting!

For the next two weeks, we are on Christmas break from any official schooling, and I am SO GLAD.

Whew!

I am linking up today to my friend Mary’s new meme, Collage Friday, at Homegrown Learners.