Weekly Wrap-up

We have been extremely busy the last couple of weeks! Almost everyday we had some kind of educational outing. Everyday I had the kids do a lesson from their math curriculum, some kind of writing, and reading.  On the days that we are home all day they also did spelling, science, bible, history, and read-alouds.

Reading Log:
Sophie:
Socks by Bevery Cleary
Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingles Wilder

Christian:
The King's Quest  by Paul McCusker

Read-Alouds:
Diary of and Early American Boy by Eric Sloane
On the Far Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George
The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare (Sophie only)

Writing:
Christian: journaling, blogging, editing WIKI articles, writing short stories
Sophie: journaling, writing letters and cards, taking notes

Volunteering at the animal shelter

 

Sophie with Cruella

Christian loves cats! He spend quite a bit of time with Autumn  and helped give her some medicine.

Sophie and her friend got to walk the little dogs.

Sophie giving her "Why Leaves Change Color"  presentation at our homeschool co-op.

Leaf project at co-op

 

Apple picking!
 

Reading and Making Cookies

 

 

 

 

 

 There has been lots of reading going on around here! Isaiah, who doesn't usually read for pleasure, has been devouring books! And over three days Sophie has read Because of Winn-dixie by Kate DiCamillo and The Boxcar Children.

 

Christian and Sophie decided that they wanted to make cookies to sell. They didn't want me to help at all, but after seeing that one of them had put 1/2 cup of baking soda in instead of a 1/2 teaspoon, I helped a little! Grandpa was the only one who bought some, but we ate some yummy cookies that evening!

 

Weekly Wrap up

We have had so much fun these last couple weeks!  We have mostly been playing educational games, making lapbooks, and reading good books!  We finished Sophie's space unit study/lapbook, and started a unit study on volcanoes. I found it at www.homeschoolshare.com under free lapbooks. We were inspired to study volcanoes while reading the book The Twenty-One Balloons  by Willian Pene du Bois.  I am doing more with Sophie and Christian together. Christian is joining in our Sonlight read-alouds, and now we are doing a science unit study/lapbook together. We also play a lot of games: card games, word games, board games, online learning games, and homemade games. Kid's can learn and review so much with games!

 a fun card game that teaches Greek and Latin roots.

 The Great States Jr. game

 I made this addition facts lapbook for Sophie. 

Sophie's completed space lapbook.
                                     

Back to Homeschool!

We are back-to-homeschool this week! I decided to ease the kids into the school year by starting with our Sonlight Readers, Bible, History and Read -Alouds. Then next week start www.Time4Learning.com, and the week after that hopefully the rest of our books will be in and we can start those. My 16 year old, Isaiah, will be starting co-op classes in a couple of weeks. For the rest of his subjects I'll need to wait till his books come in (yes, I order late).

We are doing Sonlight Core C. Last year I did Core B with with Sophie and Christian together and I realized that Christian would rather read on his own than have me read-aloud to him. So, for history he will use The Mystery of History, and for reading I will assign him the Sonlight read-alouds and readers that I think he will enjoy.

Nature Walks and Social Activies:

On Thursay we got together at the park with friends from our homeschool group. The kids reconnected with old friends and met some new ones. Today we went on a hike nearby our home. All summer Fred has been taking the kids on nature walks, pointing out and teaching the names of bushes, trees, flowers, mushrooms, tracks, ect. This has been fun and educational for the kids!

What we have read this week:

Sophie (7):

How many Baby Pandas by Sandra Markle

Fancy Nancy Pajama Day by Jane O'Connor

Chipmunk Song by Joanne Ryder

Emily's Everyday Manners by Peggie Post

Nancy Clancy Super Sleuth by Jane O'Connor

Books on CD:

Double Fudge by Judy Blume

Superfudge by Judy Blume

The Penderwicks on Gardam Street by  Jeanne Birdsall

The Penderwicks  Jeanne Birdsall

Christian (12):

Bambi :A life in the woods by Felix Salten

Isaiah (16):

Save Me From Myself by Brian Weltch

Tracey (Me)

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

Red Sails to Capri  by Ann Weil (read to Sophie)

The Last Few Days

Here is some of what we did over the last few days.

Christian:
Math- Keys to Fractions
Reading- Abraham Lincoln:The Great Emancipator, Charlie and the Chocolate factory, Garfield Comics
Writing-Blogging
Our read-aloud inspired christian to start writing a story about a boy's first day of school.
Research-read about analog televison and brodcast television on Wikipedia
Art-C asked who Piccaso was, so we looked at some of his paintings online
Drawing- always lots of drawing

Sophie:
Crafts-winter crafts, paper snowmen
Drawing-lots of drawing
Reading- Henry and Mudge and the Wild Goose Chase, Henry and Mudge and the Tall Tree House, Morris is a Cowboy, Henry and Mudge in the Sparkle days, Curious George goes to a Chocolate Factory, and more. I can't keep up with her reading!
Phonics-MCP level B
Math-The Complete Book of Math
Handwriting- Getty-Dubay Italic book B

Together:
Spanish-We found out that with our new library card we have access to a incredible online  forign lanuage program. It's awesome! Together we learned some Spanish and Japanese.  Also Christian and Sophie watched a Charlie Brown DVD in Spanish.  Christian had his Spanish Dictionary out and sometimes they paused the show to look up words.
Read-Aloud-The Year of Miss Agnes
PE -Swimming and homeschool gym class

Monday 11/28/11

Christian:
Reading-The PIXAR Touch, The Making of a Company by David A. Price and Abraham Lincoln:The Great Emancipator
Writing-IEW writing paper on the pyramids
Research-read about SIGGRAPH on Wikipedia after reading the PIXAR book
Science-C looked up hedgehogs on Wikipedia

Sophie:
Book on CD-Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Crafts-used Make Cards! book to make a pinwheel gift for Andrew and made mobiles
Drawing- S spent the morning drawing pictures and playing bank and store
Reading- S read Cranberry Thanksgiving to Daddy
Phonics-workbook
Math-workbook also I taught S how to use a ruler and the symbols for feet and inches while doing crafts

Together:
Geography-played The Great States Junior board game. Daddy talked to kids about the states he's lived in and traveled through
Read-Aloud-The Year of Miss Agnes

New Library

Today we met with a group of homeschooled kids at a new library. They meet on Wednesdays and it's only 10 minutes from my house. The kids play chess and other board games. Today the kids played Apples to Apples and UNO. We ended up getting a library card and it is so exciting because around here if you don't live in the town you usually have to pay a yearly fee of $45 to $60 to take out books. But I got card at this amazing library for free! I think we will be spending a lot of time there! I've been going to the same library almost every week for 15 years! Now you see why I'm so excited!

Christian:
Reading-Replay:The History of Video Games
Writing-Blogging
Drawing-created a comic
Computer Programming-c spent over an hour and a half learning to program in TI Basic. He is using the same tutorial that my husband used when he was 12.
Sophie:
Poetry-For Laughing Out Loud by Jack Prelutsky
Mom read-An Outlaw Thanksgiving by Emily Arnold McCully
Book on CD-Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Crafts-made thanksgiving Card using the book Make Cards! and made snowflakes and paper Christmas trees

Together:
Critical Thinking-played SET game. Sophie is so good at this!
Read-Aloud-The Year of Miss Agnes

Friday

Christian:
Writing (IEW)-worked more on pyramids report
Math- Key's to Fractions 
Reading-Abraham Lincoln from the Childhood of Famous Americans series
Science-Smithsonian Visual Timeline of Inventions
Music-piano practice
Bible-practiced AWANA verse

Sophie:
Reading-More Busy Times -Pathway Readers
Math-The Complete book of Math
Phonics-MCP
Handwritting-Getty-Dubay Italic book A
Grammar-First Language Lessons

Fall Craft

Christian:
Writing-started writing a report about the early days of computer animation
Reading-Abraham Lincoln from the Childhood of Famous Americans series
Computer/Art-learning computer animation
Music-piano practice

Sophie:
Reading-Skippy Jon Jones Class Action by Judy Schachner
crafts-autumn wreath

Together:
History- a chapter on Greek gods and goddesses in A Child's History of the World.
PhysEd-swimming and homeschool gym class
Sonlight Read-Aloud-The Year of Miss Agnes
Critical Thinking-"Set" game

Homeschooling Day 15

Today was a full day. We started school at 9:00 and went till about 2:00. The kids also did some painting and made homemade stickers. In the afternoon Andrew went to his first Lincoln Douglass Debate class (LD).

Three years ago he took Team Policy Debate and he liked it. He was more interested in speech, so for the last 2 years he's only competed only in speech. But this year he's going to compete in LD debate and speech. A friend who lives down the street wants to pick him up for the class every week-a major blessing for me.

My husband suggested that we go to M. Village to fly Charles' plane and just to get out and enjoy the day. It was a very relaxing time and I got some great pictures.You can see that Christian has a sling on his arm. Unfortunetly, he may have fractured his elbow. He goes back to the doctor tomorrow. Poor guy, but he's handling it amazingly, he doesn't complain at all.

Andrew:
Radio Theater homework
Debate homework
guitar practice
Reading
Bible
Play Practice


Charles:
TLP-Unit 3 Vocab A, Spelling A, Grammar A (dictation)
Math-Pg. 6F
History-Lesson 5
Reading
Bible

Isaiah:
TLP-Unit 3 Vocab. A, Spelling A, Grammar A (copywork)
Math Pg. 1F
Reading
Cursive writing
Play practice

Christian:
Math Pg. 29D
Science-Usborne Human Body Encyclopedia--taste and Smell
Reading-Fox and His Friends by Edward Marshall
Phonics-Explode the code Pg. 84
Language lesson 10 (andrew did it with him)
creative writing-new story he's working on
Starfall worksheet