Friday, August 19, 2011

Weekly Update - August 15th - 19th


This week was more of a routine week for us. Nothing really exciting happened around here.

We played outside more than we have in a long time thanks to a break in the heat. Kids had a great time during one playtime when I started a water fight. We all ended up soaking wet and laughing. Even little E enjoyed laughing at all the craziness. We also decided one morning to go check out a new playground at a park that we haven't been to in a long time.

Workboxes are still doing their job and the whining and complaining have dropped down to a more 6 year old appropriate level. Meaning he still whines, but it's a lot easier to keep him going when he can see when something fun is coming soon. It also helps me since it forces me to plan in more fun/hands on things for him to do.

Soccer has started again and that means practice two nights a week along with a game on Friday night. All that hard running in the heat wipes D out so he has been grumpy since he hasn't been sleeping in at all even though he needs to.

A few pictures from our week
D's spelling for the week - AAS 2 Step 7
S decided to write her name on her own
Playing Monopoly Jr - A favorite around our house






Sunday, August 14, 2011

Weekly Update - August 8th - 12th

A few pictures from our week - Sorry not many didn't pick the camera up much this week



I really need to remember to write these update posts at the end of the week rather than waiting until I have time on the weekend. By then I can't remember anything that we did! I do remember that this week was full of outings!

Monday was back to school for most of the kids in our city so we celebrated by spending the morning playing outside. It was also the first morning in weeks that it was cool enough to play for awhile without being miserable. After we played outside for awhile and were completely covered in chalk dust I loaded the kids up and we went and got donuts for a special treat before we started our work for the day.

Tuesday - We went to an indoor play place to meet some friends. The kids had a blast playing on the bounce houses and running around like maniacs.

Wednesday - D had soccer practice. Even though sitting through practice with the other 3 kids is hot and miserable... I love soccer - It makes all my kids sleep great that night!

Thursday - The one day of the week that we managed to stay home

Friday - Back to the indoor playground, out to eat and then off to the library.


What we accomplished this week

Reading - D continued to work his way through OPGTR. We finished Nate the Great Undercover and we are starting Amelia Bedelia. D seems to have kept a bad habit of guessing at longer words rather than taking the time to sound them out. We've been working on sounding out longer words and not just guessing at what they might be. He also has trouble with his eyes moving faster than his mouth and combining two sentences when he is reading out loud. So he will add in random words from the next sentence into the sentence he is reading.

Math - Finished up the IP problems for section on Adding and Subtracting within 1000. We started measurement using meters/centimeters. I also purchased the IP book for 1B and will have D start working 15 minutes a day on review using that book. I also got a trial of IXL for D to try and he has been enjoying playing on there. I think I will be purchasing a subscription for him soon

History - This week we finished up talking about the Sumerians and made a clay tablet to record our observations about nature. D decided to record the number of animals and people that we have in our house. He also wanted to make drawings of the vegetables that we are growing. We finished up our History pocket for the Sumerians as well.

Science - We never got around to making our edible plant and animal cells but we may try to do that this week. Instead we watched a video about cells on BrainPop and read Greg's Microscope.

Art - We finally started Artistic Pursuits K-3 book 1. I'll try to remember to take a picture of D's first drawing.

Monday, August 8, 2011

Weekly Update - First week of August

A few random pictures from our week -










An update on what D accomplished last week

Reading - Still working our way through OPGTR. Wish we could move through this faster but D doesn't really like it so even though we could get through 2-3 lessons a day he drags his feet so most days we only get through one unless it is a really short lesson and then I throw in 2

Phonics - Now that we are doing syllables in AAS we went back to finish up the 2nd half of book 4 where we stopped last year. We are currently on Lesson 7. I'm hoping that getting through these next couple of lessons in ETC will get him more confidently reading multi-syllable words.

Spelling - Last week we started Step 6 of AAS Level 2. We had a short day of school on Thursday so we didn't get that step finished so we will move it to this week.

Math - Finished up the Unit on Addition and Subtraction within 1000 in Singapore 2A - Worked on the IP problems from that Unit as well

History - History Odyssey - Sumerians - Read about the Sumerians in STOW - Also did math umerian Style. We built our own Lego Ziggurat. This week we are making our own clay tablet and recording observations about nature like the Sumerians did.

Science - Talked about cells and looked at an egg as a giant cell. This week we will be making edible jello plant and animal cells.

Spanish - We also started watching Salsa on PBS

Required Reading - This week Drew read aloud Nate the Great and Nate the Great goes Undercover.




First Week with Workboxes

So the first week in August was our first week using workboxes. Although the original setup and getting used to filing the boxes each night was a pain the first couple of nights it was SO worth it. The kids love their workboxes. My 6yo fusses a lot less about how much more are we going to do. Even though we had an assignment sheet printed off from Homeschool Tracker it still resulted in a lot of whining about how much more or that we are doing too much.

Now with the boxes he can see how much more we have left and what fun thing he is going to get to do when we are done. It also has made me more conscious of making sure that we add in more fun things to do. It's amazing how throwing in a small bag of cookies can make doing a dreaded subject more fun.

Here are a few pictures of our workbox setup:

Our two stacks of bins - I found these at Shopko.com for $30 and free shipping!


Close up picture of our picture cards for the subjects


I just toss his checkmarks for when he is finished in with his work. When he completes it and returns it to his bin he is allowed to take the subject card off and put the checkmark up.