Tuesday, August 29, 2006
08/14 week 3
Posted in Learning on the Narrow Path
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Dad brought home a book called “Christian Colleges and Universities” and Blair has spent a great deal of time reading it, researching and asking questions. She has also spent way too many hours on the phone and reading in other rooms. I don’t think I’ve seen her four hours all week. I miss her lovely face and charm. She did join us on our field trip this week earning extra PE credit, and at my request, took the kids to the pool for 3 hours so the carpet could get cleaned. Her writing assignments for her online group continue to receive outstanding reviews. The calf-deep mess in her room was discovered, and we had a fruitful and friendly discussion about the God of order and the god of confusion. During a discussion with Rose about Gideon’s army, Blair asked why so often God uses deception to defeat His enemies. Hm. Something to pray about. Dad finally laid down the law regarding John’s disrespectfulness and disobedience. He will be assigned his work daily by me, checked by me, signed off and then reviewed with Dad every night. ANY instance of bad attitude regarding assignments will be dealt with. Whew. I really feel better having a little backup. Still, there were a couple instances where assignments were given and refused. But they were dealt with and I anticipate fewer challenges next week. In Bible, John studied John Wesley, founder of the Methodists. I asked him to write down a few rules that would benefit him and make his life easier. He came up with rules for other people, but wasn’t able to internalize any rules for himself. It took a lot of conversation to even come up with daily prayer and Bible reading. He seems to have a lack of self awareness while being entirely self-centered. Strange, this young adulthood time. His geometry lessons have become more challenging for him, and he has slowed down to a lesson a day. Our house is now decorated with little green post-it notes, showing the Spanish words for items in every room, and the rooms themselves. Kate is continuing her Old Testament Overview and finds times during the day when she is able to apply her knowledge to current family and world situations. We have discussed praying for the peace of Israel many times this week, she seems to have a burden for that part of the world. She did an “investigation” in math this week – I guess it’s like a math lab – on fractions. She enjoyed working with the manipulatives, not because she is particularly tactile in nature, but because it was something other than writing answers to questions and doing speed drills! She completed her mammal research and her mammal book is looking very nice! She did a little review on cause and effect and inference, spent 3 hours at the pool and got extra PE credit on our field trip. She only practiced fiddle three times this week and I wonder if her interest is waning or if not taking classes is causing the lag. I wish we had the money to spend…On our field trip, we spent a few minutes discussing a Civil War era garden with its keeper. Hannah was very interested and asked a lot of questions. The master gardener was very impressed and recommended she attend their summer Junior Master Gardener program next year. She had a great acrostic for our Taxonomy study: “Kind Princess Carried Out Five Gross Snakes.” Christy continues to zip along, and shows great creativity in her work. She spent an entire day creating a dollhouse, doll and furnishings out of a couple boxes. Her Bible study this week has been about focusing on others instead of ourselves. She is already very “other” oriented, but doesn’t know how to deal with it when people say mean things to her. She is working on becoming more forgiving and focusing less on her own hurt. She spent 3 hours at the pool and mastered a forward roll in the water. She is learning how to draw in proportion, which requires some measurement skill, so a lot of her time she is spending comparing the size of a bookshelf to her finger from different distances, and the like. She thoroughly enjoyed the field trip despite the heat and humidity. Rose used “equal” and “unequal” in conversation this week, after studying it in math. We read about Gideon’s army and how God can bring things to His desired resolution in spite of what we may see as possible or impossible. She read about the Bill of Rights and we talked about each of the amendments and what they mean in our daily lives. The long trip to the pool helped her sleep better, as did the long morning at the zoo. Field Trips and Extracurricular Activities: Ahh, Member Morning at the zoo. We have a family membership to the local zoo. Twice a month they open their doors early for members to come watch the animals being released from their nighttime enclosures and fed. They also hand out free Krispy Kreme doughnuts, coffee and juice to feed the visitors! We didn’t find a lot of animals on our first trip around, but there were NO children at the playground (a rare sight, indeed) so we spent the first hour there. Then, we went off in search of mammals! The zoo had kindly set up tents with ceiling fans at the more popular exhibits, so we could escape the searing heat while observing the elephants have their morning melon and hay. The high point of the morning, though, was to the historic home on the zoo grounds. We didn’t tour the inside, but the outside was like my dream home. Big trees set in a huge yard just right for a vanload of children, a barn, fields for cattle, horses, goats, sheep, chickens, and the most wonderful garden! Not just beautiful (and heirloom) flowers, but a kitchen garden of fragrant herbs, a medicinal garden of healing plants, a vegetable garden large enough to feed the family, a grape arbor, several places to sit under a trellis of fragrant blooming jasmine – oh it was a dream. Turns out the house was built (and I mean built – they even made the bricks!) in the early 1800’s by the in laws of Andrew Jackson. They traded livestock and seeds with the Hermitage on a regular basis. In my dreams, I live there with one major exception: snow. It positively MUST snow at least 12 inches per year. Oh, right. Sorry. Where was I? Field trip. Anyway, the kids just loved walking around and petting the animals. Most would come right up to you if you stood by the fence. We talked about each of the animal’s specific nutritional, exercise and rest needs, as well as the shearing times and frequency, etc. We also discussed how many hands it would take to run a farm of that size, which led to a discussion of the high death rate of children during those years, and slavery. The PE extra credit? That would have been pushing me around in a wheelchair! |
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