Jan. 26, 2008 - Weekly Wrap-up, Weeks 21 and 22
I've got to get myself back on track doing our weekly reports . . . or in my case, my every-other weekly reports. So, here it goes!
Math:
Big Man (7): Abeka 2 -- Big Man is confidently gliding into multiplication. He's worked thru the O's, 1's, and 2's (the easy ones I know!), but can easily do many other combinations if offered. He even asked to do more flashcards with Daddy this afternoon. Umm, excuse me Mr. Alien Man, what exactly did you do with my son? I'm thrilled that he's so taken with multiplication. I really stank at it when I was young (and we didn't start learning them until a much later grade back in the day! That day was so long ago, I can't even clearly remember what grade it was. 4th I think, but I'm not sure about that). I was so bad, I went with one other stinks-at-multiplying person to a special tutoring time during the schoolday. It didn't help much. Basically all I remember was flashcards. No help if you're failing to grasp the concept. His last two math tests have been A's, and today was the day he filled up his math test chart, so out came a prize from the prize box. Woo Hoo!
Little Monkey (5): Abeka 1 -- Little Monkey is bored. Bored, bored, bored. This is all too easy for him. Thus far I have stuck to the curriculum, doing one lesson a day. A reminder from my darling husband jolted me back into reality. The first couple months of the 1st grade curriculum is review for him. Move on! Poor Little Monkey. He has such a slow mommy! He has had all A+ tests, and is thrilled doing the Speed Drills. I can't remember if I explained those for you who do not do Abeka. There is a one minute speed drill every day, except test day, to build up speed in answering addition and subtraction problems. I thought Little Monkey might get thru half of the problems, maybe a little more, before running out of time. Dopey mommy! That little guy blasts thru them in 30 - 40 seconds!!! He's sooooo proud of himself. He asks (with glee) everyday if he gets to do another speed drill today. What a cute little guy. I'm going thru the math book now to see how far ahead I can move without loosing him. It looks like we can easily dump a month, or even two out of the curriculum without a problem. He'd still be ahead of the game in some areas, but wouldn't be so far ahead as to be bored by it all.
Reading:
Big Man: He's doing great at reading books from his reading basket. He especially likes the Little Critter readers I've found at the library. He's read just about all of them, though. He's going to be disappointed when he runs out of them. A neat book he picked from his basket last week was a "Lets Read Together" book on the rainforests. I thought he would like it, with all the great pictures of animals in there. His confidence level continues to slowly creep up. He's been reading little books to Peanut (3) every once in a while, and I even caught him a couple times reading on his own!! If he only knew the backflips I was doing inside!
Little Monkey: Ordinary Parents Guide -- He's plugging right along. He's learned all of the combinations that can make the long "a" sound, as well as the combinations that can make the long "e" sound. Next week he'll start the combinations for the long "i" sounds. He already knows that any word with that sneaky little "e" at the end (like the word "like") turns the vowel long. He's fascinated by all the words he's able to read now, and is quite good at figuring out words that he doesn't know the rules for yet.
Spelling: Big Man is doing great. I'm so pleased with the progress he's made! When I think about our frustration about spelling a year ago, I just have to say a quick prayer of thanks for His guidance. I catch myself being concerned every now and then that he isn't spelling words yet that other 2nd graders might be learning. I always come back to the peace I feel about where he is, and I know that he's learning so much more doing things this way rather than forcing him ahead of where he can be right now. His abilities in this have come so far over the last few months. I have no doubt that he will eventually catch up to where his peers might be, it's just a slower timetable for him. Selfdoubt. The bane of the homeschooling mom. When I was out of town, he did some spelling words with his daddy. The next Monday I tested him on them. All wrong. We took the week to go over them again. Tested the next Monday. All correct. He also did great on his Review Tests, so this week we began a new set of words, moving consistently up Level A. I hope to be thru with this level by summer so we can start at the beginning of Level B next year. That may not happen, but we'll see.
Handwriting: Big Man is done with his handwriting book for this year, and I don't think he's quite ready to begin cursive, so his only handwriting now is copywork and letters to friends/family. I say only. Hah! That's plenty! He's just about done with thank you letters for Christmas presents. I think he only has three more, then it'll be just about time for his birthday. That will be another round of thank you letters to write. Factor in dictation exercises and copywork from grammar, and you've got plenty to practice with! Little Monkey is just about done with his handwriting book for the year. He has about one week left in it, then I'll switch him over to thank you letters. He has plenty to write, and he tires easily!! It may take him until summer to get thru them all.
Grammar: Big Man is learning prepositions. He has an easier time picking the preposition out of a sentence than he does reciting the definition of a preposition! :)
Science:
We've finished up our Earth Science studies and have moved into space. The boys are very excited about this. I'm not sure why they've been chomping at the bit to get started in space, buy they're thrilled. All of their excitement has rubbed off on me, so now I'm just about as excited as they are. This week we just did an overview of space, learning about what's out there, what astronauts do, etc. By the way, for a breathtaking picture, check out this Helix Nebula. It's called "The Eye of God". So beautiful, but so ho-hum compared to what's waiting in heaven! The boys each made a space suncatcher (see picture above), which took waaaayyyy longer than I had anticipated. They're beautiful, but MAN it took some work!! We'll be starting an informal solar system display from our basement ceiling. We'll be hanging little planets (styrofoam balls) in our solar system (room) to show the size differences of the planets as well as the spacing from the sun.
History:
We've done The First Russians and The Ottoman Empire. Gotta tell ya, I didn't come up with much for extra activities with these. My boys were fascinated by the Russian egg painting (like Fabrige -- okay I probably spelled that way wrong!), so we cut out egg shapes from construction paper and they decorated their "eggs". Not that thrilling, but they preferred that to a coloring page of Ivan the Terrible. This next week is the Black Death. That's too cool for boys, but at the moment I'm having a mental block on activities. I do know we'll be doing "ring around the rosie" whose origins were in that plague. Come on brain . . . think!
Piano, Music Appreciation, Art: I've been sorely lacking motivation to do art with the kids these last couple of months. I'd be more concerned about things if they didn't do loads of art/drawing/creating on their own. I figure whatever we get in, we get in. Daddy enjoys it as much as they do, so he has led an art time with them twice in the last month. What a good daddy! Music Appreciation used to be done during lunch. I'd put in whatever the selection was for that week as we ate lunch, then one time over the two weeks we do that composer, I read to them a bit about him as they do the coloring page from the Themes to Remember book. We've been doing more stories during this time, so I moved our music appreciation time to our "classroom". The boys enjoy having soft music playing while they work, it even seems to help Big Man keep his focus. This is nice, since I don't have to carry the CD player back and forth from the kitchen to the basement. I've been neglecting this area since coming back into town, though, so we'll get back on track this week with Mozart. Piano is going really great. Big Man is easily playing his lessons and is having a great time. He realizes now that the first day of a new lesson is rough, but by the next day he is playing very well. Next week will be the next big challenge. He will be learning how to read music. Right now he knows where all the keys are, but the notes are just that: notes with a letter on them, there isn't a music staff. Next week the notes will begin to be on a staff. This could get interesting.
Comments
|
|
This site owned by Enter name here |
|
|
|
