History/Geography -  We started learning about the early peoples of America, namely the Indians/Native Americans.  We are reading the second book in the Boxcar Children series, called Surprise Island and the children discover some Indian artifacts on a part of the island.  We also read "The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush" by Tomie dePaola.  We talked about what a legend is and that the Indians were the first people in America and they didn't know our god and made up stories to explain the things they observed in nature, that nature was very important to them.

Literature - We continued to read poems from "A Child's Garden of Verses" by Robert Louis Stevenson for poetry.  We're still reading Surprise Island (2nd Boxcar Children book).

Reading - He read a couple Level 1 books from the library, but mostly found excuses not to read.  I have encouraged him to read on his own and a couple times I have heard him reading in his room.

Copywork - He is really resisting any of my attempts to encourange him to write, even his name.  He will get a composition/journal book at school which they start with each morning.  The left hand page is blank for drawing and the right hand page is lined for writing.  I hope that having his own book (and another adult encouraging him), will help.  My plan is to have him pick a family member each week to write a letter to mail, but I am postponing that a few weeks.

Science/Nature - We took a walk in the neighborhood. S ran ahead of me several times and I told him when he took a break  to wait for me to look closely at the ground and tell me if he saw anything interesting.  He found some yellow and red leaves on the ground that he said were "signs of fall".  He also saw a very tiny cricket.  I was proud of his observational skills.  Our painted lady caterpillars arrived in the mail and he observes them several times daily.  We also read a fun book called "Where in the Wild?" by David Schwartz.  It's a seek and find book of camouflaged creatures in the wild and contains poem clues to find each animal and an animal fact page behind the flap which reveals each animal.  This is a great living science book.  Also, our Painted Lady caterpillars arrived.  They grow so fast!

Math - Read "How Much is a Million" by David Schwartz.  Very good.

We are still slowly building up to more formal schooling.  Part of this is that we are still working on his bad attitude.  If I ask him to write a word or even a letter, or if I ask him to read something in a book, he complains.  Part of this is him asserting his independence, part perfectionism, and part learning to obey without questioning.  I hope to be through this and be more consistent by mid-September.  That will also get him through the first couple weeks of school before I am a little more formal with our after-schooling.  With only 2 days a week in school, I will still be with him the majority of each week.  So here is what we worked on this week.

History/Geography -  Obviously we spent a little time on cowboys and Jamestown this week.  Also, last week I started reading "Paddle-to-the-Sea" by Holling, but while I think this is a charming story, S is not responding well.  And since this is an Ambleside Online Year 1 (age 6) book, I am not going push this now and will put it at the bottom of the list to come back to later in the year.

Literature - We started using "A Child's Garden of Verses" by Robert Louis Stevenson for poetry.  Our favorite poem this week is "Bed in Summer" which talks about having to go to bed while it's still day out in the summer.  We also started reading the second book in the Boxcar Children series called "Surprise Island".  We read quite a bit, but I will only report our book list reading, surprise finds, and perennial favorites here.

Reading - He is trying to earn a Webkinz and I give him 10 points for reading a book (while most chores earn 1 or 2), so he read several Level 1 books from the library.

Copywork - During the Frazier scavenger hunt, I realized S5 has forgotten how to form some letters on his own.  I haven't made him write much this summer (note to self - remember to practice writing year-round!).  He was really upset when he realized this and didn't want to do it if it wasn't "perfect".  So I went back to dotted lines for him to trace.  I'm not a worksheet person, but I have some sites bookmarked with free worksheets, so we will probably do some of these over the next couple of weeks.

Science/Nature - The September issue of Your Big Backyard arrived and we spent time learning about parrots, quails, and strange-looking creatures.  We also read a Cat in the Hat Learning Library book called "Wish for a Fish: All About Sea Creatures".  It's amazing how much information they can pack in that signature Seuss-style rhyme.  The author is Bonnie Worth.  If you haven't seen this series I suggest you check it out.  We have also read one about Seeds and Flowers.  I don't think it should be the definitive text for science, but it does present it in a different style than normal science books.

I cheated a little and already read one book on our Kindergarten list during the summer.  That would be the Boxcar Children, which we both liked and I have already requested the next two in the series from our library.

This week I am starting very slowly. Samuel has been having some anxiety issues, for lack of a better word.  Or temper tanturms, however you want to look at it.  I think he is just overwhelmed with turning 5.  He's very upset at moving to the elementary class at church which is upstairs from the nursery and preschool classes he is used to.  He's upset at having to wear a uniform to school beginning in September, tucking in his shirt, wearing a belt, and shoes that don't have characters or light up. He doesn't want to do the chores I added to his days now that he is 5.  And the list goes on and on.  I have had several serious emotional and hopefully encouraging conversations with him.

So, we're starting slowly.  One book I found that is turning out to be great is "Pordy's Prickly Problems" which is in Janette Oke's Animal Friends series.  I didn't even know she wrote children's books and this one is turning out to be a perfect lesson book wrapped in an entertaining story.  Pordy is a young porcupine who is afraid to climb a tree where porcupines can be safe from predators and find the food they like to eat.  Sound familiar?

History/Geography - We started Holling C Holling's "Paddle-to-the-Sea".  The plan is to read a chapter every night or two.  I have also ordered the first couple of books for the history portion.

Literature -  This may not count exactly as "literature", but this book did provide an exercise in creative "writing".  The book in question is "Fortunately" by Remy Charlip.  The story starts with a young boy receiving an invitation to a party.  When you turn the page, "unfortunately the party is in Florida and he is in New York."  Each page alternates between a forutnate event and an unfortunate event.  We read this three times and then "wrote" our own story as a family, going around a circle alternating who came up with the fortunately and who came up with the unfortunately.  This would be a great game for long car trips.  The story ended when Hubby got tired and came up with an ending on his turn.  We didn't write this down, but I can see this being a good writing assignment for an older child to write his own story in this style.

Reading - Level 1 Readers from the library.  No particular one stands out as being great, but they are all OK.

Math - I am just doing everyday word problem math and he often blurts out something while he's playing, like "Mommy, does 6 and 6 make 12?".  I don't know exactly where the questions come from, but they do tell me he is working things out.  Since he's only 5, I'm forgoing formal math, but I am thinking of looking for some games we can play that will work on skip counting.  He has a CD from Discovery Toys that has a counting by 10's song, so he knows how to do that (if he sings!) and living books taught him 2's to 10.  He will get "formal" math in his Kindergarten class (which meets 2 days a week beginning in September), so I can just do the fun math at home.

Nature Study - we made it to the park for our Outdoor Hour, but we only made it through our picnic by the creek and time on the playground before it was time to leave.  Next time, I will build in more time to play so we can still do our nature walk.  I did order the caterpillars for the butterfly treehouse he got for his birthday.

We are finished with what I had planned for summer and school doesn't officially start until September 3 (with our after-schooling schedule beginning the week after that).  Still, learning takes place anywhere anytime. 

Hubby was "on vacation" this week so there is a lot more TV going on in the house.  But also bedtime read-aloud time is longer.  He is working his way through the Ready Freddy series of books by Abby Klein.  They are twaddle, but it is good bonding time for them that doesn't include TV.

I read "A Pocketful of Cricket" by Rebecca Caudill, which S5 and I both liked.  It is a sweet little story of a boy who makes friends with a cricket and takes him in his pocket to his first day of school.  There is a great narrative in the beginning of his journey to the cow pasture to drive the cows back home and all he encounters on the trip.  Also, in reading about the author, we discovered that she was born in KY, which is where we live.

Another good story was "Uncle Jed's Barbershop" by Margaree King Mitchell about a man who never gave up his dream even though he faced obstacles along the way.  Part of the story took place in the Great Depression, but mainly we just talked about it being a story from a time before they had many cars.

We also read the first "Boxcar Children" from Gertrude Chandler Warner.  This came off our school read-aloud list for fall, but it's sometimes hard to time things right when you are using the library.  We both like this too and may read some others in the series.

One of the readers from the Rainbow Resouce catalog I requested from the library came in - "The Best Fall of All" by Laura Godwin.  It is a "Ready-To-Read" Level 1 book.  S read this twice.  This was very easy for him, but I am sticking with Level 1 for now to give him some more practice reading aloud and more confidence in his ability.  A bunch more readers came in so we'll be trying them out.

So the next two weeks will be more of the same.  And of course, if an educational oppotunity pops up, we will take advantage.  I will blog about any special things or any books we just really love.

Samuel is turning 5 next week!  I've always thought of our "school year" as from one birthday to the next so that means we will soon start Kindergarten!  The week after his birthday will be Zoo Camp and the following week we will be having a "staycation", so I'm looking at August 11 as my date to start being a little more formal. 

As such I have developed some lists of books, goals, and experiences that we will work from for the year.  By next week I hope to have a timeline/plan/schedule for getting it all done.

Bible

• Calvary Chapel schedule as a guideline for readings
• Keys for Kids devotions
• Awana for memory; Work on Genesis 1:1-5; Psalm 23; 1 Corinthians 13

Civics

• Volunteer on Thursdays - still looking for opportunity

Reading/Writing

• Start with one postcard to a family member each week and work up to letters
• Dolch Word Lists
• Practice reading by reading real books from public and personal library

Math

• Living Math books and activities (Stuart J. Murphy and others)
• Books and Ideas from Marilyn Burns' "Math and Literature (K-3) Book One"
• Begin addition and subtraction up to 10

Nature Study (Science)

• Complete 12 pages for his Zoo Animal Scrapbook (photo, name, and a few facts)
• Activities from Nancy Castaldo's "Little Hands Nature Book"
• Nature Walks/Scavenger Hunts
• Keep a Caterpillar
• Weather Lapbook (Christmas Break)
• Nutrition Lapbook (Summer Break)

History/Geography Book List (most of this list comes from Laura Berquist's "Desigining Your Own Classical Curriculum")

• Legend of the Indian Paintbrush by Tomie de Paola
• Iktomi Stories by Paul Goble
• First Strawberries by Joseph Bruchac
• Native American stories by Terri Cohlene
• Corn is Maize by Aliki
• More Than Moccasins by Laurie Carlson
• Picture Book of Columbus by David Adler
• In 1492 by Jena marzollo
• Pocahontas and the Strangers by Clyde Bulla
• Colonial Times from A to Z by Bobbie Kalman
• Sam the Minuteman by Nathanial Benchley
• If You Lived at the Time of the American Revolution by Kay Moore
• If I Were President by Catherine Stier
• Story of the White House by Kate Waters
• Hero Tales by Jackson
• Children Just Like Us by Kindersley
• Paddle to the Sea by Holling
• Picture Book Biography Series by David Adler

Literature/Poetry (most of this list comes from Sonlight Core C and Tanglewood)

• Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson
• The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner (may read others in series if we like this)
• James Herriot's Treasury for Children
• A Bear Called Paddington
• American Tall Tales by mary Pope Osborne
• Li Lun, Lad of Courage by Carolyn Treffinger
• Betsy-Tacy by Maud Hart Lovelace
• The Apple and the Arrow by Buff
• In Grandma's Attic by Richardson
• Story of Dr. Dolittle
• A Grain of Rice
• Just So Stories by Kipling
• Pagoo by Holling C. Holling
• When We Were Very Young/Now We Are Six by A. A. Milne
• Wonderful Wizard of Oz
• Twenty and Ten

Music Study

• "Amazing Grace"
• "In The Garden" (grandfather's favorite hymn - learn and sing as a surprise)
• "God Bless America"
• William Tell Overture
• Nutcracker Suite
• Selections by Mozart and a biography of his life

Life Skills

• Building (Lowe's and Home Depot Clinics)
• Making simple items for gifts (e.g. plastic canvas bookmarks, painted ceramic items)

***This is in addition to 2 days a week in a classical school.  We read a lot anyway, so I might as well read something that has some cohesiveness and educational value.  All the books on the list, I own or are owned by my public library.

Nature Study -

We had a storm that brought in a cool front, so we took advantage of the cooler weather and went outside for a nature walk along the fence line that the condo property shares with a horse farm.  We had not been since early May.  Here is what we discovered -

1. "Our secret house" is very overgrown and we almost missed it.  It is a small clearing surrounded and covered by trees.  I couldn't fit back there, but I was able to move enough branches for S to fit.
2. Two ladybugs and a small lavendar moth/butterfly.
3. Several orange flowers that had fallen on the ground. They looked like trumpets.  We looked for the source and discovered some way up high in a tree.  Using the internet after we got home we found that it is a trumpet creeper, which is a vine that grows on trees.
4. A tree with thistles growing on it.  This led to a memory exercise in how different trees make seeds.  For instance, pine trees use pinecones, apple trees use apples, and oak trees use acorns.

Reading/Phonics -

Some time ago I found this site and printed out the complete list of Dolch sight words by grade level and Dolch Nouns.  On the Fourth of July, I went through the list of "pre-primer" words and while I thought he knew them all, I wrote a few up on the white board and he just breezed through them.  Then I wrote a few from the Primer list and he got them all.  When I got to the First Grade list, he got one out of four words, but after  I explained the phoncs rule involved and he looked at them for a few days, he knew them.    In addition to these "quizzes", he has been reading every few days from a reader that I find in a library or in our bookshelves.  He was getting a little frustrated with some of the harder beginner readers so I'm stepping back on those to a really beginner level (like "My dog likes to play").

History -

We read Lynne Cheney's "America: A Patriotic Primer" that I found for $1 at a yard sale last year.  This is a book that is great for a wide variety of ages and I plan on reading this at this time of year eveyr year.  It goes from the very simple "A is for..." to historical details and quotes in addition to the nice illustrations.  Last year I only read the "A is for".  This year I talked about it and added in some of the details, but not all.

Crafts -

The Craft King lives!  This week's big project was a "Swan Machine".  He cut up a piece of yello cardstock in several different shapes and sizes, then drew and colored on them.  Finally he glued the pieces together collage style (with no background paper). When he was finished it kind of looked like a swan, but then he decided it was really a machine that sucked in mosquitos and turned them into ladybugs!  I want that invention!  He went so far as to show me how each part of the machine does something different to turn the mosquitos into ladybugs.  Very creative...but I take no credit other than letting him keep his craft supplies in plain sight on the dining room table.

Math -

This continues to be informal, but I sneak it in whenever I can.  For instance, today at the grocery, it was cheaper to buy 2 boxes of 3 bags of microwave popcorn each, so I had him calculate the total which he did by multiplying or adding rather than counting, and see if it was the same number as in the one big box.  All this was done in a conversational way rather than a quizzing way.  He'll start formal math in the fall using Rod and Staff.

Kid's Cooking Camp -

Kid's Cooking Camp Installment #2 was tomatoes.  We read "First Tomato" by Rosemary Wells and a Charlie and Lola book called something like "I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato".  Samuel said he would not try homemade spaghetti sauce so we just had spaghetti out of a jar.  I am thinking about making homemade sauce without him and seeing if he'll try it.

Installment #3 was Muffins.  We read "The Muffin Fiend" by Daniel Pinkwater about Mozart playing detective to find out who is stealing all the muffins in Vienna; and "Come Meet Muffin" by Joyce Carol Oates which was about a cat and had nothing to do with muffins whatsoever.  But it was still a good book...just goes to show you how lacking our library's search engine is.  Again I took the short cut and made banana nut muffins from a mix, but this time Samuel did do most of the work.

Handipoints.com -

I must have read about this site somewhere else and bookmarked it a while back.  This week I was organizing my bookmarks and started playing around with this site.  You can enter up to 35 "chores" on a chart for each child and they check off boxes as they do them (we have just been checking off the boxes before bed), the parent "grades" each chore (for instance if Samuel fusses about going to bed but still goes to bed on time, he would get an A- instead of an A+ for "going to bed on time, which translates to fewer points), then the child gets points to redeem for fun stuff or playing on the web site.  The parent sets the rewards.  I decided to give a dollar for every 100 points.  

In addition to chores on the list, you can add fun things like "Sing a Song" or educational things like "writing a poem".  We also have "give mom a big hug" as a daily "chore.  You can also get points reduced for "arguing" or "talking back".  Anyway, so far, it's gotten Samuel a little more interested in doing his part to keep the house clean and himself healthy.

I have really relaxed my requirements in favor of fun and child-led learning this summer.  He is still in his three day a week camp and although it is a fun camp as opposed to a learning camp, he comes home exhausted, so mostly we spend the rest of the time "playing around".  Now I fully believe learning happens all the time, plus the fact that a four-year old ought to have a lot of free play, so I am just going with the flow.

There has been a lot of swimming, a zoo trip with a friend, and time with extended family. He loves crafts and often just makes up a craft with materials on hand.  Right now, he is working on "Samuel's News".  I don't know what makes it news, but he has about seven pages of it now, as well as some smaller pages he cut down.  All the pages are covered in different scribbles, lines and dots.  One of the pages has a spider web on it.  He came in to the bathroom this morning while I was taking a shower to ask me how to spell "The End", but even though he wrote those words on a piece of paper, I guess the "news" never ends because he is still working on it.

Instead of every night asking him to read, I ask him maybe 3 or 4 times a week.  Literature is slowing down too as he wants to squeeze as much play out of the day as he can which takes us right up to bedtime instead of having at least 30 minutes of bedtime reading.  Plus I haven't been checking out as many books as I usually do so there's not a lot of good stuff to choose from.  

We did one planned activity:

We signed up for a Kid's Cooking Camp at this website.  It's free and you get a link and password once a week.  The first camp is about carrots.  The site gives you a few book suggestions and a recipe.  Even though I have 4 weeks worth of camp in my mailbox, we have just finished the first "camp".  the recipe was for carrot cookies.  We had a lot of fun making the dough.  Samuel grated carrots, cracked the egg, helped me measure and stirred the dough.  While each batch was cooking, we read a book - Carrot Soup by John Segal, The Giant Carrot by Jan Peck, and The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss.  Samuel liked the dough, but the cookie was less liked.  They were not very sweet...think muffin cookie.  I liked them though so they will get eaten! Next installment is tomatoes.

Monday we spent an hour at the pool, playing, but also "practicing" his beginner swimming skills.  Tuesday was his swim class.  In talking to another mom there I got a recommendation for some early readers, so I put one on my reserve list at the library and will let you know if I like them.

S finished the last of the ten books he had to read for the library's summer reading program.  I liked their checklist...after the space for the title of each book it had a smiley face, a neutral face and a sad face.  Samuel had to circle the face that described how much he liked each book.  He is only supposed to fill out one list, but I think I may snag a couple more just for our records and not to turn in for prizes.  He read a book Monday and Tuesday. 

Last year he began an alphabet book that was a series of worksheets for each letter with a picture to color, so cut and paste shapes and two lines for practicing the upper case and lower case letter.  In our review of this "book" a few weeks ago, we noticed that "k" was missing, so he did that this week.  He is a perfectionist (read "slow") so it took him two days to finish, one day for the color, cut and paste and the second day for the writing.

Another writing activity involved copying "Happy Father's Day Love Samuel" onto his dad's card he made.  We hd the beginning of a melt-down on that one because he didn't like how it was looking and his "r" looked like an "n" and he didn't have enough space...you name it. 

He is such a little perfectionist and he is sometimes afraid to try if he thinks he cant' do it perfectly.  I have told him that "practice makes perfect" and that I will just be proud of him if he tries and does his best, and that his "best" doesn't have to be the same as Mommy's best, and many other variations of encouragement and explanation.  I want to pull out my hair sometimes because I have never been a perfectionist, but a "good enough" person.  I am good at a lot of things, but not great at any one thing as a result of my attitude.  But I really need to find a way of helping him deal with his way of thinking that doesn't result in temper tantrums.  Any ideas?

We went on vacation for week 5 so week 4 was mostly getting ready to go.  However, we did fit it  -

Family Picnic and Nature Walk - The goal was to find three yellow things (three different flowers), three red things (found a wild strawberry and a red stem on a weed), and three blue things (the sky, the reflection of the sky in the stream).  We decided that maybe somewhere in the park had been a cardinal and a blue jay, so that would finish out our list.  We went on a small hike also after we found our items.  We all tried humuus for the first time and decided we liked it.

Science - We read Octopuses by Sandra Markle.  This is the next one in the prey series, although we have read that octopuses are both predator and prey.  I also told him that the more common plural of octopus is octopi.

Reading - Spent a few days reading Dr. Seuss' One Fish Two Fish.

We went to Myrtle Beach for our vacation and took 2 days getting there and two days back.  We listened to The Mouse and The Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary.  I started reading The Enormous Egg by Oliver Butterworth at bedtime each night and got about halfway through.  We all are really enjoying this story about a special egg that hatches out of a small town hen.

During the car trip, I had a bag of tricks that S dubbed the "surprise bag".  In it I had a maze book, a sticker book, a coloring book, a read to yourself book, some markers, a plain notepad, two toy cars and some snacks.  I could have done with more, but he really did well with the trip.

We all loved our vacation week, but mostly we just had fun.  S practiced his swimming and I taught him to open his eyes underwater.  Hubby and S found some cool shells, including one that still had the dead animal attached.  We went to a privately owned zoo with some interesting animals including several babies.  Whenever we see a baby animal, S adds it to "his baby collection".  I don't necessarily take pictures of all of them, so I this is a collection he keeps mostly in his head, but he can rattle off the animals in this collection pretty well.  For me the best part was the Lazy River at our resort.  I love these things...they are so peaceful.

S starts camp next week (T/W/Th 9:30 - 1:30), so probably the only "school" I will get back into with him is reading/phonics, as well as good lit/poetry for bedtime reading.  I may be gearing up to try a weather lapbook the following week.  At least I've been gathering books and materials.  I won't press it if he is not interested, but I think he might like it.

One of the things I love best about homeschooling is that if the child loses interest in something you can just put it on the shelf and (maybe) come back to it at a later time.  In public school, they just have to plug along and either get it or don't and possibly end up hating it.

Such has been the case with reading for us.  I started with letter games, singing the alphabet, puzzles, etc...very laid back.  When I decided he was ready for a little more formal program, I bought the Fun Tales set of 26 readers from Sonlight Curriculum.  This was just too much of a jump from letters to reading, so I stopped and tried a few lessons from Ordinary Parents Guide to Reading.  This was good, but just more formal than I wanted.  I finally found Progressive Phonics, which was just perfect for us through the three letter short vowel words.  We started the next book, which was still short vowel sounds, but added two letter beginning blends.  half-way through this one, he got bored and wanted to go back to Fun Tales.  But he didn't just want to read Fun Tales, he wanted to read other easy readers from the library.  He might even go a week or two without reading anything other than just words he would find in real life.

He started reading around September and just finished the last Fun Tales reader!

My point is that he has learned to read at his own pace, but if I had pushed it at any time and with a curriculum or reader series he wasn't interested in, would he hate the idea of reading now?  If this happens when he does start formal Kindergarten in the fall, then I see my job as a parent to help him find other ways of learning the same thing.

Friday

S spent the morning with my mom.  He played Reader Rabbit Preschool Math for a while in the afternoon.  It lets him practice his math concepts and he just thinks he's playing a game.  He also finished cutting out some shapes he had colored yesterday.  The next step is to paste them on a sheet of paper to make a picture of two birds in a nest.  He wants to paste it on sky blue paper so I have to look for that color in my scrapbook stuff.  After dinner, we did our neighborhood walk to check on our caterpillars we found two days ago (yeah, we found them!)  and also found two roly-poly bugs (I poked one to show him how it rolled up, but said we shouldn't scare the second one) and picked a leaf to identify back at home...I knew it was a white oak leaf, but he didn't, and he was able to match it to a poster we have in his room.  Also, he checked on and watered his flower and it's not dying yet.  At bedtime, he read two books ; The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss and I Like Stars, a Step Into Reading book by Margaret Wise Brown.

Saturday

Samuel read Dog and Cat, a reader from the library.  I read him two poems by Jack Prelutsky, Millions of Cats by Wanda Gag, the beginning of a story from Winnie-the-Pooh, and the end of Porcupines by Sandra Markle.  He planted another weed he pulled from outside and the first one is still alive.  He wanted to check on "his" two caterpillars, and since I was short on time, I discovered a possible side benefit to studying nature.  Normally, our nature walks are leisurely strolls, but this time we had a purpose...get there and back in the shortest possible time.  So at about a mile round trip with a small rest in the middle, I definitely got my exercise in!  Back to the caterpillars - we saw an additional two smaller ones hanging on the same fallen branch as one of the bigger ones.  The other bigger one, we could actually see him munching on a leaf, just like in the Eric Carle book.

Sunday

We team-read Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss (he read the big words and I read the small words - big and small physically).  He played Reader Rabbit Preschool Math.  We baked a cake together.  I measured, he cracked the eggs and did some of the mixing.  He wanted a banana chocoate cake, so I bought chocolate cake mix, substituted mashed banana for the amount of water and used water for the amount of oil.  The batter was really good, but the cake wasn't such a big hit.  Next time, I may try adding chocolate chips and chocolate frosting to banana cake.

Monday - Friday

My home computer broke and I just got it back today.  My habit is to add things to a draft entry every night and I didn't write anything down anywhere else (and even if I had my house is such a wreck I probably wouldn't have been able to find it today when I got my computer back).  So this will really be just the highlights as opposed to the more detailed record I normally have.

At swim class #9, he actually swam about 2 feet without the teacher giving him assistance.  It was a proud day for both of us and he has renewed interest in continuing with classes.  He will start the next level this coming up week. 

The literature book that stands out in my mind was a picture book retelling of Little Babaji by Julius Lester called "Sam and the Tigers"  I thought the author did a great job of keeping with the feel of the original language but taking out any hint of racism that is sometimes brought up.  I used voices and tried to read the book as though I was telling the story instead of reading. 

On Thursday we showed up at the library on opening and they were excited that Samuel was the first one to get the summer reading program form (they know us well at our branch).  I told him this was the first year all the books could be ones he read instead of ones I read to him and he was so excited by this that he read 5 books that same day!  Since then (and I'm writing this on Sunday) he has not wanted to read a whole book through, although he has read a few pages each day.  I guess he overdid it!  He has to read 10 to get the prizes and be entered in the drawing for the bigger prizes.

Also, his "Your Big Backyard" magazine arrived and we read about lizards and ants and a few other articles.  And sad news on the caterpillars...the mowers came and when we checked the usual spot did not find a one.  I am hoping there are more around that we just did not see, but we didn't have time to look around that day.

And that's about all I can remember, although I am sure we did more.  Also, I only need two more comments to reach 100, so please leave me a comment and tell me your (or your child's) favorite beginning/easy reader.

READING

Because Samuel is so young to begin reading, I am wanting to guide his progress without a formal phonics program, but I also want to make sure he doesn't get into some bad habits.  So I am always on the search for some good beginning readers at the library, but many of them are just a little too hard and I think he has pretty much gone through all those I could find.

So I was really excited last week when we were at Half-Price Books and S asked for "Ten Apples Up On Top" by Dr. Seuss and I opened it and realized it was the perfect level!  It is awful long for a beginning reader to read in one sitting, but he happily plugged along reading a few pages a day until he finished the whole thing.  He was so proud to read that whole book.  So, now I am looking at other Dr. Seuss books that would be at the right level.

WRITING

He practiced writing quite a bit with his Mother's Day cards.  I have noticed that while he is now staying on the same line and his letters are more evenly spaced, they are all the same size (the top of each letter are even with each other, as well as the bottom of each letter) and he does not have any space between words.  So that will be the next thing I "gently guide" him.  One day I needed to do some work on the computer and he did not want to be away from me.  So I set up the child size table and chair next to the desk and printed a few work sheets.  One of them was to practice printing R's which are one of his hard letters.

LITERATURE and POETRY

1. We continued to read Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and finished it.  Samuel didn't comment too much about it, except to say the Radish Cure is his favorite, but he always asked for it as part of his bed-time reading. 
2. We read "The Little House" by Virginia Lee Burton.  This is a really good story of a little house in the country who watches the passing of seasons and eventually the city growing out and up around her until she is overshadowed by the big city.  Don't worry it has a happy ending and Samuel loved this one. 
3. We are still reading from Jack Prelutsky's "Something Big Has Been Here" for poetry. 
4. I had checked out Winnie-the-Pooh a few weeks ago and this week we read two stories from it.

We read lots more, but nothing else I really felt qualified as "good literature", although I believe that quantity is, while not as important as quality, definitely good, at least in terms of amount of time spent in the act of enjoying a book.

NATURE

On Wednesday after supper we took a walk around our neighborhood that turned into a nature walk.  We watched two worms squiggle around on the sidewalk (it rained most of the day).  We found two caterpillars and decided we should check back on that area over the next several days to see if we can find chrysallises chrysali cocoons and later butterflies.  We noticed that even the evergreens get spring leaves (they are a much lighter green and softer).  And he pulled a weed wildflower with the roots still attached so we are experimenting with replanting it at our house.  My theory is that being pulled from the ground was too big a shock and it will die.

We also finished reading "Porcupines" by Sandra Markle from the Prey series.

MUSIC APPRECIATION (a stretch, but still...)

He rode the free horse ride at Kroger and it played the William Tell Overture.  I told him what it was called, we noticed that the music made us think of horses galloping, which is probably why the makers used this music.  I even told him about the Lone Ranger and that good classical music never gets old.

P.E.

He is doing amazingly well in his swim lessons.  I think having an adult, not his mommy, giving his lessons is just what he needed.  No way would he put his face in the water for me, but for a woman he met only 9 weeks ago...sure!  Next week he graduates from the Rosie Redfish I class and he has already asked to keep going with the Rosie Redfish II class.  His goal is to make Rainbow Fish, which is swim team ready for next summer. We'll see how that goes.

BIBLE

We finished The Beginner's Bible!  I ordered Keys for Kids and I hope it come soon so we can begin.

I also signed up for a free trial of Clever Island.  I hope the link works.  Once I signed up, the cookies take me directly to the login page instead of the free trial page.  This lasts for 15 days and I'm not sure how much it costs after that.  The games supposedly reinforce all the basic school subjects (reading, math, science, arts, social studies).  S has played a few games and one of them had a little money math in it and after a quick explanation from me, he was good to go.  I started him on the easy level, but there are 3 total levels.  I'll give a more detailed review after our free trial is up.

Our first week of May began with the Kentucky Derby Festival Pegasus Parade.  I had not been since the 8th grade and my dad had not been since before I was born.  Samuel of course had never been.  We had a great time, although S's favorite part was the "pooper scoopers" who follow the horses.  Each team had a fun costume and really played up to the crowds who all cheered when they "did their duty".  Even on our fun day, I had to sneak learning in there by asking S to tell me the names of different instruments in the marching bands!

Everyone in my family except for me was getting over their illness.  I could not even read out loud for very long, so that suffered a little, but not a whole lot.  The benefit to me not reading was that S read more.  We only have one book left in Sonlight's Fun Tales series of 26 booklets which focus on the short vowel sounds. 

Even when I couldn't read for long, I would read one or two poems from the Jack Prelutsky anthology we have from the library (Something Big Had Been Here).  Other books I have read are:

1. Four chapters from Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle by Betty MacDonald.  I remember this book from my own elementary days.  Samuel is getting a kick out of all the bad things the kids do and then how they get tricked into being good children again.
2. We began one chapter from Winnie-the Pooh by A. A. Milne.  I'll finish it up tomorrow.
3. Tom Thumb (Grimm) retold by Eric Carle in  "Eric Carle's Treasury of Classic Stories for Children".  In the notes of this book, these statements - "In the lively retellings of the classic stories in this volume, Eric Carle has followed the long oral tradition, retaining the essentials of the tales, but making such alterations as he felt were called for.  In general he has kept to the plots of the sotries faithfully, but in some he has eliminated long descriptive passages that he felt were obstacles to young people just beginning to have some mastery of reading."  Not being familiar with any originals myself, the ones I have skimmed over seem good to me.
4. The House of Maple Street by Bonnie Pryor.  This is a delightful tale of the history of the land and people who came before the house on Maple Street was built, starting with an Indian tribe and description of the land, followed by pioneers travelling west to those who eventually settled the area.
5. We are still following up on our Vulture Experience back in February!  The author of the book we found at the library after that is Sandra Markle and she had 6 total books on different Scavengers which we finished in March.  Then I noticed she also wrote books about Prey animals and Predator animals and S said he had to read all of them!  We began the first of the prey books this week, entitled "Porcupines".  Each book follows one animal (in this case a make porcupine) and follows it through a season, touching on what it eats, how it defends itself, how it finds food, mating, birthing, parenting,  interacting with others of it's species.  It's really like a story filled with facts. 

We also made a trip to the zoo on Friday.  We were only planning on visiting the gift shop to buy these little animals Samuel likes to collect (he had "worked" extras jobs for me and his grandparents to earn a whopping $12 which bought him 4 animals) and a present for Hubby's birthday.  But then we heard the announcement that the elephants were going to be "exercising" at 11 and since it was 10:30, we headed that way (we have a one-year old elephant and you just can't miss anything that Scotty is going to do!).  Well, of course, we had to visit the lemurs, giraffes, hyrax, elephant shrew, spiny mouse, bongos and lions on the way.  We also noticed that the Addaxes had two new babies that we hadn't heard about - so cute!  So we actually ended up staying at the zoo for about an hour instead of the 15 minutes I had planned.  I didn't really mind since it was a beautiful morning (that afternoon it rained buckets on those attending the Oaks horse races, including my parents, brother and SIL).

One other opportunity I found was in a crying jag S was having.  If he is tired or not feeling well and gets the smallest bump or negative attention (read "fussing" from me), he will start crying and can't stop.  I have held him for up to 30 minutes while he cries it out.  And I have tried distracting, singing, leaving the room, you name it.  Nothing works to stop the crying until he is ready to stop.  So this time I tried some word problems.  I asked him simple things like if I had two apples and he had two apples how many do we have alltogether (he can talk through his cries, he just can't stop).  Then I used silly examples like if he had ten baby bears and I took away five.  Then I asked if he could count backwards from 20.  I knew he could do it from 10, but didn't think he could from 20.  He couldn't, but I kept him at it and his little brain was reall working to figure out the next (previous) number until he got to 10 and then he just flew down the number line.  By that time he had stopped crying and he was surprised as he realized this.  So I told him to try that technique the next time he couldn't stop crying.  Maybe it will work again, who knows, but he still got some math practice out of it!

I have realized that S(4.75 yo) has already met or surpassed the goals I had for him for this school year that I called K4.  I called it K4 rather than preschool because of a couple of reasons:

1. He wanted to learn to read
2. He wanted me to read chapter books
3. He had already achieved almost all of the skills listed on the World Book Curriculum Standards for Preschool

So I am taking an extended "summer session" lasting from May through August.  I will continue to read good literature that I can find in our library from lists and recommendations I find from other homeschoolers using the Beechick, Mason, and/or Classical philosophies.  We will work on expanding our nature study, art and music appreciation.  I have ordered Keys for Kids and am hoping that will work for our Bible study and devotional.  He is taking swim lessons, attending a 3 day a week camp for 4 weeks, Zoo camp for 1 week (mornings only) and we are going on one week long vacation in June and a possible shorter trip in August.  I will choose good books for his book basket, but I will also let him have a say in what he wants to read.  I will have him practice his letters and numbers once a week and reading 3 or 4 times a week.

In my head it didn't sound like much, but now that I'm writing it down, it sounds like a lot.  Mostly I just want to have learning available, but let him lead the way.  I want him to have plenty of free play, but I want to be ready to take advantage of the opportunities where we find them.  I will attempt to blog weekly about what opportunities we found during the previous week.

After the big storm of the winter last weekend (we usually only have snow once or twice during a winter) and Easter just a few days away now,  I have begun looking forward to summer and making tentative plans.  Planning is my way of dreaming.  My plans are always evolving though, and rarely are followed completely.  So please indulge my summer ramblings:

S4's first swim lesson (without me in the pool with him) will be tomorrow night and finish up the week before the pool opens.  I have promised that we will spend more time at the pool if he takes lessons.  This means 2 to 3 times a week for an hour or two.  We are both very fair and even with sunscreen 1 or 2 hours at a time is enough time outside.

The first week of June we will be at the beach.  I usually use beach time as a way to get some hands on nature study that we can't get at home.

For the next 4 weeks of the summer, I am going to send him to a 3 day (9 - 1:30) a week day camp.  He loves this time of play and using his lunch box is a big deal for him too. 

Zoo Camp (mornings only for one week) is the last week of July and will be on Animal Defenses.  The first week of August is another vacation week, but we will probably only do a short trip or "vacation in our hometown".  I think the second or third week of August is the state fair and there is a lot to see, do and learn there.

Except for Zoo Camp week, we will do nature walks each week, read good literature (book lists will be in the next stage of planning), practice reading/phonics (my goal is to finish the rules in Book 7 of our phonics series...we should be finished with Book 6 in the next couple of weeks), practice writing with stories and letters, and living math.  I am also debating on doing a Nutrition lapbook I bought a while back before I decided lapbooks were not for us.  But maybe it will be better at 5 than at 3 1/2.  I also will keep incorporating music appreciation and art appreciation when I can.

A while back I posted about Choosing a School.  I want to homeschool, but don't really have Hubby's support for this.  My next best thing is to find a great school and "after-school".  That would be hard to do in a full time public school (not to mention my not-so-good feelings about public school in general).  We've been sweating over whether S would get in to the Highlands Latin School because at his application interview/test, the admissions director told us that she was seeing a lot of "qualified boys" for only 16 Kindergarten boy spots.  Part of me was hoping to get to Plan D if this fell through because I was 50% sure I could get Hubby to let me homeschool for one year and re-apply at HLS for first grade.  I already knew Plan C was out because they were full and we wouldn't know about Plan B until May 1.

Anyway, we got a letter today from HLS.  They give preferential treatment to siblings and 25 of the the 32 total K spots were taken by siblings!  Five more were taken by siblings of new students in other grades!  So, they made a decision to open another K class (and invited S to be part of it) and look for a second campus site for what will be be S's first grade year.  That's about all I know; there is a meeting on March 19 to answer questions.  I have mixed feelings about this news so far because the future is still somewhat unknown past K.  I was hoping to have one school for K - 12 and be done with it (barring any unforeseen problems or changes) and I really like the Classical Latin-centered philosophy.

Well, I'll just try to keep an open mind until March 19.  Hubby thinks this is a good thing because maybe the new campus would end up being closer to us (the current campus is 20 - 30 minutes depending on traffic).  One of my questions is that the letter said the new campus would eventually be a K - 6 campus, so what happens in 7th - 12th grades?