School 2012 Week 1

We had a wonderful first week of school. We were all a little tired after school each day due to the extra brain power we were putting out, but other then that my schedule and timing for each subject was spot on. I guess after doing this for 6 years I have become a pro at scheduling. LOL!

We started each day with the Pledge of allegiance and we learning and singing 1 hymn a week. Then we move onto the calendar for my daughter and we study a painting a week using our Master Pieces. Then onto our Bible which is very fun. I read the short story from The Illustrated Bible and then re-read the actual account from the Bible. The kids are really enjoying this because the Illustrated Bible gives them pictures to put to the words I am reading from the actual Bible. Once we were done with the reading I had them either narrate what they have learned or write a sentence or two about what they learned and draw a picture for me. So this week we drew Adam and Eve. They turned out great. Just look below!

On to History. Reading for the Story of the World (SOTW) is wonderful. It is an easy read and it only takes us about 30 minutes to read it. Then I read from a library book. But on day 2 and 3 of each chapter we do our student pages that came SOTW and a project. This week our student pages were to tell the story of us. So you will see they wrote all their info on their page. Then for our project we did a timeline of ourselves. I printed some pictures out, one for each year of their life. They really had fun with that and wanted to show it to everyone!

For Science we are learning about Botany through Apologia. This book is so well written, however the first 2 pages were a mouth full. So many Latin word and scientific words. However when we got around to doing our notebook and our experiments the kids were able to understand a bit better. For the project we were suppose to do a shoe taxonomy. But, I have to honest, I did not want all the shoes all over the house. I know me and the kids. they would have stayed downstairs for the day, then gone up to the rooms and stayed on the floor for the rest of the evening and probably would not get put away till the next day! Soooo, we did a Lego taxonomy. OMGosh! that was so much fun. You know they  actually really understood it . The project page only asked to go down to order, but we were able, in a few cases to take it down to genus.

For Geography I am doing two things. I am reading from a book that actually touches on each country around the world. So the reading will be fun. However we are putting together a Geography Dictionary. So each week we will be looking up a geography term, writing down what that means and then drawing a picture of what it looks like. Once the year is over, I will bind each of their books and they can have them for years to come.

As of this year I have two kids doing English now. My daughter had a little tough time understanding, but we will take it slow for the first couple weeks until she gets the hand of it. Then I know her, she will soar! Her reading is coming along too. We had to take a little step back this week since we ended up taking the summer off and hardly touched a book for 2 1/2 months. But by the end of next week she will be in full swing.

We also started cursive again. Now when I taught my son to write, I taught cursive first and he soared at that. He has always hateed to print. But my daughter actually taught herself how to print by age 3 1/2 or so. She would copy words all the time. She did not know what they said, but she copied them. So she was taught printing first. However, I want her to know how to cursive and I know she will have beautiful cursive once we are done with the course. So I took a picture of her first week of cursive page.

My son is doing his reading completely on his own this year. He has his book and reading schedule etc all laid out for him. I started him off on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I know he has seen the movie a hundred times, but I figure that would be a good way to ease him back into reading. And he is enjoying that. This year we are also starting composition or creative writing. He struggled with it at first, but once he calmed down, relaxed and just let go, he came up with a great little paragraph. Yes, just one little paragraph. This is one area that he has really struggled with over the years and I am so glad we homeschool for this very reason. Writing has never been a strong point. So instead of throwing him completely into it like traditional school would do in 5th grade, I am starting off slow. All last year and the year before we had dictation of 1-4 sentences. Then I would dictate half the sentences and he would finish the story and so on. Now this year he is on his own. He really did a great job. By the end of the year or so, I expect, we will be at 2 paragraphs or so for his writing.

Anyway, that was my week. Next week we have a HUGE week. I start teaching my two or possibly three children's choirs. Part of me is dreading it because my schedule will be so tight and I am not sure what and how it will feel, but I am also SOOOO looking forward to it too. I know once we get past this coming week doing school, singing for the adult choir, teaching all the children's choirs, singing for Celebrate Recovery, Art and Park Day and I can feel how my week will feel, I will calm down and feel great about our schedule.

Well, I hope you all had a great first week. See you next weekend!