Jan 7th-11th - A New Semester starts!

Our school was back to work this week after a long hiatus over the Advent and Christmas seasons. We did some educational activities during that time (and I counted some of these as "official" homeschool days), but nothing baldly academic in nature.



Classical Conversations started back up this week, which we were all looking forward to! I didn't quite accomplish all my plans for this week, but I'm fairly happy with our first week back in the usual school groove. The week ended with a weekend visit by some friends from TN, so we spent a little time doing "Home Ec" to get ready for that! :)



Devotional Time

Started using our The Anglican Family Prayer Book book again. I keep harping on this little book , but I really do love it. If you desire to introduce your kids or family to the Book of Common Prayer or to use it for home prayer and devotion, this is a great resource. I highly recommend it. We managed to read our The Child's Story Bible, too, on a couple of days.



Math

DS 11 is anxious to get through his Saxon Math book (a bit of a holdover from last year - when we took time off to do fact practice). So, we've decided to double time it through, skipping over those lessons he will either get in the next book or those with which he already shows proficiency. If he is up for it, I may just start giving him the tests to work through until he gets stumped. Then we'll do the lesson that corresponds to his point of "stumpedness".



DS 8 is working his way through his Singapore math. Again, a bit of a holdover from last year. This week's lesson included learning to add by tens (42 + 10 = 52, 65 - 10 = 55)



DD 5 (almost 6) is flying through her Early Bird Singapore. This week we stated comparing "less and more" with numerals and manipulatives.



With the 8 and 5 year old, I also play Arithmetic Lotto and do some simple practice reading the clock.



Poetry and Literature Selections

Read from Ambleside Online's Year 1 Poetry Collection, including: "Velvet Shoes" and "A Calendar". Read a couple chapters of Five Little Peppers and How They Grew.



Timeline

Our Veritas Press timeline cards for this week go from "John Calvin and the Institutes" to "The Mayflower Lands at Plymouth".



English: Grammar, Writing, Phonics, Copy Work

DS 11 had a very light week. Just some review of sentence classification and diagramming.



DS 8's reading has really been picking up steam the past month or so. He's enjoying the DK reader (level 2) Star Wars: Journey Through Space. We also enjoyed completing a MadLibs Jr. story.



DD 5 completed a few pages from her Get Set for the Code: Book B.



Both the 8 and 5 year old and I played Phonics Lotto, too.



Classical Conversations Memory Work

Back into the memory groove with Week 13! We kept it simple this week by just using our Memory Work CD.



Subject area reading (Family)

My kids (the whole family actually) had some very late nights, so we took advantage of the homeschooler's option to sleep in. :) But, this meant we missed some of our subject area readings. The only subject area I managed this week was History. We listened to "James Watt and the Tea Kettle" from Thirty More Famous Stories Retold, looked at the The Usborne Book of World History (Guided Discovery Program), read from Children's History of the World on the subject of the Industrial Revolution. DS 11, also read from The Story of the World: Early Modern Times "Cotton and Guns".



Subject area reading (Student)

DS 11 and I read about "Orion" from D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths.

DS 8 and I read about "Odin's 8-legged Steed" from D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths.

DD and I read "The Frog's King" from Aesop for Children.



Other

DS 11 gets to present an oral report at next week's Classical Conversations on any subject we chose. He asked if he could do his report on the history and making of root beer. I thought that sounded like fun, so I agreed. He did a little research and planning for his report.



And that was our week. Thank you for visiting with us. If you've posted your weekly report, drop me a comment and I'll come by to visit you!