Week in Review

We have come to the end of another week. The girls and I enjoyed a week that included a day of cleaning, some progress in our lessons, some time with our handwork group and two different days with friends at the park. I'd say it was a perfect blend of lesson plans, Unschooling and Life School. Let me share with you some of the things we did this week.

LANGUAGE ARTS

This was a very productive week in the language department. Somehow I never quite got to reading Twig this week, but we did read up to chapter 10 in Black Beauty.

As far as the girls individual work, they both finished their "reading" books this week. The Princess read the last story in her Reading Literature Primer. She was beyond excited to move on to the First Reader. She read The Three Little Pigs aloud to her sister and me from the First Reader. She was surprised to hear the story went a bit differently than what she had heard before. In addition to reading aloud, the Princess also read a lot on her own. She read Meet Benji and Benji's Big Adventure several times (to herself AND to us). She also read My Pony Jack and My Pony Jack Riding Lessons.

The Hippie finished reading and narrating The Family Under the Bridge this week. She really liked the story and said that Daddy and I should read it. She started two other books this week ~ Socks by Beverly Cleary and Turtle in Paradise by Jennifer Holm. In addition to the novels she reads, she is ALWAYS reading something. She likes to read one-sitting picture story books and has read an African Rapunzel book this week as well as Kate and the Beanstalk. She has been reading from Grimm The Illustrated Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm and also from Girls Who Rocked the World 2 by Michelle Roehm.

The Hippie learned to write the letters L, M and N in cursive this week. In her Language Lessons this week she wrote a short paragraph about our family where she was reminded to capitalize where needed. We did a bit of picture study together and she worked on some copywork from the book, Wee Willie Mousie: Life From His Viewpoint, by Jane Fielding.

The Princess completed twelve lessons in her Language Lessons book this week! We did some poetry appreciation together with the poem "The Night Will Never Stay" by Eleanor Farjeon and she drew a picture of the outdoors at night. She got lots of reading practice in, reading paragraphs and words and sentences to me from her book. We talked about the "th", "ch" and "sh" sounds and she got several opportunities to practice words that use those sounds through copywork. We did some more poetry appreciation with the poem "Whispers" by Myra Cohn Livingston. We also did some picture study together this week with an adorable photograph of two bull mastiff puppies.


MATH


This week was fairly relaxed in the math department. The Princess and I reviewed all of the math facts that we had gone over last week and she and I did main lessons for the numbers 4 and 5. She drew pictures to represent each number and practiced making each number with jewels. She also spent about 20 minutes on Dreambox this week. The Hippie and I only did one main lesson this week. We reviewed all of the math facts for the numbers 1 through 7 and figured out what all could be done with the number 8 (using addition, multiplication and division). She drew her picture for 8 and wrote out all of the possible equations to make up 8. She also spent about 30 minutes on Dreambox this week. Aside from the "lessons", we did play Ponyopoly as a family last night. The Hippie ran the Farmer's Market again (similar to being the banker in Monopoly) and had to add up all of her "treats" (money) at the end of the game to determine who won. She did this in her head, which was difficult, but she managed. And, she won!

The Princess's picture for FOUR

The Princess's picture for FIVE

The Hippie's picture for EIGHT

BIBLE / CHARACTER

We started reading a wonderful book this week called Wisdom and the Millers. I'm pretty excited to continue with this series. It is a great little book that teaches the Proverbs for children. This week we read and learned the importance of discretion (of thinking before we act) and about not arguing or talking back. This one hits close to home as I have a beautiful and kind and amazingly well behaved child ... who would make a FANTASTIC lawyer! The Hippie tends to argue (not disrespectfully, but still) with almost everything. I suggest she eat an orange, she wants an apple. I suggest she read this, she wants to read that. You know what I mean. It was nice to have another source to remind her that it is inappropriate for her to do that.

NATURE

The Hippie's favorite thing we do (by far) is our Bird study. This week we read chapters 8 and 9 in the Burgess Bird book. While we listened, the girls colored pictures (accurately) of Eastern Kingbirds. We watched video of Eastern Kingbird, listened to audio of their songs and studied their markings and where they live. After they were finished coloring their birds, they pasted them into their Bird Notebooks and copied something small ~ the Princess simply copied the name "Eastern Kingbird" and the Hippie copied a short sentence from chapter 8 of the Burgess Bird Book.

The Hippie's

The Princess's

The girls also waited patiently (well, actually it was fairly impatiently) for some flamingo eggs from the Dollar Tree to hatch. When they finally hatched, the Princess wanted to know what sound flamingos make, so we spent some time researching flamingos online and watching videos of flamingos "dancing".

ART & MUSIC

We listened to the "Classical Guitar" station on Pandora all week this week. It's really a lovely station! For Picture Study this week, we studied the painting "Dance at Bougival" by Renoir.

EXTRAS


In addition to all the stuff above, we had lots of fun this week with friends. The girls enjoyed their Waldorf Handwork Group this week. The Hippie finished her first cross-stitch practice and is ready to move on to making her worm. The Princess is working hard on hers. Thursday after our lessons at home in the morning, we met our homeschool group at a local park for lots of fun. All of the kids played so well together, bigs and littles, harmoniously. It was a beautiful thing. On Friday, we took our cats to get neutered. This meant we had to drop them off at the crack of dawn (well, early to us anyway) and had to stay out all day to be ready to pick them up in the late afternoon on the other side of town. The girls and I enjoyed a morning date at Panera bread (coffee for mom and bagels for all ~ yum). We then headed into Michael's (craft store) to browse and then moved on to Barnes & Noble for a morning of reading and exploring the books. I just love hanging out in Barnes & Noble! The Hippie made me proud ~ she spent the whole time in the biography section (of the children's department). After our morning time together, we met friends again at another park. The kids climbed ancient Oak trees, played on the playground, made fishing poles out of sticks and Spanish moss and "went fishing" in the pond. They drew and wrote and just hung out. They made friends with some other homeschoolers that were there (from a local Catholic Homeschoolers Group). It was a lovely day!

And, as I write this, the girls are outside getting a very detailed lesson in automotive mechanics. Daddy is doing a side job today and is working on someone else's vehicle here at our house. The Hippie is dressed appropriately and both are out there helping him. Helping him for real. And, learning. I can hear him teaching them about inner and outer tie rods and racks and brakes and all things front end. The girls took turns removing lug nuts and have already been working with a pry bar and an impact gun. And, the job hasn't even begun. Should make for a long and educational day. I'm pretty sure this will take Daddy two to three times longer than it should, but he is making memories with the girls and is teaching them valuable information!

It's great to be a homeschooler!