Week 26: Moving Along

It's been another crazy week here. We ran out to CVS Monday morning when I read on the Southern Savers website that the Huggies refills were ringing up at $2.50. (Some deals are too good to pass up even without coupons.) Thursday, my Mom called to remind me that I hadn't emailed her the kids clothing needs for spring and summer, and she was consignment shopping that evening. Violet, Henry, and Benny were simply a matter of checking boxes downstairs, but Jessie had to go through her clothes from last summer so we could see what still fit (mostly shirts and dresses) and what she had outgrown (mostly shorts and capri pants). Needless to say school ran late a couple of days. Here's our week.

MATH

Jessie is still working through the section on percentages. Most of her work this week has been word problems. There were several general word problems, but a few more practical ones as well. She calculated discounted prices for sale items and how much money would be in a bank account after a year at a given interest.

Violet has finished the section on length in the textbook and workbook and begun the corresponding section in the IP book. She's had lots of what I assume careless errors this week since she answers them correctly the second time. She's also been sneaking in to watch Curious George in the mornings without finishing her math, so I guess if I want to check my email it's going to have to be before 8 next week or after lunch. In Miquon, she been working with line graphs, identifying where things are on the graph, drawing different shapes in specified locations, and drawing a series of shapes in a line.

Benny spent two days in Miquon Orange matching up multiplication sentences with addition sentences (ie. 3x5 to 5+5+5) and a third day cementing the differences between multiplication by figuring out the answer for pairs of problems (ie. 2x5 next to 2+5). In Singapore 1A, we continue to work with numbers over 20. I downplayed the matching numbers to words parts since he can't read those words yet and focused just on the place value aspect (if you see 1 group of ten and 3 more that makes...13).

LANGUAGE ARTS

Another week, another spelling lesson for Jessie. In grammar, we're still working through the punctuation section. There was one lesson on writing a book report, but I didn't like their format. We finally had our discussion on The Hobbit using Teaching the Classics. We did the story chart for plot and discussed conflict as we've previously done. Then we focused on the character of Bilbo and went through several of the Socratic questions related to protagonists. I assigned her a 3 paragraph book report, which she can't finish until I get off the internet, so I'll post the results later. In CW, she completed the analysis and rewriting of The Defeat of Cyrus. (She was a little disappointed when I told her she couldn't use the summary from history last week because it wasn't detailed enough.)

Violet finished her second lesson in SWO F. In grammar, she working with a combination of adjectives and adverbs to help her distinguish between the two. She still gets the questions each one answers mixed up, but she's getting better. In CW Aesop, she did her rewrite of "Cornelia's Jewels" with her garden illustration on the bottom. In literature we continue to work through The Children's Homer. Whatever her issue was the first time through, she seems to have corrected it. Her narrations are still short, but they are much better than her previous attempts (which is probably just a sign that I was too lax in my expectations). Her handwriting continues from the same passage in The Secret Garden. I think we may try a day of studied dictation next week in her handwriting notebook to see how it works. I'd like her to be fully switched over to dictation by the beginning of next year, so I know we need to start transitioning now.

Benny worked with the long e sound this week in its various form (e-e, ee, and ea). We tried an early reader from our church library one day with mixed results. It had more sight words than I would have liked, but between the two of us we slowly finished the book. For copywork this week, I just had Benny write the alphabet. I gave him a try at writing from memory, but we quickly switched back to copying after I watched him write some of the letters backwards. We also did a much better job at getting to our read alouds this week.

HISTORY

In our OT unit, we covered the conquest of Israel by Assyria and the failed Assyrian attempt to conquer Judah during the reign of King Hezekiah. Jessie continued charting the different kings. I made an exception with Hezekiah and had her do a summary instead since their were several chapters related to him. Both girls completed maps showing the relocation of the Israelites after the Assyrian conquest. Violet and Benny also read about Jonah and various prophets.

In Greece, this week was all about Philip of Macedon. Both girls read and wrote summaries from their regular sources and made maps of Macedon, its ally, and the lands conquered under Philip. Jessie also read about the early life of Alexander and wrote a summary for next week's notebook page. Both girls drew Bucephalus from the Draw and Write Through History book for next week's notebook page on Alexander. There were a bunch of timeline figures this week. After looking at the available space in the notebooks, we opted to only include Isaiah and Jeremiah and leave out the other prophets. Other timeline figures included Philip I, the conquest of Israel, and King Hezekiah.

SCIENCE

We did two lessons of science at the beginning of the week and then there were enough interruptions that we haven't done any more since Tuesday. We've started a new unit on reactions. Monday's lab had a fun demonstration of a chemical reactions called fire extinguisher in a jar. We lit a birthday candle and fixed it in the bottom of the jar with clay, added vinegar and baking soda, watched the bubbling liquid, and saw the released carbon dioxide extinguish the flame. On Tuesday, we worked on chemical equations. The idea of balancing the equation went way over their head, but they at least figured out the difference between a number 2 in front of the molecule versus a subscript of two in the molecule.

LATIN / LOGIC

Jessie finished the Mind Benders B3 book this week. In Latin, she learning the demonstrative pronouns for this and these. Violet finished lesson 4 this week and watched the DVD for lesson 5 on Friday.

OTHER

Fun Henry moments for the week:

1. Repeating the follow conversation multiple times in a row is funny if you're almost 2.

"Mom?" "What?" "Hello." "Hello."

2. On Thursday while dinner was cooking I heard a noise behind me while I was washing dishes and turned around to see this.

Apparently, he was really hungry because he ate 1 muffin, asked for 2 helpings of applesauce, and then ate most of a second muffin. Now if I could just get him to eat more fruits and veggies.