Week 29: A More Normal Week

We finally had a week without any extra outside runs or activities. It wasn't completely normal, since DH threw out his back on a call Wednesday and has been hobbling around the house since then. Everyone has pitched in to get things for him or pick things up, and the kids have tried very hard to remember to be quiet since DH has been taking lots of naps due to his pain medication. We didn't quite get everything done because the weather has been so beautiful that I've been trying to get the kids outside. Here's what did get done.


MATH


Jessie finished the IP section on averaging, and has started a new section in the textbook and workbook on rate. Basically, it's been all word problems. Some asking for the rate. Others giving the rate and asking either how long something will take or how much can be done in a fixed amount of time. Based on her work this week, it looks to be another easy section, so she has been finishing early and had plenty of time to work on her Sudoku puzzle craze. (She started working on them again when she was sick on Saturday and seems determined to finish all the puzzles in her book.) I need to check to see how many weeks of school are left and how many weeks of math are left. If we're behind any, this will be a good time to catch up.

Violet spent the first half of the week doing review exercises in the textbook and workbook. With those done, she started a new section on volume. Thus far, she's been introduced to liters and milliliters, given various beakers to read the amount of liquid each contains, and was told that 1000ml=1l but hasn't had any conversion practice as yet. After struggling a bit with reading the pictures of the scales in the last section, she did an excellent job determining the volume of liquid in the beakers. I'll be checking her pace to see if she needs to do any doubling up as well.

Benny has started subtracting numbers within 20. The main focus so far has been to take a problem that he already knew like 5-2 and change it into 15-2 so he can see that the answer in the ones place remains the same. The next step was to eliminate the first problem and just subtract the second one using a picture. He did very well on both. In Miquon, he is almost finished with the addition and multiplication section. If you didn't see my Wednesday post scroll down, there are some great pictures of Henry "helping" him with his Miquon.

LANGUAGE ARTS

Jessie scored another perfect score on her spelling lesson for the week. In grammar, we've talked about how certain prepositions can be used either as prepositions or adverbs and how to tell the difference, when to leave out unnecessary prepositions, and how conjunctions are used and diagrammed. In CW, our model for the week was "The Cyclops" from The Children's Homer. In analysis, we finally covered the final step in the six sentence shuffle where you write a new sentence using the same grammar parts as the model sentence. Jessie's version is on the right. In literature, she's still progressing slowly through Robinson Crusoe. Of course, she's progressing faster than I am, so I'm just hoping the narrations are accurate.

Violet finished another unit in grammar and has started on the last unit for the year! So far, she reviewed dictionaries and homonyms. In literature, she completed reading The Children's Homer. We did try dictation one day instead of copywork. Her spelling and grammar were fine, but her handwriting was atrocious. I think we'll stick to copywork for the remainder of the year with an added emphasis on neatness. In CW, we analyzed the fable, "The Ant and the Grasshopper". For spelling, we're still working on words she misspells in her other assignments in the hope that she will start being more careful when she does her work.

Benny spent half the week reviewing long vowel words in Phonics Pathways. The second half of the week, we spent reading Bob books. I started him back on the A1 series for review since he seems to be trying to make every vowel have a long sound now. We'll pick back up with the phonics book in two weeks. His copywork is still going very well. The picture is Friday's work. The other paper for the week magically disappeared overnight or maybe the dog ate it ;).

HISTORY / ART

We finished up our unit on the Old Testament this week. YEAH!! Jessie read most of the book of Nehemiah and wrote up a summary of the events. Violet and Benny finished reading about Ezra, read about Nehemiah, and had a short chapter on the events between the Old and New Testaments. Both girls completed a map showing what Israel looked like at that time. For timeline figures, we added Ezra and Esther from last week and Nehemiah from this week.

We also finished up our unit on Greece this week. Double YEAH!! (Also a YIKES, I'd better get myself in gear and get the unit on Rome ready fast!!) Basically, the girls covered the events from the division of Alexander's empire to the fall of Greece to the Romans. I just had Jessie takes notes and give me a summary of the events. Violet actually had 4 chapters and summaries covering Ptolemy, Pyrrhus, Cleomenes III, and the fall of Greece. Both girls completed a map showing the division of Alexander's empire and drew a picture of the lighthouse at Alexandria using the Draw and Write Through History book.

SCIENCE

Alas, it didn't happen this week. Better luck next week.

LATIN / LOGIC

It all got done.

OTHER

I don't have anymore cute Henry pictures to post. Besides helping his brother with math, Henry's started using the signs for book and water. I also broke down and decided enough was enough as far as his eating. The pureed pears were met with a tremendous temper tantrum on Thursday, but I still managed to get them in his mouth at which point he had no choice but to swallow them. The pureed peaches on Friday also met with objection but not nearly as much as the previous day, so I'm hopeful we can make some continued progress next week.