Home school report for January 30th -



The weeks are definitely going better without mom having to attend college classes 2 days a week. The online RN program is difficult, but worth it for us. This week we attended the home school co-op on Monday afternoon. Caden's class is studying honey bees, he is also participating in choir, Zach is in guitar classes and hand bells. Autumn is not involved in the co-op this year but she using the time to work on her independent work. The boys will be making valentines for a class party next week. This week at home we covered...



Autumn :

Math - a review of ch. 1-3 in geometry this week, she is having trouble remembering some of the concepts & we continue to go at her pace in this area.

Science - properties of water in chemistry

Literature - read Ilyas by Tolstoy, The Mansion by Henry Von Dyke, The Brothers by Bjornson. Ilyas was her favorite.

Vocab/ spelling review of roots; ven,vent,ali,alter,log,logy,omni and the prefixes; peri,ante,un,hypo,sur,ante.

Writing - continues with dictation exercises and free writing

geography - southern states, we plan to go out for Cajun food next week to wrap up our study of Louisiana.



Zach:

math - fractions/decimals

Science - plant kingdom studied molds, moss and mushrooms. We have a mold experiment in progress...

grammar - word usage ( lay/lie, set/sit ect..)

spelling - learning rules ( Z is such a poor speller, we are starting with the rules and phonic instruction to see if it helps)

writing - continues with dictation exercises and free writing

geography ( as above)

music - lesson each week and in home school group



Caden:

math - horizons finished lesson 20 ( doing great in math)

science - studying plants, attempted to a bean seed ( it never sprouted will try again this week, read aloud the trellis and the seed, & cactus hotel. We studied how water travels up a stem.

story time - we are reading a pioneer sampler (both boys love this book , so do I)

copy work - least favorite subject, we copy selections from poems, history, science, and spelling words.

history - continue with early life for the Pilgrims, made ice cream ( use HOD)

reading - phonics using Noah Webster's reading handbook



yesterday we added a small unit study on snowflakes to take advantage of the 6 inches + that fell here over the last 24hrs. We made snow cream, looked at snowflakes, learned why snowflakes form the way they do (hexagon shaped) and read the poem To a snow flake.


Blessings Lisa

The week has had it's ups and downs in the homeschooling area, even after almost 2 yr of algebra Autumn is still having some problems with the concepts..today's lessons were

math - review of midpoint formula, finding slope and intercept and solving equations.
In literature - this week she has read The Bells by Edgar Allen Poe, Lochinvar by Sir Walter Scott with discussion on rhythm and pattern in poetry. Also she read What men live by by Leo Tolstay.
in vocab - today's study was the latin root van/ vant, the prefixes peri & hydro, the suffix ment.
chemistry - the discovery of inert gases & Daltons atomic theory
geography - New York city & upstate.



Z - spelling - lesson on adding suffixes to words ending in ce, de, dge
grammar - subject verb agreement
math - radius, diameter, circumference of a circle
science - Hidden Treasure moody science video
geography - New York city and upstate.
reading - historical fiction, a pioneer sampler



Caden - copy work spelling rule on c/k sound
played the exclamation game
math - place value tens and ones plus review of number line, counting by 10's
science - Hidden treasure moody science video plus activity on building a bay (see below)
history - reading about the first winter at Plymouth
reading - historical fiction a pioneer sampler



This is a pic I snapped of Caden playing with his boat, we made a bay out of play dough after reading how the pilgrims sailed into the bay at Plymouth.





The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding. Proverbs 9:10
blessings,
Lisa

First day back at homeschooling after our break,

I managed to get home from work this morning without any problems despite the snow covered roads, I am grateful the hospital let me use a sleeper room on sat. night but was so glad to get home... I missed my boys.
After sleeping for a few hours we started back at our schoolwork. Caden continues to study the pilgrims, todays reading was on the discovery of Plymouth rock and some of the hardships of that first year. In math he is working on number lines, he has no problem with the concept but was most curious about what went on the left of zero, so we discussed negative numbers in addition to our lesson. His copywork was from our phonics book today. In reading we started a historical fiction book on early settlers, I think we will all enjoy reading.

Z got our of doing school by sleeping over at grans tonight..

Autumn had a hard time settling down to do her work, her mood is better but she is more easily frustrated then normal, she did a math review lesson, chemistry lesson on the spectroscope & Newton's work with prisms. Reading was The Pied Piper of Hamelin (Browning), she failed to see the twist of fate in the children's probable imprisonment vs promised journey into paradise. She worked a lesson in vocab also. I am at wits end in getting her to apply herself a bit in her studies.. she would prefer to be let alone and every gain we have made in her education has been akin to pulling teeth for her and me. She sees no reason she needs to apply herself, as always punishments & rewards fail to motivate her. I am however very determined to give her at least the basics and instill in her the fact that she can learn if she so chooses too. sigh... I is difficult work... Maybe tomorrow will go better..

Oh yeah.. due to the extreme cold Moby the great dane has been shampoo'd and is staying IN MY HOUSE AGAIN....uggh.. Blessings, Lisa

Happy New Year & guess what?.....

I WON!!

The contest for the subscription to The Old Schoolhouse magazine. I am so thrilled, I love this magazine and I had not been able to renew my subscription this past year when it ended. This is the best homeschooling magazine I've found. There are still give aways to be won at Tamara's blog at Branch of Wisdom, so go sign up.

We are getting ready to start the second 12 weeks of homeschool. We made it through the last 12 weeks, but are a bit behind where we should be. I knew going into it while taking 4 college classes that it was possible we would not be able to keep up. We will have to make up time in geography, and science. I am looking foward to getting started again.

In other areas - Autumns mood has been awful the past 2 days. She is cutting again, one night was so bad I had to take her friend (was here for a sleepover) home at midnight and we had Autumn sleep on a mat beside out bed, after talking with the on call mental health therapist. We suspect this stems from problems with her 'boyfriend' or others. It is a very long and winding road we are on with her... we continue to pray and ask for prayer for her and for us in our way of dealing with her issues.

Blessings, Lisa