52 Books in 52 Weeks

I love to read, but I readily admit that I usually choose to read "easy" books.  I love Amish fiction because it is easy, quick, and the stories and characters lead me to reflect on my own walk with God.  I don't usually choose to read intellectually challenging literature, because I read for relaxation instead of stimulation most of the time.  However, as 2012 comes to a close and we get ready to ring in 2013, I want to challenge myself to put more effort into choosing quality literature, and learning new things in the next year.  So, I have decided to join a group with the goal of reading 52 books in 52 weeks.  In addition to that goal, I will also be participating in the 5/5/5 challenge - read 5 books from each of 5 categories or 5 genres.  The genres are fiction, autobiography, history, drama, and poetry.  I have my first book, Pride and Prejudice, and I'm ready to start tomorrow!  Click on the picture on my sidebar to read more about the 52 books in 52 weeks challenge.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas!

It's been a few weeks since I have done a report.  Time seems to pass so quickly.  Things have been a little crazy around our house, as K's work schedule has been changed around quite a bit.  We started our Jesse tree devotionals on December 1st.  This is the second  year for us to do a Jesse tree, and the boys really enjoy it.  Since we are studying ancient times in history this year, it is also reviewing the Bible history we have learned.

We made our annual visit to the Christmas tree farm to pick out our tree, and Ethan enjoyed petting the goats. 

This week we studied the early Greeks in history.  We heard the story of the Odyssey and learned about other Greek myths.  We learned about the early Olympics.

  In science, we learned that the air is a mixture of gases and did a couple of demonstrations to determine some of the gases in the air.  We figured out that there must be oxygen in air, because a flame needs oxygen to burn and when we covered a lit candle with an inverted jar, the flame went out.  We also saw that water was drawn into the jar when the oxygen was depleted.  The boys also got a kick out of our demonstration on carbon dioxide.  We combined baking soda and vinegar, producing carbon dioxide, and the boys loved "pouring" the carbon dioxide onto a candle to extinguish the flame.  This led into a discussion of fire extinguishers and general fire safety.

Isaac is learning multiplication facts for 2 and 3, and Ethan is learning about picture graphs in math.  I am trying to come up with something fun for us to tally and graph over the break...maybe the different kinds of Christmas cookies we make? 

Both of the boys have been reading like crazy.  We made 2 trips to the library this week.  Recently, Isaac has read Little House on the Prairie,  Mr. Popper's Penguins, and Charlotte's Web.  Ethan has loved reading the My First Little House books.  We went to the library's story time on Wednesday. We heard a story about elves, made an elf ornament, and got an elf coloring page to bring home.

We are looking forward to some fun Christmas plans next week!

Weekly Roundup - Spooky Style

 

In science this week, we learned how to read a map and about the cardinal directions.  The boys had fun using a map to navigate and tell me how to get to the library.  We also practiced figuring out directions by trying to determine what direction we would be going when we made a turn.  On Friday, we went outside and learned how to become "human compasses".

 

Ethan finished studying shapes in math, and Isaac has been working on weight in kilograms and grams.  He loved using his balance! 

We are taking a few weeks to review the Latin we have learned so far before we start working on Christmas words. 

On Wednesday, we enjoyed a laid-back afternoon for Halloween.  I finished reading Bunnicula to the boys, and they watched the Magic School Bus videos on bats and spiders.  We also cut out skeletons and glued them together on construction paper, learning about the different bones and how they fit together.

We learned about the Phoenicians for history, and watched a video of a present-day blown-glass artist in Hebron, showing the process involved in his craft.


The boys both earned their Book-It awards for October.  Isaac is currently reading Little House in the Big Woods and Ethan is reading The Berenstain Bear Scouts and the Humongous Pumpkin.

We don't usually get much of a fall here in Texas, but here is a little bit of our "autumn color".

Weekly Roundup - October 26

This week was an unexpected 4 day week.  We took Tuesday off so that I could meet with a realtor about listing our house.  We should have the paperwork back to her on Monday, and then we can move on to the next step in our planned move.  I have been perusing the houses available in the new area on several websites, but I haven't found much yet.  Hopefully more will come on the market soon.  Here is what we covered this week!

Bible: We have been reading about the exodus this week, starting with the twelve spies and ending with Moses' death.

Language Arts: For handwriting, we have used a mixture of their handwriting books and copywork from their Awana memory verses.  This week, Ethan worked on John 17:17 and Colossians 1:3.  Isaac studied Isaiah 9:6 and Psalm 100:4.  Isaac has continued his work in Easy Grammar.  Each day he covers a capitalization rule, a punctuation rule, and sentence combining.  This week he also covered subjects, dictionary guide words, and nouns. In Primary Language Lessons, he studied comma usage and creating a venn diagram comparing ideas from what he read.  He is memorizing the poem My Shadow by Robert Louis Stevenson.  He completed lesson 15 in his spelling book and is reading The Whipping Boy for literature.  Ethan has completed 4 lessons in his reading program and has read Play Ball, Amelia Bedelia, and  Little Bear's Friend this week.

Math: Isaac finished his study of English measurement today.  He has taken two tests this week and made a 100 on both of them.  Today he also reviewed for his cumulative exam he will take Monday.  Ethan has been studying shapes and spent time today playing with Mighty Minds.

History: This week in history we studied the Israelites' exodus from Egypt.  We are still working on our sticker pages, and I'd like to start a project on famine, comparing how a plant will grow with water vs. without.

Science: For science, we have been studying what makes day and night.  We read a book on Monday.

On Wednesday, we demonstrated how the earth rotates using a globe and a lamp.  We were able to see how only a portion of the earth receives sunlight at a time.  We also talked about what direction the sun seems to "rise" and "set" from.  On Thursday the boys colored a worksheet with yellow for the part of the earth receiving light and black for where it would be night.

Foreign Language: This week we continued to learn the names of animals in Latin and watched episode 7 of Salsa Spanish.

I have been reading Bunnicula aloud to the boys this week. 

We are about to leave to shop for our Operation Christmas Child box, and then meet our homeschool group this afternoon to put the boxes together and get them ready to send. 

The Curious, The Missing, and The Creative

Ethan earned his Book-It award this week for October.  His goal was to score a 90% or better on 5 book quizzes.  The books he read were:
Magic School Bus in the Haunted Museum: A Book About Sound
A Chair for My Mother
Chicka-Chicka-Boom-Boom
Madeline
Swimmy
He has also read Magic Tree House: Twister on Tuesday and Tut's Mummy: Lost and Found, scoring 80% on each of those quizzes.  The quizzes help me to determine what reading level he is on so that I can help him choose appropriate reading material.  The last two books listed were a little above his reading level, but they were books he wanted to read.  I'm hoping they stretched his reading ability a little, helping him to grow as a reader.

In science this week we reviewed the properties of matter, the types of energy, and the differences between matter and energy.  Isaac wanted to test water to see if it had weight.  We then determined the volume of water we poured into the bucket and the weight of the water. 

The tooth fairy visited our house this week.  She has made only 1 other visit, and that was when Isaac had 4 teeth pulled to make room for those adult teeth on the bottom to come in.  This was the first time he had a tooth loosen up and come out on its own.  He was beyond excited!

 

Friday we had a little extra time in the afternoon so I pulled out Ethan's tabletop easel.  He loves to paint!  Here is the artist at work.

 

 

Wordless Wednesday - Does water have weight?

Sights, Sounds, and Tastes of Early October

"A wise man will hear and increase learning" Proverbs 1:5
We have been busy learning and growing! In history, we have continued our study of ancient times. Last week we had a great time studying ancient Africa.

making paper bead necklaces

 Anansi the Spider and Cushion

Our African Feast - Chicken with figs and papaya fried rice (Delicious!)

 decorated hands

 

 

This week we studied the Middle Kingdom in Egypt.  We learned about Egypt invading Nubia and the Hyksos invading Egypt.  We learned that the Hyksos were one of the tribes that lived in Canaan when God told Abraham to go there.

 

In science this week, we studied sound.  We learned that sound comes from vibrations. We learned that the faster the vibrations, the higher the frequency of the waves, and the higher the pitch, or note that is produced.  We also talked about how the amplitude affects the loudness of the sound.  We experimented with rubber bands, instruments, and our voices.  We also talked about how sound travels through the air, into our ears, and to our eardrum.  The boys colored a diagram of the ear and we talked about the parts of the ear.  Here are some pictures of them experimenting with their instruments by plucking the different strings and watching the vibrations.

 

In math, Ethan is finishing up addition and subtraction and getting ready to start a unit on shapes.  Isaac is studying measurement and just made a 100 on his test over measuring in centimeters.  Ethan is currently reading Henry and Mudge and Mr. Putter and Tabby.  He has also read Magic Tree House and Magic School Bus books for fun. Isaac is reading Because of Winn-Dixie for school and The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader for fun.

 

There is great excitement in our house for next week.  We will finally get to King Tut in our study of history and the boys have been asking since July when we would get to study him!

"Fall"ing Into A New Routine

I can't believe we've actually worked two days of school into one day and still finished before 4!  We took off yesterday except for math to go see our new princess (my brand new niece), and we are taking off Friday so I can bake and get ready for Isaac's birthday party, so I didn't want to get too far "behind" my own schedule.  Isaac did 2 lessons of grammar, two lessons of spelling, and 2 lessons of handwriting.  We also did math, reading, science, history, Latin, and Spanish!  Normally we alternate science/history and Latin/Spanish.  We still have our read-alouds to do and studying our memory verses, but we can do that tonight, after scouts and soccer.

Every fall our schedule gets crazy busy, as I'm sure a lot of people with children involved in extracurricular activities do.  As a matter of fact, as I write this I am looking at the clock and realizing that I have to take both of the boys to activities in the next couple of hours...and I still have to take the chicken out to thaw for dinner.  I try not to overload our schedule with a ton of activities, but I feel that the boys get something very important out of each of the activities they are in.  They are both in soccer, which my husband and I both agree is very important for teaching them to make physical fitness a part of their daily lives.  They are also in Awana, which is a part of their religious education.  Isaac is also in scouts, which he loves and teaches him a lot of very practical skills.  It just seems like we are out of the house nearly every night at activities.  I keep reminding myself that this is only a season in my life, and that one day I will miss having the boys here to taxi around to different activities!

I am so thankful for the opportunity to be home with my children at this time.  I don't know how long it will last, and I am treasuring every moment.  I am often reminded of just how short our time with our children at home is, and I want to be sure that I am providing them with everything they need from me both as their mother and as their teacher.  At the top of that list are love and time.  I am going to make it a priority to spend as much time as I can with my kids this fall, because I know that the seasons change quickly, and the season that I have with my boys at home will be over far too soon.

Weekly Roundup - August 20-24

Last Saturday, we changed the salt mixture for our chicken mummy.  Here is how it looked when we brushed off the salt that it was in.

On Monday Ethan had a math test, and he made a 100!  He was so excited to get to eat off of the "Made the Grade!" plate again.  Isaac was upset that he didn't have a math test, and begged me to give him one.  I told him that he will have one sometime this week!  Here is Isaac working on his math.

Tuesday Isaac woke up sick, and so we didn't get a lot of schoolwork done.  Ethan did his math and handwriting, and we read 2 chapters in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, our current read-aloud.  We also went outside once Isaac started feeling better and had our science lesson on organizing living things into the Plant or Animal Kingdom.

After our science lesson, the boys wanted to pull out their excavation kits and work on them.  Isaac has a triceratops kit and Ethan has a crystal kit.  I have never seen these two so excited as they get when they start to uncover their "treasure".

Ethan read from Frog and Toad Are Friends and once Isaac started feeling better he did his math lesson and read The Legend of the Bluebonnet.

 

Wednesday was one of those days that seemed to drag on forever,  but we got everything done (even Song School Latin and Salsa Spanish!).  I don't ever have to ask the boys to do either of those.  They love them both.  Isaac sometimes has trouble maintaining his focus during his seatwork.  Well, it's actually more accurate to say that more than once I had to tell him to stop hanging head first out of the chair and do his math!

 

We took a day off on Thursday to spend time with one of the boys' good friends that they have been missing.  It was great to get to spend time with him before he starts back to school next week.  I did have Ethan practice writing his numbers and Isaac do some math in the evening.  We finished reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

 

Friday began with a trip to the doctor for annual checkups.  Both boys are perfectly healthy.  Ethan passed his vision and hearing test.  He is in the 45th percentile for weight and the 49th percentile for height.  Isaac is in the 61st percentile for weight and the 57th percentile for height.  I talked with the doctor a little about Isaac's attention issues, and he agreed with our stance of just waiting to see for now.  He said that a lot of times it is an age/maturity issue and he will grow out of it, but he did give us a couple of options of things we could try if we wanted to see if it helped.  One was Focus Factor, a dietary supplement, and the other was giving him a little coffee or Sunkist in the mornings. 

 

We had an early lunch after we got home, and then we started on our schoolwork.  Isaac took both a math and spelling test, and made a 100 on both.  He also did a lesson in Explode the Code 6.  Ethan did handwriting, reading, and math.  We made a lapbook piece on Sargon for history.  In science, we continued talking about the plant and animal kingdoms, focusing on the difference in how plants and animals obtain energy.  The boys watched an epsiode of Salsa Spanish and Isaac worked on his online history class.  We have a free trial of Veritas Press's Old Testament and Ancient Egypt course.  He has finished 28 lessons and has a 97 in the class.  The free trial will be over soon, but he is enjoying it for now.  Isaac finished the day by reading Prairie School by Avi.

Mummies and Chickens, Oh my!

This week we started what is without a doubt the most anticipated project so far: the chicken mummy.  My boys are having a blast with the mummies, and I often find them reading one of our many books about mummies (Magic Tree House, Tut's Mummy, and too many others to mention!). 

For our mummy, I decided to use a cornish hen.  This was mainly to keep it a smaller project and make it more manageable with the amount of salt, baking soda, and baking powder we are going to be using throughout this project.  Yesterday we washed and dried our hen, then we rinsed it well with rubbing alcohol and dried it again.

Here are the boys reading the instructions and the hen wrapped in paper towel.

We filled a large plastic (zip-close) bag halfway with the mixture of salt, baking soda, baking powder, and cinnamon (to make it smell nice), put the hen in the bag, and then added the rest of the salt mixture.  The salt mixture is to try to get the salt closer to the acidic Natron salt that was used by the ancient Egyptians. I've read that you can also using washing soda.  We sealed the bag, and put it inside another large bag.

Today we checked our mummy and changed the salt mixture, as a lot of moisture had been absorbed into the powder.  This is what our mummy looked like when we brushed off the excess salt mixture.

The only thing we smelled was the cinnamon.  So far, this project has been a lot easier than I expected.  We will check on our mummy again in a couple of days and probably change the salt mixture again at that time.

Weekly Roundup

Last weekend we went on a "field trip" to a local college to watch "Egypt: Secrets of the Mummies" and see the exhibit on Ancient Egypt.  We had a great time, even though the mummies were "gross" according to the boys!  

 They were a little afraid of the sphinx!

 They only needed help with a couple of these, and they were things we hadn't talked about.  They did a great job!

We also went to the Discovery Science Place before eating dinner and finishing up our trip with Ice Age: Continental Drift.  It was an awesome day, and we all loved spending the day out together.

The boys are continuing to do great on their schoolwork, and the rest of the week was pretty normal, except for this:

Our first trip to the ER for stitches.  He did great, and the only time he got really upset was when he found out he needed the stitches.  He's doing fine now.

We got our Baby Mammoth DVD in the mail, so we all watched that on Friday night.  It was very interesting, and we are looking forward to watching Raising the Mammoth soon.

Weekly Roundup July 23-27, 2012

We tried something a little different this week - a four day week.  In science this week we talked about air as matter.  We proved through our experiments that air takes up space and has weight (technically mass, but we haven't talked about gravity yet, so I didn't go into that much detail with them!)  Here is our demostration showing that a balloon filled with air is heavier than an empty balloon.

The boys also got to spend some quality time on the playground with their cousin on Thursday.

The one school-related thing we did on Friday was our history project - a model of the Nile River.

This was both of the boys' favorite activity of the week.  They definitely love history!

Both boys are doing well in math.  Isaac just finished his first unit in Singapore 2A.  He made a 100 on his Unit 1 Chapter 3 Test and will take the Unit 1 Cumulative Test on Monday.  Ethan has been flying through Singapore 1A so quickly that I forgot to check the front of the HIG for when to take the tests!  It's odd that the 2A HIG puts the tests in the lesson plans, but the 1A HIG does not.  So, Ethan will spend a lot of next week reviewing what we have covered by taking the 3 tests we have skipped.  He is getting close to finishing Unit 3.

The boys are also loving the Salsa Spanish videos and their Latin lessons.  It was another great week for us!



Wordless Wednesday - July 25, 2012



Weekly Roundup - Weeks 1 and 2

We finished our second week of homeschooling yesterday, and it has been a lot of fun and a lot of work!  I have spent countless hours planning and going over everything, and so far the curriculum choices I have made have worked out well.  I asked the boys about their favorite subject and they both said history.  We are using Story of the World 1: Ancient Times as our spine for history.  When I asked them about their least favorite, they both said they like everything!  Here is a summary of what we have done so far:

Math: (Singapore Standards) - Isaac has been working on place value to the hundreds place, grouping objects by hundreds, tens, and ones, and adding and subtracting within 20.  He has also used money to represent numbers within 1000.  Ethan started with reviewing numbers 0 to 10, understanding "more" and "less" and arranging numbers in order/finding missing numbers.  He just finished the unit on number bonds, which was a new concept to me.  I can really see how thinking about math in this way makes mental math so much easier!  Both of the boys have made perfect scores on their math tests so far!

Spelling: (Rod & Staff) - We are using R&S 2 for spelling.  The word lists are extremely easy for Isaac, but I've read that the power in the R&S program comes not from the lists but from the activities that the children do with the words.  It is a phonics-based spelling program and since I am not doing formal phonics with Isaac this year I thought this would be a good program to use.  I'm just not sure if I should accelerate him a grade level or just go with it as is.

Language Arts: Isaac is using Primary Language Lessons and has done really well so far with this program.  His memory amazes me.  He has had no trouble with the two poems he has memorized.  I was a little surprised when, after only reading the poem to him twice (once Monday and once Tuesday, along with reading it on his own once each day), he was able to recite it from memory on Wednesday.  We are using Grammarland for grammar, but I have to admit this is the one thing I have let slip in these first 2 weeks.  I'm not concerned about it because it is a relatively short book and we are on chapter 7.  We have covered nouns, pronouns, articles, and adjectives.  Ethan is on lesson 44 in his reading program (A Beka Reading 1).  We skipped to where his ability level was and started there.  We are doing a lot of review of dipthongs and learning some new ones.  He loves the A Beka readers and begs to read them.  I don't think he feels the same way about the Handbook for Reading though.

Literature: Isaac has finished The Treasure, The Giving Tree,  and The Chalk Box Kid.  He is currently reading Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Ethan quickly read through the beginning readers we had at home, which are mostly Dr. Seuss books.  I am going to the library today to pick up a couple more books for him to read next week. 

History: As I said before, both boys have said that history is their favorite subject.  The first week we studied archaeology.  We read out of Story of the World and The Usborne Encyclopedia of Ancient History.  Isaac also read the book Digging Up History.  This week we focused on nomads and the first farmers, and we learned about the Fertile Crescent and why people started settling there.  The boys got a kick out of thinking of living in that time and going hunting for lizards to make stew.  Another book Isaac enjoyed was   It's Disgusting and We Ate It.  We did mapwork, coloring the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and the Fertile Crescent, as well as identifying the cities of Jericho and Catal Hayuk.    We read The First Dog and colored a picture of a farmer using a shaduf.  The boys went outside and tried to make a shelter from materials they could gather, but they had a hard time with that, so we watched a video from BBC about a man creating a shelter for a group in the woods.  It was very interesting to watch!

Cave Paintings

Science: This week in science we were studying the states of matter.  We classified different substances as solid, liquid, or gas.  We did a few investigations including timing how long it took the scent of air freshener to get from one side of the room to another and watching my Scentsy go from solid to liquid to being able to smell it as a gas.  Then we melted butter so show that temperature can cause a solid to change to a liquid and put an ice cube in a pot on the stove and watched it change from solid to liquid to gas.  I also placed a glass with ice cubes in it to the side so we could see that the cold glass caused the water vapor in the air to condense and droplets of water could be seen on the outside of the glass.  The boys then made booklets about the states of matter.

Foreign Language: We have learned several new Latin words in the last 2 weeks, and the boys think Song School Latin is a lot of fun!  We listen to our CD and sing the songs.  Isaac does the workbook and Ethan colors coloring pages to go along with the chapter we are on.  We have also watched a couple of episodes of Salsa Spanish.  I'm interested to see how much they pick up from watching those.

Hopefully next week I will be able to post pictures and my roundup won't be so wordy!

BFSU

Unfortunately I have had some computer issues, and I am not able to upload pictures at this time, but that issue will hopefully be resolved soon.  I've got some great pics to post so far!  As I type this, my boys are sitting at the kitchen table creating booklets about the three states of matter.  We are only in our second week, but I am loving Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding by Bernard J. Nebel, Ph.D.  Tuesday I introduced our lesson on solids, liquids, and gases and we learned how to classify substances into these three categories.  I used my Scentsy warmer to illustrate how matter can change from a solid to a liquid to a gas (particles in the air that we can smell).  We also sprayed air freshener from one corner of a room to see how long it took for the other person on the opposite side of the room to smell it (about 1.5 minutes).  Today we talked about how water changed to ice and we also melted butter.  This showed that temperature affects the state of matter.  We then took an ice cube and melted it, then let it evaporate on the stove, showing that the heat changes it from solid to liquid to gas.  I had a glass with ice cubes inside sitting nearby so we could see the water condensing on the side of the glass and I could explain how the water vapor changes back into liquid water.  We are having a lot of fun in science!

Day 3!

Today we studied about archaeologists in history, which the boys loved.  We read the section in Story of the World and also read the book The Magic Treehouse Shows and Tells.  The boys did narrations and drawings about what an archaeologist does.  I had planned to do the archaeological dig on Friday, but it has been raining for the past few days and the forecast calls for more rain.  I think I am going to pull out their excavation kits and let them work on those instead.  We will see how the weather goes. 

A good thing about the rain is that we can measure how much it rains each day and record that as part of our nature study this week.  Today there was 1.4 inches in the rain gauge.  That is probably the amount we have gotten over the last couple of days.  We are going to continue to check it over the next few days and then I will have Isaac write about our findings.  I may look up average rainfall for this time of year in our area because this is not normal for us! 

Isaac started reading The Chalk Box Kid and Ethan read a couple of the early readers we have on their bookshelves.  I pulled out a Kindergarten workbook for Ethan to work in after he finished the rest of his work, to keep him busy while Isaac was finishing. Both of the boys seem to be enjoying all of their subjects.  As we go through the year, I hope I will be able to determine how well the curriculum fits and if we need to make any major changes for next year.

Day 2 of Week 1

I was advised that it would be a good idea to blog every day this first week of our homeschooling adventure. That way I will have a record of it to look back on later in our journey and remember the beginning.   As we continue after this week, I will probably only blog once a week about our homeschooling. 

After 2 days of homeschooling, I feel tired but fulfilled.  I'm not sleeping at night (it's after midnight now and I'm up writing this) but I don't know if that's because of being nervous about having everything together or what.  It's hard to go to sleep at night.  This morning we got up later than I planned, but I couldn't help thinking that if it was a school morning last year it would have been so stressful and it wasn't at all.  So, I started school in my pajamas...worse things have happened! 

One thing I have planned for Tuesdays is "tea time".  Dh laughed a little when I told him about this ("You had a tea party with your boys?") but he really does get it.  Yes, I put a tablecloth on the table and took out our nice china and a few punch glasses to have blueberry muffins with the boys this morning.  As they ate, I read to them from A.A. Milne's When We Were Very Young.  They really enjoyed it (mostly due to the blueberry muffins, I'm sure) and Ethan says he wants to try hot tea next time.  Maybe I need to hint to someone that I need a set for my birthday.

This afternoon we had our first science lesson.  The lesson was about why we organize things into categories.  Since my background is as a science teacher, it was interesting to get to plan the lesson for my own kids.  I also am accustomed to teaching 11 and 12 year olds, so 7 and 5 was a little different!  I took them to their bedroom and talked to them about how their things are (supposed to be) organized.  The action figures go in this box, the cars go in that box, the airplanes here, etc.  Then we went into the kitchen and talked about how the kitchen is organized and we also discussed how the food is organized in a grocery store.  We went to the library so the boys could pick out their free reading books for the week(also discussed how the books are organized in the library), and when we got back home I had them record a couple of sentences in their science journals about why we organize things into categories.  It took Isaac a while to come up with his sentences, but he finally was able to come up with a good answer.  We are using the book Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding by B. Nebel, and that is where a lot of the ideas for this lesson came from.

I asked the boys today what was different about homeschooling than going to school.  Their responses were:
-"We get to spend more time with Mommy."
-"We don't have to get up and go anywhere, because we're already here."
-"We don't have to go home at a certain time, because we're already home."
-"We don't have to ride a school bus."

Tonight I took Ethan on a date to see the movie Brave.  We really enjoyed having one-on-one time.  I'm looking forward to the rest of the week, and hoping I can get some rest in at some point!

First Day of School 2012!

This is how the boys started their first day of school this year!  They were waiting on breakast and decided to cuddle up on the couch together. 

We had a special treat for breakfast this morning - cinnamon rolls! (On a school day????)

After breakfast, I read our Bible story for today on creation, and then the boys cleaned up and did their chores.  Finally, we settled in for our first stretch of work.  We practiced Isaac's poem from Primary Language Lessons and then I read to them from My America and My World.  Isaac worked on his morning folder (maps, math review, and analogies) while I taught Ethan his math lesson.  While Ethan was working in his math workbook, I went over Isaac's spelling lesson and started him on his assignment. Even though Ethan is working from a first grade math book, he had no trouble with the lesson.  After spelling, Isaac did a handwriting assignment while Ethan and I curled up on the couch for his reading lesson.  This part of the day went much faster than I anticipated, and we actually finished about 15 minutes early.  This just meant that the boys got more playtime because recess was next!

Before I let the boys run off and play, I had to take the traditional first day of school photos!

The boys had about 45 minutes of outside play time, and I joined them for a little catch after I got dinner going in the crock-pot.  By that time, they were ready to come in and cool off, so we cleaned up, got a drink, and got back to work.

This next part of our day actually took longer than I expected, so I had to do some rearranging.  Isaac did great with his math and Ethan flew through his handwriting and got to play on Starfall.  I ran into the problem that Ethan being on the computer was distracting Isaac from doing his math problems, so I need to come up with a solution for what to have E do while Isaac is working on math.  After a little while, I sent him to his room to play with his blocks and things went better after that.  Here is Isaac working in his math workbook.  You can see E's reading words on the chalkboard in the background.

Next we did Isaac's picture lesson in Primary Language Lessons.  I had to work with him a little on answering the questions in complete sentences.  We also started Grammarland.  I expected to have time for Isaac to do his reading before lunch, but it was already lunch time at this point so we took about an hour break for lunch.

After lunch, Isaac re-read (because he also read it the day we brought it home from the library) the book The Treasure by Uri Shulevitz.  He gave it a thumbs-up, especially since the main character shares his name!  I had him create a picture essay to tell the story.  He did a great job, and was able to retell the story to my mom when she stopped by to see how the day went.

Our last official subject of the day was history.  We read the introduction to Story of the World 1: Ancient Times and I asked the boys comprehension questions.  They had a tough time at first answering the questions, but when it came time to give narrations they did pretty well for the first time.  Here is Isaac's narration, which he wrote himself, along with the pocket we made that contains examples of artifacts historians might find.

Ethan gave me his narration orally and I recorded it in his notebook for him.  As his handwriting improves, he will start to write his own narrations as well.

We finished our day by practicing instruments.  Isaac plays violin and Ethan is wanting to learn piano.  Isaac practices out of I Can Read Music , his Suzuki book, A Tune a Day, and music from Star Wars that his teacher gave him.  Ethan is using Pianimals to learn piano.

So at the end of the day, when everything was said and done, Isaac decided to spend his free time drawing the Solar System on the chalkboard and then, when the mail came, opening up the book I ordered for later in our history study - Ms. Frizzle's Adventures Ancient Egypt- and reading it.

And this is....THE BEGINNING!

Beach Time!

This past week our family enjoyed a vacation at a beach house on Bolivar Peninsula along the Texas Gulf Coast.  We had a great week spending time with family and enjoying the beach.  Our beach house had an ocean view in the front and an Audobon bird sanctuary in the back.  The boys enjoyed hunting for seashells and watching the birds.  They got to see live jellyfish and we actually watched a jellyfish eating a fish!

On Thursday we went to Moody Gardens and toured the Rainforest Pyramid, the Aquarium Pyramid, and the Discovery Pyramid, which was showcasing Bodies Revealed.  Isaac said it was "gross" and "cool".  We also watched the  3-D film Wild Ocean. We enjoyed our week, but we were also glad to get home.  Now we have a week to get things done around the house before we start our new school year!

The Plan

I officially withdrew the boys from school today.  I was a little sad, as I have thoroughly enjoyed the time they have spent at our primary school, but I truly feel God has called me to make this change and I am very excited for what our future as a family holds.  I have been researching for months to find the curriculum that I want to use for next year.  If you know me well, you will know that means that I have been having a lot of FUN!!!  I am a curriculum "junkie", so to speak.  I LOVE looking at different curriculums, reading about them, and finding what works for my students.  Since this is going to be our first year, I know that there will be a learning curve for myself as well.  I am excited to try out the curriculum I've chosen, and I hope it is as much fun as I think it will be!

We will be doing a few subjects together and then I will separate the boys for other subjects, according to their ability levels.  We will start each day with a Bible reading that goes along with our History lesson for the week or a devotional from the devotional book God's Amazing Creatures and Me.
  We will then work on memory work.  Memory work will include AWANA verses for both boys, and poetry for our oldest.  We will also do our calendar time (months, days, seasons, etc.) and Social Studies.  For Social Studies, we will be using A Beka Book's My America and My World.
  After Social Studies, our oldest (2nd grade) will start working on independent work.  He will have a "morning folder" that includes mapwork, math practice, and analogies.  After that, he will work on his Spelling lesson. We are using Rod and Staff for spelling.  While he is working on his morning work, I will work with our younger son (Kindergarten) on his math.  We are using Singapore Primary Math with both boys (Standards Edition). Our oldest will be using 2A/B and our youngest will be using 1A/B.
  Our 2nd grader will then work on handwriting (Zaner-Bloser Grade 3 - Cursive) while I work with our K'er on his reading (A Beka Reading 1).  Then it will be time for a break!  On most days, this will be a time when the boys can go outside and play or play inside on rainy days.  On Tuesdays, we will have "tea" time.  Now, my boys don't drink tea, but we will have milk and a sweet snack (banana bread, muffins, etc.) while I read poetry to them.

After the break, the oldest will work on his math while the younger one works on handwriting (A Reason for Handwriting K).  Then I will work on grammar/writing with the oldest using Primary Language Lessons.  I love this book!  It is so sweet but introduces a lot of important skills.  There are dictation exercises, selections to be memorized, drawing, picture lessons, nature and observation lessons, lessons in troublesome forms, copywork, compositions, letter-writing, and grammar lessons.
  While I am working on this with the oldest, the younger will have time to do one of his favorite activities - www.starfall.com!  He loves this website, and I love that it has helped him learn to read.  Another website both of the boys enjoy is www.readingeggs.com. 

Our older son will then have his reading/literature time.  During this time, he will read aloud to me from an assigned book. I will give our younger son the choice of listening in or having quiet reading time on his own.

We will have a relaxed lunch and then move into either history or science, depending on the day.  I have an hour set aside on MWF for History and T/Th for Science.  Both of these will be based on reading good books for the topic studies and doing a lot of hands-on projects.  For History, we will be using Story of the World 1 - Ancient Times, and for Science we will be using Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding.

We will finish our day with violin/piano practice (Oldest plays violin and youngest wants to learn piano.), clean up time, and free reading time.

A Chore Thing

I have been working on getting the boys to do more around the house, and getting them up and getting things done in the morning.  I came up with this chore chart, and we started using it yesterday.  So far, it is working pretty well.  I think the boys really like moving their cards and completing their "trains".

At night I put 4 laminated cards in their clothespins.  They will always include brushing teeth and making the bed, and the other two will change daily.  As they complete each chore, they move the card from the clothespin to the velcro dots by their names. The cards on the right side are the chores that are not being used that day.  The rotating chores include watering the plants, dusting, vacuuming, helping with the dishes, picking up the toys from around the house, picking up dirty laundry, cleaning the sink in the bathroom they use, and taking the trash to the curb. 

We also finished The Magician's Nephew last night and are looking forward to beginning The Lion, the Witch,  and the Wardrobe tonight.

We recently finished reading Little Pilgrim's Progress to our boys.  It took a while for us to get all the way through it, as we just read one chapter a night and there are over 90 chapters.  The boys loved this book, and their retention of the story and the things that happened to each of the characters was very good.  They were both also able to take the lessons in the story and apply them to their lives. The story follows two separate journeys to the Celestial City, one by a boy named Christian and the other by a girl named Christiana. We used the study guide by Christian Novel Studies to go along with the book.  We didn't do many of the activities, as we read the book as a bedtime story, but the questions that went along with each chapter were a good way to review what the story was about.  They were not too difficult that the boys (7 and 5) could not answer them, but some of them did lead us into good discussion.  I highly recommend this book to parents of children 5-12 as a read-aloud.

Box Day!

Something that I haven't revealed to many people yet (who will all know now!) is that we are going to begin homeschooling our boys this year.  My passion is teaching, and for the last 11 years I have used that passion in the classroom as a public school teacher.  I love to teach school. When someone says they are going to homeschool, the first question that is asked is always "Why?". Our decision has nothing to do with the school itself.  Our boys have had incredible teachers in the years they have attended public school, and I still consider the people I have worked with, in all 5 school districts I have worked, friends.  I may not get to talk to them often, but I do think of them and pray things are going well in their lives.  Our decision stemmed from a desire deep in my heart to be home with my children.  It is something we have prayed over and sought God's Will about for years.  It just made sense in my mind to combine my passion for teaching with caring for my own children.  After a series of unfortunate events (which we now see as God preparing the way for us - funny how that works!), we have decided to make a leap of faith and follow the path God has laid on our hearts.  This is going to be a huge adjustment for us, and I ask for prayers from each of you to help us along our new journey.  The boys are excited.  They both love to learn, and have already gotten into the stash of books I was collecting for next year.  We are planning to study ancient history, and our oldest has already read about Tut's Mummy and Pompeii several times since he found the books.

So, what is a box day, and what does that have to do with homeschooling?  A box day is a day when you get a box full of new books for school in the mail.  I have been collecting books for the last month, usually buying them used to save money.  I finally ordered the rest of the math books I am going to need for the boys, along with a handwriting book for the little guy and an encyclopedia on ancient history.  Our books arrived today!  I was sad the boys weren't here to open the box with me (they are visiting grandparents), but it was so much fun to open the box and look through all the new books.  I can't wait to begin our school year next month!

"Bear" has been learning to play chess ever since he got this game for Christmas.  He loves the story format of the book, and he sits and practices his moves.  After he practiced his violin today, the chess set was the first thing he went for.  Love that smile!

Planting the Seeds

"Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace." James 3:18

This weekend we built a carrot box for the boys to plant carrots in.  They love to pull the carrots up when they are done, wash them off, and eat them like Bugs Bunny.  One of the things we make time to do is work and play outside as a family.  We have discovered that the more time our boys spend outside, the more calm and well-behaved they are.  Honestly, even I feel more peaceful after spending time in nature.  As we enter the spring season, I hope to be able to do more outside - camping, picnics, and just playing in the backyard.  We also plan to try some more container gardening.  Spending time outside enjoying God's creation is one of the best ways we can bring peace to our family.