We are still amazed at how much we are enjoying school this year. I believe it’s the grace of God. We don’t have a lot of outside friends and activities yet, and so we are enjoying a season to become acquainted with our newest member and to school.
I love the “connections” the kids make all on their own with the subj
ects we are studying. One day last week, after noting that Nolan and Zander had been quiet for an extended length of time I went to investigate. I discovered them in their room playing with a Solar System puzzle. This week we studied Jupiter. We made a Hurricane to see how stormy it was on the planet. (No pictures because the camera is on the fritz). We are enjoying these Apologia Elementary texts so well that we are going to need to order another book in the series. This text should have taken us the rest of the year but the kids are doing in 1 week what I expected to take 3 weeks. We voted to let Jared choose the next textbook because this will be last “elementary science” he does before doing Apologia’s “set”. He chose to do Zoology. Expect a lot of bird studies in the next few months. Unfortunately, I’m not sure this is the time of the year to study birds. I’ll have to look over the book and if it looks like we won’t be able to do many of the projects we may have to order botany yet.
Nolan finished “Off We Go”, the first book in his phonics program. This means he has learned the alphabet and all the consonant and short vowel sounds. It’s a huge step. We’d been told it would be wise to hold off on phonics and focus on speech therapy. We were fairly confident he’d complete the kindergarten program quickly this year – and he has. We are still waiting to hear from the school district about getting him speech therapy here. If I don’t hear back by the end of this week I will call the base again and ask them to refer us to private therapy in a local rehab center.
Jared has conquered a big math block he’s had for years. He’s finally able to read the lesson, understand what it means, and score well on his work. He’s made 80 – 92% all week on his work. YaHOO!
Arielle is on step 27 in the Raceway Book. She is reading up a storm. Her new favorites are the Boxcar Children. She loves the fact that her big sister’s left behind their childhood series for her and Stacia.
In History we are all studying James Madison’s Presidency and the War of 1812. We have found a lot to admire in James and Dolly Madison.
The younger ones and I took a side jaunt and researched Francis Scott Key and the Star Spangled Banner. This led to a study on flags in general and the US flag specifically. Arielle and Nolan painted a huge flag on Friday – complete with 13 stripes and 50 stars.
Zander helped.
That quickly summarizes the week.
I love the “connections” the kids make all on their own with the subj
ects we are studying. One day last week, after noting that Nolan and Zander had been quiet for an extended length of time I went to investigate. I discovered them in their room playing with a Solar System puzzle. This week we studied Jupiter. We made a Hurricane to see how stormy it was on the planet. (No pictures because the camera is on the fritz). We are enjoying these Apologia Elementary texts so well that we are going to need to order another book in the series. This text should have taken us the rest of the year but the kids are doing in 1 week what I expected to take 3 weeks. Nolan finished “Off We Go”, the first book in his phonics program. This means he has learned the alphabet and all the consonant and short vowel sounds. It’s a huge step. We’d been told it would be wise to hold off on phonics and focus on speech therapy. We were fairly confident he’d complete the kindergarten program quickly this year – and he has. We are still waiting to hear from the school district about getting him speech therapy here. If I don’t hear back by the end of this week I will call the base again and ask them to refer us to private therapy in a local rehab center.
Jared has conquered a big math block he’s had for years. He’s finally able to read the lesson, understand what it means, and score well on his work. He’s made 80 – 92% all week on his work. YaHOO!
Arielle is on step 27 in the Raceway Book. She is reading up a storm. Her new favorites are the Boxcar Children. She loves the fact that her big sister’s left behind their childhood series for her and Stacia.
In History we are all studying James Madison’s Presidency and the War of 1812. We have found a lot to admire in James and Dolly Madison.
The younger ones and I took a side jaunt and researched Francis Scott Key and the Star Spangled Banner. This led to a study on flags in general and the US flag specifically. Arielle and Nolan painted a huge flag on Friday – complete with 13 stripes and 50 stars.
Zander helped.
That quickly summarizes the week.
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