Week number 2

I can't believe how fast this week flew by! Especially since I've had a headache all stinking week. Nothing is helping. But I sucked it up and kept at it. I just couldn't face falling behind when we've made such good progress.

We've been reading a lot of poetry. I think the kids favorite was a book called Sad Underwear and Other Complications. I liked some of the poems by Robert Frost in his collection called You Come Too. We also read several selections from A Child's Garden of Verses and At The Top of My Voice. I'm also reading from A Child's Introduction to Poetry which includes a handy CD to listen to. This book is nice as it covers several styles. Next week we will hopefully try our hand at writing a few!

Our Bible/History study is starting to pick up. We finished up this week at The Great Flood. Next week we'll go over The Ice Age and begin learning about civilizations. This is where our Art History will begin as well. I picked up a book called CHARGE! Weapons and Warfare in Ancient Times that I think will pique my son's interest. I have a couple other books on Mesopotamia as well. So far the timeline has been pretty barebones. Next week will see quite a few new additions and hopefully I'll find some way of studying some topics a little more in depth. I'm hoping to begin a unit study on Dinosaurs. We'll see what happens with that.

Science is off to a slow start. We're doing some review work on the planets, working on getting our notebook put together. Once we finish the planets we'll begin an in-depth study on Earth and they'll each pick a planet to study as well. I'm hoping this will spark some unit studies. My dd wants to be an astronaut, so we'll read some biographies and use the NASA website quite a bit.

Next week the kids will take their final tests on 5th grade Math. By Friday we'll be working in our 6th grade books. I'm really dissapointed with the grade 6 book. Half the book is just review work of basic operations and reviewing fractions. I do realize that the more you practice basic operations, the better you remember and recall them. So we're going to start the year in chapter 7, I think, with decimals, and I'll have them do the basics as "homework". I'll assign 4 pages per week and let them decide when they complete them, as long as they're done by Friday.

We've been learning about the different kinds of instruments and where they were invented. We haven't gotten our recorders yet, so I'm thinking I'll pencil those in for sometime in October. Next week we begin learning about the different instruments used in different cultures. Which works out great as part of our MultiCultural Unit for social studies. We've been reading different books about Jewish and Chinese cultures, as well as a book about immigration, called Coming to America. Next week we'll begin what I'm calling a Culture Festival. We're going to pick 3 cultures to study.

For art projects we pulled out the prism and went outside to break up sunlight. They took turns focusing the light on sand in full sun, outdoor carpet, shaded sand, and their feet. The kids thought that was way cool! (also fits into science!) Then we used a worksheet with a prism outline and colored the order of the light. Next week we'll do another project based on the prism.

English/Grammar/L. Arts has been an eye-opening experience for me. I've discovered that my son is further along than I thought, and that my daughter rushes through her work and doesn't read the directions! They are at two different levels in English, but I'm teaching most of the LA together. They each have a workbook at their level for English/Grammar and Reading Comprehension. Then I pull out worksheets for different things. This week we worked on Syllables, Alliteration, Idioms and Hyperboles. We had a lot of fun with alliteration. Apparently, Dogs Dance in the Dirt, not dig! LOL

We finished reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory today. We'll begin The Year of the Dog on Monday. I was hoping they would choose Inkheart next, but they didn't. We'll get to it. My son finished reading Night of the Ninjas and will begin reading Ninjas Don't Bake Pumpkin Pies. This time I will ask for a verbal summary of the book from him. My daughter is reading Dragon Rider. It's a very large book and I'm excited she wanted to tackle it. I asked her today what has been happening so far, and she looked at me, shrugged her shoulders, and said "I dunno". So I had to make a few very direct questions to get her talking. I think I'll need to ask her everyday just so she keeps things in mind while reading. In whatever spare time I can muster I am reading several school books as well as The Pirate Queen: Queen Elizabeth I, Her Pirate Adventures and the Dawn of Empire. I'm also doing some sewing on my dress and beginning dh's shirt for his Tudor outfit. I'm excited about getting his shirt going, because I get to do some blackwork embroidery. Though I think I'm going to use white on white instead of black on white. {shrug} We'll see what happens when I get to that point!

Even despite the headache that is still raging in my head, it's been a good week. Things have gone smoothly, including the kids doing their chores (dishes and garbage). The only hitch I can think of was when I tried to print something today the printer said I couldn't because it was missing a cartridge. DH took the empty color cartridge to be refilled for me. aawwww...so I couldn't be angry. Oh, and it stormed yesterday just as we were heading for the pool. :( that's always sad.

Since I couldn't print until I got my cartridge back, I'll be working on school for awhile tomorrow to get ready for the next week. No biggie, most of it is done, just need to tweak a few things, make a few copies for the timeline and make sure worksheets are all ready. And then the weekend is mine to do with as I please. (read: sewing!)