Weekly Report 3/6/09

What an interesting week. Monday, my daughter was home from school because of snow and now today we were in shorts!!! Our schedule was disrupted with her snow day on Monday, a 2 hour delay (ice) on Tuesday. Thursday was a half day. She has an Odyssey of the Mind competition this weekend and so we've had all kinds of extra practices to fit in.

So this week:

Literature: We started Pilgrim's Progress Book Two. We did a lot of work with predictions and discussed how it amazingly follows our own spiritual journey. My son (who's still thinking of what he wants to be called online) said that we should name our scaredy cat "Timorance". This cat is scared of everthing and hides under the bed all day long.
We also read a chapter in Robin Hood
We continute listening to Wind and the Willows in the car and 6 chapters of Frindle at lunch.
We're through chapter 5 in Queen of Sorcery.
Boy it looks like we read a lot when you put it down on "paper"

Reading: He continues reading Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.

Composition: This week, he wrote advice columns to work on paragraph structure. He and his sister took turns writing letters with a problem and then answering the other's letter with advice.

Penmanship: He did a little bit in his copywork book but composition, copywork, and a lapbook ended up being "too much" writing so we lightened up here.

Typing: Same old practice....

Vocabulary: Two rounds of Word Roots. He FINALLY had his "aha" moment that he's learning something from this during the week.

Spanish: Worked on Rosetta Stone.

Math: We finished up Singapore 4A and played some fun review games. We watched Cyberchase episode on decimals to prepare us for 4B next week. He also did one page in his Challenge Word Problem (CWP) book. Played a few rounds of Timez Attack and is pestering me to get the upgrade.

Nature Studies: Three chapters of Burgess Bird Book -learned about tree swallows, swifts, purple martins, barn swallowsm crows, and meadowlarks. We watched some video clips on identifying these birds and observed birds in our neighborhood. We had a real fun nature walk and watched a squirrel hop from tree to tree. We also found a broken bird egg to take home and examine.

Science: The bulk of our science was the physics of archery. We did several experiments to learn about motion, force, speed, and gravity.
Both kids built a bridge between two trees that fallen across the creek.
He continued working with legos and built the Dwarf Mine kit and a catapult.

History:Learned about John Wycliffe, John Huss, Joan of Arc, and Prince Henry the Navigator.
Played a multi-player game of Age of Empires 2. He also added several components on archery to his lapbook on Medieval Weaponry.

Geography: We continue our reading about Marco Polo and learning about Afghanistan. We also mapped some of the areas that Prince Henry's ships navigated and learned that he never actually sailed on any of the voyages.

Art History: We begin our unit on Michelangelo with a study on "David". This was a great introduction on perspective because from the traditional side view, David looks rather like he is dreaming. However, from the front, you can see that he looks focused on where he is going to sling the rock that is in his right hand. We also discussed how he was model on the Greek ideal of man and he was not circumsized like a Jewish man would have been.

Art: We worked on the technique of line drawing.

Music Appreciation: We continue our study on Baroque composers with a unit on Bach. This week we focused on Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

Music: Guitar practice and lesson. He's working on Rockin Robin.

Religious Studies: He continued his memory work and worked on several Awana lessons during the week.

PE: Gymnastics class-worked on balance beam and high jumping. (Plus the usual playing at home, trampoline, hiking, biking, etc)

Home-Ec: We made Raisin Bran muffins. I taught him how to make your own buttermilk and what it means to beat eggs.