My poor neglected blog.

Well, it's been quite a while since I posted on here. Our computer broke down, so I couldn't load pictures. Then I started doing Facebook and it seemed easier to just post a few things on there, but I do miss journaling about what we've been doing, so I'm taking it back up.

We've finished our school year and begun summer. The last half of the school year was busy and fun. We had co-op from the first of February until the first of April. I taught a hands-on history class about pioneer life for David's age group and helped sponsor a class for Hannah's group that involved a lot of building contraptions with unique items.

We all four went to Tybee in February with Anita and had lots of fun there. In March, we found out that Darin might lose his job because of cutbacks. By the end of April we found out he did have his job, so we are thankful for that. The kids and I went with Anita, Seth, and Angela to Disneyworld in May. We had a great time there.

We were done with our schooldays by the end of May. Hannah finished up 8th and David finished up 2nd. They are growing so fast. I'm so thankful that God has made a way for me to be home with them all this time. He is an awesome and mighty God!

Week of Nov. 15-19

We began our week with the last day of our co-op classes. It has been very fun for the kids. They've enjoyed making new friends and seeing them each week. It will be quite a few weeks before we start back.

David had music practice and Hannah spent time at her friend Rebecca's house. The kids had a birthday party that same day, so school work was pushed a little bit into the weekend. Darin pointed out how lucky Hannah was to get to go hang out with a friend in the middle of a school day. I think she does realize how nice the flexibility is.

Hannah is really enjoying the Life of Fred books. She finished up LU 804 in math this week. I will have her finish 805, but she'll be doing the LOF books for the rest of this school year. She is continuing her study of plants in her science. It was really neat to watch her trying to classify trees on a drive home this week. The plants are more interesting to her than the microbiology. Her favorite topic all year has been genetics. In grammar, she has been learning about noun clauses and how to diagram those as well as complex sentences. She did not have a literature selection because I'm trying to get her back on track with the Sonlight Literature matching up with her history. She has been studying the establishment of the country and government. She will be moving to next to the expansion of the country.

David definitely wants to switch to Bob Jones math. He's loved the pages I've given him. I want him to finish all the 2nd grade materials I have here, which is two light units in CLE, about 4 chapters in Bob Jones, and a Singapore book. Once he has finished all that, he can start Bob Jones Math 3. In his language arts, he is learning about possessive nouns. He's also started working on the slants to begin learning cursive. This should be interesting. I think his printing needs more practice, but when he really tries, he can do fairly well. He has a lot of writing to do each day, so I don't emphasize handwriting on everything. In history, he began studying about the early Native Americans.


David really enjoyed science this week. He was learning all about worms. He got to dig for worms at a neighbors house. He doesn't like getting dirty, but my friend's son sure does!
Later in the week, the boys got to observe the worms we found. The worms didn't always do what we expected, but it was very interesting.

Weekly Report and Catch up for Oct 25th - Nov 12th

I've been super busy these last 3 weeks, but I'm going to try and do a quick catch up. We've had family in town, performances, church events, etc. School has been getting done in there, too, though. We've been attending co-op, but that ends tomorrow. It's fun, but I'll be glad to have one last thing to do each week. We don't start back until well after the new year.

Hannah has been using the Bob Jones history textbook for a few weeks now. She is learning quite a bit. It has some rather challenging activities to go along with the text and tests. She did quite a bit with the Constitution and has been moving on to the establishment of the government. I had Life of Fred Fractions here, so I let her do it just for fun. She LOVES it. I was going to order the last half of her CLE math, but I've decided she's going to finish what I have and spend the rest of the year of Life of Fred. I have the Decimals/Percents book. She should get through those quickly, but I'm going to have her do both of the Pre-Algebra books in the series, too.

Her outside vocabulary class ended last week. She had a test over 220 roots and only missed 6. She was very happy to have done that well. The teacher was very pleased with all the students' results. The class will start back in the spring and will focus on grammar, writing, and literature. He volunteers his time to do this, which is amazing to me.

She is doing well in her science and trudging along through the material that doesn't thrill her. She is still reading God's Will, God's Best for Your Life and seems to be enjoying it. She's not had a literature assignment the last couple of weeks because switching spines caused her to back up a little. She's been reading the Artemis Fowl series that she had never read, but that's on her own, not for school.
Our church had a harvest festival. Hannah dressed up as a nerd and her best friend came as an 80's girl. David went as a Clone Trooper but quickly lost the helmet.

David has had a good 3 weeks in school. He read more about Lewis and Clark and the legends of American folklore. He has also been studying the War of 1812. He is continuing to like the added math supplements, especially the BJU materials. I am strongly considering switching him to 3rd grade in it when he has completed all the 2nd grade materials we have here. Grammar has introduced pronouns and using words such as to, too, and two. He has started to show a little frustration when he can't understand or get something right first try. I'm trying to show him that some things take time to learn. In bible, he's been covering Old Testament stories such as Ruth, Gideon, Samson, and Samuel.

He is in a musical performing group, called Arete. The group performed for a retirement home and a senior group at a local church. The group has learned patriotic songs. The leader of the group volunteers her time and donated the costumes. It is such a blessing to have people who want to make a difference in the lives of children.
My parents were able to come visit and see his performances.
In science, it has been a fun time. He studied genetics, classification, and started invertebrates with the Cnidarians. Here is David and his friend working together the day we did classification. I had started with classifying shapes, then the creatures that RSO provided. The boys ended up creating creatures with the shapes, but that somehow turned into building a tower and pretending to be Godzilla attacking it.



I'm very sleepy, so that's all I can remember for now. It's been a great few weeks.

Week of Oct. 18th - 22nd and the week of Fall Break

Darin had a week of Fall break with his school the week of the 11th, so we took off, too. His parents flew in town, and we picked them up at the airport. We really enjoyed their stay. It's hard not having any family here, so we are thankful when we do get to spend time with any of them. They love to eat at the Blue Willow Inn in Social Circle, GA, so we took the long drive there and had a fabulous southern meal.
They enjoyed playing the Wii with the kids and relaxing with us. We went to see Toy Story 3 at a nearby dollar theater. It was a fun week, and we were sad to take them back to the airport to return home.

This week (the 18th) we've had school as usual. We had our usual outside classes, co-op, Hannah's vocabulary class, and David's musical group. The group is getting ready for two performances next week. It was a great week.

I had Hannah switch from the Hakim series to the Bob Jones 8th grade textbook this week. I already had it here. I felt that she was reading a lot, but not retaining much of what she was reading. She finished the chapter on the American Revolution this week. After her test, I asked if she thinks she will learn more from the textbook and extra materials it provides. She said that she really thinks she will.

In math she's been working with multiplying monomials, probability, and constructing angles. In grammar she's been learning about infinitive phrases and how to diagram these as well as reviewing pronoun-antecedent agreement and use of commas. She has started microbiology in her science, which is not a favorite topic, so she'll have to buckle down and make herself learn it. In Bible, she is continuing the devotion book from the Navigators and started a book, God's Will God's Best for Your Life. For literature she read A Gathering of Days.

David finished up the American Revolution and establishing the Constitution and has moved on to studying Lewis and Clark. He read How We Crossed the West and A Picture Book of Sacagawea, as well as A Picture Book of Davy Crocket. In science he studied the nervous system and did a lab with our neighbor. In Bible he learned about Gideon. He started one of Bob Jones' Booklinks, The Treasure of Pelican Cove. He has been doing the Book Adventure website and has really enjoyed reading books then taking quizzes on them. He's loving the Magic Treehouse books right now.

He has started to get a little bored with his CLE math. I think it is because it has a lot of review. I love certain aspects of the program, so I'm not ready to give it up yet. I had the 2nd grade level of Singapore math here, so I'm supplementing with it and crossing off a lot of the review problems. I also still have the second half of Bob Jones' math that I switched from, so I'm going to use some of it as well. I will switch if I think one of the programs will be the best for him. I would probably lean towards BJU because I will more than likely use it in high school.

Week of Oct. 4th - 8th

We had a really good week. We took last week off to do some fall cleaning, although we still had co-op and classes on Wednesday, so I didn't get as much cleaning as I would have liked. We started off with co-op on Monday. David made a pirate treasure box in his history class and a board showing the life cycle of the frog in his animal class. They both enjoy co-op a lot, which makes my work as director all worthwhile.


One night David enjoyed the corn so much that he grabbed the pan and finished off the leftovers.

On Tuesday, we started doing school work, then my sister called me wanting us to join her at a fun site near us. It's a farm with lots to do, including a "tiny town" of buildings for kids to play in. Don't you love the flexibility of homeschooling?!!!


My nephew loved this big stuffed dog at the little fire house.

David took up preaching in the little church.

The kids had fun being with my sister's friends' kids.

It was small, but Hannah made it into the balcony of the little theater.

We did do school work the rest of the week, but we aren't quite finished. We aren't doing school next week because it's Darin's fall break. We can finish up then. Hannah has been reading some of the Anti-Federalist papers, as well as the sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." In science she has been learning about evolution and some creation ideas, such as the gap theory. She's doing a lot of work in math with radicals. Grammar has been covering active/passive voice, intransitive and transitive verbs, and such. She seems to be enjoying the devotional book she is doing with Bible, too.

David has been finishing up studying about the American Revolution. He is learning more about working with 4 digit numbers, multiplication, and measurement. Grammar is introducing adjectives as well as having him write a lot more sentences of his own creation. He is doing a really good job with it. He studied the respiratory and digestive systems this past week in science. I forgot to take pictures, but he got together with our neighbor and made a giant model of the respiratory system at work. It was drawings on the nose, lungs, heart, and legs. They used a vacuum tube to exchange oxygen for carbon dioxide and learn the path it all takes in our bodies. For digestion, they ate muffins, and then we measured out (with yarn) the full length of the digestive system. It stretched about 21 feet when it was completed. They made predictions of the length, then we compared with the actual. We discussed how long it would take the muffin to leave each part of the system.

They both have a little more school work to do in all their subjects, but we've got a week to get it done.

Week of Sept. 20th - 24th

Our co-op started on Monday. It was a lot of fun for everyone. We have 20 families and just over 50 kids. Things went very smoothly. Hannah has four classes, a career explorations class, a nature/survival class, an introduction to Spanish class, and health/PE. David has a history through crafts class focusing on pirates, PE, story time, math games class, and an animal classification study class.

Hannah started the third book in Hakim's history series. She read Traitor, the Case of Benedict Arnold. She actually thought it was very boring. She is progressing well in her math and language arts. In science, she made a 100% on her test about genetics. She has found it to be a very interesting subject.

David began studying the American Revolution. He read the Magic Treehouse about it, and has requested more Magic Treehouse books. We read The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere, as well as a book on his life called A Picture Book of Paul Revere. A funny book he read was John, Paul, George, and Ben by Scholastic.

David is enjoying doing science with our neighbors. We are using Real Science Odyssey, Life Science. The study right now is about the human body. This week we covered the heart and circulation system. We did a lab checking pulse rates after various activities.

The boys enjoyed learning about the components that make up our blood. They made a model of blood using corn syrup, lentils, beans, and Craisins.

Week of Sept 13th - 17th

We are 6 weeks into the school year...only 30 to go! We had a busy week because the co-op I direct starts next week. I've had a lot of emails, phone calls, etc. We actually started our week at the church where we will meet. I went by to set up our storage cabinet and meet parents who wanted to drop off applications and teachers who wanted to see their classrooms. It wasn't a very heavy week academically, mostly just the basics. I tried to plan it that way with co-op stuff going on. I did manage to get an artist study in this week. We read about Edward Hicks and The Peaceable Kingdom.

Hannah is starting a new Bible devotion book by The Navigators, The Life, A Journey With God. I hope she will enjoy it. She finished reading the next book in the Hakim series. She seems to enjoy reading the series. She also read Indian Captive, the Story of Mary Jemison. She did her usual lessons in math and grammar, as well as taking two tests in science and starting another chapter. I had her do a SAT practice essay, timing her for 25 minutes. I think it was a little shocking to her how fast the 25 minutes went by. I am glad to start her practicing now so that she can have it down pat before she has to really do it on a test.

David had lessons in math and grammar, geography, critical thinking. In reading, he read a play about the Pilgrims coming over on the Mayflower. In Bible, he learned about God giving the 10 commandments to Moses.

David is learning about Colonial life in history, so we got together with friends to do some projects. We learned about the daily life of the colonists and made a collage of foods the colonists would have eaten in various seasons.



We played a game that I have called Made For Trade. You travel around the colonial village (board) purchasing items from various shops.
We ate pineapple and berry syllabub. Colonists tried to grow pineapples inside, but the plants rarely produced fruit. The berry syllabub was juice mixed with sugar and added to heavy cream, then whipped into a yummy topping.


In science, David is studying about the human body. This week he learned about our skeleton and muscles. He cut out and labeled this skeleton. The "arm" was great at demonstrating how muscles work in pairs and shorten/lengthen as they move.

Week of Sept 6th - 10th

We started our week with Darin home for Labor Day. He and Hannah painted her room and put together the new furniture from IKEA (love, love, love that place!). She paid for almost all of it, so I think she can truly enjoy and appreciate it.


On Tuesday, we went to a nature center for a field trip with our homeschool group. We invited our neighbors to go along. David enjoys playing with his best friend, Ian. Ian came with his mom and siblings, Lucas and Elise.



We saw a lot of great animals there. It is a privately owned nature center, so admission is normally free.

In school we continued our reading of Psalms. This week was Psalm 20-23. I love the 23rd. It is one of my favorites. We also worked in our worldview curriculum, Who Is God?. We read a story that used the idea of brownies not being able to make themselves. We decided to test the idea, and no the brownies could not make themselves, but they were good when we made them.

Hannah continued in her Hakim series and read Amos Fortune, Free Man. She wrote an essay about him living a good life. She worked in math and grammar as usual. She also learned quite a bit and seemed to enjoy her science lessons on genetics. She is enjoying Fallacy Detective. She often reads ahead of her assignment.

David worked in math and grammar as well. He is improving in his speed drills. Subtraction from the teens has been a bit more difficult for him. He really had a breakthrough about writing sentences of his own. He has really been stressed by it, but wrote several this week without "freaking out". Quite a bit of his fear has been spelling words he doesn't know. I've always said he could just ask me, but I think he's a bit of a perfectionist and wants to do things independently and only if things are "right".

In history, he finished up studying the settlement at Plymouth and started learning about life in the colonies. In science, he had to make a folder for the human body study he will have over the next few weeks. He really enjoys his critical thinking workbooks. I have one that is logic puzzles and one that is analogies.

Week of Aug 30th - Sept. 3rd

It has been a very busy two weeks. After my grandmother passed away, we went out of town for the funeral. I decided to take a week's worth of school and spread it out over 2 weeks because I didn't want to be stressed missing days because of the funeral, and I knew I was headed back out of town the very next weekend.

We traveled to Tennessee to stay with my nephew while my sister and brother-in-law went away for their anniversary. I also stayed a couple of days and helped my mother. She had to go in the hospital less than a week after the funeral. She was in several days, but it getting better.

As far as school work goes, the filing system has been a huge help during all this. I just pulled out week 4's folders and was ready to go.

Hannah finished LU's in LA and Math. She read "Stink Alley" in literature. She is still working on a writing assignment over this weekend. She couldn't do her science while we were out of town because we didn't have internet access much at all. She is enjoying reading in the Hakim U.S. history series. I like having the discussions so well laid out for me. She is continuing to work in "The Fallacy Detective". She missed her outside class, so will have to make up work to do there.

David also finished LU's in LA and Math. He read about Billy Sunday in reading and is doing well with the comprehension practice. We started science last week with our neighbor, using REAL Science Odyssey Life science. We went out to a local park to do a plot study and studied cells by looking at an egg. In Bible he is currently working through Abraham's life. We haven't done as much history as I would like the last week, but he did learn about Jamestown and Plymouth. I hope to cover some more of it over the weekend.

Week of Aug. 9th - 13th

We had a great second week of school. The filing system has made things so easy. I'm so glad I did it. The kids have really done well getting back into doing school full time. We read Psalms 6-10 this week. In Who is God?, we learned 7 ways to build your life on the Rock, God. They are study and learn the Bible; know, think, and follow truth; care for your body and use it the right way; worship God faithfully and joyfully; pray to God always; stand against and resist Satan; put God first, not things or money.

Hannah read Peace Child, a missionary story. She is reading through Why Pray in her Sonlight Bible books. She will be reading every week in a Hakim US History volume. In science she learned about cell structure. We have a small microscope for her to use, but I'm hoping to ask a friend who has a better one if we might could borrow it or come over to use it. She did well with her math this week, and is learning quite a bit in her grammar and vocabulary class. She is working through The Fallacy Detective and is finding it challenging.

David learned about Noah's ark, including the size of the ark, and we did some map work to learn about where the ark probably came to rest. He learned subtraction with borrowing this week in math. He understood it very quickly. He made A's on both quizzes in math and language arts. He enjoys the critical thinking workbooks, especially the Perplexors logic puzzles. In our history study, he enjoyed a game online about the Vikings. He also read more about Christopher Columbus, did a map of his journeys, and a narration page about him. He learned about the Spanish explorers, too, including Ponce de Leon. We went to St. Augustine this summer, so it was good to study him. David is going to do the musical theater group our homeschool group is offering. The group is learning a patriotic program with lots of marching and other types of choreography. It should be interesting.

Both will have some additional subjects added in the next few weeks. I like to ease back into school and not hit it all at once. I will be adding poetry reading and art/music studies with both of them. I may have them both do some piano lessons with me as well. It would just be review for Hannah, but David hasn't done any. Hannah will add IEW's Student Writing Intensive. She will do about one lesson every other week. David will add science week after next. He will be doing REAL Science Odyssey Life Science. We are going to do some of the experiments with our neighbor. I think it will be fun.

Week of August 2nd - 6th

We had a great first week to our new school year. We began each day reading in the Psalms and prayer. We will read through the entire book this year. We also did "Who Is God?" by Apologia two days. This is a Christian worldview curriculum designed for family use. It is great!

To celebrate our first day, we went out to IHOP for breakfast with my best friend, Jenny, and her kids. Then we went to the dollar theater to see "How To Train Your Dragons". David and Jenny's two youngest kids were going to be studying Vikings this week, so we figured it worked! We did some school work before and after our outing.

Hannah read about the life and work of Cameron Townsend, learned about early life in North America, worked on a digital bug collection, studied cells, did math and grammar, as well as started "The Fallacy Detective", a logic study. She also attended a free vocabulary class offered by a retired English teacher.

David did study Vikings, which he really enjoyed. He got to listen to a story about Vikings and do a craft with Jenny's kids. We did a 3D Map of the Vikings' exploration to North America.
He also started his BJU Bible curricula, did some geography, did math and grammar, as well as some story narration. He did some logic puzzles and did some drawing. David attended a music class offered by the above mentioned English teacher's wife. She is putting together a patriotic musical performance as a salute to our soldiers and veterans. He enjoyed it and will continue weekly.

Both kids have really taken an interest in drawing in the last couple of weeks. Here are some pictures.

My Filing System

After reading much of the huge filing thread on The Well Trained Mind forums, I decided to take the plunge this year. After our first week of school, I can truly say I'm glad I did it. It was so nice to just take out Week 1 folder and go. I am planning David's history this year all on my own, so I'm glad that each week, I'll only have that planning to do.

Here are some pictures and details.

I had bought these file boxes a few months ago. The price was only $5 each, plus there are lids and stacking slots on top of the lids. I had not decided what I was going to do with these until the filing thread.

Each child has a file box. In the file boxes, I put monthly folders and 36 weekly folders. The monthly folders will be for supply lists, library books to pick up, etc. The weekly folders contain workbook pages and notes about specific assignments for the week.

Hannah, in 8th grade, is doing Sonlight Core 100 this year. I took the schedules and copied them, highlighting the portions she is to do. I also took apart the IG pages to place the appropriate discussion guides in the appropriate week. We are tweaking the schedule and having her do a novel a week, rather than a couple of novels over a couple or few weeks. She prefers to read this way, and it made the filing easier, too!
These are the file boxes I used last year for workboxes. It will be similar this year, but there will not be a schedule grid. I take the week's work from the big filing box and spread out by subject the work for this week. Some books are on shelves, but those that can fit will go in the box.
Instead of a schedule grid, I got these planners from http://www.goodnewsplanners.com/. I love the 2 page format and the little check off boxes in the upper right of each subject corner. This is where I will be keeping grades.

Curricula for 2010-2011

Our curricula is set for the 2010-2011 school year. We will be attending an enrichment co-op during fall and spring as well.

BOTH CHILDREN:

Bible:
Who Is God by Apologia
Read and Pray through the book of Psalms

Fine Arts:
Artist and Composer Studies
Poetry

History Read Alouds, Field Trips, Projects, and Movies

Hannah:
Sonlight Core 100 Bible, History, and Literature
CLE 8th Grade Math and Language Arts
BJU Life Science for Middle School
IEW Student Writing Intensive B
The Fallacy Detective
SAT Vocabulary Class


David:
BJU Bible
CLE Math & Language Arts
BJU Reading
R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey-Life Science
American History program designed by Mom
Daily Geography Practice, Drawing
Beginning Analogies, Primarily Logic, Perplexors, Math Perplexors
Cub Scouts, Upward Basketball

Tybee Island

My family (parents, sisters, and nephew, and the kids and I) got to go to Tybee Island. We enjoyed a nice week on the beach and doing the activities in the area.

Relaxing in the condo!

Here are the kids and me with my Daddy.

We did photos on the beach. We will use several of these for our parents' fiftieth wedding anniversary later this year. Here my parents are with the grandkids.

Here we all 3 are with Momma and Daddy.

It was fun being at the beach together, but we did miss Daddy.

We visited several sites in the area, including Fort Pulaski, an aquarium, and the Lighthouse. The kids, my dad, and I all climbed to the top of it.

Time to Catch Up

Things have been so utterly crazy in my life. I can't begin to think about catching up the blog as far as academics. From the 2nd week of March through mid April, the kids and I went out of town 3 times to help care for my grandmother and mother. My grandmother is bed-ridden with a brain tumor, mini-strokes, and seizures. She is at home with helpers coming in and my parents living there. My mother lost her sight in both eyes and had to have surgery on one of them. She is having a slow recovery, but should regain her sight in one eye. They will deal with the other later.

We did manage to get school work done, but it has been more of the essentials than any fluff. Co-op lasted through the first part of April. I was able to plan all my trips around that so we could be there since I am the director.

We had some fun times, too. Hannah turned 13, and we went to a resort with an indoor water park for her birthday. We felt like 13 was a time to do something really special. We went to visit Darin's family for his spring break. I'll post pictures later.

Week of March 1st

This week has been a little crazy. We did attend co-op on Monday, but the rest of the week was not our norm. My mother, who has been taking care of my grandmother for about 6 months, lost most of her sight in the past two weeks. She is diabetic and has an auto-immune disorder that can attack organs. She needed to have some procedures done on her eyes, so I went to be there and help her and my grandmother.

I dropped the kids off with my sister and went to my grandmother's house. The kids did actually get some schoolwork done while at her house (a little history, language arts, and math), but they mostly had fun with their aunt. Hannah is attending a discipleship retreat at our church. She'll have lots of bible study sessions. I'll do some more work with David this weekend, so they will get some school days out of this week, but not a full one.

My mother has fluid in her eyes that is seeping in from outside her eye. The diabetes has weakened the membranes or muscles around her eye allowing it to happen. While I was there her vision did improve slightly so we hope her body is absorbing the fluid. The doctors can see enough into one to know she has some bleeding going on, but could not see in the other at all.

Being available for family is such a blessing of homeschooling. I'm so glad that I could be there to help, and I know I could not if I were working and the kids in school.

Week of Feb 22nd

Monday means co-op, so we started our week there. Both always enjoy their classes and time with other kids. We studied the virtue "work" in Bible, reading about the rebuilding of the wall and lots of scriptures about work and not being lazy. Both the kids had library books about Beethoven and did notebook pages from their reading. We attended a homeschool gathering at an indoor play business. That day had 4 hours of PE! As far as our other work, both continued on in their LA, math, history, and sciences.

Week of Feb 15th

This week was a week off of school because their Daddy had the week off as well. We were going to have co-op, but had to cancel because of so much sickness. The kids really missed that. Hannah had her last writing class this week. She is really going to miss it. The instructor is considering offering a Vocabulary class next year as SAT prep.

We did get to go visit some family this week, but had some bad news about expensive repairs needing to be done to our heat pump. Ah...that is the joys of home ownership!

Week of Feb 8th

Wow, it's been busy. I haven't had time to update this in quite a while, so here goes. The week started off with co-op as usual. In Bible we continued studying about being generous and giving. In music we are still studying Beethoven. We read "Beethoven Lives Upstairs" and watched the movie of the same title. We are continuing our Poetry reading day.

Hannah had an interesting writing assignment from her outside class. She had to develop a "criminal justice system" for an imaginary country. She was to determine what punishments should be in place for major crimes. She also finished the book, "The Hound of the Baskervilles" for her book club. She continued in her grammar, math, and did labs in science, as well as 2 more lessons. In history she read about the early years of agricultural and industrial revolution in Europe as well as the Seven Years' War.

David began new Light Units in his math and language arts. He LOVES his speed drills in math. He is racing with himself to see how much time he can leave on the clock. He read about the Seven Years' War in history, as well as beginning some social studies topics in government and economics. He is working in his critical thinking books and seems to enjoy those.

Week of Feb 1st

We started the week with Co-Op. Hannah loved her Bill of Rights class. She is very interested in politics, so she enjoyed debates they had over court cases. In Bible we learned about being generous. The kids learned Luke 6:38. In music, we are learning about Beethoven. In art we looked at paintings by Valesquez because Hannah is reading "I, Juan de Pareja".

We had a poetry reading while we drank hot chocolate. I had read about someone making it a tea time, but David does not like tea. It went over so well. We have memorized some poetry this year, but they have never had a real appreciation for it. Both wanted turns reading some of the poems. It is a new tradition we will be continuing.

In history we read about the slave trade triangle. Although we are not to the time period of it's end, we watched the movie, "Amazing Grace", a personal favorite of mine. We also read "Amistad Rising" by Veronica Chambers. It was very good.

The both began studies in chemistry, so we discussed atoms, molecules, etc. They enjoyed making their own like these.
We thought this one looked more like a skier than a molecule.


Both had work to do in grammar, math, literature, and critical thinking. Hannah is reading "The Hound of the Baskervilles" for her novel club. She also went to her writing class that started back this week. David was very excited this week to do well on his speed drills and make A's on his tests in math and language arts.