Week 6 (just a little late)

Time is flying by here with the Heathens! With our theater troup starting back up, we have been very very busy here.

During Week 6 we hosted a playgroup in our home. It has been great having some of the younger children in our homeschooling group come over and just play. Fifi has made some wonderful new friends around her age! (finally) We also hosted a Tween Movie Night, which brought tweens all the way from Painsville to watch the Harry Potter movies! I think my friend Willow was more excited about these then the tweens lol. Lola is excited that these events have such a great turn out. Lastly, Nacho taught an art class to the group. Five families can and learned how to draw cartoon characters step by step. I love the idea of student led classes because they not only allow the teens in our group a chance to teach, but it gives the moms in the group a chance to sit and chat. We also went to our theater troup's read though. Our schedules are getting busier but we love it!

In week 6 Coco worked with:
Spelling- we wrote the words 3 times each, wrote sentences, wrote a newspaper article using at least 8 words and did a word search I made on www.theteacherscorner.net.
Language Arts- we worked with determiners. We worked with her Language Arts text book, her Scholastic Success workbook and her Comprehensive Curriculum workbook.
Math- we started working with Rounding and Estimating numbers. We used worksheets from www.abcteach.com, our Comprehensive Curriculum workbook and worksheets I made.
Science- we worked with measurements in Science. We used our Comprehensive Curriculum workbook and our Physical Science text book.
Social Studies- we are learning about Vikings as explorers. Being that we are Normandic Wiccans, we have tons and tons of information about Vikings. We also used print outs from www.enchantedlearning.com.
Journaling- we are working on writing longer journal entries. I am correcting them at the end of the day so she is now able to see the spelling and grammar errors. We are covering topics like - "What would you do if you had $100?", "What is the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?", and "If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go and why?"
We also made Personality Spirals, these are a spiral of construction paper cut with cut outs from different magazine of pictures of things that they think represents them. We then hung them up in our classroom. I will post pictures of them tomorrow.

In week 6 Fifi worked with:
Spelling- we learned the color words. We did color by numbers, wrote each word twice, and completed workbook pages from our Comprehensive Curriculum . We also played a game where we put a bunch of crayons in a bag and she had to pull a crayon and then put the right color on a poster board with the words spelt out on it.
Language Arts- we worked with complete sentences and what they are comprised of. We worked in our Scholastic Success workbooks, our Comprehensive Curriculum workbooks and with pages printed from www.instructorweb.com
Phonics, we are still working in our Hooked On Phonics workbook for Grade 1. We learned more rhyming words and to sound out the difference between Bs and Vs at the beginning of the words.
Math- we are working on counting by 2s. We used our Scholastic Success workbook and played games (hop scotch and made up cheerleading cheers)
Science- we started learning about giraffes. We read stories about them and worked with the printout pages from www.enchantedlearning.com We also made hardened paper beads that look like giraffes and made necklaces. I got one for my birthday!
Social Studies- we are still working with maps with our Scholastic Success Map for Grade 1 workbook. We made a map of the park using a key and worked more with directionals. We also talked about the Wiccan directional color associations. She is now coloring North green, South red, West blue and East yellow on every page lol.

Lola is still doing very very well with OHVA. She loves the workload and the teachers. We are doing alot of work with the Italian Renaissance both in art and history. She is reading A Wrinkle in Time by M Engle. I bought her the audio copy so we could listen to it during the day on the computer and she read the hard copy at night. OHVA doesn't really have a study guide or any quizzes, so I printed her one from www.coreknowledge.com This gives her a chance to work with vocabulary words from the book, do character summaries and state her opinions about the storylines.

Nacho is really doing well with his new curriculum. While I do have to sit at his desk with him the entire 4 hours, the work I'm getting from him is the best work Ive seen in three years of homeschooling.

In Math he is working with Number Lines. We are still using his Algebra 1 math book from K-12. His weekly average is 94%
In Science he is still working with power and energy. We are still using Holts Physical Science and printables from www.teachervision.fen.com His weekly average is 100%
In Health he is working on Personalities. We are still using his Health book from Prentice Hall. His weekly average is 83% (We still have an issue with writing out his answers in complete sentences and loses points off his grades for those errors)
In Social Studies he is learning about Religious Intolerance in Europe. He did a worksheet from www.teachervision.fen.com and wrote a paragraph about a specific incident. His weekly average is 81%
In Language Arts he is working on types of sentences. He is still using his Language Arts book from K-12. His weekly average is 98%
In Spanish he worked with a new vocabulary list and congregating standard ar, er, and ir verbs. His weekly average is 95%
He also attended an anime class at the Stark Main Library and was placed on the make up committee with the Stark County Little Theater Troup.

Really Getting into a Grove

We have had such a great week so far! Day 3 of our new school year and the girls are still so excited about their new lessons and projects. I am sneaking off the blog this as they are doing an impromptu art project. (I will post the project and the pictures when they are done)

Lola is moving right along with OHVA. We have run into a few stumbling blocks. Her French isn't listed on her daily schedule. We ended up noticing yesterday that she hasn't even done any of it, only to log on today to find the program isnt working right. We then took our own Primsluers French CDs and listened to a few lessons all together. I plan to wait until her online school actually starts before I ask any questions. I could just be because she started their program so early.
I am however, so very proud of how well she is doing in math. Those summer time math drills really are paying off!
Coco seems to be working harder and faster this year compared to last. I hate to admit shes having a better start without Mimi here. We are both enjoying her Daily Drills book (Daily Learning Drills by Brighter Child) and I am getting much less resistance to writing sentences than ever before.
In the last two days we have done:
DD pages 50 and 233
Spelling- correcting sentences and a word scramble (made at www.theteacherscorner.net
Language Arts- textbook pages 18 and 19 and CC page 294 (types of sentences)
Explorers- we marked the journeys of Daniel Boone on our US map and worked on some vocabulary words using a grid worksheet I found on www.teacherspayteachers.com
(settlers, wilderness, pioneer, frontier, exploits, treaty)
Math- SS pages 7 and 8. We are still working on comparing numbers and place values
Science- We started working on our weekly worksheets I made from the textbook. I will be using the same text book and worksheets with another student starting next week so Coco will actually be a week ahead of him.
French- we have been working with the vocabulary worksheets I made and we have also been listening to the Primsluers CDs with Lola.
Reading- we are still reading Stuart Little but its not really holding her interest. I have found some great character worksheets on www.teacherspayteachers.com and those seem to hold more of her attention.

Fifi more interested in school this year as well. She is still transitioning from K to 1st grade but is grasping 90% of the work she is being giving.
Our main issue with Fifi is that she is worried about not having any friends. She has playmates from the neighborhood, but no other homeschooling friends in her grade or her age. We are working on setting up some new playdates and 8 more families joined our homeschooling group in the past week!
I will post tomorrow what she has been working on this week.

As a side note, I have found many many audio and ebooks both educational and reading for enjoyment. Lola is trying to read The Hobbit with the audio book reading along with her. (Its not working well lol) Nacho is reading Animal Farm by George Orwell as an ebook and it seems to be working better for him than it was as a paperback.... If are looking for anything specific let me know.

Dani

Coco's 4th Grade Curriculum- Social Studies

My friend Sherri and I were on the phone and it came to me... Instead of just doing US History, why couldn't we do Explorers?!! I started on www.enchantedlearning.com and went through their list of explorers (that comes with at least one worksheet per explorer and a printable bio)

We are definitely looking for any resources we can get on this one.

1) Christopher Newport
2)Ponce de Leon
3) Vitus J Bering
4) Robert Burke and William Willis
5) Vasco de Gama
6) Eric the Red and Leif Ericson
7) Christopher Columbus (Well it is Columbus Day Week)- have worksheets from the CC
8) Robert Ballard
9) Amerigo Vespucci
10) Henry Hudson - we have a activity book about him I found at a yard sale
11) Roald Amundsen
12) Magellan
13) Kit Carson
14) Richard Byrd
15) Robert La Salle
16) Alvar Nunez
17) Jaques Cousteau - have two worksheets from the CC and a field trip to the aquarium
18) Neil Armstrong - have worksheets from the CC
19) Buzz Aldrin- have a field trip to the space center planned
20) Sally Ride - have a biography book and a few worksheets from the CC
21) Sue Hendricson
22) Pedro Alvares Cabral
23) James Cook
24) Douglas Mawson
25) Sir Francis Drake
26) Daniel Boone
27) James Smith- have a few worksheets from the CC
28) Lewis and Clark- this is Coco's obsession! We have posters, books, the board game...
29) Robert Scott
30) Sir Walter Raleigh
31) Mae Jemison
32) Marco Polo
33) Jaques Cartier
34) Mary Kingsley
35) Jean Le Perouse
36) Petre Stryvesant
37) Hernan Cortes
38) Final Review and testing.

I have created a lapbook style worksheet for this so she will have a Bio on Mondays, a worksheet from enchantedlearning, a worksheet from me, a vocab sheet with a crossword or word scramble (Gotta love www.theteacherscorner.net) and we have lots and lots of maps that I also got from enchantedlearnig.
Typically we test every 10 weeks and I have made those too.

Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions? (or materials I can borrow?)