Day 103

Kieron

• Bible & Creed --remainder of chapter 10 -- discussed
• Poetry: Tennyson --
• Math --Chapter 14.4
• Language Arts --Latin -- adjectives
• Science:The Boy Scientist --did lab instead – magnets
• Ways of the Wood Folk---Merganser Duck -- narrated a portion
• George Washington's World -- Phillis Wheatley, and George and Mary Washington
• Exercised while listening to Johny Tremain
• 2-15 min clean
• Literature: Robinson Crusoe -- chapter 4 -- narrated a portion
• In addition, we read chapter 53 of This Country of Ours, on Bunker Hill, and discussed and narrated.

What we didn't get to (I'm going to start mentioning that because it seems to help me think):

• Outdoors -- didn't get outside -- icy and miserable out there. Maybe I should have us just go out for 10 minutes -- start small just to breathe the air and get a feeling for the weather? (but that will mean I can't be a wimp!)
  
• piano -- didn't get to that

He narrated George Washington's World but not very well. On the other hand his narration of Bunker Hill was pretty good. Obviously we're still adjusting. We talked a bit about retention strategies, like making a visual image in the mind, and also reflecting a bit while reading to check one's attention status (these are things I got from reading that book about the Right Brained Learner -- I don't remember the exact title -- and also there is a list of reading strategies here, and these in PDF and a list of others). He has been very agreeable, not arguing, but sometimes making excuses for not paying much attention. I have become more aware of the natural noise level around here -- it's true, it is challenging for him to focus with everything going on around him.

Paddy --

I read him Cincinnatus from 50 Famous Stories. I asked him to tell what it was about and he said, "He was a king for 16 days" (which was the last sentence of the story). Other than that, he was fairly vague. That was a tough choice for a beginner narration though, since it was 3 or 4 pages long.

We finished reading Jimmy Skunk. He certainly loves to listen to stories and brings a book every time I sit down.

I read a couple of poems from A Child's Garden of Verses. I found a more general anthology of poetry for young children and am going to use that sometimes since I have to admit I am not particularly fond of RLS's Child's Garden. I am very sure it is me and not him, but it's hard for me to read them to Paddy when I don't really care much for reading them. Right now I've started just skipping through the book and having him look at the pictures and then listen to the ones I prefer of the lot.

We worked a bit on math. He can add two 2-digit numbers in his head. And he likes picture stories with his math.

We tried to do "S's" in HWT but he had a lot of trouble. If anything he seems to be worse than he used to be.

Aidan

We worked a bit on adding and recognizing larger numbers. He listened in to some of Jimmy Skunk. Maybe by the time we get to Year 1 with him it will already have a bit of familiarity -- that would be nice.