Day 42 & Week's Wrap Up

Yesterday we really didn't do much academic stuff at all.

I had Kieron read this story that Liam recommended to me.

• Martian Odyssey
• We had a homeschool Halloween party in the afternoon.

I used a new form this week, so here is an incomplete summary of what we actually got done for Year 7:


You notice that record-keeping is a huge challenge for me. I never find something that works perfectly, and I have a tendency to get bored using the same method week after week.

I am going to try this one again next week, though, because I like being able to see at a glance the areas we did OK at and the weak areas as well..

Here is a blank form in doc.

Day 41

Another review day for Kieron, pretty much exactly like yesterday. Notes:

• We finished The Shakespeare Stealer. .. the last 5 chapters.
• In Latin, we've started Unit III (looking at the vocabulary). I'm having him review the grammar we've learned so far by declining a couple of nouns from the vocabulary list every day.
• He seems to rather enjoy the review readings and worksheets we are doing for Renaissance/Reformation and Chemistry. Doing these, though, I'm seeing why it wouldn't be a complete education to rely on them. That kind of information does not stick in the brain in the same way as the material from a "real" book. I think some summaries are useful for a framework at his age, though.
  
• We did part of this Peter Rabbit cloze for grammar. It actually is a quite valuable pre-composition/literary discernment activity as well as a verb sensitivity exercise, and he enjoyed it. It made him want to do mad-libs though, so I am going to look for some of those for next week.

Paddy:

• Read the subtitles in a cartoon. Wow! He can really read.
• Read part of a story in an Aesop's Fable reader.
• Did simple addition, subtraction and multiplication mentally.
• Wrote a "P" and an "A".

Aidan (who is a bit sick today and last night).

• matching numbers.
• tried to read a bit of Go Dogs Go.

Day 40

A Time to Review

I have started reviewing with Kieron. It was one of those decisions I started to implement before I even knew I had decided. I had been gathering review-type materials and so I just started handing them to him. I will try to pull together a sheet later on.

Anyway, he did:

• Latin -- finished Unit II
  
• Math -- chapter 7.3 of MEP Year 7.
  
• History -- review of the Renaissance
  
• Science -- review of Matter.
  
• English (grammar) -- started volume 1 of the KISS workbooks.
  
• Literature -- Shakespeare Stealer study guide -- used it as a kind of review/narration starter.
  

and we read five chapters of Shakespeare Stealer (got to an exciting part and couldn't stop).

He really seemed to enjoy the day, even though it was sort of "schooly". I have some thoughts about that but am still trying to decide on what the thoughts are ;-).

He has been doing a lot of writing recently and has been playing several RPG type games.

Comments:

• Paddy and Aidan listened to Shakespeare Stealer, too. I realized that Aidan has basically vaulted from toddler board books to chapter books. Not that he drinks in every syllable of the chapter books, but he does listen, and the funny thing is that he laughs with delight when he hears a familiar word or a cool new one. I don't know if he'll ever hit the intermediate picture book stage, but I'm feeling better about his literary progress now because I realize he doesn't have to comprehend in detail in order to get delight from books. Paddy really does follow the story line and even posed a discussion question -- what does Julian want? What does Nick want? What about Widge? Maybe I'm training a future literature professor ;-).
  
• I'm going to start saving the little ones' learning notes for the next day. My best logging time is at lunch time and I usually am more likely to work with the littlies in the afternoon. Plus, they often do informal things in the afternoon and evening that I "count" for their homeschool. Just writing this down to remind me.

Day 39

Kieron

• Thatquiz.org -- practice on multiplying with decimals
• Quizlet on the Renaissance
• Weekly housekeeping jobs

Paddy and Aidan

• Starfall -- long "a's"
• Occupational Therapy
• picked up toys upstairs
  

Day 47

Sean

• Greek
• Vocabulary
• Henle Latin -- last day of review -- matching declensions, "sum" --
• Geography matching cards
• Algebra -- Summary and Review, end of chapter 5 -- we will do another day of review on this chapter and then go on.
• Read Logic chapter 3 and answer questions -- I used the study questions to go over the main points, which were about univocal/equivocal/analogous terms. I think I need to go back over these chapters and prepare some sort of review sheet.
• Read Mere Christianity
• Composition -- Paper? What Paper? (I think he needs more direction than just sending him off to invent and write on his own-- well, now we know. I shall devise paper topics and strategies today as the kids have their computer time)

• Daily and weekly jobs.

Kieron

• Greek
• Handwriting
• Spelling (we discussed the first few WRTR rules)
• Latin -- matching declensions -- at present he knows them a bit better than Sean does.
• Math -- subtracting like fractions -- easy stuff -- whew!
• Read Faith and Life chapter 7
• Read Discovery of New Worlds
• Daily and Weekly Jobs (did a good job -- progress!)

Aidan

• HWT letter forms
• wrote an H
• Last week Aidan had a milestone -- he started drawing freehand, which he has never done before. He was SO proud!
• Today he did several housekeeping jobs -- he loves to be involved in the workings of the house.

General Life:

• Yesterday we drove south to see Liam at college. It was a beautiful day and the kids had a lot of fun. We played a fun question and answer game which Liam had learned at an engagement party the day before (not HIS engagement -- a couple of his classmates are engaged to be married).
• Sean's team lost in the first playoff game, so no more football -- a bit of a relief. Sean was in a few plays in the game so it ended on a good note for him.
  
• We are going to the library and market today; Clare says The SEven Samurai has come -- the older kids are big Kurosawa fans -- last week they watched the Magnificent Seven which was an American version of TSS -- also, A Bug's Life has the same storyline with obviously a different twist.
  

Day 46

Sean

• I promised Sean no math today because he had to go into town to make it to All Saints Day mass (the rest of us are going locally but he has practice tonight and can't go at that time). Plus he has his orthopedist appointment tomorrow and a game Saturday out of town, so it is a busy time for him.
• I had him do a history day: he read Plutarch, then Stories from Virgil, then started the Book of Discovery. He has finished Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea.
• He also read chapter 2 of Traditional Logic. What I'm going to have him do is just read through the more philosophical chapters 1-3, not answering the end of chapter questions (which are sort of overly-detail oriented). I'll work with him on making a summary of the essential philosophical points in those chapters, but not expect retention of historical figures etc. Then we'll start the more detailed work in chapter 4. If he is still not really getting it, we'll go to Introductory Logic (Canon Press) -- we did some of it in 6th grade and it was easy for him then.
• I told him to write his paper but have not checked to see if he did.
• We did a quiz on the first 2 declensions. He has them down pretty much by heart now, so Monday we'll do just a bit more review and then move on.

Kieron

• He did math -- regrouping fractions with unlike denominators. This is not easy stuff. He goes slowly but does well.
• Spelling test
• He read "Black Holes" (about space) for a long time
• Also finished Hunters of Souls.
• We discussed All Saints Day a bit.
• I had him work on a map puzzle of the world.
• Declensions verbally.

Little Ones (Paddy and Aidan)

• Aidan did a bit of matching with the Pink Cards
• Both did number cards 1-20. Surprise! They both know all the numbers up to 20 and can recognize them. I'm not sure how they learned! Paddy made a train by himself and Aidan made one with a bit of motor-process prompting -- which one's the?? type of thing.
• They played with the map puzzle.
• Aidan worked a bit with the Parent/Child masterpiece cards.
• Both worked with the stamp sets -- letters, and animals.
• Reading: Berlioz the Bear, Tintins, Teddy Bears Picnic, and Goodnight, Little Bear (about Alaska). I guess we're on a bear theme here.
  

Now it's time for me to start lesson planning for next week, and write up the weekly report for this week. No school tomorrow. This was a full week in spite of not getting to everything we'd planned, but then, that's a good thing : ).