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Saturday, February 25, 2012

Week 25

Besides formal work, the kids did a lot of BrainPOP Jr. and playing outside with our awesome weather. In fact, Wednesday was so beautiful, we only did a bit of math work and shelved all of our stuff in favor of visiting two different parks. When you have mid-70s in February, you have to drop some things and just enjoy the beauty of the weather!

PreK:

Emmett did a bit of Reading Eggs this week...that was it. :) He has asked for a few reading lessons, so I think I should probably get on that...even if it I know it won't last long.

Math:

Abby worked through week 27 in MEP 1B. This week was a review of number bonds up to 15. She is really reaching a place where figuring these sums and differences is automatic. I'm loving where Abby is with MEP and how it is teaching her complex reasoning while keeping those numbers low.

For warm-up math, she did a lot of Math Bingo. She likes level 1, which contains number bonds through ten. I require her to use level 2 which requires addition with one- and two-digit numbers without regrouping if the number is past 20. At one point we worked with level 3. She did just fine with that level, but there were a few problems where I had to write down the two numbers and break them into tens and ones for her to add up. (IE: 18 + 24 = 10 + 8 + 20 +4 = 30 + 10 + 2 = 42) That was more than she wanted to do during the course of playing an iPad game, so I happily let her go back to level 2.



Language Arts:

We are still working with common and proper nouns in grammar. Abby was a bit confused by the word common in this instance (which is actually quite funny considering her using the word sibling vs sister a few weeks ago).

We moved into Step 2 in AAS2. Because we're already ahead, I don't want to zoom through this level. So, we're only working with spelling twice a week or so. It would be expensive to allow her to work through this faster than that. :) So, this week, she learned that English words very rarely end in the long i sound. Instead, we use the letter y at the end of words that end in the long i.


Cursive is going okay for her. This week she worked on the letters f, r, and c. She picked up c very easily, but f and r were rather difficult for her. It's a work in progress.


Abby read me Amelia Bedelia and absolutely loved it this week. We've had a compilation of Amelia Bedelia books, but she's never picked it up. She thought it was hilarious and zoomed through three days' worth of reading in one day.


Geography:

This was our last week of our continent study and we finished it up with Australia. It was a good little unit that hopefully gave us some awareness of the unique things in each continent.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Week 24

PreK:

Emmett did a bit of rod play this week. He built a staircase to earn some candy. When I bribe him, he's more than willing to perform. I took this picture before he put in the last rod. Can you tell which color was missing?




Math:

We worked through MEP Y1 Week 26. Her focus number this week was 15 and she worked through it without complaint.

She asked to do a few problems in Singapore 1B and sped through something like 30 pages. And this is why we work with a few different math curricula!


Language Arts:

We worked through the first step in All About Spelling 2 this week. It is a bit of a more formal review. It is difficult to work with it when Hyrum is awake though!


Abby is still working through her cursive. Even though it's not easy for her, she says it is still her favorite part. This week we worked with the letters u, e and l. She knows six letters now!

In FLL1, we learned that we capitalize proper nouns and what proper nouns are.


Geography:

We learned about Europe this week. With this focus, we mostly talked about famous monuments in Europe.


PE:

There was no PE class this week because of Valentine's Day...


Extra:

Valentine's Day was Tuesday. I think I read Pinkalicious four times that day. Because it was V Day, we made pink cupcakes just like in the book.





On Friday, we did some art stuff. I showed the kids Noah's Ark by Edward Hicks. We discussed the picture and the story of Noah. Then I asked each of them to paint a rainbow.




Daddy's birthday was on Saturday, so we went to the Science Museum and renewed our membership.






Saturday, February 11, 2012

Week 23

This is our fiftieth blog post here! Woohoo!

We had a good week. We have been reviewing the continents and this week we did Antarctica. We also are slated to complete
Mr. Popper's Penguins today. We'll watch the movie on Sunday. With all of that happening, of course it was perfect timing to do a little mini-unit on Penguins. I love synchronicity like that!

PreK:

Emmett played around with Starfall and ReadingEggs this week. He also loves to do BrainPop. I got smart and had him use earphones so Abby couldn't be distracted by his noises.

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Math:

We worked through MEP 1B week 25. MEP is still overwhelming to her at times, but it just is the way it is.

I've been weaving in Miquon and some Math Mammoth pages as her warm-up exercises, which she loves. This Friday, we got Singapore Math 1B. As I thumbed through it, I realized she really would have been ready to begin it right after completing 1A. I had been under the erroneous assumption that she should be able to construct her sums to 20 with automaticity. Apparently not. Abby's not the only one learning new things!

So, on Friday, we worked through some SM as well. She completed an entire week's worth in one sitting and asked for more. It's safe to say she prefers the look and sequence of Singapore vs MEP. Too bad I'm a mean mommy and will require her to complete the MEP pages as well. The question will be, which should we work through first? I'm not sure I know yet...

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And, sometimes, this is what I do while I'm encouraging her to work through a problem independently. C rods aren't just for kids, you know...

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We also got the Singapore CD-ROM game Rainbow Rock in the mail. We haven't fiddled with it much because it isn't supported by Windows 7...so we have to use it on my dinosaur laptop.

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The kids still love to watch Math Monsters. That counts too, right?

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Language Arts:

Spelling is still review. On Thursday we received the next level of All About Spelling. I need to go over it before we start it...so who knows when that will happen. She's still just five, right? Maybe this week I'll sit down and prep it...

Cursive is going swimmingly. She is resistant to it because it is hard. I know we've established that she's a perfectionist. It really does frustrate her, but I can see her working through it and she feels accomplished by it. This week she mastered the letters s, i, and t.

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We jumped ahead a few weeks in our Sonlight Readers schedule. I reserved Hill of Fire from the library and it became available quicker than I anticipated. It was no struggle. I don't think we're going to go back and read most of the ones we skipped...

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This week we began First Language Lessons. It's fairly simple and only takes us five minutes three times a week. The only thing that tripped her up was when I asked her what we call two girls who share the same parents. She replied, "We call them siblings." Uh...yes...but not what I was reaching for. LOL

She has nearly memorized the first poem from the book. It was introduced on Wednesday and this video is from Friday. She is pretty pleased with herself. I'm not surprised since memorization is not difficult for her.



We are finishing up Mr. Popper's Penguins this weekend. Daddy is still working through My Father's Dragon with Emmett. In her free time, Abby is reading a Cam Jansen book on my kindle.


Science:

Our little impromptu penguin unit morphed into some talk about eggs and birds. We discussed the strength an egg is afforded by it's shape. I illustrated this by showing the kids how four eggshells could hold up a fair amount of books. Daddy thought this was pretty impressive too.

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Of course, the kids tried to squeeze the egg to crack it as well.

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Daddy was adamant that he could actually crack an egg this way. When he first grabbed it, he didn't place it in his palm, but held it in such a way that his fingers could puncture the shell. I corrected him and had him wrap his fingers all the way around the egg. He was a bit chuffed that he couldn't crack it this way either.

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We also discussed what is inside an egg and what an eggshell is made of. This led to dissolving an eggshell in vinegar.

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Geography:

We studied Antarctica this week. We talked about sunrise and sunsets and the differences in Antarctica vs here. We observed how Antarctica doesn't look like a flat strip of land like we see on maps either.

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We also discussed Penguins and made a fair share of these activities from this Easy Make and Learn Projects: Penguins book. (I bought this one during the Scholastic Dollar Days!)

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We read all those books that our shells held up.

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The kids watched a bit of Discovery Streaming. It has the Life documentary with a segment on the poles.


PE:

The Air Force base nearby has a large virtual academy group that gets together and does a PE class in the Youth Center's gym. A new group has spun off for independent homeschoolers that we have gone to a couple of times. There aren't enough kids to really play anything, but they do get to use a few typical PE things.

Abby keeps practicing her jump rope skills. The poor kid has a hard time commanding all her limbs (which are quite long) while keeping time with the jump rope. Again, she is overwhelmed and frustrated with it. She keeps trying, though. :) Much to her surprise, however, she can dribble!

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They also have these scooters that the kids love. Last week my kids used jump ropes to tie them all together to make a large train and coerced one of the older boys to pull them along. Not exactly physically taxing, but at least they were using their imaginations!

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Extra:

We had a mini box day! I ordered the next few things that will take us through most of next year. These things will last us for a while, though. It's nice to have the beginning of next year already planned out.

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Here's our tentative curriculum list:

First Grade!

Math: continue on with Singapore Math, and MEP and Miquon
English: First Language Lessons 1 (and maybe move into 2), Writing With Ease 1, All About Spelling 2 (and maybe move into 3)
History: Story of the World: Ancients, its accompanying Activity Guide, and a lot of "living books"
Science: Real Science Odyssey: Life, definitely a lot of books, and maybe a few lessons from Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding
Art and Music: as outlined in the Core Knowledge sequence


K4:

Emmett will continue tagging along where he chooses. Sometime around this summer I will start him with Funnix. Learning to read will be his main "schoolwork." When that becomes a bit more fluid, he will start some gentle Miquon-esque activities. If these things work out, he might start some FIAR-type activities. I am calling it K4 because he will be ready for these activities, but if he were attending public school, he wouldn't be doing Kindy until fall of 2013.


PreK/ThreeSchool:

Ellie will be three this summer. If I can get it together, she might enjoy some themes surrounding certain picture books. I can see a lot of LeapFrog's Letter Factory in her future.

Toddler:

*gasp!* By the time next school year starts, my sweet baby will be moving into toddlerhood! His plan? Learn to walk and talk, I guess. ;)

Friday, February 10, 2012

The days are long...

I posted this in our family blog and thought it pertinent here too. When in conversation about being the mom of small children, my mom has told me, "The days are long, but the years are short." I'm trying to cherish these days!

10 Feb by nagazwife
10 Feb, a photo by nagazwife on Flickr.
So, this is going to be a bit of a boring post, but I have been thinking about doing writing down what I do each day. Obviously I've excluded things like changing diapers, potty breaks, etc, but I think this will be good to look back at and see what day-to-day life is like at this point. This is gonna' be long...

I wake at 7:15 to Abby and Emmett telling me they have made me a special breakfast. I am immediately concerned for the state of my kitchen. Then I remember doing the same thing for my mom, hoping that she would be so pleased. Hyrum needs to be nursed, and then I put a smile on my face at the thoughtfulness of my children. Breakfast is a HUGE bowl of cereal that is filled to the top with milk. It's also soggy. I eat it and thank my kids profusely. They are grinning ear-to-ear.

I send the kids off to get dressed, or at least change out of their nighttime diapers while I clean the surprise breakfast and accompanying milk mess.

Abby comes back wearing blue sweat bottoms and a black sweatshirt. I tell her she doesn't match, she tells me she doesn't care, and because we're not going anywhere, I shrug it off. We complete math together, which includes an entire unit in Singapore Primary Math 1B (which we just got and is ridiculously easy for her) and a page from MEP math. While we are working on math, Emmett and Ellie are off in his room "reading books."

After math, Abby asks to do make-up, which I agree to. That draws the kids out of the woodwork. Hyrum wakes up, so I leave the other three happily painting their faces while I quickly grab a grinny baby. I pull him into the living room so I can be close to where the kids are while I change his diaper and his clothes.

While the kids finish up their make-up, I start putting together a Where Do Penguins Live? piece for our mini-penguin unit. It mostly involves coloring...which morphs into Abby and Emmett wanting to color their own penguin stuff. I encourage them to put the make-up away and, after they do, they are happily coloring their own penguin activities.

A little bit later, Ellie starts dancing, so I help her to the potty. Afterwards, she declares she does not want to wear underwear and streaks away from me, completely in the buff. Again, we're not going anywhere, so I allow it. (Yes, I am that mom.)

After the kids are done coloring, cutting, and crafting, there is a big mess. With some reminding, they clean the crayons and paper pieces off the table. While they are doing that, I sweep the kitchen floor. It needs to be done since I didn't do it after breakfast and there are now random cereal pieces and tiny pieces of paper all over the place...and I have a crawling scavenger-baby.

It's obvious that Hyrum is getting ready to go down for a nap, so I put on a Math Monsters for the older kids. It's about time and I count it as a "school show." It definitely isn't the most interesting show, but they DO learn from it and it gives me a good few minutes to feed the baby and leave him to nap.

When I come out, I realize that Emmett and Ellie never put away the books they were perusing. I call them to come pick them up, and as I do, I take a double-take and realize they have at least three dozen out. I help them sort them and put them away.

Then, I make my way into the kitchen and see that Ellie has helped herself to the playing cards that I save for math games (Abby is particularly into addition war). I stand there and direct her as she picks up each card. (If I don't, I know she will walk off and not complete the task.)

I ask Abby what Math Monsters was about and she rambles off a few moments of the show to me. Then, I instruct each of the kids to grab a library book. With Abby on my left, Emmett on my right, and Ellie in my lap, I read their library books. Just as we are placing them back in the book box, Hyrum wakes up.

I go grab him and he is once again, his happy and smiley self.

Emmett has pulled out some notebooks and is drawing pictures in them. I notice Abby has drawn a "No boys allowed" picture and has taped it to her door. Emmett, though, has managed to make his notebook purge itself all over the kitchen floor. I encourage him to clean it up. This takes him fifteen minutes to do because he keeps dawdling or trying to get out of the chore.

I realize it's nearing lunchtime, so I grab a pot. Friday is sort of like "fun day" at home. We do extra crafts for schooltime and the kids get a fun lunch. Lately, they love ramen noodle. Everyone, even Hyrum, eats.

Of course, because Hyrum had ramen, he now needs a bath. I declare it Quiet Time for Abby, Emmett and Ellie and strip Hyrum naked. He takes a bath and makes silly noises as he splashes around. He also does a funny face-bob thing where he actually drinks some of the bathwater. As I pull Hyrum out of the bath, I look at the clock and realize it's only noon.

After Quiet Time, I read aloud from Mr. Popper's Penguins. We only read one chapter, though, we should read two because we need to complete this book by Sunday afternoon...and Abby loves it.

Instead, though, we get ready to go to the library. I send kids off to get various pieces of clothing on or switched. While they do that, or should be doing that, I notice that my dining room floor needs to be swept, so I sweep again. As I'm taking the dustpan to the trash, I realize it's getting full, so I take out the trash too.

By this time, Ellie has picked a dress (it's a sundress of course, because that's all she wears these days) and Abby has changed into a more appropriate shirt. I quickly pull Ellie's hair into pigtails and help Abby brush her hair. Then I send them both to the bathroom and to grab shoes.

I pull Hyrum from the floor (where he is crawling around and pestering the cats) and nurse him. Emmett walks by in only underwear and I ask him why he is not yet dressed. He whines that his drawer is empty. I tell him I washed his clothes, they are not yet folded, but they are clean in a basket in the garage (where my washer and dryer are). He whines about it and I ignore him while I finish nursing Hyrum, tidy myself up.

He is still whining while I weed through our library books, deciding which ones will go back and which ones will stay.

Emmett is still whining when I tell the girls to get in the car and buckle Hyrum in his car seat. I give Hyrum his blanket, he giggles, and I play a little bit of peek-a-boo with him. He is so easy to please and has such a fun laugh!

I put Hyrum's car seat in the car and open the garage door. Emmett comes RUNNING to the car, in his underwear still, begging me not to leave him. I tell him he should really hurry up because I am leaving soon. He finally grabs a pair of pants, a shirt, some socks and his rain boots and takes them to the car. It took him an hour to pick his clothes.

Before the library, we stop at the post office to mail off a book. It takes us fifteen minutes to do that, when it would typically take me five minutes max without the kids.

As we get to the library, I realize Eleanor doesn't have shoes on (of course). I weed through the extra jackets on the floor in the mini-van and grab an extra pair (that she has, of course, kicked off at a different time).

When we get inside, the kids help me put the books in the return slot. They love doing that. Then they head to the computers while Hyrum and I peruse what books we should pick up.

After thirty minutes, it's time for us to go. I tell the older kids to pick something if they want. Abby and Emmett hop up and both choose a DVD each. Ellie, instead, stands on her chair and yells, "Ladies and gentleman! Boys and girls! I DO NOT WANT TO GO." Mmmhm. I put Hyrum down and we have a chat about why it's important to be quiet at the library. Then, I call for the older kids that it is time to go.

As I lean down to pick Hyrum up, Ellie is all of a sudden exhausted and a handful. She is crying, "I don't want to leave the libar-wy. I don't want to go home. I'm tired." Of course, she isn't rational, so I try to juggle her, Hyrum, and my bag of fifteen picture books to the checkout counter. I get a fair number of stares, a few lifted eyebrows and two dirty looks. I can't help but think, "Well, you could help me out instead of just glaring at me."

When we get to the checkout counter, I put Hyrum on the floor where he happily bangs the tiles as I ask Ellie if she'd like to help me put the books up. She immediately stops her fit, her face brightens up and says, "Oh yes!" Bipolar much?

Of course, after the books are checked out, I am left to drag all four kids and our books to the car. At least we have a new audiobook to listen to, even if Emmett says he doesn't want to.

We also have to stop at Redbox because Netflix apparently couldn't ship a DVD of Mr. Popper's Penguins, even though it was next in our queue. I need it for Sunday movie night, so we stop. Luckily, there is an open spot right in front, so I leave the kids in the car, instructing them to count how long it takes me. When I get back in the car, Emmett tattles on Abby because she wasn't counting with him. Abby rather angrily retorts back that she couldn't because Emmett kept skipping numbers on purpose. I turn on the audiobook and by the time I've turned onto the street, they are quiet and staring out the windows while they listen.

It is 2:45 by the time we get home. Hyrum has fallen asleep in the car, which is awesome. I pull out his car seat and lug him into my room.

Then, I realize I need a few seconds to myself. I turn on a show. This is unprecedented at our house of late and the older kids are ecstatic.

While they watch, I haul in the library bag, place the books in the bin.

Of course, as they watched, Ellie decided she didn't care for the show and pulled out a few books. So, I help her put them away again.

I steal a second for a drink and to check my email. Then, I print off the next few pages and activities for Abby's lessons.

The show only lasts fifteen minutes and afterwards, Abby and I talk a bit about Antarctica. We use the globe to check out how it really looks (rather than just a flat strip on the bottom of the map). Emmett sits in on our discussion about how days are different there due to lack of sunlight.

Now all we have left is language arts. Abby chooses to complete her grammar first. We've been talking about nouns, more specifically common nouns. We discuss how mother and father are common nouns. I ask her, "What do we call two girls that share the same mother and father?" She stares at me blankly. This is definitely not too hard so I repeat the question. She looks confused for a second and then replies, "We call them siblings." I laugh because a) what five-year-old uses the word siblings correctly like that? and b) while this is true, I'm very obviously wanting her to use the word sisters. LOL

After grammar, we work on her recitation. She has very nearly memorized the poem she's been assigned, which is two stanzas. She was only assigned the poem two days ago. I record her giving the poem, and we watch the video. She comments that she is moving a lot. I agree and she asks to take it again. She does much better with the second recitation.

Hyrum wakes up and I go grab him. Everyone goes to greet him, grinning and smiling at him. But, he is grumpy and whiny. Apparently he was not ready to be awake. I have to hold him for the next hour or so before he decides to be cordial.

Next up, Abby chooses cursive. She is excited to write in cursive, but she also finds it rather difficult. I believe this is good for her. Many things come easily to her, so it's good for her to be working on something that does not. Today we learn the letter s. She is rather frustrated and keeps making mistakes. Each time she writes the letter incorrectly, she throws her head in the air and grumbles. The fourth time she does this, she whacks her head on her pencil tip and cries. I'm sympathetic, but not overly so since I have been cautioning her against such drama since she began it. After twenty minutes of work, though, her letters look really good and we venture on to connecting her second word written in cursive (the first was yesterday): sit. She is extraordinarily pleased, and I am too. She takes her sheet and magnets it to the fridge.

After cursive, all that's left is her reading. Her reading curriculum is too easy for her, so she reads the assigned fifteen pages with ease. I'm left re-evaluating if I shouldn't move her up in the curriculum, but decide to not worry about it for now.

As Abby's answering some comprehension questions, I realize it's nearly five and Dan's jet should have landed by now. I put away the book, and challenge the kids to complete their chores before Daddy gets home.

We all start the mad rush to complete our jobs. As I start in to the kitchen, I see Ellie falling asleep on the couch. Now is NOT the time for a nap, so I pull her up and plop her on the kitchen floor. She cries, but when I put on some music, she cheers up and begins to dance. I begin to unload the dishwasher and sing along.

The kids finish their chores within 25 minutes, which is actually pretty good for them. They ask to finish up a show they began earlier this week, and because I have nothing left for them to do, I consent. At this point, Hyrum is okay being on the floor for a bit, so I put him down and grab the camera to snap a picture.

Then, I retreat into the kitchen to make dinner. As I do so, I call Desi to tell her a funny story. We chat for a bit while I make french toast and eggs for my crew. I always enjoy chatting with Desi and it seems that whatever chore I'm doing while we talk just flies by.

Dan shows up just as I'm finishing up dinner. I say goodbye to Des, he helps me set the table and we all sit down. Everyone must have been starving because we ran out of french toast and eggs.

Because it has been freezing today, I had told Abby we could go play at McDonald's after Daddy came home. In order to make good on that promise, we tell the kids to get ready to go.

I sweep the kitchen floor AGAIN, wipe down the table and load the dishwasher while Dan goes and changes out of his work clothes and changes Hyrum as well. (What can I say? Hyrum's a messy eater.)

We visit a different McDonald's than we typically do. The kids love running around and Abby and Emmett both find friends to play with. We get dessert and the kids all love the cookies (3 for a buck!). Even Hyrum enjoyed the cookie...which makes him a mess again. Dan and I play Scrabble on the iPad while the kids run around the playplace.

Hyrum falls asleep on the way home, so we pull his carseat in and let him sleep in our room. The kids get in jammies and Emmett keeps on asking to watch the DVD he picked at the library. It is past their bedtime (8:30), so we tell him no. He keeps asking and asking. Finally I tell him that if he mentions it again he will lose the DVD - he can watch it in the morning.

It's very obvious that Ellie is tired, so we do our bedtime routine (scripture, song, prayer, water, vitamins, brush teeth) and put them to bed. I lay with Ellie while she relaxes. She still needs Mom a lot at night...and that's okay because she'll only be this small once.

After all the kids are asleep, Dan and I sit and chat about a youTube video called the Lunch Scholars. We are both dumbfounded. This discussion morphs into discussion on thinking processes and comparisons of each other to Booth and Bones. We're big nerds, I know.

We put in a Redbox movie I picked up, but Hyrum wakes up 15 minutes into it. Dan and I both agree it was boring anyway and turn it off. We get ready to watch an Alcatraz (we're not sure if we're going to like the series or not), but Ellie wakes up. I finish feeding Hyrum and then go pat Ellie back to sleep. She's obviously overtired tonight.

Then, we decide it's late to watch TV anyway, so I sit down and start to write this blog post, with my foot on the bouncer keeping it bouncing while Hyrum's sleeping.

I know I probably missed pieces of things here and there, but this is a fairly typical day at our house. No wonder I am exhausted all the time! And this is why I am 100% certain that God designed families to have two parents for a reason. Yippee for the upcoming weekend!

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Week 22

PreK:

Emmett is definitely in a slump where he doesn't want to do anything except ride his bike and be loud. That's a four-year-old boy for you! Academics at this age are not formal or mandatory at our house, so he's just taking a break, I guess...


Math:

We worked through week 24 of MEP 1B this week. Abby was fine until Friday. After she had been working on addition facts through thirteen for a week, she flipped out on the last day. And it wasn't because the problems were too hard. I knew it was coming too. We started the sheet and she was fine on the first set. While she was working that first set, though, she saw the third set of problems which had questions like 5=13-9+?. She knows how to work these problems on the number line, knows how to use her rods to find the answer as well. I had told her she could use them. Instead she refused to focus on the problems and tried to write whatever she wanted. When confronted, she complained that she didn't know the answer and then just zoned out. After she cried and I got annoyed with her for not focusing (!), she got to work and completed those problems with 100% accuracy.

Since I've been planning next year, I have been thinking about the differences between MEP and Singapore Math. I want her to complete MEP because I like the reasoning and the math puzzles, if you will. I did go ahead and order Singapore 1B (which I was avoiding doing because MEP is free) to see how she'd do with that.

This is one of those math puzzles that MEP has that I love! She was supposed to move one stick to make the fact true. The original fact was XI+I=X. After a few minutes of thinking, she immediately said, "There are two ways to do it." And then she showed me both.

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We did play a math game, Race to 100. All of the kids really liked this one. It was good for Emmett to actually pay attention and practice his one-to-one correspondence and it was good for Abby to practice her adding. After the first few rolls, she had no problems adding in her rolls. Adding past a ten is becoming fairly simple for her...as long as she believes she can do it...

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Language Arts:

I was thinking I should probably group all of the like things together....

Spelling:

We are still reviewing words from AAS level one. I did order level two, so we'll fold that in when we get to it.

Reading:

Abby read Mouse Tales this week. She apparently has read it a few times before and loves the book.

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Mr. Popper's Penguins is going well. This next week we should have a penguin-filled week as we are scheduled to finish the book as well as study Antarctica in our little continent study! I think we'll be watching the movie next Sunday.

Perhaps the most exciting that happened reading-wise, is that Mommy got a Kindle! It was considered a school purchase since a lot of our curricula is PDF or e-book form. Ellie likes to take it and pretend she's reading on it. I learned my lesson the first time she bought a book (*doh*) and turn off the wi-fi when she gets it.

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Abby also loves the Kindle and I let her take it to her bed each night to read a chapter in Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Stolen Diamonds. I've written that she is resistant to reading most chapter books. I believe part of it is that she does like the pictures in picture books. Just like with her math, though, she is easily overwhelmed. And since things have usually come easily to her, she tends to be a perfectionist and doesn't want to do things that might be hard. Anyway...with the Kindle she can't see if the book is thick or whatnot. She can't be concerned that she won't finish the entire book. I can turn the words to be bigger, so it's she is quickly gratified that she completed a "page." In this way, she's been reading a chapter a night of Cam Jansen with ease. And now, it is very obvious that, since Cam Jansen is a late third grade reader, that she might have started Sonlight's grade 3 readers just fine. At least she enjoys the grade 2 ones... :)

Penmanship:

This is the new one this week! Abby has been experimenting with different ways to write letters, adding loops to her letters, etc. She has very typical kindergartener handwriting and we have worked much through any formal penmanship this year. She has been begging to learn "curtlain" so this week we added in a cursive program: Peterson Directed Handwriting. This week we worked on our "sharp tops" and, even though it was hard and she struggled with it, she loved it. Learning cursive definitely has the appeal to her to keep pushing through even though it might be difficult. She kept telling herself as she worked, "Just because you make a mistake doesn't mean you're dumb; it just means you're learning."


Science:

Whoops! I guess we probably won't get to the final week of our magnet stuff where we were supposed to magnetize a needle and make a compass. Oh well! We have been definitely been more aware of magnetic properties and notice them around the house more. Success!


Geography:

This week we learned about South America. Ellie loves Diego currently and having heard or watched her sister's television shows, she could tell me a whole lot about different South American animals. It found me wishing they could make a Diego equivalent for other continents.

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She was amazed to learn about the Amazon and squealed with delight, "Diana is from there!" My little Wonder Woman fanatic. :)