I always do this to myself...

...make rash decisions that make more work for myself...That is what this blog is: More work for me.  I am rethinking this blog.  I get confused and can't remember if I posted things on our family blog or this blog.  Let me consider if this was a mistake or not...Until then I will be writing down what we are doing in my old stand by: a composition notebook.  Back asap with a decision....

Day 61 & 62: TGIT& TGIF

Thank goodness it is Thursday!  Jake is spending the night, after craft club, at Nee and Papa G.'s house!  We are still doing school tomorrow (and Lego Cousin Club and archery...) but it will be abbreviated.

Today (Day61) this is what we are working on:

*Chapters 34-35 of History of US Book 3.
*The Great Little Madison pg. 32-64 (Madison is an interesting guy!  Reading this book is perfect timing for the movie we watched last week)
*Practice the Preamble
*Math L16
*Science Mod 6,  review 
*Spelling-review the words together
*Wordly Wise L2 sec's A & B
*Read more of Indian Captive (be done chap 13 by tomorrow)
*Craft Club @ Nee's house. 

Tomorrow (Day 61) this is what we will be doing:

*Help Nee decorate for Christmas!
*Review weeks 1 & 2 History in Cycle 3
*Correct problems that you got incorrect in the last 4 lessons.
*Lego Cousin Club @ 1:30
*Archery @ 6:30

Day 60: Hump Day

*Read chapter 31-33 in The History Of US, Book 3
*Review Week 1 & 2 History Sentences in Foundations cycle 3
* Math Lesson 15
*Practice spelling words on own
*KWO
*Read 1/2 of chapter 13 in Indian Captive
*Boy Scouts/Mutual
*Search for Mommy's missing keys for over an hour
*Worked for a couple of hours on Lego Robots for Friday's Lego Cousin Club

Day 57 & 58 & 59: The Biltmore Estates, Co-op Day & Organization Day

Day 57:
I didn't right it on the board and can't find my list of what we did on Friday...So, I will just use our day trip to The Biltmore Estates as day 57.  Lots of history and so much fun!

Day 58:
Co-op:
Lego Robotic Engineering:

 IEW:  Turned in Lesson 8 paper and working on Lesson 9-taking two reference paragraphs and writing one paragraphs from the information.

Science Lab: 7.3 and 7.4  Petrification and something about leaves...can't remember right now.
 (we left a few minutes early because Jake had a headache.  After medicine, lunch, and resting he felt better)

Jake took his spelling test for last week and pretest for this week.  We also read a couple of chapters in The History of US Book 3 and a couple of pages of The Great Little Madison, and a chapter in Indian Captive.

Then we went to the Veteran's Day parade.  We met our favorite veteran, Papa G., there and Nee and some friends.

 

Day 59:  We spent the whole day organizing Jake's room (done), changing the school rooms location,  and making a spare bedroom.  A real education!!!  We also went to the library for Lego Club, and Jake spent time working on his robots for Cousin Lego Club on Friday.

Day 56: Fall in the South...

To Do List:  (APA: American Patriots Almanac, SNB:student notebook, MW-memory work)

School outside...

Life is good!

Day 55: Why you shouldn't do school until 6:30 pm...

You shouldn't start school at 8am and work until 6:30pm because the next day you are too burnt out to want to do anything!  I had a long list for Tuesday and we did it all (except reading 1/2 of the anti federalist papers.  We only read part of it).  Besides going to book club at the library (a homeschool club-not put on by the library, just done at the library in the Teen Room.  It is just a group of hs teens that read and discuss books, more than 50 years old, on their own.  They discussed The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe this month.  Next month it will be The Wizard of OZ), lunch, and a couple of breaks we worked all day long.  We proved we could do a mountain of work in one day and we aren't going to do it again.  (Notice I didn't say never...It was long and horrible, but it may happen again...just not any time soon!)

 Today we took it easier.  We watched about 3/4's of the movie:  A More Perfect Union: America Becomes a Nation.  After (and during) we discussed it and went on to do some math review worksheets.  We did a little reading and Jake ended the day with a lesson on honesty and integrity at church and reading from The Book of Man: Readings on the Path to Manhood by William J. Bennett.  When I went in Jake's room to tell him goodnight he asked if I could bring in post it tabs so he could mark a quote he wanted to remember (he gets that from me) and the only ones I could find were pink.  I gave them to Jake and he looked at them and then back at me and said, "Really?  Pink post it's for a book about being a man?"  We both laughed and he read me the quote and marked it.  This is what he marked:

"There was once a common understanding in our society among men that there are standards of action and behavior to which men should hole themselves.  Men, the code dictates, among other things, keep their word, whether in writing or not, men do not take advantage of women, men support their children, and men watch there language, especially around women and children.  The code of man is fading." 

We are lucky that the code is honored in our family, but Jake recognizes it is fading in the world...that it has faded.  Hopefully we are raising a teacher and leader who will help bring that code back.

54: We will get it ALL done today...

...even though it is a lot...

Day 53: TGIF (and over the weekend...)

Reading history, math, and The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe audio version over the weekend (we have read it before so we did the audio version) to get ready for Literature Club on Tuesday.

The End.  TGIF.

Day 52: Halloween

Lets call it field trip and work day.

Free scary face pancake at IHOP.

 Some green vampire teeth.

 Finding Jake's costume, in the form of a sweatshirt, at Walmart.

 Jake helped me set up all the table and chairs at the church. 

"Field Trip", Service work and reading and a party=school.

Day 51: Two out of 3 isn't bad!

We covered 2 of the 3 "R's" today.

We read 5 chapters in the History of US-Book 3 today and discussed it.  We are getting into the interesting part of US history: Founding Fathers.  I love it!  I never knew that Thomas Jefferson ended up at the 2nd Continental Congress because his cousin, Peyton Randolph, was called back to the House of Burgesses in Virginia and Jefferson replaced him.  I always thought Ethan Allen was from Vermont but he was actually born in Connecticut.  We learned a lot today!

Jake finished lesson 13 in math today and read Star Wars on his Ipod Touch.  Tomorrow we will add in some writing and cover all three! 

Day 50: School in bed...

I am not feeling great, but school must go on!  Jake read Traitor..., the book about Benedict Arnold and will finish it this week. Jake should have been done with it last week, but he hates it.  He is not a fan of old Benedict Arnold.  Who is?  It is a good lesson that there are parts of history that we won't like but we need to learn about.  I don't like communism but we will eventually read Marx's The Communist Manifesto.  We read not just for enjoyment but to learn.  If we don't learn from our mistakes in history, we are bound to repeat them!

The whole finishing what he didn't get done, because of the surprise two night Scout trip (except his IEW paper-he did finish that), didn't happen over the weekend, so Jake was bummed when he realized he was on problem 20 of lesson 12...not 13.  So, we changed things up.  I had him finish lesson 12 and then do an Algebra worksheet.  Still Algebra, but not having to do a lesson from the book made his day.  The worksheet referenced Pascal's triangle so I got out our History of Math book and we started a

unit study on Pascal.  We read about his childhood (he was homeschooled :) ), and about his contributions in not just math.  Then we did a couple of the worksheets that went with it.  It was all about patterns and I am proud to say I saw them all before Jake did.  :)  And I thought I wasn't a mathematician!  We still have a few more games/worksheets to do and will finish the unit study up this week.

 It is amazing how stepping away from the book and just changing it up made it fun and not stressful at all (Jake was stressed!)  We spent a couple of hours (at least) on math and it wasn't because Jake was staring off into space-it was because we were having fun! 

Another amazing plus to homeschooling.  Throwing out the plan and still accomplishing so much!!!

Day 49: Co-op

Lego Robotic Engineering:

IEW: Read aloud the Pourquoi stories and reviewed KWO.  No new paper due next week (yipppeee!), which is perfect because Jake has one to make up when we missed co-op 2 weeks in a row.

General Science Lab: Lab 6.3 (Physical weathering-the power of plants) and Lab 6.4 (Chemical weathering)

I didn't even tell them to pose, it was just that cool.

We got to take home the experiment for 6.3 to see what happens.  We will take pictures tomorrow to show how it is coming along.

Days 45-48: Book work, Wing Running, and A 2 Night Scout Camp Out

Here's the "To Do" list.  It started out being Wednesday's list but I added a few more things and it became Wed & Thurs list. 

A closer up so it is easier to read. 

Jake got the chance to go with Papa G. on Wednesday afternoon and be a wing runner.  That means Jake held the wing of the glider plane up and ran next to it until it had enough speed to keep itself steady.  We had only gotten in a couple of hours of work in before going to the airport so we carried over what was left and added on Thurs work.  Jake loves reading on his Ipod touch.

Wednesday night at Scouts we found out there was a 2 night camp out planned for the next day (Public schoolers have today off).  So we did some of the list for Thursday and then packed and got already.  We didn't finish the list so we will be doing some school on Saturday (yuck) when he gets home. 

So, Jake is off hiking and doing the cooking for all the guys to sign off on a merit badge.  That is school people! 

Day 45: Just another day...

Monday is a sick day.  Jake woke up not feeling great.  Stuffy nose, sore throat (from post nasal drip), cold...Turns out it was allergies and we should have gone to co-op but the decision was already made to stay home by the time he felt better...

So, day 45 was Tuesday and it was just a regular day.  We tried to go to the library and do some school but everything takes longer when you are surrounded by books (Avatar comic books to be exact) are calling to you...

Day 44: TGIF

Days 39 (the other half)-43...Busy, busy, busy!

Other half of Day 39, Saturday:   Two halves make a whole and we are good to go.  We went to the Fair on Saturday where we learned:

Alpaca's don't spit and they are adorable.

 That Antelopes from India are precious.

 That Daddy is getting old (your inner ear fluid thins or something like that) and this ride made him feel like he might puke. 

That chicken on a stick is yummy.

 And that winning ribbons is kind of awesome!  Jake won 2nd place for Lego's.

And 1st and 2nd place in two different sewing categories.  (Apron for Nee and Star Wars PJ pants for Daddy)

After going to the Fair, Aaron and Jake went on a hike with our youth group followed by a bonfire and devotional.  It was over 6 miles and they had to have a small stone in their shoe.  The lesson was that even small sins can wear you down.

Day 40, Monday:   Temple Trip & The Zoo.  Two field trips in one.

 See totally educational.

 Day 41, Tuesday: Reading day.
         *Indian Princess: pages 86-144
         *Star Wars, Heir to the Empire: pages 1-53
         *Read some in Nick of Time, but not sure of the pages.
         *Problem solving? . .  Aaron gave Jake an Ipod Touch (it is an old one that a friend gave him) so he did some reading on that and played some games.  We'll call the games problem solving. :)
       
Day 42, Wednesday: Field Trip to the Library.  We had a behind the scene tour of the library.  Very cool and I officially want to be a librarian. 

 After the tour the librarians had a "Survive a Zombie Apocalypse" game for the homeschooling teens (7th-12th graders) and a lesson on prepping.

After that we spent the afternoon shopping for Jake's fall/winter clothes.  The only thing that fits from last year is a pair of jeans.  We hit the clearance racks and did great.

Day 43, Thursday: Mental health day.  We are hanging out.  It has been a busy week but not completely school wise.  We aren't counting this as a school day because it hasn't been.  Tomorrow will be tests and lots of work to get back on track for the week.  The truth is that lessons aren't always learned by sitting and writing or reading or whatever.  We have learned a ton this week and I feel like we have haven't spent much time in the school room.  Those are the perks of homeschooling: life lessons!

Day 39: Report Card & 1/2 Day

We are on a mission to find some shoes so school will be 1/2 day today.  Science, Foundations, Spelling, (okay the short list isn't so short so I took off math. . .) and he is watching school house rocks right now to work on his memorization of the Preamble to the Constitution (a document we believe and support wholeheartedly-even if our current President and his administration don't. . .)

Also it is report card day!  Here is Jake's report card (we grade on a 10  point scale) for the 1st 6 weeks of school:

 Math: A (92)

Science: A (97)

Language Arts: A (94)
  These 4 parts are averaged together for his Language Arts grade:
    -Spelling:  B (86)
    -Literature:  A (90)
    -IEW (writing): A (100)
    -Vocabulary & Analogy:  A(100)

Lego Robotics Engineering: A (no tests, just hands on and worksheets)

History:  A (93)

Day 38: Shoes and a sick girlie

We had to make a trip to look for sneakers.  Jake woke up on Wed. and his feet had grown so much his toes were trying to bust out the front of his shoes.  Three stores and we had to give up because a friend of mine needed me to pick up her daughter, who is sick, and you can only drag a sick kiddo to so many stores.  When we got home she took a 2 1/2 hour nap while Jake tried to get some more school work done.  He may not have finished Indian Captive. . . If he didn't he will finish it tomorrow!

Day 37: School House Rocks

The To Do list:

Jake is going to memorize the Preamble to the Constitution so we decided a little School House Rocks would help. . . But when you go to youtube you can never watch just one School House Rocks! :) 

Songs are an amazing way to learn and memorize.

Just another day of home schooling!