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!

Day 35: Foundations

 

 It feels like we are always behind.  I guess I need to cut back on our to do list...Instead I keep adding to it.  I have added another thing to the list but it is so important and worthwhile.  We used the Classical Conversation curriculum last year and loved it.  Foundations is amazing and I miss it, but Jake aged out and their next level, Challenge, wasn't enough reading for us (not to mention it is expensive).  I decided to add  Foundations back in to our curriculum.

 We just started cycle 3 (C.C. co-ops are doing cycle 2 this year) which covers U.S. History.  We will take the next 24 weeks to refresh our memory of a 164 point timeline we memorized last year.  We will also memorize a sentence (fact or the answer to a question) every week in these subjects: Timeline, history, geography (US), English, Latin, math, and science.  This is on top of what we are already learning.  It only takes a few minutes a day to work on the memorization and it is an amazing amount of information.

    The math is obviously review.  Week 1 is reviewing "skip counting for 1's & 2's".  Younger children (k-2ish) just memorize the numbers.  Older children recognize this is multiplication.  We skipped the 1's but did a quick review of the 2's.  Jake knows them but it is just a review that takes 45 seconds to run through.  I ask him what 2 x's 12 is and he gives me the answer as quickly as he can.  Review is a good thing. We will go all the way through 15's for multiplication and then move into things like: linear equivalents, area of a square, and the associative law of addition.   

 Geography will cover learning the states and their capitals, mountains ranges, bays, rivers, trails, etc.! 

We love the Timeline song and flash cards that we used last year.  We are going to be more diligent about reading all the information given on the back of all the cards each week.  We will read one or two each day and discuss it.

And we are going to hang the cards up under our chalkboard each week.  It will help remember it and cover up the wall that I need to paint but don't have the budget for right now.  We hung this weeks up with poster goo so we can take them down and read.  By the end of the 24 weeks we will have that spot and others full of cards because there are 7 cards for each week.  I found some of the science flashcards at a homeschooling consignment store a long time ago and they just happen to be for cycle 3 so we will read those and post them on another wall. We are going to be surrounded by information!  I love it.  The cycle 3 science is anatomy.  We haven't studied anatomy so it will be interesting to learn it. 

I think memorizing is so important and it fills in those pegs that, as Jake gets older, he will build upon and learn more about.  All the books we are reading are based on US history and now we will have facts memorized to make sure he is retaining the information too.

We actually went and had lunch/recess with our C.C. friends today.  We miss them all and were glad to have the chance to see them today.  I guess I should have added recess to the to do list. :)  We went to the library too. . . Okay, I guess we do accomplish a lot!

(Jake ended up reading pages 49-83 in "Traitor". Reading through page117 like I originally planned for him to do was a little to ambitious.)  

Day 34: Co-op

I was working at our county fair (signing in, setting up, and judging all the sewing/crafts/hobbies entries that came in), so Nee took Jake to co-op for me (he spent the night the night before).
At co-op they:

Lego Robotics Engineering:  Jake can't remember the, in his words, "fancy, fancy term" for ramps. . . I will try to find out more. . .

IEW: No paper assigned for this week (YIPPPEEE!), because other people were having a hard time and even having to rewrite papers from the week before because they didn't do well.  Jake got a 59 1/2 out of 60 so we aren't rewriting it.  They learned about "who which clauses" and we will just be reviewing this week.

Science Lab:   They did experiment 4.1 on levers.

That was it for school that day, unless you count playing Super Mario Galaxy as school.  I was beat from working all weekend so we had a short but sweet school day.

Day 33: A Readind Fort and Deconstruction

Sometimes it is just more fun to read in a fort. . . Sadie really wanted to get in too.

Jake read some of Indian Captive (through chap 4), and Traitor (the Benedict Arnold book)

We finished reading and discussing Amos Fortune Freeman before we headed out to see Tibetan monks as they performed the "Deconstruction Ceremony" on the Mandala Sand Paintings.  It represented our impermanence and it was amazing.  

Day 32: Brunch, Tibetan Monks, and Christmas in October

On Wednesday night Jake went to Boy Scouts (and yes I do count that as part of his education) and they learned about cooking skills.  He came home wanting to cook brunch for Nee and Papa the next day and he promised to help me clean the kitchen so how could I say no?  He wanted to show them some of his most recent Lego creations and his Temple recommend. I count it all as school!

He wrote up descriptions of everything and I edited his spelling mistakes (we really need to work on spelling.  He takes after Aaron in that area).  I count that as writing for the day and guess what?-he did it all on his own.  He didn't complain about it, like he does with IEW.  In fact I didn't even know he was doing it.  

We tried a new recipe we saw on Pinterest: doughnuts out of canned biscuits.  They tasted yummy but we had a little issue getting the temperature just right. . .You can probably see that by the little burnt bits at the bottom. 

Papa. . .

and Sadie enjoyed a nap while we were doing that.

That afternoon we headed over to see Tibetan Monks create a Mandala Sand painting.

That evening when I got home from a meeting, I was greeted by 3 boxes of books my Aunt Gloria sent to us.  It was like Christmas in October!

We didn't get to do math or science today but we will catch up on that.  We learned a lot of other great things today that made it worth missing math and science. :)