Weekly Wrap-Up

We are really cruising through our curriculum. The kids are enjoying the lessons. 

The day seems to go smoothly when we tackle Math first thing. My 8yo is learning place value in hundreds. He really seems to have the concept nailed down. 

My 6 yo spent the week transitioning from adding objects, to the much more abstract concept of adding numbers. I was kind of worried that he might not get it but he surprised me by getting every problem correct on the first try. What can I say, they do NOT get their math abilities from me, THANKFULLY!

Then we go on to reading. This way we are getting our 2 least favorite subjects out of the way early. My 6yo  is still in the habit of sounding out each individual letter. So this week we worked on word families. Mainly the "-un" family; bun, fun, run, sun, etc. We have also been watching the Electric Company on Netflix. Each episode introduces a rule for reading. Last week we learned that "silent e is a ninja." It sneaks up at the end of the word, changing its sound. So plan becomes Plane... You get the idea. This week our rule was about "bossy r." It changes the sound of the vowel it follows. I admit, I am learning from this show!!! I know how to read but I never knew why letters sound different sometimes. 

My 8yo is still reading Kipling's Just So Stories. He thinks they are pretty funny. 

I am really excited because in history we have been reading about the Pilgrims. Our biography that I chose for story time is Squanto. The 2 stories are matching up perfectly. We get to hear both sides of the same story. 

We had a fun geography lesson too. The kids ran through the house sticking post-it notes that said "north, south, east, or west" on the appropriate walls. 

This week, both boys mastered all of their spelling words. They got every one correct. I think my 8yo could really handle more difficult words but I have not done spelling with him since Kindergarten so I think it won't hurt to start small. Also, he is a bit impetuous, sometimes hastily writing a word misspelled. He is learning to take his time to get it correct. 

Copywork is going well. My 6yo's handwriting is improving daily. My 8yo on the other hand... impetuous and hasty... He tends to try and rush through it. He reads a sentence and tries to write it again without looking back at the original. The result is a bit sloppy. I think I will try to cut down the amount that he is copying daily and just try to get some real, quality writing out of him. 

I think my favorite part of this curriculum is the science. I never liked teaching science. It was always so boring just reading about nature or overwhelming trying to put together a project. The science projects and readings in our curriculum are quick, easy, and FUN! The best part is that it takes almost no time to set it up. We had a lot of fun this week, counting how many drops of water will stand on a coin before the tension bursts and it over flows. We even stretched out the project by testing it out on different coins. In case you want to know,  it is 22 drops for a nickle, 18 for a dime, and 36 for a quarter.  

We got VERY lucky on our afternoon walk yesterday when a striped crayfish snake laid in our path. We studied it for a good, long while. When we got home, we looked him up online and added him to our nature notebooks. 

It was a great week here. How was your school week? Post a link in my replies if you would like to share.