Our Week in Review 8/1 - 8/6

Getting school done this week was like pulling teeth.  We managed to get most of it done, but I'm really thinking that I'm going to have to go to a more hard-nosed schedule.  Or at least ban legos until school is done for the day ("Just a minute, I'm almost done!  I just need to add one more piece . . . almost done . . . No! Just a minute!!").  The other thing that gets old is the, "Okay, Mom!" (they've been switching from "Mommy" to "Mom" over the last week or so.  Sniff.) when I let them know that we're starting or getting back to work after a break--which is then followed by grumbling, griping, and attitudes when the timer goes off!  Once we get going, things generally roll along fairly smoothly, but getting started can be rocky.  At the very least, a more consistent start time would probably help (and here I see the "FINGER OF BLAME" pointing squarely at me!).  Need to work on that.  Anyway, on with our week!

Connor:

Math: He finished lessons 22 through the first part of 25 in RS Math level C, continuing review, practicing skip counting (3's and 4's so far), and introducing multiplication.

Working on multiplication with the abacus.  Loads of enthusiasm, as you can see.

History: We only got one day of history done this week, partly due to the pulling teeth issues and partly due to a change in my plans.  We'll regroup next week.  We read/he narrated section 3 of chapter 26, "Rabbit Shoots the Sun," and he colored the comic strip from the AG.  Later on he made his own booklet of the story.  Which, of course, I can't find now to take a picture!

Reading: Still going through Aesop's Fables.

Grammar: He finished lessons 102 and 103 in FLL this week, reviewing verbs and working on memorizing the poem "The Goops."

Spelling: He started step 17 in AAS level 2 (words with "or").

Latin: He finished lesson 3 and began lesson 4.  I'm loving having some more independent work--after we go through the actual lesson, he can make his flashcards on his own, which takes him a good 15 minutes since he draws pictures.  He had the verbs "amo" (I love) and "adoro" (I adore) for lesson 4, and for his cards he drew the states Nevada and Mississippi since they're the states that fall in love in the book Scrambled States of America.  Loved it!

Writing Latin vocab words for practice

Writing: He did week 20, days 2, 3, and 4.  And just as I'm really thinking about going ahead and moving him to book 2 in Writing with Ease, he made several errors in copywork this week.  I know he can do it; we just need to review, emphasize, and enforce doing careful and accurate work.  I'm pretty sure the errors were at least partly due to the "pulling teeth" issues too.  Nothing like an attitude on a 7 year old.

Memory Work:  We're starting to get back into the groove with memory work.  This week (mostly still the same as last week): 1 Peter 1:24-25, catechism question, Latin prayer (sanctus), plant unit memory work, history chant, and the poem, "The Goops."

Brennan:

Math: He finished lessons 54, 56, and 57 in RS Math level A, reviewing tens and ones, adding ones, traditional names for tens (twenty, thirty, etc. instead of two-ten, three-ten, etc.), and partitioning 100.  He also finished adding to a graph showing how many tiles of each color we pulled out of the box.

Fashion accessories are a must when doing math.

Especially for a goofy boy!

Phonics: We FINALLY moved on this week!  He's been working on adding suffixes (-y and -ing) to short vowel words--you have to double the consonant if there's only one after the vowel (i.e., "sit" becomes "sitting" and "bed" becomes "bedding," but since there are two ending consonants in "rest" you just add the -ing to make it "resting).  He's catching on pretty quickly.

Handwriting: This week he has been copying our Bible verse (1 Peter 1: 24-25).  I drew a smiley face on one of his papers the other day, and now he wants smiley faces more than stickers. :)

Reading (literature): We're still making our way through The Adventures of Peter Cottontail.  This week Peter is trying to figure out why all his animal friends are telling him goodbye for the winter.

Together:

Science: This week we read more about flowers and made notebook pages with pictures and a couple of things they learned about flowers.  We also took a little detail and read a bit about simple machines.  They've been clamoring to make a Rube Goldberg machine, and I thought it might help us with ideas to include.  We don't have church tomorrow night, so maybe tomorrow afternoon we'll give it a shot!

Connor's notebook page.  He dictated his narration and I wrote it: "Flowers have to be pollinated before they can produce seeds.  Flowers also can smell very sweet or they can smell like dead animals!"  He specifically dictated the exclamation point. *grin*

Brennan's notebook page.  He wanted to color a picture rather than draw--he dictated the narration and I wrote it for him: "Flowers make seeds.  The seeds fly out and land and make a new plant."

Art: We actually got an art lesson done this week!  The lesson (from How to Teach Art to Children) was a review/application of what we learned a few weeks ago about vertical, horizontal, and diagonal lines.  They divided their papers into three sections and filled (or partly filled) each with a different kind of line using paper strips.

I feel like today's post was a little whiny!  Still, better to admit to the bad days/weeks than to pretend we don't have them.  Anyway, I'm ready to regroup and hit the ground rolling on Monday.  Strictly enforcing a 9 AM start time.  And maybe no legos.

Trying something new--linking up to the Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers Weekly Report.  Check out some of the other homeschool blogs and see what they've been up to this week!