Weekly Report: Back in the Groove

For the past month we've been a little irregular as far as school goes. Call it spring fever, call it burn out, call it lazinesses. We just needed to take it a little slower. I am feeling re-energized now and excited to finish 1st and 3rd grade! We are also looking forward to summer projects, trips and learning. I am gathering curriculum for next year and can't wait to apply all the things we learned this year. (Which, by the way I will detail in a later post. I will. I will.)

Here's the break down this week:

SOTW (Ancient History): We've finished our Ancient History studies from Story of the World. That was one of our anchors. We still like to listen to our CDs and review our lessons about the Babylonians, Greeks, Phoenicians, Persians, and Romans. We are looking forward to the Middle Ages next year!

Language Arts: We've also been more relaxed with writing. I haven't assigned any big projects. The kids are mostly just writing for fun. Sam and Elise enjoy writing in their Nature Journals. ( I got the great link from Chocolate On My Crainium--Thanks Cocoa!)We HAVE been doing lots of spelling work. Sam and Elise want to take a Latin course this summer (because of our Roman studies). Fun, eh?


Geography: My kids really like geography, so we always play our geography games and look at maps. But we are done with our formal stuff for 1st and 3rd grade. Elise knows the location and name of the states and capitals for all of the states west of the Mississippi, and a few on the other side as well. Sam knows most of the countries and capitals in Asia, the Middle East, Europe, North and South America. Right now we are working on Africa and the Pacific Islands. Here are a couple of web sites to help with geography: World Maps, National Geographic Bee, Fun Brain

Science:We continue to enjoy our Nature Studies. The nature studies have taken over our science curriculum the past few months and I'm SO glad. We really like science, but this has been such an enriching experience for us. Plus we learn lots of great science by observing nature. We are trying to identify the trees around us. We found a GREAT web site that has posters you can print out that help with identification: International Papers.

It has been really incredible watching these robins hatch and grow. The mother and father are constantly feeding them. AND they are getting pretty cranky about us climbing up the ladder to look at their babies. We never touch the nest. Mostly I just hold the camera up and take some quick shots. We take try to take peeks when they are away. But if the male comes back he gets pretty aggressive with loud calls and swooping right up to my head! I guess I can't blame him. I think I'm going to back-off for a few days. Their eyes are starting to open and yesterday I heard them peep. Look at this, isn't it amazing??

Hatch day 5

Math: Oi vey! We still have about 4 weeks of math left! That's because haven't been doing it every day. Well, that's the way it goes I suppose. I think it will be better than taking a big, long break from math. We are currently in Saxon, but I'm looking at other curriculum. I might stick with it though. Sam really likes the DIVE CD, and I find it really helpful too. Especially as he advances. He has been working hard on multiplying two double digit numbers.

Reading: This is going really well. We posted a reading list this week. Sam,Elise, Claire and Anna are participating in our local library's summer reading program. Also, Sam and Elise are participating in Barnes & Noble's summer reading program.

Music: Sam and Elise are both doing well with the piano. Sam is almost done with level 1. We are looking forward to seeing Little Woman, the musical at the Hale Center Theater next week!

Art: Most of the art we've been doing has been in our nature journals. We were SO inspired by Arches National Park. Did you know that Dr. Suess was too? My mom mentioned that to me. I can definitely see its influence in some of his work.



Garden: Okay, I know you are all dying to know what happened with the gopher, right? Did I go all Rambo on him? Is my garden all gone?No. To both the questions. Here's what happened. After loosing both cilantro plants and 3 pea plants, I sprinkled black pepper around the remaining plants and borders of our garden. Then I mixed quite a bit of hot pepper sauce and some olive oil and poured it down the gopher's holes. We left to go camping and hoped for the best. When we came back, there were no missing plants and no more holes. So...problem solved.

It could have been the pepper, but we also have seen a hawk flying around the last few days. Either way, I'm very happy (and hopefully not jinxing myself)

Scripture Study: Through 1 Nephi 12
Our tree lesson this week corresponded to our scripture reading, a little. We read Lehi's dream and Nephi's response. First of all, I am always struck by the beauty of this dream. The rod, the mist of darkness, the great a spacious building, the brilliant tree of life. I try to picture Lehi. He is described as a "visionary man." I can imagine Lamuel and Laman rolling their eyes as Lehi announces he has had another vision. And Nephi, he listens with keen interest. He asks the Lord if he can know the things his father knows. As he sits, pondering in his heart, he is caught away in the Spirit of the Lord into an exceedingly high mountain. There is shown marvelous, miraculous things. We thought it was interesting that to help show Nephi that the Great and spacious building represented the pride of the world, the angel shows Nephi the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And that to show the true representation of the tree of life, or fountain of living waters, which represents the love of God, the angel shows Nephi the mother, Mary, holding her infant son.