Monday, August 29, 2011

Great day of school today! I am still experimenting on how things ought to be run, but each thing seems to be working better and better.

I pulled out all of E's sheets for grammar, math, handwriting and phonics and put them in her binder. She knows to get one sheet out per day and that is her independent work. She watched Mr. Steve for her lesson on multiplying 1 and 0 today. Did really well and actually said she liked math today!!! That is definite progress from last year. :)

Also did:

• Bible - verse is Psalm 139:14
• Spelling - did her list on spellingcity.com

Following all done on time4learning:

• Science - passed her test on life cycles
• Social Studies - passed her test on the globe vs. maps (country and city)
• LA - fluency reading
• Grammar - also worked on making sentences out of index cards (nouns, verbs and adjectives)

P's day:

• Verse - Proverbs 12:22
• Handwriting - continued working on correct forms of letters
• Bible - God created people. She had to draw a picture of herself showing "God did not make anyone else like me"
• Math - we went back to the very basics so she wasn't so aggravated. We worked on adding 0 and adding 1 along with "playing" with the manipulative blocks to recognize color with amount
• Spelling - did page 86 with her spelling words still from last week
• Poetry - we reviewed "The Caterpillar" and she is almost ready to recite and let me video
• Phonics - we worked on blends and coding words with short vowels and circling our blends

G - still trucking along and writing her letters and numbers. She did the number 8 today and was able to cut out 9 rectangles, color them the correct color, and then paste to the correct corresponding color word.

We got a lot done today and I am proud of our Monday!!!

August 26, 2011

Homewood Park - "Learn about Alabama"

Today was a field trip followed by a back to school party for Essential (our cover school) and Highlands Homeschoolers (a support group that organizes a lot of our field trips). We all met at Homewood Park to have our "Learn about Alabama" kickoff study.

Ms. Kristy went over a lot of facts about the state that we have been discussing along with going over some we haven't. The girls got to look at pictures of everything she covered. She also had some things they could touch and feel to see them also.

The girls were able to state the facts they have been learning and have a lot of fun doing so. They played bingo (with cheerios) as Ms. Kristy called out facts about our state. I had to help P with the reading some but she did a great job!

They also colored pictures of state symbols, did mazes, some riddles about our reptiles and so much more. It was very hot but they had a good time. Each one also sang the first verse to the Alabama State song - they were very proud to know it!!

Great first meeting for our Alabama study.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

P - Today was catch up on reading. Also did reading eggs complete first lessonl. She really enjoyed it!

E did time4learning.

Science lesson and test. Did her test on life cycles - only missed 1!!!

Social studies - Essential needs of humans

Math - working with money

LA - fluency in reading

G - reading eggs. Completed her 2nd lesson and really likes it too!

Here's video of E:

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Busy, busy day at the Reed school today. Took a while but got a lot accomplished.

Today for P:

• Working on sight words: heart, any, only, was, climb
• Bible: Review verse from earlier this week
• New spelling list
• Math: 9 facts and making 10
• Phonics: the A sound (ai, ay, a-e, eigh)
• Language Arts: Proper noun definition
• Handwriting verse

Today for E:

• Cursive - q and g and review previous
• Bible - review verse
• Math - 2 sheets multiplication with rectangle area
• Grammar / LA - linking verbs (see video), also "telling" sentences
• Handwriting - verse

Monday, August 22, 2011

We are getting back into things since we didn't do school Thursday and Friday. We are having to make some changes over the next few weeks due to Emi's gym training schedule changing up some.

Today for P:

• Bible: God made animals (she drew her favorite animals. she chose a giraffe and a monkey)
• Verse for this week is Proverbs 16:9 - "In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps"
• Language Art lesson : The Rabbit and the Turtle. Worked on comprehension of the story and being able to answer the questions I asked. Reviewed her poem, The Caterpillar.
• Math: still working on adding more than 10 and filling in the unknown.
• Spelling: writing her new spelling words out and doing 1 activity with them
• Handwriting: Wrote her verse with only 1 correction.

Today for G:

• worked on sight words for her colors and worked on the number 6 and 7

Today for E:

• Bible: God made animals.
• Verse for the week: Matthew 5:25
• Language art lesson: Reviewing nouns and verbs. Learned about "state of being verbs"
• Math: Started multiplication around rectangles
• Spelling: started new list. Had to make 2 corrections
• Handwriting: learned 0 and c in cursive and wrote words containing those letters
• Science and social studies: online with time4learning
• Recited her poem "The Goops" (will post video)

Wednesday, August 17

Schedule of today's school:

Together time:

• Prayer
• Pledge of Allegiance
• Handwriting practice
• Bible: We are still working on Genesis 1. Today we are looking at "God created plants, flowers, trees and animals." The girls had to draw their favorite plants and flowers.

• Alabama state facts: During the time of learning the facts about Alabama, we are listening to this on the computer to help us learn our state song. The Alabama State Song (first verse).

Then we do separate work. I work with P on spelling and phonics while E does hers independently. Then I work with P on math while E works on hers independently also.

E does online for science, social studies and supplemental language arts. P does online for spelling enrichment.

We were planning on starting some Spanish today but math has taken us a little while longer so I think we will wait on that one!!

Funny for today. While working on 1st Language Lessons, we were working on Proper nouns with Payton compared to common nouns. One of the goals of this curriculum is to help your child learn to speak correctly and answer in full sentences. I asked Payton to tell me what her name was and the response should have been was "My name is Payton." Instead she answered, "Me llamo Payton." I laughed so hard that she answered in Spanish. Guess we started that a little today anyway!!!

Tuesday, August 16

School today took a little longer than usually. Each girl completed all of their assignments but we added in science and social studies for E. I am trying out a new online program called Time4Learning. It has lesson plans and some supplemental work for math and language arts along with a core curriculum for science and social studies. E seemed to like it today because she could do it independently and it was on the computer!!

P has decided that handwriting is her favorite thing. I am having to intersperse it with her core subjects to keep her motivated. She learned how to add her 9 facts today by taking one from the units and making 10. She felt smart once she grasped the concept. We are going to do a few more days of this before moving on. She also learned her new spelling list for this week and only missed 3 words. Very proud! I set up a list for her on spellingcity.com so she enjoyed working on the computer also.

G is enjoying writing and also playing on Starfall .

I have changed some stuff up for tomorrow to see how the schedule flows. We will see....