This is our second week of school coming off of Christmas break, mainly 'cause Tutoring Center started back up last week. The kids seemed to be suffering from Christmas hangover until just recently, everything disorganized, not enough sleep and too much sugar in their systems to think straight. Or maybe that was me.
This week was better, though Christmas company (i.e. older siblings and friends, you know who you are!) still lingered. They were trucked to the airport last week and this (until spring! We'll miss you!) and we are back to our regularly scheduled programming.
That being said, we added in some stuff so "regular" is relative. We are excited to be taking 3 classes on-line through Landry Academy. Feeche will be taking Copy writing, Pre-Law & Mock Trial and Cub is signed up for intro to Biblical Greek. Class 1 of the semester began on Monday and so far we are impressed. Impressed with the system of delivery (Haiku) as well as the teacher, reading and schedule. The boys are ready to have a blast.
Along with that play practice for our yearly Festival of One Act Plays competition has begun and Feeche can be found in the far reaches of the house memorizing lines. The Festival is the last Saturday in January - good, clean fun!
Our weekly homeschool Tutoring Center is going, in addition to Lego League so one full day a week we are out of pocket. The theme this year for LL is "Food" and our team is working on a project with Raw Milk. This has involved a couple of field trips, including one last night to a Raw Milk Poducers dairy. We stood in the barn at milking time in 5 degree weather wowed by Bessie, Frank and Flower, et al (the cows). We purchase our milk from them, and it was actually pretty cool to see how and where it's all done. It was certainly a kinder, gentler operation than some of the huge thousand head dairies we saw in NM. True story- these farmers treated their cow's pneumonia with garlic tincture- homeopathic cow cures-LOL!
During LL I am teaching my bevy of 3rd grade girlies writing using IEW's Fairy Tales, Myths and Fables, then go to TC to teach Creative Writing and just added Jr. High Writing With Skill. WWS is set up just the way Writing With Ease was. It works systematically and sequentially through writing skills, beginning with narration and ending the year with a research paper. Simple and effective.
We've moved from Poetry to short story/novelette writing in Creative Writing. It's interesting to break down the writing process into small bites. I am learning a lot as we go this year. At some point soon, I'd love to work in actual writing time of my own (insert rueful laugh). I just need to get back into a routine that works again, where I get enough sleep and still keep the kitchen clean.
Cub is taking Latin (First Form), World History, Pre-Chem at TC and Feeche is sitting in on Latin. Along with that we are throwing in math, spelling practice every now and then, Shakespeare and Chem DVD's and MoH.
We finished Out of the Silent Planet (the first in the Space Trilogy by C.S. Lewis). The kids incessantly interrupted but there was lots to figure out with the analogies, sci-fi and language. We went back to the wild on this planet and are half way through My Side of the Mountain. My Mom fed Miss R's love of Craighead George's writing by purchasing almost all 40 of her books and it's fun to introduce my other nature loving kids to her excellent word-smithery.
We finished sanding, staining and polying the door frames for the second floor last week. Over the week-end Viking Man glued and shimmed them in. They still need leveled and nailed but they already define and refine the doorways upstairs. Looks like the girls, dh and I will be staying on the 2nd floor for now. The boys are fine in the basement and everyone appreciates the extra space and privacy.
Miss R and her beau were here during record breaking mild weather, which broke the day she got on the plane. Again, back to our regularly scheduled programming- cold wind, ice and snow. Mr. Fife has never been this far north so we were glad for him that his first intro to the upper Midwest was rather mild. Our daily walks might be over for a while.
Today and tomorrow are full up with play practice, Lego League practice/scrimmage, birthday parties and Bible Study. Not a bad combo, but busy.
This week was better, though Christmas company (i.e. older siblings and friends, you know who you are!) still lingered. They were trucked to the airport last week and this (until spring! We'll miss you!) and we are back to our regularly scheduled programming.
That being said, we added in some stuff so "regular" is relative. We are excited to be taking 3 classes on-line through Landry Academy. Feeche will be taking Copy writing, Pre-Law & Mock Trial and Cub is signed up for intro to Biblical Greek. Class 1 of the semester began on Monday and so far we are impressed. Impressed with the system of delivery (Haiku) as well as the teacher, reading and schedule. The boys are ready to have a blast.
Along with that play practice for our yearly Festival of One Act Plays competition has begun and Feeche can be found in the far reaches of the house memorizing lines. The Festival is the last Saturday in January - good, clean fun!
Our weekly homeschool Tutoring Center is going, in addition to Lego League so one full day a week we are out of pocket. The theme this year for LL is "Food" and our team is working on a project with Raw Milk. This has involved a couple of field trips, including one last night to a Raw Milk Poducers dairy. We stood in the barn at milking time in 5 degree weather wowed by Bessie, Frank and Flower, et al (the cows). We purchase our milk from them, and it was actually pretty cool to see how and where it's all done. It was certainly a kinder, gentler operation than some of the huge thousand head dairies we saw in NM. True story- these farmers treated their cow's pneumonia with garlic tincture- homeopathic cow cures-LOL!
We've moved from Poetry to short story/novelette writing in Creative Writing. It's interesting to break down the writing process into small bites. I am learning a lot as we go this year. At some point soon, I'd love to work in actual writing time of my own (insert rueful laugh). I just need to get back into a routine that works again, where I get enough sleep and still keep the kitchen clean.
Cub is taking Latin (First Form), World History, Pre-Chem at TC and Feeche is sitting in on Latin. Along with that we are throwing in math, spelling practice every now and then, Shakespeare and Chem DVD's and MoH.
We finished sanding, staining and polying the door frames for the second floor last week. Over the week-end Viking Man glued and shimmed them in. They still need leveled and nailed but they already define and refine the doorways upstairs. Looks like the girls, dh and I will be staying on the 2nd floor for now. The boys are fine in the basement and everyone appreciates the extra space and privacy.
Miss R and her beau were here during record breaking mild weather, which broke the day she got on the plane. Again, back to our regularly scheduled programming- cold wind, ice and snow. Mr. Fife has never been this far north so we were glad for him that his first intro to the upper Midwest was rather mild. Our daily walks might be over for a while.
Today and tomorrow are full up with play practice, Lego League practice/scrimmage, birthday parties and Bible Study. Not a bad combo, but busy.
7 comments:
Wow, what a busy week! My daughter would be insanely jealous of your field trip to the milking barn. I appreciate you description of WWS, it helped confirm my decision to hold off on this for my 4th and 5th graders.
It's always a good feeling to get back into the normal routine. I've been eyeing some of the Landry Academy classes, so I look forward to reading how they work out for you.
You guys accomplished a lot!
Really enjoy reading your blog Lisa :) The IEW Fairy Tales has just landed at our house - I have no idea how to incorporate it at this point but it just looked so sweet!! You'll have to give us more details.
What a week! Keep us posted with the online classes hopefully they are a blast. I teach IEW class at our co-op. I hate it, but love the results is produces.
A great-looking, and busy, week! We get our milk from a family friend, who has a little farm, and my kids love visiting. I keep eyeballing IEW Fairy Tales for dd when she's ready.
Wow - such a variety of clubs, classes, skills, and activities! We are on week 6 of WWS, and I like it so far. I also bought the Creative Writer, but have not found a way to sneak it into the schedule! Not sure why I bought it since I have not been able to fit Andreola's Story Starters in either. I'd like to hear how Greek is going - all I ever learned was the alphabet when I was in a sorority! I cannot decide if I should make the commitment to learn along with dd and dh. I hope you get some writing time; I'm sure you learn quite a bit from teaching.
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