I had to squeeze all my instructional time into the morning hours today. N had an ear infection and I had a hair appointment (which took five hours because, yes, my hair needed that much work). I had S and H finished up before breakfast. Then I quickly did individual and group instruction time, and handed out lists of independent work for N and C to complete. N packed up her work and came with me to my hair appointment since we had to stop at the Minute Clinic first for her ear infection. C finished her work at home.
N (age 11):
Math: N warmed up with a multiplication worksheet and some mental math. Her lesson was a review of finding the factors of a number and finding the greatest common factor of two or more numbers. She learned some tricks for finding single-digit factors of large numbers without dividing. She reluctantly did her lesson review on the floor of the hair salon.
Spelling: N practiced her words with the prefixes mis-, en-, and im-.
Reading: N read a chapter of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, and I read a chapter of The Witch of Blackbird Pond last night.
Bible: N and C reviewed all the memory verses they learned last year (2 Timothy 3:16-17, Exodus 20:1-17) and recited the books of the Bible. They began learning this week’s verse (Psalm 1:1). The lesson was on the rules for presenting a grain offering. We discussed the symbolism behind the grain offering.
Science: N, C, S, and H continued learning about the 88 constellations and the celestial sphere. The Perseids Meteor Shower starts tonight and it’s still cloudy out. I hope it clears up!
Geography: N and C filled out their maps of the Middle East and Southeast Asia (all the countries they know). They learned about another archipelago today: Indonesia. Fortunately, we were able to find the country on Time for Kids, which is N and C’s favorite geography site.
Social Studies: N and C started their group project on Connecticut (finding out information on Connecticut and filling in portions of a worksheet, then sharing their findings with each other).
Music: N practiced her scales (G major and C major) and practiced her lesson.
C (age 9):
Math: C warmed up with mental math and a worksheet on multiplication. Her lesson was on naming mixed numbers and on showing money amounts in two ways (using the cents sign or the dollar sign and decimal point). She completed a lesson review.
Spelling: C continued to review words with different spellings of the long /e/ sound.
Reading: C read a chapter of Little House in the Big Woods , and I read a chapter of The Witch of Blackbird Pond last night.
Bible: Combined class with N.
Science: Combined class with N, S, and H.
Geography: Combined class with N.
Social Studies: Group project with N.
Music: C practiced A, B, C, and all her chord transitions. She played while reading music.
S (age 7):
Math: S warmed up by counting to 100 by 1s, 5s, and 10s, and by counting backward from 20 to 1. Her lesson today was on acting out “some, some more stories.” She was very distracted by using the counting bears and had a hard time focusing on the task at hand, which was pretending that bears were getting in and out of a community swimming pool. She kept making her bears act out stories that had nothing to do with math, which is great for creativity but not so great for learning about addition. She usually doesn’t have a problem concentrating while using manipulatives, and I think this was an aberration.
Grammar: S continued to work on memorizing “The Caterpillar.” We reviewed the definition of a noun, and continued to work on the difference between common and proper nouns, being sure to point out the capital letter at the beginning of each proper noun.
Reading: S reviewed lower case “y” using a printout from The Measured Mom. We sang the alphabet song and S located lower case “z” on the alphabet poster. While she colored a picture of the letter “z” and zippered hoodie, I read her poems containing the /z/ sound. I recited some well-known poems to S, but made some mistakes. She pointed out the mistakes that I made (e.g., I said, “Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of lemonade,” and she said, “They fetched a pail of water”). I read S and H a chapter of Ramona the Pest.
Writing: S did copywork of lower case “z” on a custom worksheet I made at HandwritingPractice.Net.
Bible: S and H learned about the rules for presenting a grain offering. We discussed how the offering was a Messianic symbol and how yeast represented sin.
Science: Combined class with N, C, and H.
H (age 4):
Math: H warmed up by counting to 20 with me. Her lesson was on exploring pattern blocks. We’ll be using them in upcoming lessons, and this gave her a chance to play with them for a while and get over the newness of them before she has to use them for a specific task.
Reading: H reviewed the vowels and their sounds using flashcards. First, we went through each card and said the name of the letter and its short sound (e.g., “A says /a/,” etc.). Then, I laid the cards on the desk and made a short vowel sound. She had to identify the letter based on the sound I made. I read S and H a chapter of Beezus and Ramona.
Writing: H did copywork of her name and all the vowels (all upper case) on a custom worksheet I made at HandwritingPractice.Net. This is her least favorite school activity.
Bible: Combined class with S.
Science: Combined class with N, C, and S.
Homeschool Daily 