Homeschool Week 29

While most people in our circle of friends and family were out on Spring Break last week we were at home doing another week of school.  I plan for us to take off a few days at the end of this month and then again at the end of April.  So, for now, we are like busy little bees trying to squeeze in all we can.  Here is a look at our most recent week of learning.

In Bible we covered the stories of Jesus and the Lepers, and Lazarus and the Rich Man.  Cruz is continuing to memorize the Ten Commandments.  We sing several Bible songs each day and do a doctrinal drill.  I have enjoyed our Abeka Bible curriculum these past two years but am strongly considering a change to  Positive Action Bible curriculum for next year.  Does anyone have any experience with that curriculum?  If so I would love some feedback from you.

Cruz's language lessons for the week focused on the "wh" and "qu" sounds.   His grammar lessons were on question words (Is, Do, Which, Where, When, Why, How, and What) and question sentences.    We finished the week by taking a book end assessment test for reader #11. 

coping his spelling words for the next day 

Here is a look at his most recent assessment test.  On the first page I call out a word and he has to circle it.  We then go through the list again and I read a word comprehension question and he has to underline the correct word.  For example in box #1 I would read "the opposite of lost".  He would have to underline the word found.  Next he has several pages from each of his stories to answer questions about.  He has to read the sentence and then mark the correct picture. 

He also has a section on story comprehension.  He reads two short stories and then answers the questions.  He has one of these assessment tests at the end of each reader book.  This particular test had 75 questions and he only missed 2.  I was proud of him.

Ben learned the letter S.  His memory verse for the week was Isaiah 55:6 "Seek ye the Lord while He may be found."  His nursery rhyme for the week was The Itsy Bitsy Spider. We do a lot of alphabet games each week to review the letters and sounds. 

 singing the ABC song

 matching alphabet letters

matching alphabet sounds

name writing practice 

If you look closely you'll notice the red dots on each of the letters.  When I asked him why they were there he told me "my letters have the chicken pox".  I just never know what is going through his little mind. 

letter writing practice

 saying his memory verse for the week

nursery rhyme

We made a handprint spider to go along with his nursery rhyme.

he loves "fire hair"

 his itsy bitsy spider that is now hanging over our school bathroom door

I had not planned to work with Ben much on reading until kindergarten but this past week he began asking for a book to read.  I ended up grabbing one of our Bob Books readers and let him try.  He had practiced it several times before I made this video.  He was so proud of himself as you can see from his big grin at the end.

In Math Cruz is continuing to learn the subtraction facts.  This week we focused on making 9.  Ben's math lessons had him recognizing and writing numbers 0-19 and counting 0-80.

what number comes next...

I would call out a number and he would have to write it in the box.

more review of what number comes next 

Our History lessons were called Slavery in the Free Nation and Here Comes the Cotton Gin.

Our activity for the week was to make Johnnycakes.  You cannot get cornmeal here so we were not able to do it.  I was a little bummed but I know the boys will be getting all the cornbread they will want while on Stateside Assignment later this year.  I'll just postpone this activity until the fall.

We learned about two States- North Dakota and South Dakota.

We are continuing our study of plants in Science.  This week our lessons were on stems.  

Our activity had us using celery to show how water travels up the stems of a plant.

We placed a celery stalk in a cup of colored water and let it sit for several days.  Ben chose to tint his water red and Cruz chose blue.  

our experiment 

They were not thrilled about having to wait overnight to see results.  They checked on it several times that first day just to see if there might be any change. 

When we got our experiment out of the way they spent a long time just chopping the celery and examining it up close.   Who knew something so simple could be so entertaining?  They really enjoyed this.

 more chopping in the school room 

Of course they wanted to get out their magnifying glasses for a better view.  Those things have been my best homeschool purchase yet.

After 24 hours we checked on our celery.  

This is the red cup after one day.  You could already see a lot of the red on the leaves.

This was the red cup after 3 days.  The leaves looked almost orange.

 The blue cup after one day.  The blue did not show up as well as the red but you could still see spots of it on the leaves.

The boys really enjoyed this experiment.  In spite of not wanting to wait they ended up liking the idea of checking on their plant each day.  We watched it for three days and every day we were a little more amazed with the changes.

Our last experiment for the week was called "Blowing Stems".  We mixed some yellow and blue paint to make green and diluted it down with a little water.  I put a few paint drops on their papers and they had to use straws to blow stems.  Once the stems dried they drew flowers and colored them.

 

In Art we drew a baby panda cub.

Cruz's journal entries for the week-

"What I like about math... I learn things in it.  It is fun.  I like it.  I will tell you some math facts right now.  That is it!"

"I like to build with Legos because... they are fun.  You can build with them.  Legos are fun.  They are cool.  I like to build boats with them."

Lastly, we began a Health unit on manners.  My boys might not act like they have any but it is not because I am not putting in a lot of effort to teach them.  

Have a great week everyone!