Warning, warning. . .
this is an extremely long post. I don’t expect you all to read the whole post. I bolded the subjects so you can find what interest you. Have fun!
September 22nd-26th 2014
My 2nd week of juggling 6 Heart of Dakota (HOD) guides went well. Super busy but good. I admit Wednesday I was a bit harried and grumpy. For some reason I stress out on AWANA days.
Focus: Ancient Empires of Babylon, Minoa, Phoenicia, and Greece
Unit 3
World Geography:
Annette read from the Book of Discovery, Archaeology Book, and the Seven Wonders of the World.
Using A Book of Discovery the had to write a 3 paragraph narration. I love that HOD walks her through it. Giving her ideas and asking questions to make sure she sticks to the the main topic, main idea, has supporting details, and did she write in a style that reflects the personality of the author, did she had an opening and closing sentence.
Geography she she is using Mapping the World With Art she made some stamps (recipe included in the Guide). Next week she’ll make a Babylonian clay map. She also watched the DVD Mysteries of the Ancient World.
Living Library she is reading The Sign Above the Door. Once she completes the reading she has different activities to do throughout the week: orally narrate and/or write a one sentence summary. In the guide it gives her steps for writing her one sentence summary.
World Religion & Cultures she read from But Don’t All Religions Lead to God and World Religions: An Indispensable Introduction.
Annette and I went out for a cup of coffee to discuss what she read in her World Religion and Cultures course. One thing that stood out was how Heart of Dakota has Annette look up scripture to compare what she is reading to the Word of God.
Foreign Language this year is Spanish using Getting Started with Spanish.
The Fallacy Detective for Logic
Literature Study and Grammar/Composition she is using from Bob Jones Fundamentals of Literature. From Rod and Staff: Building Securely. Writing for right now she is using Essay Rock Start: Writing an Expository Essay from Fortuigence. Once she completes this course she’ll start with Essentials in Writing.
She is also reading A Lantern in Her Hands.
Bible Study: Rooted and Grounded, Scripture Memory AWANA
Math: Math-U-See
Her HOD Guide just looked nice so I took a picture of it along with her books, hehe.
Currently she is skipping science. She is going to do the Biology course with Josh instead of the course that goes with the World Geography Guide (WG).
Annette’s weekly homeschool books!
Whew! And that was only one guide I wrote about. This may take awhile.
Maybe I’ll get another cup of java!
This week finished Unit 1 Day 4 and Unit 2 Days 1 & 2 and part of 3. Right now Caleb is completing 3 days of Heart of Dakota: Mission to Modern Marvels. Next week he will start with Unit 2 Day 4 and complete Unit 3 Days 1 and 2.
I don’t have pictures of all his books like did with Annette’s. I’m still trying to figure out how to document all their work. It takes hours to get the pictures, crop, grab the guides, organize, and write it all.
Reading about History: I read Rescue & Redeem to him.
Caleb had to give me an oral narration, do comparison of characters, and look up provinces on the map. All this was throughout the week not in a day.
History Project: Caleb worked on making a Chinese Wall Hanging.
He had to brew a cup of strong coffee and put his paper in it to ‘age’. A few days later he painted Chines letters.
Independent History Study: he uses Rescue & Redeemed to find China, Korea, Japan, Korea, Hawaiian Islands, United States, Mexico, Germany, and Uganda. Had to look at timeline for the Modern Church Timeline and in his Student Notebook write a quote that jumped out to him from a letter that Hudson Taylor wrote.
Storytime: I’m reading Under the Hawthorne Tree. Throughout the week Caleb had to orally narrate, discuss why a character who believed in God now thought God was a monster, summarize a chapter in one sentence, and ask a question about the chapter.
Biblical Self Image: I read Who Am I? And What Am I Doing Here?
We actually didn’t get too much of R&S and Writing and Rhetoric in this week. I’ve been so buys reading to everyone. I do need to figure something out. This is why I have added IXL, so they can at least keep learning. IXL doesn’t teach diagramming so we need to get back to R&S soon before they forget all that they’ve been learning. Thankful for IXL!
Caleb has completed lesson 16 of Spelling You See! Yay, for Caleb. He is almost done with the first book.
Here is Caleb reading his guide.
Bible Quiet Time: Faith at Work. Scripture Memory: Romans 12:1-2. Music: Hymns for a Kid’s Heart
Math: Math-U-See and CTC Math
Caleb completed a lesson of MUS and CTC Math. He’s going to be switching to Saxon 1/2 in a few weeks though. MUS he is not understanding.
Science Exploration: I read Exploring the World of Chemistry. Next week he’ll do a science experiment. This week he answered questions from the book Exploring the World of Chemistry.
Geography: Caleb labeled the “World Empires 1900” map. Timeline: he drew pictures and dated them in his Student Notebook. Economics: Caleb read Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? He had to write one sentence that summarized the economic principle from the days reading.
Worthy Words: He had to analyze and evaluate a letter by Hudson Taylor. Caleb and I read the letter taking turns with the paragraphs and discussed the the questions. I am not having him write & answer the questions on index cards.
Nature Journal & Poetry: He personalized his journals cover.
State Study: We both took turns reading State History From a Christian Perspective.
He had to find the boarding states of Texas, color Texas, and find the lakes.
Brent completed Unit 1 Day 4 and Unit 2 Days 1 & 2 and part of 3. The three middle boys (Caleb, Brent, Ethan) younger kids are only completing 3 days of the schedule a week. Lance, 2 days.
Unit 2: Life in the New World at the Time of Fredrick II Becomes King of Prussia
Reading About History: Brent reads this on his own for the most part. Sometimes I’ll sit with him and listen to him read.
Brent had to write a written narration 10-14 sentence, an oral narration no longer than 6 sentences, had to find the city of Berlin in Germany on a globe, he compare the Pueblo's spiritual gaurdians and rituals to the Spirit in 1 Corinthians 2:12-16, throughout the week.
History Project: Brent made a Woodland headdress and started making a Pueblo pottery.
He will finish his Pueblo pottery next week.
State Study: Brent read from Fifty States Under God about Pennsylvania. He wrote facts in his notebook, pasted the state seal, flag, etc.
Storytime: I read Amos Fortune: A Free Man to Brent. We discussed questions that are in the guide: evaluation, synthesis, analysis, and an oral narration.
Geography: Brent had to label Prussia using Map Trek.
Independent History Study: Brent copies a quote from Benjamin West in his notebook, he drew an American bison, and he looked at the timeline in George Washington’s World to see who was living when Mr. Washing was alive.
Bible Quiet Time: Brent is working through Hidden Treasures. Scripture Memory: Hebrews 11:1-3 and AWANA.
Language Arts: Spelling You See, Rod and Staff English 4, IXL grammar, The Exciting World of Writing. Like Caleb no R&S was completed. He completed his first lesson from The Exciting World of Writing. He had to write about his room using detail.
Hopefully next week I’ll be able to add some R&S lessons in as well as Writing & Rhetoric.
Biblical Worldview: I read from Who is God? And Can I Really Know Him?
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Science Exploration: Exploration Education, he really liking this. Here he is reading his science text from the computer.
He made a racer.
Poetry: I must admit we only read the poem once. Bren copied the title of the poem and 6 lines from it.
Research: Using The Signers Brent read about Samuel Adams. He then had to write using bullet points information about Mr. Adams on the back of card he cut out of his notebook.
Music: we listened to The Story of Classical Music CD Tracks 1-5. We read the Periods of Music booklet and put together Opera Program together.
Inventors Study: the inventor we are studying this week is Michael Faraday. You know, reading almost everything to the boys take time and yes I’m tired at the end of the day. What I do like is I am now reading all the books that I haven’t taken the time to read before. It would have been years before I picked up the book Michael Faraday.
The inside.
Brent’s books that he used for the week.
I love finding Brent reading one of his school books.
Next up! Ethan’s school.
Like the other 2 boys, Ethan finished Unit 1 Day4, Unit 2 Days 1 & 2 and some of 3.
Focus: First Cities After the Flood
Reading About History: I read from The Story of the Ancient World. Ethan gave an oral narration that I wrote down for him to copy into his notebook. He’s really suppose to do this on his own. He copied a portion of Days 2 reading into his Student Notebook.
Storytime: I read Dinosaurs of Eden and started The Golden Bull. Unfortunately I didn’t have him narrate the portions reading to me. I forgot.
Bible Quite Time: Ethan read either from his Bible or The Illustrated Family Bible. He highlighted verses in his Bible and is memorizing Philippians 2:1-2. He was suppose to copy Phil. 1:1 in his Common Place Book but the stinker didn’t do it so he’ll have to copy two verses next week.
During Bible time he also read Job and highlighted Job 42:2
Independent History Study: Ethan was suppose to listen the What in the World? disc but the first disc to the set is missing so we are skipping that portion for now. In his Student Notebook Ethan copied in cursive Genesis 11:8-9. He didn’t want to do this but I told him he had to. He whined that it was too hard. I calmly reminded him that he can do this and to do his best for Jesus.
After a while he was whining that he couldn’t fit the whole verse in the box. I told him when his older brothers used CtC that they would write it on a lined piece of paper than tape it into the notebook.
A little while late he proudly showed me how he was able to fit the whole verse by adding some lined paper. I was very proud of him because I had told to write what he could and next week he can use notebook paper. So seeing that he wrote it all melted my mama heart. And he changed his bad attitude as well. He was happy and not whiny.
Bible Study: I am reading Genesis Finding Our Roots. This week I just read and discussed. We didn’t do any of study portion of it.
Poetry: I admit I only read the poem twice to Ethan. This week he copied a portion of the poem and painted a scene. He doesn’t say it verbally but I can tell he enjoys the poetry painting.
The blue part of the painting his water with branches sticking out.
Math: Teaching Textbooks 5, right now Ethan is doing 2 lessons a day because it’s on the easy side. Once it becomes more challenging he’ll slow it down to 1 lesson. Our goal is to get him through Teaching Textbooks 5 and 6.
Science: I read from Land Animals of the Sixth Day. This week Ethan made an animal track book. This is where he will draw animal tracks as we go through the book. He copied Genesis 1:26 on the cover.
He also had to orally narrate a days reading .
Here is Ethan reading a portion from his science text. As time permits I really try to have the boys do some reading. I am doing most of it but again, if I can get them reading even 1/4 for now that’s a good thing!
The DNA section was confusing for him but that’s okay. With Heart of Dakota it will come around again.
History Project: we made air dry clay and next week will finish the project. We kind of got behind with this.
Language Arts: Ethan completed 2 lessons in All About Reading and All About Spelling, he completed week 5 of Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Tree, and 4 lessons of English Lessons Through Literature.
Geography work
Lance made us all some ice coffee. He knew we needed it!
Lance my Preparing Hearts for His Glory guy struggles with writing. I have him do what he can.
I have Lance copying only one or two sentences at a time.
I didn’t get a chance to get Joshua’s school stuff. I’ll try to get a post next week of his work and where he’s at in high school.