We spent a long weekend at Grandpa & Nana's house last weekend, so I didn't get my wrap-up post up. Instead, we hung out with family, baked goodies, and watched the Church's General Conference. When we were packing up to come home Sunday night my Dad said he wished the weekend was longer, and I agreed. But it was a lovely weekend while it lasted.
But Grandpa and Nana had to go back to work and all the kids had to go back to school, so we came home again and got back to work ourselves. Happily, much of our work is very enjoyable!
I realized that Monkey is not being challenged anymore in our math, so I completely reworked the schedule to really pick up the pace. The plan is to move into some more challenging stuff in the next little while. He loves doing the work; it's pleasantly play-like. But I need to get him to a place where it's requires a little bit of effort. I feel like I'm floundering around a bit, but he's having fun and loves math - it's one of his favorites.
We finished up Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, tried a chapter each of The Incredible Journey and The Prince and the Pauper, before settling in for some more Laura Ingalls Wilder with Little House in the Big Woods. Selecting a read-aloud that fits nicely is still one of the most difficult things. I think after we finish this one we'll go on to Farmer Boy. Hopefully by then I'll have a clue as to what should come next.
We only did one science project this time because, oddly enough, I had a hard time finding the regular food coloring that comes in those drop-shaped bottles. I was out of red, and a color-mixing activity without one of the primary colors seemed a little pointless. We were going to do it over the weekend with Nana, but forgot. But what a success when we finally got it all together! I think he spent more than an hour doing this, and when he saw me do the collage for the blog post he asked to do it again. Works for me!
We also learned about puffins. It hadn't really registered that puffins are predators - they eat little fish - until Monkey announced that they're fierce birds. Not sure I agree with his assessment, but I can understand why he'd say it. In addition to the two clips on the puffins post, we also watched this, which I thought was fascinating for the way that they "fly" underwater. I was also very pleased with Monkey's narrations. I asked him some leading questions, but otherwise, these are his words:
For Red-tailed Hawks (last week):
Red-tailed hawks are fierce, and rip the animals open to eat them. The babies make a "tik-tik-tik" sound. The mama red-tail hawks and the baby red-tail hawks, they are a family.
A bird of prey is a bird that claws other animals. It holds the animal and takes it to his baby. Their beaks are hooked because they are predators.
And for puffins (this week):
There are three kinds of puffins: Atlantic Puffins, Horned Puffins, and Tufted Puffins. They have their nests in holes, and when they are not living there they use the water as their home. They dive for food. They use their wings to drive under water and they let bubbles out behind.
Phonics is moving forward. In addition to CVC words, we're adding some 2 consonant endings: -ll, -ss, -st, things like that, and he's doing well. Blending is getting noticeably smoother, which is exciting. And, probably most exciting of all, we're back to reading the Bob Books! I told Monkey when he's read me all 12 of the little Bob Books I'd get him a Super Friends book. He thinks that's worth working for. We're both happy.
First Language Lessons is, mostly, a breeze, though the difference between common and proper nouns is tricky. We did four lessons last week and four lessons this week. The memory work is fun, and coming right along as well.
We also had some very successful nature study this week - our first trip to the park this spring, and then later in the week one of my friends brought her baby chicks over and we played with them. Those both deserve a post of their own, there's so many fun pictures. I'll leave you with this one of Raven as a teaser:
4 comments:
You had a great week! Visiting grandparents is always fun :)
I love General Conference weekends. Looks like a great two weeks.
Grandparents and Conference made for an outstanding weekend all around. Well worth the delay in the post. And, other than the boys trying to stagger nap times - which means that someone is sleeping nearly constantly from 11am to 6 or even 7pm - the weeks were both good, productive weeks. We're getting the hang of the new stuff we've been adding to our schedule, and he's doing great in all his work!
I love all of your photos. Looks like it was a great week!
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