Weekly Review

It has been a fast week, we have been busy getting ready for LittleBit's first TaeKwonDo tournament, trying to finish up school work for the 1st grade, and working on the garden.

I told LittleBit once he finished his work in history and math that he would be finished with 1st grade and be ready for 2nd grade in July(when I officially register him). I was giving him options for his end of the 1st grade treat and he chose to go to the Adventure Science Center for a day. I was surprised, he picked this over Chuck E Cheese, Legos, or the bounce factory. He is a man on a mission now, he is trying very hard to finish his math book. He is asking to do extra math before bed, pulling the workbook by himself to work on it, this is a complete opposite from his usual behavior when it comes to math worksheet time!

He is also practicing chess, he is determined to beat Dad at a game. He is playing Learn Chess on his nintendo, reading the instruction booklet that came with his chess set and setting up the board during the day to work out scenarios.

Watering his vegetable seedlings

Science experiment with Dad

Collecting dandelions for a botany experiment

Weekly Review

This week I realized we are almost finished. We have about 2 weeks of work left to do and then we will be moving forward. I can't believe how fast it has gone by. Although, there are days I do wonder, will this day ever end or exactly why was it we wanted to homeschool. It is worth every minute.

I wanted to give a status of the curriculum we are using this year, talk about summer plans and give a review of Botany.


Handwriting without Tears - it caused tears. We have been doing copy work instead.
My First Language Lessons - it is a two year program and we will use it next year
Spelling Workout - will continue to use lightly and for copy work
Story of the World - 10 chapters left to read
Singapore Math - completed 1A and intensive workbook for 1A, 2 sections of 1B left to complete
Lifepac Bible - Finished
Magic School Bus Experiments - we have done many experiments with plenty left to do
Reading - We read everyday


We should be finished with the current curriculum in the next 2 or 3 weeks. Since we have decided to switch to all year round school, I will begin purchasing our next books. I am planning on a lite program through June.


We will continue with botany, copy work, some math, experiments and reading from May through the end of June. Along with his vegetable garden, bug club, animal encounters, and other summer activities we will be busy. I feel a year round schedule will work better for us and allow more break times for spring and fall, when the weather is nicer.




Exploring Creation with Botany Review
I am going to mention botany once again, I realize I have talked about it a good deal but I do really like the program. There are 13 lessons in the textbook and I thought we would do a chapter a week and be done in 13 weeks; boy was I wrong. We are only able to read 1 or 2 pages at a time. There is a great deal of Latin root words and terminology, difficult concepts and projects to do. This is an in-depth immersion curriculum, it is written in a easy to understand format for children without "dumbing down" the terminology or concepts.

Both LittleBit and I are enjoying and learning so we will go slow in order to completely grasp and understand the lessons taught. I don't usually purchase companion books with the curriculum, but I did purchase the Botany notebook/journal. It was worth the $16.99 price tag. LittleBit loves finding new things to add to his journal. He is always bringing in a weed, leaf, or flower, asking to borrow the camera to take pictures etc. It uses the outdoors and household items to create fun projects to explain and reinforce concepts in the book.

Butterfly Lecture and Egg Hunt

Today our local recreation department had a butterfly egg hunt and lecture on butterflies. We are very lucky our local parks and recreation department has so many good programs that work so well with homeschooling. LittleBit's favorite is Bug Club.


Today he learned about what butterflies eat, where they grow, how they grow etc. They went on a hunt for milkweed, did not find much, it is a little early yet. He learned about what kind of plants you can grow in your own yard to attract butterflies. We have now added parsley and basil to our little vegetable garden. It was a great morning and we will go back in a couple of weeks for more egg hunting and then next month it will be larvae finding and counting.

Seedlings!

LittleBit is so excited about his vegetable garden. The seedlings have started to sprout and he checks every morning to see if they have gotten any bigger. So far, his cantaloupe, corn, lettuce, and broccoli have come up, we are still waiting on the peppers. He helped plant the grape vines and apple trees. He checks everything with his magnifying glass and is pulling every weed or interesting piece of grass he finds to add to his botany notebook. Again let me say we are really enjoying the Apologia science and I can't wait to pick out our next book.

Seeds just begining to sprout

(Day 5)

Day 10

Granny Smith Apple Tree

School Outdoors

It was another beautiful day here and LittleBit asked if we could do school outside. We are in the process of rearranging out patio and sitting area and I confess to thinking, how can I make this work for the benefit of homeschool.

We practiced math on the patio and fence with sidewalk chalk.

We read about plants.

Worked in our Singapore math workbook.

Practiced measuring with a ruler.
(Dad time to cut the grass)

Continued our discussion on water and evaporation.

Drew a water molecule