Weekly Report-Week 14

Ok, I'm alittle late in writing this, but by the time this weekend got here, I just crashed. I forgot how much fun it is to be pregnant (said with quite a bit of sarcasm). Be sure to check out others at the Weekly Wrap-up. We had a great week of school though, here's what we did...

Language Arts: Princess finished reading Viking Adventures and we started reading Castle Diary together. She continued to practice her cursive and phonics. However, we had a melt down over writing this week though. Princess felt that the dictation was too hard. Which lead into a nice discussion about how school is going to be challenging, that's how we learn. We disscussed the reasons I want her to learn dictation and how it will help her in the future. After she understood the purpose, she was willing to give it another go. We adjusted the way we are doing dictation to challenge her, but to still give her the confidence that she can do it. Let's hope that next week goes better.

Math: Princess passed her final exam for 2B this week! Some of the things she missed I wasn't completely surprised as we are working on them already. Others I was really surprised as they were things that I knew she had down cold. I'm thinking that she just got anxious because it was a test. So now I'm looking at adding a few more tests in to reduce her anxiety over them. If you've got a better suggestion, please leave a comment! I just don't want to send her off to college dreading having to take a test. I realize that we've got plenty of time before that, I'm just trying to be proactive :).

Science: We began studying constellations this week. The plan was to make a shoebox planetarium, but since I don't have a shoebox or index cards or a flashlight, we decided to make a book about them instead! Here's a look at that...

History: We started talking about medieval England this week. We learned all about nobles, serfs and castles. We made our own model of a castle, here's a picture, but you can also read more about it below.

All and all it was a great week for history!

Other: We completed our artist and composer studies this week. Our composer right now is Vivaldi and we have been having alot of fun listening to his Four Seasons Concerto. We also began reading Lamb's Tales version of Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. So far, so good and I'm really glad that we are back to our Shakespeare studies! We didn't do art this week because I figured that our castle project was enough :).

Education of Me: I haven't been the best about keeping up with my reading this week, my brain just hasn't been able to handle it. Maybe next week will be better.

Hope you had a great week, thanks for reading about ours!

Weekly Report-Week 11

I feel that we had a very successful week here given the recent transition. Here's the rundown of what we accomplished this week.

Language Arts: Princess is reading through Black Beauty which she has informed me that she does not like. She doesn't like that Black Beauty has been sold, but I'm encouraging her to finish it. We completed a week of Writing with Ease and princess worked on spelling with Explode the Code.

Math: We worked through another review this week. We also began the unit on capacity. Princess is doing well and it seems to me that the second half of the 2B book is alot easier then the first!

Science: We talked about Pluto and complete an experiment this week. Here's a look at princess's notebook page from this week...

History: We talked about Charles Martel and Charlemagne this week. Princess thought that it was really neat that she can write better than Charlemagne could. She also completed two pages for her notebook and we did some map work.

Other: We didn't do too many extras this week, but we did take advantage of the pool. Swim lessons are PE class, right?

Education of Me: I've been reading through Piers Plowman. I'm not as far as I would like to be, but I am really enjoying this so far.

You can read other weekly reports here, thanks for reading about ours.

Weekly Report-Week 10

It's been a rough week for me health wise, but we did manage to get some school done. Except for today, which was kinda a wash-sigh...

Here's a rundown of what we did accomplish...

Language Arts: Princess began reading an abridged version of Black Beauty. So far she's doing well and enjoying the book. We began reading The Little Duke together. It took awhile for princess to get into the book, but the last two days she's been asking for more and more. We didn't complete a full week of Writing with Ease and we did no Dictation Day by Day.

Math: We wrapped up the unit on fractions and began working on clocks. Princess is doing well as usual.

Science: We continued our study of the planets with Neptune. It turns out that Neptune made it around the corner of the wall. Princess did go alittle overboard with the storms that were on Neptune, but really this has been such a fun project!History: We studied Clovis and the Franks and added them to our timeline. We also discussed the Islamic invasion. I had no idea that Spain was part of the Islamic empire, learn something new everyday!

Other: Didn't make it to any of the extras this week.

Education of Me: I didn't read anything this week, my mind was elsewhere :).

Hope you had a great week, you can read other Weekly Wrap-up here.

Weekly Report-Week 9

Ok, so there are no pictures from this week, but we did get Shakespeare done :). Here's a look at our week...

Language Arts-Princess finished reading Little Pear this week and I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to assign her for next week, oh well :). We finished read White Stallions of Lipizza and I was surprised at how much princess loved this book! She now rides her own White Stallion around the house and it's teaching her to ride properly, absolutely hilarious! We also completed a week of Writing with Ease and Dictation Day by Day.

Math-We spent the first half of the week reviewing the first half of the 2B book and then princess took a mid-book test. She passed with flying colors, so that means that we kept moving. We finished out the week with learning fractions. Princess has declared that this is her new favorite math concept! I have a feeling that will change when we get around to graphs again :).

Science-We spent the week with Uranus. Princess was quite perturbed when we added it to our wall model of the Solar System because she feels it's too far away from the other planets. I explained that's because it really is that far away. To which she replied, Ok, but it's probably pretty lonely. Just wait till we get to Pluto :)!

History-We spent the week in the East. We read about Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand. I have to admit that alot of what we read about this week was totally new information to me. It also helped me to connect a few dots about Asian cultures. It's pretty cool to learn from your second graders curriculum :).

Other-We looked at another painting by Jan Van Eyck and listened to another piece by Corelli, who by the way is one of my favorite composers! I'm so glad that princess is enjoying him, but I have to say that neither of us are going to be big fans of medieval painting. We also got back to reading Lamb's Tales of Shakespeare "As You Like It". My plan of doing two plays a term is probably not going to happen, but we are enjoying reading through the play and I'm surprised how much princess remembered from the last time we read.

Education of Me-I finished reading Otto of the Silver Hand and I must say that I thoroughly enjoyed it. What a great book, it will definately be on our list for the next go around. I'm hoping to write a more in depth review later this week. Next up Piers Plowman, only because the idea of reading Dante right now doesn't sound so appealing :).

Hope you had a great week, see what others are up to at the Weekly Wrap-up.

Weekly Report-Week 8

I'm alittle late in writing this because over the weekend I couldn't get access to blogger, but better late than never, here's a look at our week...

Language Arts: Princess read A Grain of Rice and began to read Little Pear. The cool thing is that because it's a holiday week here we were actually able to buy one of the tang hu lur's that Little Pear ate in the book. It's always fun to tie a book to reality! We also completed another week of Writing with Ease and a Dictation Day by Day.

Math: We finished studying subtracting money and then spent the rest of the week reviewing money. Next week will be our mid-book review and then onto the beginnings of fractions!

Science: We spent the week studying Saturn. Princess really liked this planet because it was big and light, plus it had pretty rings! We added it to our wall solar system and we also expanded our Sun to make it a bit more realistic.

While we were working on our Saturn, princess told me that she loved big projects like this and that I was a great teacher because I let her do them (gotta love it!).

History: We spent the week talking about the Sui and Tang dynasties. We are still really enjoying Story of the World, it makes learning history easy!

Other: We did do our artist and composer studies this week, but we didn't get to many other extras.

Education of Me: I continued to read Otto of the Silver Hand and I can see why this book is so popular for middle age studies. It's definately going to be on our list. Hopefully I can review it more thoroughly after I finish it next week.

Hope you had a great week, read reports over at the Weekly Wrap-up!

Weekly Report-Week 7 (sort of)

Well we did finally complete Week 7 of school, but it just took us two weeks. We had a brief interruption as I had to be flown to another country with better medical care to check out some problems I was having from getting my appendix out. The good news is: it's not infectious, the bad news is: I have to have another surgery to correct the problems created by the first surgery. I'll have to wait alittle while for that because #2 has finally decided to come! That's right I'm pregnant, which is zapping my energy a bit more than I anticipated, but at this point I'm just excited to still have the little guy with me that it's worth it :). So here's what we accomplished in the last two weeks...

Language Arts: Princess read a version of Arabian Nights suitable for her reading level and several other books off our shelf to occupy her time. We completed another week of Writing with Ease and Dication Day by Day. We also began reading White Stallions of Lipizza, which I am very excited to share with princess considering she loves horses.

Math: We did alittle work with adding and subtracting money, but mostly we did word problems. I just didn't have the heart to teach math, never thought I'd see that day!

Science: We talked about Jupiter and added the planet to our wall-sized solar system, here's the picture of that... I know, it's huge compared to the other planets, we may even have to expand our Sun! But, that's why I wanted to do a scaled version of the solar system this year so that princess could really visualize that Jupiter is the largest planet and how close Mercury really is to the Sun.

History: We talked about the spread of Islam and read about the Sinbad and the Valley of the Snakes. We also added some mapwork and copywork to her history notebook.

Other: We managed to complete her artist and composer studies for the week. Princess also completed a rough self portrait. Next week we will discuss more about how to draw faces and then try to draw the self portrait again. I'll post pictures of both next week.

Education of Me: It's a good thing that my reading selection for this week was an easy one or I don't think that I would have gotten any reading done at all. So far I'm really enjoying Otto and the Silver Hand and I think that it will definately be on the list for the next rotation.

I'm amazed we were able to complete any school work admist the choas of the last three weeks! I'm really looking forward to getting back to a semi-normal routine as I now have the baby's arrival looming on the horizon. I'm guessing that might throw a wrench into my school plans :)! Be sure to head on over the Kris's blog to read other Weekly Reports.

Weekly Report-Week 4

We've had a fun week! First we took a field trip to the local science museum, which is always an adventure in a foreign country. Actually, we really enjoyed ourselves and I can see going back at some point. Second our local bookstore re-opened with huge (at least for this area) English books section. It was such an exciting event for this book lover that I had to blog about it here. Even with all the excitement we did manage to fit it a bit of school. Here's the rundown...

Language Arts: Princess enjoyed reading Mrs. Piggle Wiggle so much last week with Writing with Ease that she chose the book for her reader this week. I'm impressed because she was able to keep up with a chapter a day. We also completed another week of WWE and learned about questions with Good English. We finished A Little Princess this week and princess decided that this is her favorite book so far (that's because it's the first one of the year!).

Math: Princess took her Unit 2 test and passed it with flying colors. We spent the rest of the week playing games and reviewing what she has learned so far.

Science: We spent the week studying Venus, which we added to our wall sized solar system. It's a scaled model so it looks like Mercury and Venus are right on top of each other.

We haven't completed our experiement yet for this week because we haven't had a sunny enough day. We'll try to get to it this weekend, but if the Sun doesn't show I'll have to figure out some other way to make an artificial Sun.

History: We moved on to the Byzantine Empire and princess was most impressed by Empress Theodora playing with bears. We are really loving Story of the World! So much so that princess decided to pick up volume 1 this week and re-read it on her own. Guess that means that we can't use Story of the World with Sonlight Core 6 & 7 in the future. Bummer!

Education of Me: I spent the week reading all about scientists from the Middle Ages so that I could complete Great Scientists of the Middle Ages. It's now available and I have a new blog to host the Series, which you can see here. It's free to download, so go take a look.

Also be sure to check out the other weekly reports and the Weekly Wrap-up.

Weekly Report-Week 3

Here's our weekly rundown...

Language Arts: This week I let princess choose her own book from our self. She chose Dolphin Adventure by Wayne Grover. She loved this book and it gave us an opportunity to discuss the differences between manatees and dolphins (for some reason she wanted to call the dolphins manatees, which are not the same, to clear this up we looked both up in our Kingfisher First Animal Encyclopedia-problem solved). Writing with Ease went well this week, in fact I noticed that her dictation is getting better. It's nice to know that progress is being made!

Math: We talked about multiplication and division within 10. Princess declared that this was the easiest week of math so far. Guess all that skip counting paid off!

Science: This week we studied Mercury. Here's a look at her notebook sheet...


Princess has really taken to Astronomy so far. She's very interested in the planets and it's cool to see her excited about another discipline of science!

History: We finished Our Little Celtics Cousins and we finished her medieval book. Princess insisted on it having a gold cover, which we made out of yellow construction paper since I haven't found where to purchase gold paint yet. Here's a picture of that...

We also began to talk about St. Augustine and what monks do.

Other: We continued to read Tales from King Arthur and watch the BBC animated version of Shakespeare's As You Like It. We also managed to practice the recorder for the first time this year! I'm hoping that we will be able to keep up with it as I would like her to have some sort of muscial instruction.

Education of Me: I began Song of Roland this week, but didn't get very far because I had a ton of things to do this week. It was an insanely busy week for me, but next week should be better! Anyways, so far I enjoy it. I'm reading a translation of the original version, so it's a step up in difficulty from last weeks selection. However I find the poetry easy to follow and I'm looking for more time to curl up with this book. I ran across this article on the importance of self-education by Susan Wise Bauer and I thought that I would share it with you all.

Hope you had a great week, thanks for reading about ours! If you want to read more reports check out the Weekly Wrap-up.

Weekly Wrap Up-Week 2

Another good week here! I feel that we have a good routine going and I'm really happy with the material that we are using. For once I feel no need to tweak, I never thought I'd see this day. Now let's just hope that it lasts :)!

Here's the rundown of our week...

Language Arts: Princess finally got into The Sword and the Tree! She kicked it into high gear and finished the last half of the book in two days. We'll add a review sheet for this book to her reading notebook sometime this weekend. We completed week 2 of Writing with Ease and I'm so glad that I got the workbook for this as it has made it to much easier for me to do (thanks, Linda!). We also talked about what makes a sentence and a statement with Good English and completed another week of Dictation Day by Day for spelling.

Math: We worked on multiplication and division with 5, which princess handled well. We finished the week with a mental math sheet reviewing the 3, 4 and 5 facts. I let princess use manipulatives for this. I have put together unifix cubes in groups of 2, 3, 4 and 5. We pull these out and uses them to skip count her way through her multiplication facts. Here's what it looks like... History: We spent the week reading a book called Our Celtic Cousins. This is a wonderful old book that weave tons of history through a storyline about two boys. So far so good. We have also been working on making our own illuminated manuscript. Hopefully it will be done next week, so I can share pictures of it.

Science: We spent the week talked about the sun. We started our wall sized solar system, here's a look at the sun...
Princess was fascinated by solar spots, so that's why our sun has several of them!

Other: We watched more of the BBC Animated version of As You Like It on you tube. I love these videos, they are a great introduction to Shakespeare for this age group. We also read more about King Arthur and looked at another painting by Giotto di Bondone. Princess completed her first art project of the year, which was a still life using a pen (so that they can't erase), here's the result (it's a purse, a candle and two pixie sticks)... Education of Me: I have been frantically trying to rewrite Biology for the Grammar Stage since 4 of the six books have gone out of print in the last two months, grrrr! Hence the lack of blog posts. Even so, I finished Stories of Beowulf and I am shocked to say that I actually enjoyed it. I remembered hating reading this in high school. I think it's because it was a snippet view, watered down, poorly done version. Now I'm actually looking forward to reading the real poem and sharing it with princess. Maybe there is something to this whole classical education thing :)!

That's a look at our week, hope you had a great one! You can read more weekly reports at the Weekly Wrap-up.