The FIAR theme for this week was France. We read Madeline (again, from our aborted attempt last week) along with That Glorious Flight. Both are set in France, although TGF includes a trip to England. We looked up France on the map, made a French flag (out of paper), listened to French children's songs, checked out some new vocabulary (from Madeline - appendix, solemn, disaster; from TGF - "clacketa" which is a sound made by an air vehicle in the book), talked about the process of invention ("try, try again"), learned about roman numerals, and discussed how 12 girls can be grouped in different ways. We also watched the movie version of Madeline, which we discovered was very different from the book. It was a very full week! Jimmy liked reading the two very different books together, but I'd rather try to avoid that in the future for, if nothing else, the sanity of the teacher. =)
Our letter work this week was also combined. We tackled T & U. This worked pretty well, actually - we were able to practice both letters in several words, like "cut" and "tuck." The Bible verses associated with these letters were blessedly short, or we wouldn't have been able to memorize both. Yay!
Math went really well. We played War (Jimmy loooooves it!), added the jack, queen, & king to the game, made an ABBC pattern with our pattern blocks, and introduced tangrams. We had a math test mid-week, where Jimmy was asked to count by 1's to 100 (or beyond) and by 10's to 100. He did fabulously on the 10's, but he had a few stumbles on the 1's. Mostly, he was just having trouble focusing on what he had already counted. We're going to have to work on this a little more so it comes more naturally to him. I also learned that I had forgotten to teach him what to do once you reach 100 - he didn't know what the next number was! Good thing for these little assessments!
Our other little school asides this week were art (Jimmy used regular paints for the first time, making somewhat of a mess because Mommy wasn't *quite* paying attention) & German school. Jimmy really loves his German school. I am so thankful that we have had this opportunity. (Did I mention earlier that we won a free scholarship from a raffle we entered in December?)
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
Madeline
This week's plan was to read Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans. We read it once. (It's meant to be read all week.) It was a little crazy - we were down in the Lansdale area, staying at my inlaw's house so we could visit Grandma Bobbie. My MIL, FIL, and hubby were in VA, finishing emptying Grandma Bobbie & Grandpa Andy's house - it finally sold! Grandma Bobbie has been having a rough time lately trying to recover from her pneumonia, so the boys & I stayed down there to visit & help. Napping wasn't going well, so I skipped out on the lessons for the rest of the week.
What we did do: Read through Madeline once & briefly discussed why she was in the hospital (she had her appendix removed). There is lots more to dig through in that book. For math, we took our first peek at playing cards - ace through 10. Jimmy learned that he could tell the difference between 6 and 9 by counting the number of shapes on the card. He figured out that ace is 1 all on his own. I'm not sure whether to be proud or concerned for future gambling issues... LOL! We read the Bible verse & story for the letter T, but we didn't start handwriting yet.
What we're going to do now: We're going to keep to our original schedule for the rest of the school year (with the possibility of taking an Easter break to visit Aunt Donna). Next week's book, The Glorious Flight, is also set in France, so we'll combine Madeline's studies in with that. We'll work on T along with U, which may actually make for some good handwriting lessons when we get to writing whole words towards the end of the week. For math, we'll just continue on; we had plenty of wiggle room for fitting in lessons at the end of the year, since there were more school days than math lessons for this year.
I think this is a much better option that trying to squeeze everything from this week into 2 or 3 days. There's so much good stuff in this week's lessons. Next week might be a little intense, but Jimmy has been asking for more stuff after we've finished our lessons lately. I love that we can be this flexible.
What we did do: Read through Madeline once & briefly discussed why she was in the hospital (she had her appendix removed). There is lots more to dig through in that book. For math, we took our first peek at playing cards - ace through 10. Jimmy learned that he could tell the difference between 6 and 9 by counting the number of shapes on the card. He figured out that ace is 1 all on his own. I'm not sure whether to be proud or concerned for future gambling issues... LOL! We read the Bible verse & story for the letter T, but we didn't start handwriting yet.
What we're going to do now: We're going to keep to our original schedule for the rest of the school year (with the possibility of taking an Easter break to visit Aunt Donna). Next week's book, The Glorious Flight, is also set in France, so we'll combine Madeline's studies in with that. We'll work on T along with U, which may actually make for some good handwriting lessons when we get to writing whole words towards the end of the week. For math, we'll just continue on; we had plenty of wiggle room for fitting in lessons at the end of the year, since there were more school days than math lessons for this year.
I think this is a much better option that trying to squeeze everything from this week into 2 or 3 days. There's so much good stuff in this week's lessons. Next week might be a little intense, but Jimmy has been asking for more stuff after we've finished our lessons lately. I love that we can be this flexible.
Friday, March 6, 2009
The Rag Coat
Our FIAR book for this week was The Rag Coat by Lauren Mills. It's a beautiful little book about a little girl whose coal miner father dies. She can't go to school because she doesn't have a coat to wear during the cold winter months, so her mother's quilting friends make her a quilted "rag" coat. When she finally walks into school proudly wearing her new coat, her classmates tease her into tears. She runs away but thinks better of it, returning to school to forgive them. She tells them the stories about each of the rags - they are rags from her classmates! It's a great opportunity to talk about the power of forgiveness, the bond between a father & daughter (even after death), and death. We also used this book as a starting point to make up stories using props (like Minna did with the rags in her coat). Jimmy & Caleb had a blast making up stories about Buzz Lightyear and Woody. LOL! We also talked a little about quilts, making our own out of paper (no stitching, just enough to get an idea of putting pieces together to make something different). We'll be visiting a fabric store later today to see all the different types of fabric that could be used to make a quilt.
In math this week, we reviewed the March calendar (great opportunity to practice reading, since March is our first short-named month). Jimmy had a test early in the week. He had to graph pattern blocks. We hadn't used a graph in a long time, so he was a little rusty. We'll review this assessment during our next test just to be sure. For our practical lessons, we measured strips of contruction paper (unit of measure - linking cubes), made an ABC pattern using pattern blocks, and went through a few counting bear stories (to start addition & subtraction skills). The big math highlight this week was from Caleb - he told a counting bear story of his own! He's definitely ready for some sort of math next year.
Our letter for the week was S. Jimmy memorized our Bible verse very quickly, so we had time to read the accompanying story twice this week. I think I'd like to do that more often - once at the beginning of the week and once later in the week to reinforce what we've just memorized. His handwriting is getting better. S was a little difficult with the extra curvy bit, but his letters were definitely readable. I had him write a few sound-it-out words, too - "can", "Bob", and "skate" (his choice). I pulled out a stage 1 reader for Jimmy to read to us one naptime as well. It's a short little book but there were some challenging sections. Jimmy did very well on the easy stuff, and he patiently plowed through the harder stuff. I did have him run a lap (it's the best way to get him over a mental block), but he was just so thrilled to be reading! I think he's finally ready, but I also think that any formal lessons just won't work for him. He's a tough cookie.
In math this week, we reviewed the March calendar (great opportunity to practice reading, since March is our first short-named month). Jimmy had a test early in the week. He had to graph pattern blocks. We hadn't used a graph in a long time, so he was a little rusty. We'll review this assessment during our next test just to be sure. For our practical lessons, we measured strips of contruction paper (unit of measure - linking cubes), made an ABC pattern using pattern blocks, and went through a few counting bear stories (to start addition & subtraction skills). The big math highlight this week was from Caleb - he told a counting bear story of his own! He's definitely ready for some sort of math next year.
Our letter for the week was S. Jimmy memorized our Bible verse very quickly, so we had time to read the accompanying story twice this week. I think I'd like to do that more often - once at the beginning of the week and once later in the week to reinforce what we've just memorized. His handwriting is getting better. S was a little difficult with the extra curvy bit, but his letters were definitely readable. I had him write a few sound-it-out words, too - "can", "Bob", and "skate" (his choice). I pulled out a stage 1 reader for Jimmy to read to us one naptime as well. It's a short little book but there were some challenging sections. Jimmy did very well on the easy stuff, and he patiently plowed through the harder stuff. I did have him run a lap (it's the best way to get him over a mental block), but he was just so thrilled to be reading! I think he's finally ready, but I also think that any formal lessons just won't work for him. He's a tough cookie.
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