Friday, September 12, 2008

Week 1


All through out the week... he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." And I praise God for His continual presence through out our week, our very fruitful and enjoyable week. Since it was the first week it prooved to be a challenge, the first day was exciting and full of energy but every day after steadily slanted slightly down hill as we pushed ourselves to stay in a somewhat straight line with our daily plan. He daily supplied me with His power to not only walk in a straight line but also to beable respond with grace to all of the behavior issues and daily distractions.





(Isn't he handsome!)


Math: Superman completed all 5 lessons from his Horizon 2 workbook and each day we played a simple but fun math game to follow our lesson. I was very proud of how quickly and eagerly he took to his math lessons. I have his workbook by his desk so that he can reach it and pull out the daily worksheet and then he completes it pretty much on his own. If he struggles with anything I assist him and explain on our white board. I am loving our daily math game, it is a nice way to lighten up our lesson and have some fun practicing our lessons.


*A funny math quote from Eli this week: "65... is embarrassing me." No idea, just thought it was cute and funny.


Grammar: We didn't go as fast as I thought we would with our grammar lessons, it seems that Superman has a lazy brain when it comes to thinking about verbs and sentences. I know that over time he will begin to run a little faster, I am not rushing him but it is hard, this is one of those areas where His grace is poured all over my head as I sit there and just know what he is capable of but realize he is holding back.


Spelling: Super simpe and awesome! I don't really have a year or even weekly plan for this, we are just going to "go with the flow" of it because it is all about learning through sight and dictation. This week he focused on CM's children's motto: "I can; I am; I ought; I will." Ought was the focus word, he got it!


Cursive: Oh my goodness does this boy LOVE his cursive, he would do it all day if I would let him. I am so suprised at how well he is doing and how diligent he is about not only doing it but learning it correctly.



History: It started off a little rocky when Superman couldn't anwser any of the review question but as the week went on he did better. I decided to try out head phones for him to listen to the chapter and that worked a lot better, no distractions. I will have to listen to the chapter the morning or night before so I know what is going on. We did our coloring sheets and carpet craft and today we will do one of the activities. I am determined this year to follow through with my plans to do one craft a week + an activity if one is given. I want History to be alive, to jump off the pages of the book and live in his imagination.


*Note: we were using the revised edition of the book but not the Activity Book and when I looked through it at the store yesterday I was amazed at the illustration differences in the two and purchased the revised edition. They are amazingly better!


Science: Ya know we are just truly enjoying ourselves here and it is only going to get better, I have A LOT up my sleeve. 2 days ago I took a little trip to the library to assist us in our Plant study and Nature study. I will begin pulling alot out of my sleeve this weekend to begin doing. We studied a little bit about the seed, made a little booklit on it, read some books and planted some flowers. Just this afternoon I noticed they have already sprouted, we were all excited about their life.


Before lunch Superman has his independent reading time. I do not have this scheduled out, it really depends on the subject and availibilty of it. So far he has been able to dive into artist, history and science books while I cook lunch. Sometimes I had him read it to me and sometimes he read silently.


Artist and Music Appreciation: Amazing... we have had such a blast with each of these and I can not tell you how much I have personally enjoyed watching him growingly increase in enthusiasm and appreciation for them. I will say that I have allowed him to lead in this. He observed The Starry Night one day, read a book on Van Gogh and then decided to try his hand at recreating The Starry Night. For music we have simply enjoyed listening to Mozart's music and his life, I (the big student in the room) was very intrigued by Mozart's life. Superman already has a favorite of his works.



Latin: Ha! We have struggled with our latin lessons, we only made it to one this week. That is not good. We will extra hard to make it apart of our day next week and following, I really do not want it to fall between the cracks of the day.


Rest Time: Okay so rest time isn't a subject but it was a success this week! It is a giant chore to get T-Rex to actually sleep at rest time, he usually plays the whole time which is 2 hours usually. Well I thought up a plan. I told him that he wouldn't get his afternoon snack if he didn't sleep, I told him I would leave it on his night stand but only if he was asleep, it worked:




Butterfly has her own little "desk" that she climbs in and out of as she pleases working on her own little creations and education.


And here she is tormenting poor precious, who was trying to get some sleep:




It was a great week! I need to start getting up earlier to soak each day in prayer.



JOYfully in Him,

Kelli

3 comments:

Lori C., Texas said...

Sounds like a great week! What cute kiddos you have! I am glad the week went so well for you!:)

Lori

Dana Leeds said...

It does sound like a great week - even with its ups and downs which I'm all too familiar with!

I'm curious as to what you're using for Latin as neither of us liked what we tried last year and only made it through a few weeks but we're REALLY enjoying a different program this year (Latin for Children).

I love your art & composer study! Isn't Mozart fascinating???

Hope you have another fun week. I guess we'll have the week off from Ike. :-)

cryssi said...

Ooohhh Can I come to school with yall? It looks like so much fun! We started our first day today. Mostly, we read alot of stories, they love to read.

Blessings
Crystal