Saturday, October 30, 2010

Review of the Week

Group Time--- We did this for about 2 hours on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, then Friday for an hour as we did not do any languages --

Yoga and stretching is definitely a good way to get everybody together and start group time. It feels great to stretch too. We are getting more flexible. I need to make sure the kids have plenty of opportunity to run also. We may need to start running laps around the block, or at least walk the dog daily.

Music time-- Very much for the little kids. We need to start learning a Spanish Christmas song and a French one and both of them in sign language. I need to download more songs onto my mp3 player to keep us on course.

Spanish-- We review the alphabet, numbers, days of the week, months of the year, and how to ask things like what is your name, how are you, how old are you, and what color is ...? We learned some more question words, singular and plural, and listened to people asking where they are from and what languages they speak. We will continue with this and incorporate a Spanish movie to watch weekly.

French-- We only got in 2 good days of French. We follow our workbook which is great, but the kids were a bit bored with it, so we've started to also incorporate an audio program I've been listening to, that was more fun.

Greek- we didn't do any review of Greek this week which is a shame-- so hard to fit everything in!!

Scriptures- We read a chapter of the Golden Book of Bible Stories or Old Testament stories, memorize a scripture a week which was the 6th Article of Faith, and now we read a couple of verses straight out of the New Testament and talk about what it means and what the individual words mean.

I read at least a chapter of American History Stories, Great Inventorss and their Inventions, and Little Women, we also read Beauty and the Beast this week

Little Kids Story time- the older kids have to work on their stuff during this time unless they can finish without it, we only got 2 good days of this in this week so I'll have to be sure to read extra to the little ones today and tomorrow

We read Aesop's fables, some fun science books, Mother Goose, and lots of picture books

child #1-- sick on Tuesday so has to make up end of year 2 Greek test and Systems thematic review test today. She finished her list of requirements for the week-- I think Next week she needs to finish her math review and pass the 5B test. She's doing well but we need to stay on track, she has a lot of workbooks to finish up this year before 7th grade.

child #2-- Needs to focus better especially in math. She also needs to finish up corrections in Greek and be ready to take the final test next week.

child #3-- Learning times tables. Did pretty well finishing tasks and is finally starting to read for fun.

child #4 -- very bright following along with #3 quite well

Plans and changes for next week-- Change appt.and errands for Thursdays and Fridays so we'll have 3 full days with no outside appointments -Thursday will be off and Friday will half day- that will help immensely-- get my mp3 player set up for music time, set time aside daily for folding clothes

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Our Homeschool Philosophy and Intro to this Blog

When you start researching homeschooling you will come across all sorts of educational philosophies. There are the unschoolers, the Charlotte Mason followers, the Well-Trained Mind, the Montesorri, etc. etc. etc. I think there is value in reading what these people have to say and good insights and ideas can be gained from all of them. However, what you ultimately teach your children will be far more useful and important than how you taught it to them. However they learned to read and solve math problem really doesn't matter as long as they can sound out new words and solve math problems. Some kids learn kinesthetically -- others are visual or auditory learners. Figure out what your child needs to know and then figure out how to get them there. Maybe this will require a tutor at some point. Maybe it will require an awesome curriculum and extra time set aside. Maybe you'll need to play a bunch of games or buy an extra workbook. Whatever it is figure it out and do it. We are looking at the end result and finding a way to accomplish that result. More later on what we want our children to learn and how to get there. These are the basic subjects:

Math
Reading
Writing
Greek
Grammar
Latin
Science
History
Religion-- LDS
Music
Art
Foreign Language
Sports
Health

Over time I will post on each of these subjects and discuss which curriculum works the best for us and how our children have done with it. I will also post weekly reviews of what is working and what is not and what we are actually doing. Feel free to ask questions!!