This weekend was so crazy I didn't even post about the week and now it's 4:36 a.m.! Oh well, I feel pretty good and awake.
So anyway, it was a good week once we got past Monday. Mondays are always super hard. I'm going to have to figure something out. Everybody finished their assignments for the most part and are doing well. The boys are moving along through their workbooks at a great pace. They are both pretty far ahead and #5 is reading with me everyday.
#1 is on schedule to finish 6B in about 3 weeks and Greek in 7 weeks. Greek has gotten a little tricky so I have had to help her a bit. She has learned to use reflexive pronouns, 3rd person pronouns, and the passive voice and has not had any guidance form me, so she finally got frustrated and I've had to walk her through some of the concepts, but she gets it now. She also took a couple of days to review the vocabulary. I'm very proud of her.
#2 should finish 6B this week and start reviewing and take the test next week and be done with Singapore Math!! Then she'll have to review some more and take all the previous tests to be ready to start Algebra. Because she loves math I will probably let her start algebra if she wants, but we really want her to start Latin with #1 in the fall so we'll probably hold off and have her focus on Greek until she's completely finished. She still has 14 chapters left- 14 weeks worth so she will be working on it this summer unless she can do more than a chapter a week. The goal for her is to do o 2 chapters a week.
#1 had her 12th birthday party on Friday, so we had to spend some time getting ready for that. We had math group on Tues. which went well although we could use a few more people. We read a lot which is always nice. Saturday was stressful because me, my husband and #1 were assigned to give talks in sacrament meeting on Easter Sunday. #1 did great. I did my best- which was not real great. I think my husband did well, but I only heard about half of it because I was in the hall with the babies. My mom and #2 mostly took care of them but by the time it got to the end, the babies had had it. I think they were a little hungry because with 9:00 church and everybody finding their Easter baskets and getting dressed, they didn't get to spend their usual long amount of time eating and I didn't have time to make a smoothie- then on our way to the church I realized I had left my talk at home and we were almost out of gas.
But we made it and we took nice long naps that afternoon. I had been up 'til 5 cleaning and doing Easter bunny stuff and writing my talk. What a night-- I did sleep from 10-1, but still. No wonder I took so long to recover this week. So far this week has been tough, it should pick up though!
My husband is out of town and I miss him a lot. I also realize all the things he does around here when he's gone-- like setting and turning off the house alarm. We set it off when we let the cat out- we wondered what the beeping was I ran to the box and it said- calling police-- aaaah!! I shut it off and the police never came so I guess we're O.K. I didn't get the trash out to the street in time either and I didn't have much adult conversation. I can't wait to have my husband home!!
Holidays are pretty rough when your life is full with just regular living. It's really hard to add anything else. But the kids love it. Life!!
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
On the final Stretch of School
Monday again-- the boys finished all their stuff, but the girls didn't. I thought it might help them to see exactly what they have left and how when they finish, they'll be all done for the summer. We have 26 school days left
-- 7 weeks and then we'll take off 3 weeks where I won't even make them read if they don't want to.
#1 has 40 pages of math left and the test and the final test-- so if she does 4 pages a day, she'll be done in the next 3 weeks. She has 7 chapters of Greek left, so 1 chapter a week equals 7 weeks. One section of science left-- I've just got to gather the supplies for the experiments so she can finish-- it won't take long. She has a lot of English workbooks left, but the grammar practice ones are full of things I haven't learned yet like the pluperfect tense- so she'll be fine doing that alongside Latin-- it will probably make more sense that way too. So she can finish those up during the summer. I will also have her continue with history, required reading, a little science, music, art and writing over the summer after our break and only a couple times each week just to keep so good habits and keep boredom at bay. I think this will help her see the end and keep going to the finish!! She is way excited to be done with math. We've been going strong a long time and I think she's a little burnt out.
I will also have her do a couple practice tests of standardized testing each week over the summer. She took a reading test and passed adequately, but she needs to ace it. She just needs practice taking tests and reading the questions. I'll probably have her start with the early levels until she is acing those and then move her on up.
#2 just has about 15 pages of math left, so she'll be done very soon. She has 16 chapters of Greek left, so that will take some time over the summer, but she is very good at memorizing and being exact so I don't think it will be too hard for her. She has the same science section left as her sister and about the same workbooks. So they'll continue to work together. She's pretty far ahead so I don't worry about her so much although we're pushing her to start algebra and Latin in the fall with her sister so they can be study budies.
The boys are pretty far ahead so for them it's just a matter of building good habits and keeping them challenged which really isn't hard. They're not burnt out, their stuff doesn't take that long and it's not that hard yet. So they'll keep their regular routine, but I am excited to have a break myself!
-- 7 weeks and then we'll take off 3 weeks where I won't even make them read if they don't want to.
#1 has 40 pages of math left and the test and the final test-- so if she does 4 pages a day, she'll be done in the next 3 weeks. She has 7 chapters of Greek left, so 1 chapter a week equals 7 weeks. One section of science left-- I've just got to gather the supplies for the experiments so she can finish-- it won't take long. She has a lot of English workbooks left, but the grammar practice ones are full of things I haven't learned yet like the pluperfect tense- so she'll be fine doing that alongside Latin-- it will probably make more sense that way too. So she can finish those up during the summer. I will also have her continue with history, required reading, a little science, music, art and writing over the summer after our break and only a couple times each week just to keep so good habits and keep boredom at bay. I think this will help her see the end and keep going to the finish!! She is way excited to be done with math. We've been going strong a long time and I think she's a little burnt out.
I will also have her do a couple practice tests of standardized testing each week over the summer. She took a reading test and passed adequately, but she needs to ace it. She just needs practice taking tests and reading the questions. I'll probably have her start with the early levels until she is acing those and then move her on up.
#2 just has about 15 pages of math left, so she'll be done very soon. She has 16 chapters of Greek left, so that will take some time over the summer, but she is very good at memorizing and being exact so I don't think it will be too hard for her. She has the same science section left as her sister and about the same workbooks. So they'll continue to work together. She's pretty far ahead so I don't worry about her so much although we're pushing her to start algebra and Latin in the fall with her sister so they can be study budies.
The boys are pretty far ahead so for them it's just a matter of building good habits and keeping them challenged which really isn't hard. They're not burnt out, their stuff doesn't take that long and it's not that hard yet. So they'll keep their regular routine, but I am excited to have a break myself!
Sunday, April 17, 2011
The Week after "Spring" Break
Mondays are always a little difficult to get into the swing of things and this Monday was the Monday after our break, so it was a bit trying. I just could not get the little boys to focus and get their work done. I finally gave up and figured we'd do extra on Friday- but that didn't happen either. The girls finished everything except their Friday writing assignments and I don't think #2 is doing enough Greek. Also one of the days, #1 needed extra help on math and the babies got woken up early from their nap, so instead of the kids getting their stuff done all at the same time, I had them do "preschool" with the babies which means entertain and keep them happy so that I could help #1 with math. It doesn't come easy to her, and it's way too frustrating to me to even try to help her onkey children all over the place. So it was nice to have everybody out of our hair so that we could concentrate better. As usual it took her awhile to get the new concept, but once she has it , she has it.
We also celebarted #1's birthday with her favorite spring rolls and a trip to the pioneer museum in Salt Lake City. We also went to the library that day and I gave a couple of piano lessons, so we didn't get a whole lot of schooling in on Tuesday either. Wednesday was a normal day, but Thursday I spent 2 hours at the dentist with #3 getting a very large cavity fixed. Friday the kids had some extra activities already planned so I had to do my weekly grocery shopping earlier than usual-- so no wonder not everybody finished their schoolwork!
I think we'll be more into it this week although it gets really hard to focus when the weather's nice. Oh yeah-- that's another thing that happened- the secondary water came on and I had to remember how to turn off the sprinklers and once everybody gets outside and out of the routine, it sure is hard to get back. This week should be better-- if we can just make it about 7 more weeks, we'll take a nice long break and then we'll move into our summer schedule.
It sure is nice to write and realize how much we did this week. You can check my other blog for the business of the twins.
Here are some more highlights:
#1 turned 12 and started attending the Young Women's organization at church
she loves it so far and can't wait for girls' camp
#2 was a little sick
We attending cub scout pack meeting for #3 and he loves it-- so does the whole family.
#4 is now riding a 2 wheeler by himself!!! he started learning at the end of last summer and he is so happy to be able to join the other kids on their bikes.
#5 has started reading lessons and he has been the easiest to teach so far-- I guess I'm getting pretty good at it-- and he gave his first talk in Primary at church-- it took some serious bribing, but he did it and is so proud.
#6 loves to walk around by holding 2 hands, but we have tricked him enough that now he'll walk just holding one hand-- walking is in his future
#7 has a few molars that have finally cut through, but there are still more on the way.
We also celebarted #1's birthday with her favorite spring rolls and a trip to the pioneer museum in Salt Lake City. We also went to the library that day and I gave a couple of piano lessons, so we didn't get a whole lot of schooling in on Tuesday either. Wednesday was a normal day, but Thursday I spent 2 hours at the dentist with #3 getting a very large cavity fixed. Friday the kids had some extra activities already planned so I had to do my weekly grocery shopping earlier than usual-- so no wonder not everybody finished their schoolwork!
I think we'll be more into it this week although it gets really hard to focus when the weather's nice. Oh yeah-- that's another thing that happened- the secondary water came on and I had to remember how to turn off the sprinklers and once everybody gets outside and out of the routine, it sure is hard to get back. This week should be better-- if we can just make it about 7 more weeks, we'll take a nice long break and then we'll move into our summer schedule.
It sure is nice to write and realize how much we did this week. You can check my other blog for the business of the twins.
Here are some more highlights:
#1 turned 12 and started attending the Young Women's organization at church
she loves it so far and can't wait for girls' camp
#2 was a little sick
We attending cub scout pack meeting for #3 and he loves it-- so does the whole family.
#4 is now riding a 2 wheeler by himself!!! he started learning at the end of last summer and he is so happy to be able to join the other kids on their bikes.
#5 has started reading lessons and he has been the easiest to teach so far-- I guess I'm getting pretty good at it-- and he gave his first talk in Primary at church-- it took some serious bribing, but he did it and is so proud.
#6 loves to walk around by holding 2 hands, but we have tricked him enough that now he'll walk just holding one hand-- walking is in his future
#7 has a few molars that have finally cut through, but there are still more on the way.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Standardized Tests
I haven't had my kids take a standardized test yet. But this will be the year. I think that test taking skills are important to have. It is the one thing I learned in high school-- how to take tests and it helped me all through college. Now that we've had a couple years of doing some good learning under our belts, I'm not afraid to have my kids take the tests. I found these practice ones online:
http://www.edinformatics.com/testing/itest.htm
We'll try these first and then maybe I'll find one we can take for real!!
http://www.edinformatics.com/testing/itest.htm
We'll try these first and then maybe I'll find one we can take for real!!
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Spring (winter???) Break
We took a break this week since we really needed it and everybody else was doing it. It was soooooo nice for me. The kids had to do math, greek and piano, but nothing else-- except play and clean which they did. They didn't do much schoolwork, but they all did some. It is good to keep it up, it doesn't take them that long. The break was more for me than for them. It was soo nice and very needed.
Instead of teaching school during the twins' morning nap, I got to clean!! I never knew what a luxury it is to be able to clean. I got basically 2 uninterrupted hours a day to clean. I finally got caught up on the laundry. finding socks was becoming a nightmare. Teh bottleneck is in folding the clothes-- the kids are usually good to put them away once they're folded. I could just never get to it. Plus we had some extra projects the week before and I was extra tired- must have been fighting something. anyway, we were really behind on the house. The break gave me the opportunity to get caught up. Once caught up, the kids can help maintain. So we are there and it feels so good. I got rid of a few books and cleaned up some areas that haven't been been cleaned since I was pregant with the twins. I love walking in my bedroom now. I would help the kids with their rooms and not make it to mine. We still have a long way to go- there are plenty more places in my house that need to be ordered and cleaned, but what a nice week.
Now we'll get back to our regular schedule. We have a ton of snow. It has been a most unusual winter and very long. We usually have weeks of warmth and sunshine with isolated bouts of snow that never sticks. But this year so far I think we have had maybe 2 weeks worth of warmth and it has been snowing for days and it hasn't melted. I almost feel like I'm in Narnia where it is always winter but never Christmas. It's very depressing. I miss sending the kids outside. I am really glad that we'll be getting a greenhouse.
Anyway, I'm looking forward to a regular week. I will miss my 2 hours of cleaning and organizing time, but I think we'll be back to a smooth running household. We'll be concentrating on kitchen clean up before we go to bed. We can't usually clean right after dinner because I am usually finishing my meal after spending most of the dinner time spoon feeding the twins. If I could be organized and have dinner ready on time, it would be easier and it will get easier as the babies are able to feed themselves better.
I'm looking forward to spring!! Please come spring!!
Instead of teaching school during the twins' morning nap, I got to clean!! I never knew what a luxury it is to be able to clean. I got basically 2 uninterrupted hours a day to clean. I finally got caught up on the laundry. finding socks was becoming a nightmare. Teh bottleneck is in folding the clothes-- the kids are usually good to put them away once they're folded. I could just never get to it. Plus we had some extra projects the week before and I was extra tired- must have been fighting something. anyway, we were really behind on the house. The break gave me the opportunity to get caught up. Once caught up, the kids can help maintain. So we are there and it feels so good. I got rid of a few books and cleaned up some areas that haven't been been cleaned since I was pregant with the twins. I love walking in my bedroom now. I would help the kids with their rooms and not make it to mine. We still have a long way to go- there are plenty more places in my house that need to be ordered and cleaned, but what a nice week.
Now we'll get back to our regular schedule. We have a ton of snow. It has been a most unusual winter and very long. We usually have weeks of warmth and sunshine with isolated bouts of snow that never sticks. But this year so far I think we have had maybe 2 weeks worth of warmth and it has been snowing for days and it hasn't melted. I almost feel like I'm in Narnia where it is always winter but never Christmas. It's very depressing. I miss sending the kids outside. I am really glad that we'll be getting a greenhouse.
Anyway, I'm looking forward to a regular week. I will miss my 2 hours of cleaning and organizing time, but I think we'll be back to a smooth running household. We'll be concentrating on kitchen clean up before we go to bed. We can't usually clean right after dinner because I am usually finishing my meal after spending most of the dinner time spoon feeding the twins. If I could be organized and have dinner ready on time, it would be easier and it will get easier as the babies are able to feed themselves better.
I'm looking forward to spring!! Please come spring!!
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Review of the Week # 21-- super busy
What a week!! The kids in the neighborhood have spring break this week and I think we could use a break so I think we will take a couple days to clean and do yard stuff if the weather is nice. We'll see though-- I think the kids do so much better when they have a schedule and a checklist. I also got some science equipment so we can do more experiments.
We went to 2 park days this week. The kids also planted their own veggie plots and we participated in a nice little history/ geography fair Wednesday night. Each kid did a display about a different country and they had a great time printing and taping maps, flags and pictures on their display boards. They chose Sweden, Qatar, South Korea, Nigeria and Peru. The fair itself was very nice and all the kids gave a presentation even my shy 4 yr.old. It was great.
We have also started back up with soccer practices and 4 games on Saturdays. So it has been extra busy and we haven't been home much and the house has been a huge wreck all week. We got quite a bit done on Saturday so we had a pretty good conference weekend experience, but wow! I never cease to be amazed at the messes my lovely children and I can make!! Hopefully we can get things under control this week too.
We still did school work even with the extra things going on, but we didn't clean until Saturday afternoon. I don't like living in chaos like that, but it happens every once in a while. Hopefully we can get things back together this week!!
Sorry this is short. I'm just done and ready for bed so I can get up early and start the week out right!!
'til next time--
We went to 2 park days this week. The kids also planted their own veggie plots and we participated in a nice little history/ geography fair Wednesday night. Each kid did a display about a different country and they had a great time printing and taping maps, flags and pictures on their display boards. They chose Sweden, Qatar, South Korea, Nigeria and Peru. The fair itself was very nice and all the kids gave a presentation even my shy 4 yr.old. It was great.
We have also started back up with soccer practices and 4 games on Saturdays. So it has been extra busy and we haven't been home much and the house has been a huge wreck all week. We got quite a bit done on Saturday so we had a pretty good conference weekend experience, but wow! I never cease to be amazed at the messes my lovely children and I can make!! Hopefully we can get things under control this week too.
We still did school work even with the extra things going on, but we didn't clean until Saturday afternoon. I don't like living in chaos like that, but it happens every once in a while. Hopefully we can get things back together this week!!
Sorry this is short. I'm just done and ready for bed so I can get up early and start the week out right!!
'til next time--
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Review of the week #20-- Concentration
A lot happened this week as always. My boys are following the same path the girls were on a couple years ago. It is so much easier on me this time around because I've been through it once and I actually know what I'm doing. I didn't push my girls hardly at all because I was worried about pushing them too much after I went through a phase where I really did push them too much. When #1 would complain about how hard something was like math, I would let her get away with only doing one or two pages cause maybe it was really hard. Then when she turned 10 I realized that she was behind where she needed to be in math, so she ended up working on math for 2-3 hours a day until she was caught up.
I'm smarter this time around, so now this week when #3 told me his math was soooooo hard, I told him he had to do it anyway. He rolled around for awhile and I wondered if he needed extra addition and subtraction practice since he seemed to have completely forgotten how to add big numbers. Then I remembered past experiences with the girls and told him that he does know how to do it and I had things to do and to let me know if he needed help, that when he finished he could play his turn on the wii since it was Friday. He wasted a bit more time, but finally at some point in the day-- I think his friends were coming over-- he buckled down and finished the assigned pages in about 15 min. It was not too hard for him-- he just didn't want to do it. Life!!
O.K.-- The girls worked mostly independently this week. They are moving right along. Their compositions are getting better. They are finishing in a timely manner and have had more free time than usual. #1 did write down some of her songs, we have to continue that. #2 is working on character building. She has a tendency to yell at people for the slightest provocation and also whines and cries way too much for a 10 year old. So she starts each day with 10 extra minutes on the wii and loses a minute on the wii for every outburst and whine and cry that she makes. She is doing amazingly well. The first day, she lost all her minutes, but she only lost 2-3 the rest of the days of the week. For her she just needs to realize what she's doing. What a relief. She is trying hard and I'm proud of her. She just requires a little more parenting than the other kids have in this regard.
#3 started 3B this week and is continuing with the Greek. It is harder than he likes to do, so his main work is to learn to focus and concentrate. Lucky for him, I'm smarter as explained above and it shouldn't take long for him to adjust to his new requirements. #4 focuses really well and likes checking things off. He finished the last 11 pages of his math book and took the test in the same day and passed. He also hung around whenever I was helping #3 with Greek so I let him go ahead and start Greek also. So those 2 boys will be working together just like the girls did. I'm very proud of him. It's fun to teach one who is so willing and finds it so fun.
#5 started reading lessons for real this week. He is learning to blend the letters and is doing better at that than I remember the other kids doing. He's very proud of himself. He read his first BOB book.
The babies were happier this week. They made a lot of messes and require a lot of time and energy, but it's O.K. because they are waaaaaay cute!! I love them so much. They actually enjoy group time and I can usually read and help the other kids with their school work when they're around. But when it looks like I'm going to leave the room-- watch out!! They start crying. It worked fine for school, but it was a pain trying to clean anything on Saturday. Oh well. We survived.
We had Group time 4 days this week. We memorized a short poem and D&C 14:7. We read a weird story in the Bible stories for children and continued discussions about the New Testament. We also started the Great Composers series and learned about Bach and Hayden. We also continued our music time, exercising and stretching, and languages. It is fun for me. We only had story time twice this week. We spent some time outside before it started snowing. We visited a petting zoo of the cutest baby animals ever. The girls are planning to perform an original play with some new homeschool girl friends they have made. We also went to the Classic Fun Center and left #5's tricycle there. We have to remember to go get it back this week.
We planted seeds to be ready to plant outside when it's warm. We tried to plant some more fruit trees but it was too cold for all of us. We want spring!! Whew!! No wonder I'm tired and it's late, but I'm glad I got all this down so I remember that even though the house is no where near perfect I have been doing stuff and it's O.K.!
I'm smarter this time around, so now this week when #3 told me his math was soooooo hard, I told him he had to do it anyway. He rolled around for awhile and I wondered if he needed extra addition and subtraction practice since he seemed to have completely forgotten how to add big numbers. Then I remembered past experiences with the girls and told him that he does know how to do it and I had things to do and to let me know if he needed help, that when he finished he could play his turn on the wii since it was Friday. He wasted a bit more time, but finally at some point in the day-- I think his friends were coming over-- he buckled down and finished the assigned pages in about 15 min. It was not too hard for him-- he just didn't want to do it. Life!!
O.K.-- The girls worked mostly independently this week. They are moving right along. Their compositions are getting better. They are finishing in a timely manner and have had more free time than usual. #1 did write down some of her songs, we have to continue that. #2 is working on character building. She has a tendency to yell at people for the slightest provocation and also whines and cries way too much for a 10 year old. So she starts each day with 10 extra minutes on the wii and loses a minute on the wii for every outburst and whine and cry that she makes. She is doing amazingly well. The first day, she lost all her minutes, but she only lost 2-3 the rest of the days of the week. For her she just needs to realize what she's doing. What a relief. She is trying hard and I'm proud of her. She just requires a little more parenting than the other kids have in this regard.
#3 started 3B this week and is continuing with the Greek. It is harder than he likes to do, so his main work is to learn to focus and concentrate. Lucky for him, I'm smarter as explained above and it shouldn't take long for him to adjust to his new requirements. #4 focuses really well and likes checking things off. He finished the last 11 pages of his math book and took the test in the same day and passed. He also hung around whenever I was helping #3 with Greek so I let him go ahead and start Greek also. So those 2 boys will be working together just like the girls did. I'm very proud of him. It's fun to teach one who is so willing and finds it so fun.
#5 started reading lessons for real this week. He is learning to blend the letters and is doing better at that than I remember the other kids doing. He's very proud of himself. He read his first BOB book.
The babies were happier this week. They made a lot of messes and require a lot of time and energy, but it's O.K. because they are waaaaaay cute!! I love them so much. They actually enjoy group time and I can usually read and help the other kids with their school work when they're around. But when it looks like I'm going to leave the room-- watch out!! They start crying. It worked fine for school, but it was a pain trying to clean anything on Saturday. Oh well. We survived.
We had Group time 4 days this week. We memorized a short poem and D&C 14:7. We read a weird story in the Bible stories for children and continued discussions about the New Testament. We also started the Great Composers series and learned about Bach and Hayden. We also continued our music time, exercising and stretching, and languages. It is fun for me. We only had story time twice this week. We spent some time outside before it started snowing. We visited a petting zoo of the cutest baby animals ever. The girls are planning to perform an original play with some new homeschool girl friends they have made. We also went to the Classic Fun Center and left #5's tricycle there. We have to remember to go get it back this week.
We planted seeds to be ready to plant outside when it's warm. We tried to plant some more fruit trees but it was too cold for all of us. We want spring!! Whew!! No wonder I'm tired and it's late, but I'm glad I got all this down so I remember that even though the house is no where near perfect I have been doing stuff and it's O.K.!
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