Another Week Down, Thirty-Three Left To Go :-)

Week Three is in the books for our mostly-second-grade adventure, and things are still going beautifully.  The literature based approach just fits our family dynamic and passions so well, and the books that make up the My Father's World and Sonlight curriculum are not only beautifully written and engaging, but have the girls excited to do school.  And I'm sorry, that is just worth the price of admission right there :-)

So, here is this week's Bloggy Breakdown (anyone watch Tosh.o and see his video breakdowns?  No?  Never mind . . .)

Breakfast Time Table Talk:

• Bible time centered on three main topics this week---Jesus Saves, Living Like Jesus and Jesus as a Child.  We talked about WWJD (what would Jesus do) in everyday moments and now bring it up throughout the day when problems arise, and our discussions on Jesus as a child blended beautifully with our Character Training this week on obeying our parents (Luke 2:51-52)
• Our Character Training with the book EVERYDAY GRACES could not be going any better.  They love the literature selections chosen to correspond with the topic and have great discussions afterward.  They are getting exposure to classic literature I would normally never read at this age, yet they are grasping the material, and the poetry selections this past week by Jack Prelutsky have even inspired Jordan to write her own poem! 

Why is everything so expensive?
Everything looks so nice.
The lolly pop aisle in the corner,
Is only half the price.
And in the other corner,
There's only frozen pizza pies. 
Why is everything so expensive?
I simply don't know why!
By Jordan Harris age 6

Ha!  She keeps asking about getting published and throwing in all the book biz lingo she's been hearing around the house for the last few months, and it is so cute!  Next on my to-do list is to buy a big book of Jack Prelutsky's work!

• Our Manners Devotional is still going well and our focus this week was looking people in the eye when they talk and shaking hands properly.  

School Room Topics:

History:

• The girls are still totally loving both the Pledge of Allegiance and and God Bless America.  They make their toys dance along to the CD of the song :-)  (in fact, as I am typing this, Cali is singing the song to herself while cleaning up her toys!)
• Jamestown and Squanto were the themes of the week!  The girls loved learning about Pocahontas and reading the stories of the children of Jamestown in AMERICAN PIONEERS AND PATRIOTS.   The plan is to pick up some movies on Pocahontas from the library this afternoon and watch them this weekend

Handwriting:

• I decided to skip the copywork selections Sonlight provided this week and work more on the fundamentals of the letters this week.  We worked on K-R and I am very happy with their continued effort and improvement.  Next week we may just finish out the alphabet before going back to the Sonlight passage and working in letter practice the rest of the week.

Creative Writing:

• Cali's assignment this week was on dialogue.  Now considering that I wrote my first novel last year and am working on my second--and dialogue is a very important aspect of that--I really enjoyed this lesson.  I of course had to tailor it to her level and not point out that they are completely WRONG to keep changing the attribution (using mumbled, muttered, etc instead of just said, which is always preferred unless you avoid the attribution all together and you an action tag instead).  Cali wrote about a conversation between her and Jasmine, where Jasmine invites her to a tea party!

"Oh. Hello, Cali," said Jasmine.
"I'm so happy to see you for my very first time," said Cali.
"I'm going to let you come to a tea party in my house," said Jasmine.
"Thank you!"
By Cali Harris, age 5

• Jordan's paragraph work took a step this week with introducing "home plate" which is the topic sentence.  This has been actually challenging to completely explain and have her do.  She keeps wanting to either talk about one aspect in particular or just re-list her three favorites/points for the paragraph.  But she is doing a very good job and loves this time . .. and I learned that She Loves Homeschooling because she gets to use all kinds of pens, can be at home and her teacher is in her family and she gets to learn about Columbus, Her Mom Is Great because she is silly, laughs so much and and is beautiful (I promise this was an actual topic Sonlight had, not self created lol), and that Riding The Pony Express, The Magical Ballet Shoes and The Bible are all her favorite books, but that while the first two are ordinary books, The Bible is extraordinary.  :-)

Spelling:

• Um, yeah, epic fail on this one.  Jordan was ahead of schedule, though, and Gregg and I are meeting this weekend to talk about what we want to do with Cali's spelling, so um, yeah, that's okay!  (ha!)

Reading:

• Jordan is still a week ahead of schedule.  She read Keep the Lights Burning Abbie and is half way through Riding the Pony Express, which she is loving.
• Cali is still loving reading the Bible and one of the stories she read about was Joseph and his robe.  Well this weekend, we are taking the girls to a play --Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat! 

Read Alouds:

• We have added Squanto, Friend of the Pilgrims into this time, so Ella took a bit of a back seat this week--but we are totally picking it back up next week.  Bedtime book is still Fairies and the Quest for Neverland. 

Math:

• Another easy, almost review week where the girls learned the colors of the Math U See blocks, which makes adding easier in the coming weeks, and review of Place Value.  Girls loved it and flew through it. 

Science:

• Ha!  I totally thought I was going to have to say I failed again--last Friday's cleaning session for the family coming in town took a lot longer than anticipated, BUT we did all three weeks worth on Wednesday!  WOO HOO!  We have a few experiments we will do this weekend, but they are all super easy and on air.  The girls of course loved doing science this week. I still think I might stick with doing massive Science days on every other Friday, just not when family is coming to town. 

So that is how our school week went.  How about yours? 
Have a Great Weekend!