The Nina, The Pinta, The Sant-a Maria!

Another week down at Keep the Way Christian Academy, and the girls are still loving it. I am loving our curriculum choices for the year and having fun teaching.  After our long break (April -December), I was worried it would take a little while to get into a groove and find the enjoyment, but My Father's World and Sonlight have totally come through!

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 has had us searching for clues in the Old Testament that point to Jesus.  The girls are quickly picking this up and having fun playing detective. 
• Our Character Training is still a wonderful time and I am constantly being amazed at how the story snippets the author uses to portray Manners at Home (the theme of our current section) tie in beautifully with what we are learning in history!  Yeah, I totally planned it that way . . .
• Manners Devotional is still going well and this week we practiced having gentleman pull out our chairs and seating us, and smiling when we greet someone.

School Room Topics:

History:

• We begin with the girl's enthusiastic Pledge of Allegiance (like REALLY enthusiastic!  They spent a lot of time last Friday teaching their friends the Pledge.  They think it's totally cool for some reason) and singing along with My Father's World's supplied CD to God Bless America. 
• This week we learned about Columbus.  Since I love ditties, I taught them the one we all know about "In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue."  They sang that over and over again.  Then a few days later, for some inexplicable reason, I started saying Columbus's three ship names over and over, sing-song style.  "The Nina.  The Pinta.  The Sant-a Maria."  You just have to trust me, it's very catchy.  So now, the girls skip around the room singing this over and over again.  It was cute . . .the first hundred times.  But it all worked because when notebooking time came around, their narrations were wonderful.
• Daddy helped the girls make shiny aluminum boats to symbolize the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria, which they then played with at bath time. 
• We read a story about pioneers from Spain who traveled across the Atlantic to establish the first colony in Florida.  I must admit that when I first saw one of the books My Father's World uses as a spine, American Pioneers and Patriots, I was nervous.  It looked very text booky to me, and I did not want that.  But I should've known better. It reads like a story book and the girls fell in love with the children, Catalina and Pedro, and loved hearing about their adventures.  Mom even learned some things (like how they cooked on the boat via a box of sand and an open flame).

Handwriting:

• The girls both did their copy work on Monday via Sonlight and then worked on mastering a set of letters each day after.  This week was C-J.  Both girls are doing very well tracing the samples.  Jordan should be ready to write on her own in a few weeks but I really want them to trace right now as we work on mechanics.  Cali does really really well--sometimes cleaner than Jordan even, despite being younger--but she has a perfectionist attitude and one small mess up can break her heart on the wrong day.  We just take a breath, talk about how God doesn't expect us to be perfect but to try our best, and try again. 

Creative Writing:

• Cali continued working on description but focused on similes this week. We took the descriptive paragraph she wrote last week and turned each description into a simile.  I was very impressed with how well she grasped this concept, and how quick she was able to come up with examples.
• Jordan is still focusing on grouping 3 main topics for a paragraph, and this week we focused on how the first topic is always the most important, followed by the second and third most important.  This week, I found out her favorite subjects are (in order): Science, History, and Creative Writing.

Spelling:

• This week Cali continued on the list from week 1 as we are experimenting with finding the best way for her to learn the words.  It needs to be fun and very non-pressure-y (yes, I know that is not a word and seems an odd choice in a sentence on spelling but oh well).  Next week we may experiment with two nights a week working with Daddy and having it be special one-on-one Daddy time.
• Jordan finished two spelling lists this week.  The first list she learned and took the test on the same day and only missed one word (she wrote cymball instead of cymbal.)  The middle of the week was a little hectic so she got her new list yesterday and took the test the same day again.  She scored 100%.   At this rate, she will be finished with her curriculum by mid year if not sooner!

Reading:

• Jordan read 3 books this week.  She was scheduled to read one entire book and one chapter of another.  She read The Long Way Westward, Prairie School and Christopher Columbus.  The third book was a step-into-reading I had bought one day at a used book store and threw in yesterday so she wouldn't get too far ahead of her curriculum and because it was on topic.  She read the whole thing quickly.  Then she picked up Cali's beginner's Bible and started reading.  And reading.  She sat there last night for about 45 minutes reading the Bible (Adam and Eve to Saul).  The only reason she stopped was because it was bath time!
• Cali has been enjoying reading the Bible and reading ahead as well.  I am noticing how fluent she is and how easily she reads the words, especially for her age (she turns 5 on Monday).  Watching her sister read the past few years has definitely motivated her!

Read Alouds:

• We are reading two books by the talented Gail Carson Levine.  At lunch time we are reading ELLA ENCHANTED, which the girls are loving (although the chapters this week had me speaking in gnomic and I had no clue how to say any of it.... the girls loved my gobbly gook language, though) and FAIRIES AND THE QUEST FOR NEVERLAND at night.  I am still very pleased with our selections of more contemporary, girly, fun works for this time.

Math:

• This week was rather easy--counting and writing to 20--and while I could have skipped it all together (both girls can count to 1000), I went with it to focus on mechanics of writing the numbers.  I am not worried about perfection here, due to their age, but it was a great excuse to tie this in.  For their tests yesterday, they also had to review place value and they both scored 100%.

Science:

• Today, after I take a shower and try to massively clean the house for the influx of relatives coming up from New Orleans for Cali's birthday party, we will have MEGA SCIENCE DAY.  We will put together the last two weeks of Science and do them all.  Since Fancy Friday is only every other week, I think this will work well going forward.  Today's experiments are all about air!

So that is how our school week went.  How about yours?  Any fun ideas you can share for my five year old's spelling? 

Have a Great Weekend!