Weekly Wrap Up - The One With the Big Book Score! 01/25/13

~What We Are Reading~

Me: King Alfred's English (Kindle) and Divergent (on Audible)

Bear: Bloody Times and Divergent (Paperback)

Noodle: James and the Giant Peach (finished) and Busy Times

 

~Memory Work (ongoing)~

Bible: Books of the Law- Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy

and the Ten Commandments

Science: Planets in order from the sun,

Grammar: Pronouns and Prepositions

History: Presidents in order and Timeline from 1823 Monroe Doctrine to Modern Day 2013

Geography: Continents, Oceans, States and Capitals

 

 

This week was pretty good except for a couple of behavior issues as usual.  Noodle had a fit and put a dent/crack in our IKEA tabletop, so he is using his own money and some hard labor to pay for a replacement.  Since that incident he has been fairly pleasant. I don't even remember what he was fitting about, but usually it is because he doesn't want to do what I tell him to do and I won't listen to him when he is disobeying me.  That makes him mad because he wants me to listen to him, but sorry, if I said do "such and such" and you stall and distract I am not obligated to let you keep going.  Sigh.  Please tell me I am not the only one with a kid who wants to run the show. 

In the good moments, we learned a lot and had some fun!

 

Bible

 

This week we began reading about Moses. I read Exodus 1-4 aloud to Noodle and the "Call of Moses" reading excerpt from God's Great Covenant OT 1. 

 

Math

Noodle continued with regular Teaching Textbook lessons, but he is also doing one or two lessons a day on the review product we are working on. He loves it!  Needless to say, a lot of math is getting done around here!

 

Spelling

This weeks words focused on the aw/o/ough/al sound.  His pre-test was pretty bad, but by test day he only missed one and it was just a silly mistake.  He left the l off of belong - I probably could have let him fix it, but he does need to double check his words and now he will remember next time.

 

 

Literature

We finished our James and the Giant Peach unit. I will have a post all about that next week.

General Language Arts

We continued talking about Idioms, and we started learning about Analogies.  We also learned about Onomatopoeia and how to say it!

 

 

He was eating chocolate almonds and making him say the word was interrupting that enjoyable snack!

 

 

Noodle took a Rod and Staff Grammar test - 100%.

He is getting close to finishing Busy Times - he finally decided to focus on one book at a time. Now, if we can just consistently and purposefully read every day.....

 

Science

We finished Apologia Astronomy!! The last lesson was all about Space Travel.  We had fun learning about the "Space Race," the International Space Station and how astronauts "live" in space.  The most fun Noodle had was eating space food - desserts specifically. He had an Ice Cream Sandwich and Neapolitan Ice Cream.  I found them at Hobby Lobby for a little over $3 each.  Too fun!

 

 

 

 

History

We continued with our Lincoln and Civil War unit. Noodle did four Veritas Press Online History lessons, and the corresponding reading assignment was the Jean Fritz book Just a Few Words, Mr. Lincoln. The DK book was one I found at a book sale a while back, that we are using for extra reading.

 

We also finished reading If You Lived at the Time of the Civil War.

 

 

 

Latin

This week's Song School Latin lesson was more food words. We learned that the word Pantry comes from the Latin word for bread.  I love Latin!

 

Ramona and Charlotte joined us in the school room several times this week. Aren't they cute?

 

 

 

High School - Bear

 

I used to do separate posts on Bear, but he just doesn't do as much photo worthy stuff, and when he does, often times he doesn't want me taking his picture! He's kind of crabby that way. 

 

He continued with his usual work load and attended his Composition class at the community college.  He really likes the Professor who is a very funny African American woman who swears and makes jokes about the President. I am not keen on her swearing, but it is a college and not a high school classroom.  The Obama jokes I am fine with. Haha! Go figure. On the first day of class she did an "ice breaker" activity and had all the students ask her questions - anything they wanted to ask. Bear decided not to go the usual boring route and his question to her was, "Would you rather fight 100 horse sized ducks or 100 duck sized horses?"  She cracked up and said, "Thank you for that, you made my day."

 

This week Bear came across some stuff in his Government text book - which is a text used in the public schools.  I chose this one because he went with the Hippo Campus course, but I really wanted to use something like Notgrass or Abeka Government. I didn't because he gets irritated by the christian slant.  Anyway, he frequently finds slants of a different type in his text book.  This first picture he didn't get and came to ask me - it is referring to Clinton's dog - but since that was before Bear's time he needed to ask what the joke was.

 

 

 

 

This one here is typical - on the right is how the Republican party is portrayed - old, rich and white - while the picture on the left features two, young minorities who apparently can't survive without the support of the Democratic party.  Propaganda and stereotypes live.

 

 

Also this week he continued progressing nicely with Algebra 2, Russian lessons on Live Mocha and his Chemistry co-op class.  For history he is reading Bloody Times The Funeral of Abraham Lincoln and the Manhunt for Jefferson Davis.  All the reading about Lincoln has him asking to go back to the Lincoln Museum in Springfield, IL. I really want to go again too, but will have to work out the finances and time frame before we can go back.

 

Sadly, a local used book store is going out of business - but good for us because the store was having a 90% off sale! We all picked up a boatload (actually a car trunk FULL) of books. Bear bought a bunch of science books. He found this neat "Center of Gravity" activity.

 

 

 

Here is just a bit of what I bought.  I scored unbelievably big! I found Noodles next year's Abeka Health - a complete set that is practically brand new for FIFTY CENTS! Also found the year after that for FIFTY CENTS.  Tons of brand new condition test booklets and answer keys for TEN CENTS each.

 

I found an 8th grade Literature set - student and teacher books FORTY CENTS each.

 

 

Lots of printables type workbooks for TEN CENTS each.  Even if I only use one or two pages from each book it is worth it.  I go to used book sales every year and I could sell them for $1 which is a hug bargain for someone else, and still make ninety cents. 

 

 

I found two complete Abeka Science sets for 4th and 5th grade - FIFTY CENTS for each set.  Again, don't know if I will use it, but I wasn't going to pass up the bargain. I have used Abeka science in past years and I like it.  If I don't use it I can give it away or sell it.  I also found 5th grade Saxon with the solutions and test solutions book - TEN CENTS.  An Abeka 7th grade Literature set for THIRTY CENTS. Is this madness or what???

 

 

Bear's haul. He took these pictures with his Go Pro Hero 2 Camera with the fish eye lens.

 

 

 

Linking up this week with Homegrown Learners, Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers and Hammock Tracks.