Week in Review

In my life this week… I have a confession to make. I live in Canada and I hate winter. I want warm sun. I need warm sunny days. Winter days make me feel cranky and blah (see, I can't even think of an appropriate word, all this snow and freezing weather has me in a funk). At least it's sunny outside today so I can lie on the couch and soak up some afternoon rays. Is anyone else more cranky in the winter?

In our homeschool this week…Schoolwise we had a very productive week, more-or-less. Pretty much everything that was on my list got checked off. It's a grocery shopping week so some things ended up unfinished, but overall it went well.

 Playing Short-chain Subtraction Solitaire

In math we worked on some subtraction strategies. TJ understood them while we worked on the individual lessons but during the review lesson today she had totally forgotten about them. The next section of lessons focuses on geometry and the drawing board so I'm going to make a list of the strategies she's learned so far and have some mini-review sessions before each lesson. Between those and the practice sheets, I'm hoping that the strategies will become ingrained.

Language arts was simple and easy - a weeks lessons in writing, three grammar lessons, a step and a half in spelling, and some handwriting practice. Our language work went well too - we practiced our Greek alphabet a bit. Next week we'll work on writing the letters. French is going well - learning some new vocabulary, TJ wrote out a story in French, and we practiced a few phonograms.

We started using Bigger Hearts from Heart of Dakota this week. We'll be using it two or three days a week, spreading it out over this year and next (with plans to start Preparing in 4th grade). We did the first two days of unit 1 this week and TJ thought it was great. We read about Columbus, she worked on a painting, read a bit, discussed persistence and the weekly Bible verses, and wrote out part of the poem for copywork, among other things.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…our history co-op lesson focused on the Crusades and the Moors in Spain. The kids had a great time coloring their own version of Spanish tiles and painting over them with a mixture of glue, water, and glitter to make them sparkle.

My favorite thing this week was…starting Bigger! I can already tell we're going to enjoy this program! I love, love, love the way the different boxes all work together.

I’m reading…a few different books. I'm still working through The History of the Medieval World and The Scarlet Letter. I've been flipping through some gardening books (probably because I'm looking forward to winter being over!) and some chemistry books (for lessons next year).

TJ is reading Pedro's Journal and finished another Neverland chapter book - Escape from Carnivale. I haven't done much reading aloud this week - just assigned reading from Bigger, a few sections in My First History of Canada, and a few chapters of Meet Martha Washington (our Bigger Storytime selection).

I’m cooking…shepherd's pie. I need comfort food. ;-)

I’m grateful for…the sunshine. A husband that is very understanding.

I'm linking to Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers Weekly Wrap-Up and The Homeschool Chick's Homeschool Mother's Journal