Learning Notes Week of September 25

Add commentOctober 20, 20175 min read

Monday September 25

Anthony did a page in Miquon, read to me from Child’s History, and did copywork. his history reading took him to the map to find where the book’s small map of the Mediterranean and Fertile Crescent and Nile River fit on the big world map.

Ben did a page in Miquon, two pages in Explode the Code, read me a Bob book, and did copywork.

Sophie did half a page in Miquon, copywork, reviewed Je vous salut, and read to me from Child’s Geography. Her geography took us to the map to find Denmark and the North Sea and the Baltic and the bodies of water that connect them. We talked generally about various ways geography influences history.

Bella did Khan Academy math, copywork, Latin (read the first sentences of Hobbitus Ille aloud to me and then we roughed out something of a translation, just focusing on vocabulary, not grammar. She read me a handful of Emily Dickinson poems and we discussed them. She read from one of her history books, the Romance of Reality: China and Japan.

Bella has mostly been immersed in Anne of Ingleside, Rilla of Ingleside, and Rainbow Valley. Hard to get her to emerge for long enough to do any other work.

She asked me what a Jew’s harp is. Must have been in the book she was reading. So I looked up some You Tube videos and we watched a guy demonstrating a bunch of different instruments. The other kids crowded around, fascinated.

Afternoon stories:

Ella, Augustus Caesar’s World, Story of the Chosen People, North with the Spring.

Bedtime: Sophie read a library book to the others, Sir Cumference and fractions.

Tuesday September 26

Anthony did a page in Miquon, read to me from Child’s History, and did copywork.
 Ben did a page in Miquon, two pages in Explode the Code, read me a Bob book, and did copywork. He finished the last book in the second Bob box.

Sophie did the other half of yesterday’s page in Miquon, copywork. We translated a sentence in Amanda Cochon. And she read to me from Child’s Geography. Also she worked on preparing her dictation passage.

Bella did a page in Miquon math, copywork, prepared her dictation passage. Read another short passage in Hobbitus Ille. Really struggling with focus.

Bella found a tiny little goldfinch feather in the garden. The goldfinches love to visit our cosmos at this time of year and also have been coming to our feeder.

Afternoon stories:

We finished Ella of All of a Kind family, a good ending but everyone is sad there are no more books in the series. Golden Fleece, St Elizabeth, Story of the World, Minn of the Mississippi.

Bedtime story: Velveteen Rabbit.

Goldfinch feather with pencil tip for scale.

Wednesday September 27

Pond exploration field trip.   A local conservancy nonprofit was offering a free class for homeschoolers focusing on identifying pond invertebrates. Their concern was pinpointing invertebrate life that indicates possible levels of pollution. Of course, it’s hard to convince most small children that invertebrates are more interesting than vertebrates. So the kids were by and large more interested in the minnows and the star of the day was definitely the baby snapping turtle. But the dragonfly larvae and freshwater mussels and water beetles and snails did interest them. And they didn’t totally tune out the bit of the presentation about pollution.