Lola - She is doing great with Multiplication, MUS still seems to be the best math program around here! She continues to work on her Cursive handwriting with HWOT and regular copywork is helping her learn to tale her time and produce neat work which is an area she needs to really concentrate on. She is doing well (and loving it too!) with Sequential Spelling. Generally speaking she is a reluctant speller - tending to not want to try to spell a word she is unsure of in case she makes a mistake, but this program is already helping her with her confidence and teaching the spelling rules gives her the skills she needs to tackle spelling any word. I would definitely recommend this program to others.
Rod and Staff English is another new curriculum this year and Lola is being challenged by this is a good way. It is at a pretty high level and coming from First Language Lessons last year which is a gentle introduction to English this is a bit different. She is getting the hang of this workbook style curriculum and although it is taking her a bit longer than she is used to each day, all in all it is a good fit. I like it anyway!
We have begun to use a new language program that I found online and Lola decided against learning Spanish and opted instead for French. Since she was interested in this and motivated to learn I went with it. This is a great site and has saved us the $300 we were planning on spending on Rosetta Stone (at least for now). Lola loves her time on the computer each day and since it emails me weekly reports I can see how she is progressing. The good thing about her wanting to learn French is that I took this in school so it is coming back to me - I can quiz her a bit which is something I have never been able to do when we were doing Spanish. Lola originally wanted to learn Japanese like her babysitter (she speaks fluent Japanese, is studying it at college and just came back from a trip there) but after trying to take the first lesson we decided to wait a few more years. The Japanese word for boy must have been at least 20 letters long! eek!
As for writing we are trying a few different things I am giving her two writing assignments each week which may include book reports, journal entries, blog entries, creative writing exercises or written narrations. I have also found a creative writing program that I may try with her. I am still playing with ideas for this, but as it is my main area of focus for her this year I am sure it is something we will be doing lots more of.
Tayo - Tayo is doing great with MUS Alpha. Lots of it is review of the Primer program we did last year so she is speeding through it so far. Math seems to be a strength of hers. She is working slowly through Reading Made Easy at a a pace of half a lesson per day three times per week. Other reading activities we are doing include reading Bob books and other readers, worksheets and online reading programs like Starfall. She is making great progress and surprises me at times as I don't think she is getting it at all and then the next day she reads something I thought she'd never get.
Handwriting is a favorite subject of Tayo's and she loves her HWOT Printing Power book, if she could she'd do at least two of these per day! I will be starting some copywork with her soon.
Niyi - Of course he is not in school right now, but I have been making sure I spend a part of the morning reading with him each day and he really seems to be enjoying it! The past week we have been reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear and doing a few activities related to this. He is doing well at learning his colors and can name all the animals in the book. We will continue with this book for a little while longer and I plan on making a Tot Book to go along with this as well. Niyi really enjoys our circle time and sits well for stories too. So all in all he is doing great!
Other subjects - We began Mystery of History last week and I plan on using this jut as a read aloud. I may add in a few of the activities if they seem interesting, but right now I think this is plenty. I like that the reading itself is pretty short, and I get both s to narrate back to me once we are done. Art has not yet begun as things seemed to get in the way of it, but I plan on it being a twice weekly thing. We will participate in Sketch Tuesday and also do a lesson per week possible related to our artist study of the time. I hope things allow us to begin this week!Our current read aloud is Alice in Wonderland and the s are enjoying this!
So that's about it! Life is definitely busy this year with two in school a rambunctious toddler and a newborn, but we have settled in well and are getting lots accomplished.
Now here are some pictures of our Dino lapbooks. We learnt lots with this unit and the kids can now pretty much identify most dinosaurs (well the ones we studied in depth anyway!). We discussed Creation and the Great Flood, learned that there is at least one dinosaur mentioned in the bible, discussed reptiles and their characteristics and began our Animal classification notebook. We also researched a number of the dinosaurs and made a book about them. We had a dino-packed two weeks!
The s playing Dino Concentration memory game.
The two finished lapbooks plus Lola's book of Dino research.
Inside the first flap of the double lapbook - minit books about Behemoth, reptiles, Paleontologists, a map noting where Dino fossils of specific Dino's have been found, Dino cards and a wheel noting what could have happened after the flood.
The second flap with the six days of creation minit book, a chart of Dino heights, and a book about the dinosaur diet.
Dino height chart opened up
Various minit books opened out.
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