Another two weeks over, and despite waking up sick this morning it looks like I might get this one up in time.
So, for some random info Optimus Prime brought something home and was really sick for about 48 hours. No big deal. He got better almost immediately then passed it onto Bumblebee and Scooby-Doo, both of whom have been sick for over a week now, Bumblebee especially. He even lost his voice for three days. Sigh. Optimus Prime has been fine since the initial 48 hours, just really tired. Then, this morning I wake up sick and Bumblebee is STILL doing bad (at least he got his voice back yesterday). Needless to say we have not gotten much schoolwork done this past week. As of this moment we are officially three days behind with no end in sight to whatever this is that's kicking around the house. So here goes...
We FINALLY finished up our first Concept Week for this quarter. We did calendars, and I'll post about it in a couple of days. We'll start seasons in a few days, I want to finish off our Week 6 schoolwork first, which we'll hopefully finish off tomorrow...
Scooby-Doo was a trial this past week. We actually did nothing but read books and are technically a week behind in his workbook. He was happy with his workbook (Dora Colors & Shapes again) up until he got sick. As for coloring and stickers - both are totally out. Stickers now go on the body instead of paper and he likes to position the marker in my hand and make me scribble on the pages instead of doing it himself. I explained to him that I already know how to color, but he wasn't interested in what I had to say. Bumblebee decided that I needed some "help" with getting Scooby-Doo to do his schoolwork, so he colored and put stickers all over the coloring book pages for Scooby-Doo. Scooby-Doo saw that as an invitation to either run away or freak out, depending upon his mood. Right now I'm content to let Scooby-Doo fall behind. Our homeschooling goals for him are more guidelines than set in stone, and since he's been sick this past week he has wanted nothing to do with schoolwork and everything to do with cuddling and napping. Plus, I know he'll catch up quick once he feels better - he loves his Dora workbooks and next is a Minnie Mouse one and I'm sure he'll be equally excited to do that one as well.
Optimus Prime and Bumblebee, like I said before, are also sick. Bumblebee actually has been completely housebound. I wouldn't let him go to football practice or anything. Optimus Prime made it to practice two out of three days but it really wore him out. Despite being sick, however, we actually have managed to stay almost on schedule.
Handwriting is the same as always. Sloppy for Optimus Prime, varying between neat, okay, and sloppy for Bumblebee.
We are behind in Spanish. I was planning on having the colors unit finished up by now, but with them being sick it hasn't happened. Actually, I don't think we did any Spanish at all this last week...
We are behind in Science, however our Science book (which covers animals by continent) likes to do an in-depth look at an animal or two for each unit and this last week we got to do that twice, so they were really excited. There's a book you get to rip out and staple together. Then you read it and color it. They love doing that and they were thrilled that they got to do it twice in one week. So there was a bright spot.
We finished off our first Math and English textbooks and should of started new ones yesterday, but like I said we are a little behind.
Math we went over fractions, time, and money. They did good on fractions and telling time by the hour. Once we got into the half-hour things got confusing. Bumblebee kept reading the hour wrong and Optimus Prime just started making things up when reading the clocks. We need to work on this some more. Our kitchen has a little digital clock that I use when cooking, so I'm thinking maybe I should get an analog clock to help them out. The only one we have in the house is my watch, which is always missing since I never wear it. They understood the concept of pennies and one dollars, but anything more than that just confused them. They said that they understood a nickel equals five cents or five pennies, but when it came down to it they just did not understand counting by fives to count the nickels. They wanted to say five nickels equals five cents, not twenty-five cents. We have some Disney Time and Money workbooks, and I'm thinking next quarter we need to pull them out and really work on the concepts of time and money.
As for English we worked on sentences - telling and asking ones - punctuation, and word order. There was a LOT of writing, more than they are used to. The unit was really designed for a first grader that knows how to read.
They loved Geography, of course. We just finished map keys and symbols and are currently onto map borders.
Reading was a little different. For the past week and a half we read the story The Little Red Hen from a workbook and did the activities that went along with it. It was a nice break from trying to teach them how to read. On the plus side, they are starting to read very basic sentences, but only if they know all of the words in the sentence and only if the sentence is a few words long. Example - The cat saw a bird. I can read books. Etc. They haven't figured out sounding out words that they don't recognize yet, or guessing the word based on the context of the sentence - but it's a start!
Spelling was pretty good these past two weeks, they both did really good on the last two units. However there are about ten words total, apiece, from previous units that they do not have down. I've decided that it's time to do something about some of these words. Tomorrow we will ideally be starting Unit 7 and some of these words are from Unit 3. One thought that I am having is to do a Spelling quiz everyday until they are caught up. Another is to give them extra Spelling assignments using these words. I'm not sure what I am going to do but I've got to figure it out by tomorrow night.
Logic and Art are both fine. They are thrilled to have extra Logic schoolwork. Now they want Art dropped, but I told them no. Some days they are really into Art, other days not so much. I'm thinking that maybe next quarter I'll change our assignments for Art, we'll have to see...
For a side note we just ordered the last Dinosaur Cove book and it should be here in a couple of days. Then we will promptly read it (because god forbid we not immediately read a book about dinosaurs the MINUTE it arrives in the mail) and then I'll put up a post about the series. I'm also thinking about doing a post about chores. I keep going back and forth over this in my head. It's not about homeschooling, however when you homeschool and your kids are in the house all day making a mess there are a lot of chores to do... I'll let you know one way or another this week.
On a final note I have decided that we won't start our one-on-one time until next quarter. Right now with everyone sick, just finishing last month's Concept Week, football practice 3-5 days a week, and being three days behind there is just too much on our plate right now - in my opinion - to start throwing one-on-one time into the mix. We will definitely start it next quarter, however, since Optimus Prime at least really needs it. Right now the only one-on-one time we get is when we do our Reading assignments for the week, and sometimes we don't have a chance to do that one-on-one.
All in all it was a good two weeks despite everyone being sick. So long as I don't wake up worse tomorrow I think we can start working on getting back on schedule.
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Saturday, September 7, 2013
Two Week Review: August 16 - 29
Somehow this post got lost in the shuffle of life. I mean, here we are onto Week 6 and I'm just now getting around to writing up what happened Weeks 3 & 4. I'm not even sure what happened to provide me with an excuse. I mean, the house has been finished (except for rearranging artwork and posters) this whole time and yes I was sick during Week 5 and Optimus Prime just got sick this week, however that's actually given me quite a bit of downtime in which internet stuff should of gotten done.
Scooby-Doo is doing fine. He's finished up his second Colors & Shapes workbook. It was harder than the first (not that he cared - it's not like he was listening to me while I was reading the directions or anything, he just wanted to scribble!) and not as interesting since there was no cartoon character. He doesn't even know who Dora is - we don't watch her show and we have none of her books - but he does like her. Go figure. While workbooks are in coloring is so Last Week and as for stickers he thinks they taste better than they look on paper. Sigh.
At least he's still into his schoolwork time. Also, our goal of three books a day has lead into a renewed interest in his favorite book Cookie Kisses, which after a merciful four month break has now become his favorite book again. We are back to reading it a dozen times over the course of the day again, as well as another dozen after tuck-in time. Sigh, again.
Optimus Prime & Bumblebee are doing good.
Optimus Prime's handwriting is getting worse, not sure how. I'm beginning to think our one-on-one time is going to consist of ABC sheets...
Spanish is doing good. We are still on colors, but we should be finishing that up by Week 6 and then we can move onto new things.
Science and Geography are as good as ever. I wish we could do more Geography, but I'll need to find more workbooks first. They love the subject, though, and always want to do more.
English was a lot better these two weeks, so that was a relief. Soon we will be done with their current workbook, ready to move onto a new which means we'll get to rehash everything and see if they've figured some stuff out yet or not.
Math these two weeks was no addition and subtraction, and plenty of patterns and shapes. I don't know why. Yes, the shapes schoolwork is going to turn into fractions schoolwork but for crying out loud, they are in first grade - they know their damn shapes! We don't need two pages of review for each individual shape - where we COLORED (?!?) them - followed by a few pages of counting stars and moons. I mean those pages looked like something in a pre-k workbook and they bored my kids. It was more basic than the shapes schoolwork Scooby-Doo is currently doing. As for patterns, when you get to first grade simple two color patterns are boring. They didn't even enjoy patterns that simple in kindergarten. I'm done complaining. I do want to add that for our quizzes in Math we did addition and subtraction even though we didn't cover those subjects at all. It amazes me how well Bumblebee had has his addition and subtraction down, considering we didn't do them at all for two weeks. He got almost every question correct. Optimus Prime, however, definitely needs to work on his subtraction.
Reading is going okay, still. Same with Spelling. Sigh. I'm just impatient. I love reading and can't wait until my kids connect the dots in their heads and figure it out.
Art is the same as always. Some days they like it, other days it bores them.
They finally won me over with their Logic argument. No puns about them winning me over logically, I was just tired of listening to them complain about it! If they want the extra schoolwork then they can have it! We now do logic every schoolwork day and twice on Saturday.
About our Concept Week we did start it Week 4, however we didn't finish it then. So I'll tell you more about it in the next Two Week Review.
That about sums it up. Our curriculum is updated if you want to check it out. My husband FINALLY got his work schedule so I had to fix ours. Plus, with doing extra Logic schoolwork it made sense to update the page. Also, my aunt sent me a bunch of workbooks for all three, which has me thinking that maybe next quarter Scooby-Doo will start doing other subjects too. Maybe he'll like some patterns or numbers or something. We'll see.
Scooby-Doo is doing fine. He's finished up his second Colors & Shapes workbook. It was harder than the first (not that he cared - it's not like he was listening to me while I was reading the directions or anything, he just wanted to scribble!) and not as interesting since there was no cartoon character. He doesn't even know who Dora is - we don't watch her show and we have none of her books - but he does like her. Go figure. While workbooks are in coloring is so Last Week and as for stickers he thinks they taste better than they look on paper. Sigh.
At least he's still into his schoolwork time. Also, our goal of three books a day has lead into a renewed interest in his favorite book Cookie Kisses, which after a merciful four month break has now become his favorite book again. We are back to reading it a dozen times over the course of the day again, as well as another dozen after tuck-in time. Sigh, again.
Optimus Prime & Bumblebee are doing good.
Optimus Prime's handwriting is getting worse, not sure how. I'm beginning to think our one-on-one time is going to consist of ABC sheets...
Spanish is doing good. We are still on colors, but we should be finishing that up by Week 6 and then we can move onto new things.
Science and Geography are as good as ever. I wish we could do more Geography, but I'll need to find more workbooks first. They love the subject, though, and always want to do more.
English was a lot better these two weeks, so that was a relief. Soon we will be done with their current workbook, ready to move onto a new which means we'll get to rehash everything and see if they've figured some stuff out yet or not.
Math these two weeks was no addition and subtraction, and plenty of patterns and shapes. I don't know why. Yes, the shapes schoolwork is going to turn into fractions schoolwork but for crying out loud, they are in first grade - they know their damn shapes! We don't need two pages of review for each individual shape - where we COLORED (?!?) them - followed by a few pages of counting stars and moons. I mean those pages looked like something in a pre-k workbook and they bored my kids. It was more basic than the shapes schoolwork Scooby-Doo is currently doing. As for patterns, when you get to first grade simple two color patterns are boring. They didn't even enjoy patterns that simple in kindergarten. I'm done complaining. I do want to add that for our quizzes in Math we did addition and subtraction even though we didn't cover those subjects at all. It amazes me how well Bumblebee had has his addition and subtraction down, considering we didn't do them at all for two weeks. He got almost every question correct. Optimus Prime, however, definitely needs to work on his subtraction.
Reading is going okay, still. Same with Spelling. Sigh. I'm just impatient. I love reading and can't wait until my kids connect the dots in their heads and figure it out.
Art is the same as always. Some days they like it, other days it bores them.
They finally won me over with their Logic argument. No puns about them winning me over logically, I was just tired of listening to them complain about it! If they want the extra schoolwork then they can have it! We now do logic every schoolwork day and twice on Saturday.
About our Concept Week we did start it Week 4, however we didn't finish it then. So I'll tell you more about it in the next Two Week Review.
That about sums it up. Our curriculum is updated if you want to check it out. My husband FINALLY got his work schedule so I had to fix ours. Plus, with doing extra Logic schoolwork it made sense to update the page. Also, my aunt sent me a bunch of workbooks for all three, which has me thinking that maybe next quarter Scooby-Doo will start doing other subjects too. Maybe he'll like some patterns or numbers or something. We'll see.
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
Concept Week #3: DInosaurs
Well! All that hype and here we are onto our last Concept Week from kindergarten!
Bumblebee loves dinosaurs. Dinosaur toys, dinosaur books, dinosaur movies, dinosaur documentaries... I'm sure you get the idea. Optimus Prime & Scooby-Doo love dinosaurs too, but not nearly as much.
When we first started talking about taking a family vacation this past summer, and our initial plans were scrapped for costing too much, I decided that what we needed to do was something both closer to home and lots of fun. So I planned a dinosaur trip. There are LOTS of dinosaur museums here in Texas, I didn't realize just how many until I started looking into them. We had a blast at two different dinosaur parks and the Dinosaur State Park, and we even decided to expand our trip into two zoos and an aquarium for some variety.
My kids purchased little dinosaur toys almost everywhere we went (because what we REALLY needed in this house was more dinosaur toys!), as well as dinosaur puzzles and dinosaur eggs (that "hatched" in water).
They learned lots of stuff about dinosaurs and saw lots of animals and fish. All in all the trip was a total blast.
Then, when we got home it seemed only fitting to do some dinosaur themed schoolwork for a week.
I had some dinosaur maze books I had picked up on our trip, as well as some dinosaur dot-to-dots and coloring pages I printed up from education.com. We also had some dinosaur schoolwork books I had picked up from Target's dollar section back when they were babies and a book of jigsaw puzzles ("Discovering Dinosaurs!") I had picked up at a Waldenbooks back when they were going out of business. (A side note - if you have never seen jigsaw puzzle books before they are really awesome and you should pick them up. They are big board books that have a half dozen or so puzzles in them and on the opposite page is a few educational paragraphs about the puzzle, we are going to be using them a lot for first grade.)
So our "textbooks" about the subject were the books I had bought during our trip and from Target, as well as the worksheets I had printed up. Our activity was the puzzle book (we got to do a puzzle a day), and our book was "The Magic Schoolbus in the Time of the Dinosaurs" by Joanna Cole.
The workbooks from Target were grades K-2, but I have to be honest some of the activities were more geared towards second graders. However, they still had fun and the book introduced them to codes, which we had never done before, and they caught onto that pretty quick. Each dinosaur that was covered had a code at the bottom to translate to find out what the dinosaur's Latin name meant.
By the time the trip and schoolwork was over we had been on dinosaurs for almost two weeks, and we were definitely all ready to give it up, but everyone had lots of fun.
Bumblebee loves dinosaurs. Dinosaur toys, dinosaur books, dinosaur movies, dinosaur documentaries... I'm sure you get the idea. Optimus Prime & Scooby-Doo love dinosaurs too, but not nearly as much.
When we first started talking about taking a family vacation this past summer, and our initial plans were scrapped for costing too much, I decided that what we needed to do was something both closer to home and lots of fun. So I planned a dinosaur trip. There are LOTS of dinosaur museums here in Texas, I didn't realize just how many until I started looking into them. We had a blast at two different dinosaur parks and the Dinosaur State Park, and we even decided to expand our trip into two zoos and an aquarium for some variety.
My kids purchased little dinosaur toys almost everywhere we went (because what we REALLY needed in this house was more dinosaur toys!), as well as dinosaur puzzles and dinosaur eggs (that "hatched" in water).
They learned lots of stuff about dinosaurs and saw lots of animals and fish. All in all the trip was a total blast.
Then, when we got home it seemed only fitting to do some dinosaur themed schoolwork for a week.
I had some dinosaur maze books I had picked up on our trip, as well as some dinosaur dot-to-dots and coloring pages I printed up from education.com. We also had some dinosaur schoolwork books I had picked up from Target's dollar section back when they were babies and a book of jigsaw puzzles ("Discovering Dinosaurs!") I had picked up at a Waldenbooks back when they were going out of business. (A side note - if you have never seen jigsaw puzzle books before they are really awesome and you should pick them up. They are big board books that have a half dozen or so puzzles in them and on the opposite page is a few educational paragraphs about the puzzle, we are going to be using them a lot for first grade.)
So our "textbooks" about the subject were the books I had bought during our trip and from Target, as well as the worksheets I had printed up. Our activity was the puzzle book (we got to do a puzzle a day), and our book was "The Magic Schoolbus in the Time of the Dinosaurs" by Joanna Cole.
The workbooks from Target were grades K-2, but I have to be honest some of the activities were more geared towards second graders. However, they still had fun and the book introduced them to codes, which we had never done before, and they caught onto that pretty quick. Each dinosaur that was covered had a code at the bottom to translate to find out what the dinosaur's Latin name meant.
By the time the trip and schoolwork was over we had been on dinosaurs for almost two weeks, and we were definitely all ready to give it up, but everyone had lots of fun.
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Two Week Review: August 1 - 15
Okay, so technically the first two weeks have been over with for a couple of days now, but like I said earlier I'm in the middle of some crazy house stuff, so something had to slide and the blog was picked. My kids have also gotten extra TV time, which makes me cringe, however by Friday MOST of the work will be done, our normal schedule will resume, and I should be back to blogging starting with that damned Dinosaur Week post.
So, onto a nice easy topic, our first two weeks of our new schedule.
First, Scooby-Doo, since he's the easiest. He loved working on his Dora colors & shapes workbook - actually he finished it and is onto a new (different) colors & shapes workbook already - and he had fun arguing with me over how markers are held in your hand. He loved his special coloring books that he didn't have to share with his big brothers and he especially loved putting stickers in them. At first he was confused over what to do with the stickers - I have given them to him before but he's never actually sat down and used them, and the moment he walked away Optimus Prime & Bumblebee would pounce on them and use them up - but it took him about two seconds to figure it out then he was giggling like crazy. He also loved our "us" time where we sat down and read stories together without his big brothers (who absolutely HATED being left out - especially Optimus Prime - even though they really don't care for baby books anymore).
But most of all he loved it when I called him over to the table to do his schoolwork. He would always get very jealous and worked up when I would work with Optimus Prime & Bumblebee, and I would tell him that I couldn't play right then, or his brothers couldn't play right then, or he wasn't allowed to take markers to big brothers schoolwork and scribble all over it, etc. First thing in the morning (okay, after breakfast, brushing teeth, and getting dressed - so not FIRST thing, but you get it) I always call out to Optimus Prime and Bumblebee that it is schoolwork time. Some mornings I get greeted with "Yea! Schoolwork time!" and other day's it "Man, not AGAIN!" but I've never called out to Scooby-Doo. So now when I do his face lights up and he runs right over to sit on my lap so we can learn some colors and shapes (actually, I don't think he learned anything, but that's okay) and scribble together. He loves it, and now he's more patient when I tell him I'm busy doing schoolwork with his big brothers because he knows in just a few minutes it will be his turn instead. So I'm glad I decided to do an extra year of Pre-K with him because the look of happiness on his face when it's his turn is so perfect and sweet.
...
Okay, I'm done turning my toddler - who is going through the terrible two's phase BIG TIME right now - into a total angel.
Now, onto Optimus Prime & Bumblebee.
Initially I had decided that we would do our Concept Week during week three for the first month because I wanted the first two weeks to be all about easing into the schedule, however with all of my crazy house stuff going on there is no way it is happening before week four. However it should definitely happen then, so all's well that ends well I suppose. Plus this gives me some extra time to finally finish my totally existent - honestly! - Dinosaur Week post. I don't want to confuse myself. For an FYI - there is nothing special about Dinosaur Week, so when I finally put up the post it's going to be a total let down. You've been warned.
I also figured that I wouldn't worry about our one-on-one time for the first month because I wanted to best gauge how well they are taking in all of the new subjects. This works out rather well, because, again, the house drama currently going on.
So other than that how are Optimus Prime & Bumblebee doing? Very well. I guess they were a bit bored with our old schedule and are loving the challenge. Handwriting is coming along okay for Optimus Prime, could be better, could be worse. It's coming along awesome for Bumblebee.
Spanish is coming along super well for Optimus Prime and pretty good for Bumblebee.
They are both doing great in Science and love reading about a new animal (almost) everyday. They are also both doing good in Geography and like looking at maps, even if they don't have the firmest grip on the concept.
English is coming along a lot better than I thought it would (I was expecting total failure), however it is definitely their weakest subject. I foresee a lot of English in our one-on-one time. Some concepts they got down no problem what-so-ever - like the ending sound in words (book ends in k, hippo ends in o, etc), others I thought they were getting down only to walk away not so sure - like compound words (snow + man = snowman we can all agree upon, however when it comes down to man + snow = mansnow we disagree on), and some they definitely need more help with like putting words in ABC order (I have to be honest, I'm really scratching my head over this one. It seems so basic to me. How can you not understand this? It's not like the words all begin with the same letter, the list begins with all different letters. However, I'm not six so I'll accept and work on it).
Math is really good, however so far we have only done addition and subtraction. They had never done subtraction before this, and they picked up the concept in two days. Now they are doing awesome. Optimus Prime needs some extra help which we will do soon, he has the concept down but he keeps miscounting on about half of his problems. The answer will be six, he'll say seven, that sort of thing. He keeps skipping over pictures because he's in a rush, however he's still doing awesome so that's good.
Then there is the dreaded Spelling "class." It was their least favorite subject in Kindergarten, it's still their least favorite subject today. However, they did stop complaining today when I told them that I remember some of my spelling lists from grade school and they were 20 words long - not 5 - and I had to write them 10 times each - not 5 - and use them in a sentence. They were in such awe of the numbers 20 & 10 that they flat out said they were glad that they didn't have to do that much and that they were happy with their spelling schoolwork. I didn't have to prompt that answer or anything!
Reading is going so-so. They are memorizing the books after one reading so I decided to shorten the number of days we read them for (from six to three). I have a new idea for Spelling and Reading, but we won't do it until next quarter. However, I had another new idea which was to write up sentences using just previous spelling words to see how they do. About 50/50, so we now do this every quiz day as well. Kind of like a reading quiz, I guess? We might start doing it every day next month. I haven't decided yet.
Logic & Art are both going good. They are grumbling a bit over the lack of Logic everyday and the number of pages we are doing. They want to do Logic more often and they want more pages. I'm torn over whether to rewrite our schedule for this quarter to oblige them or just wait until next quarter. We'll see.
So, this was our first two weeks or First Grade & Pre-K. On a final note I just dropped off the paperwork for Optimus Prime & Bumblebee to start football in a week, so I'm excited. They are too, they've been looking forward to football ever since tee-ball ended, and now that the pool (in our park) is closed (as of Saturday) they've been itching for something to do.
So, onto a nice easy topic, our first two weeks of our new schedule.
First, Scooby-Doo, since he's the easiest. He loved working on his Dora colors & shapes workbook - actually he finished it and is onto a new (different) colors & shapes workbook already - and he had fun arguing with me over how markers are held in your hand. He loved his special coloring books that he didn't have to share with his big brothers and he especially loved putting stickers in them. At first he was confused over what to do with the stickers - I have given them to him before but he's never actually sat down and used them, and the moment he walked away Optimus Prime & Bumblebee would pounce on them and use them up - but it took him about two seconds to figure it out then he was giggling like crazy. He also loved our "us" time where we sat down and read stories together without his big brothers (who absolutely HATED being left out - especially Optimus Prime - even though they really don't care for baby books anymore).
But most of all he loved it when I called him over to the table to do his schoolwork. He would always get very jealous and worked up when I would work with Optimus Prime & Bumblebee, and I would tell him that I couldn't play right then, or his brothers couldn't play right then, or he wasn't allowed to take markers to big brothers schoolwork and scribble all over it, etc. First thing in the morning (okay, after breakfast, brushing teeth, and getting dressed - so not FIRST thing, but you get it) I always call out to Optimus Prime and Bumblebee that it is schoolwork time. Some mornings I get greeted with "Yea! Schoolwork time!" and other day's it "Man, not AGAIN!" but I've never called out to Scooby-Doo. So now when I do his face lights up and he runs right over to sit on my lap so we can learn some colors and shapes (actually, I don't think he learned anything, but that's okay) and scribble together. He loves it, and now he's more patient when I tell him I'm busy doing schoolwork with his big brothers because he knows in just a few minutes it will be his turn instead. So I'm glad I decided to do an extra year of Pre-K with him because the look of happiness on his face when it's his turn is so perfect and sweet.
...
Okay, I'm done turning my toddler - who is going through the terrible two's phase BIG TIME right now - into a total angel.
Now, onto Optimus Prime & Bumblebee.
Initially I had decided that we would do our Concept Week during week three for the first month because I wanted the first two weeks to be all about easing into the schedule, however with all of my crazy house stuff going on there is no way it is happening before week four. However it should definitely happen then, so all's well that ends well I suppose. Plus this gives me some extra time to finally finish my totally existent - honestly! - Dinosaur Week post. I don't want to confuse myself. For an FYI - there is nothing special about Dinosaur Week, so when I finally put up the post it's going to be a total let down. You've been warned.
I also figured that I wouldn't worry about our one-on-one time for the first month because I wanted to best gauge how well they are taking in all of the new subjects. This works out rather well, because, again, the house drama currently going on.
So other than that how are Optimus Prime & Bumblebee doing? Very well. I guess they were a bit bored with our old schedule and are loving the challenge. Handwriting is coming along okay for Optimus Prime, could be better, could be worse. It's coming along awesome for Bumblebee.
Spanish is coming along super well for Optimus Prime and pretty good for Bumblebee.
They are both doing great in Science and love reading about a new animal (almost) everyday. They are also both doing good in Geography and like looking at maps, even if they don't have the firmest grip on the concept.
English is coming along a lot better than I thought it would (I was expecting total failure), however it is definitely their weakest subject. I foresee a lot of English in our one-on-one time. Some concepts they got down no problem what-so-ever - like the ending sound in words (book ends in k, hippo ends in o, etc), others I thought they were getting down only to walk away not so sure - like compound words (snow + man = snowman we can all agree upon, however when it comes down to man + snow = mansnow we disagree on), and some they definitely need more help with like putting words in ABC order (I have to be honest, I'm really scratching my head over this one. It seems so basic to me. How can you not understand this? It's not like the words all begin with the same letter, the list begins with all different letters. However, I'm not six so I'll accept and work on it).
Math is really good, however so far we have only done addition and subtraction. They had never done subtraction before this, and they picked up the concept in two days. Now they are doing awesome. Optimus Prime needs some extra help which we will do soon, he has the concept down but he keeps miscounting on about half of his problems. The answer will be six, he'll say seven, that sort of thing. He keeps skipping over pictures because he's in a rush, however he's still doing awesome so that's good.
Then there is the dreaded Spelling "class." It was their least favorite subject in Kindergarten, it's still their least favorite subject today. However, they did stop complaining today when I told them that I remember some of my spelling lists from grade school and they were 20 words long - not 5 - and I had to write them 10 times each - not 5 - and use them in a sentence. They were in such awe of the numbers 20 & 10 that they flat out said they were glad that they didn't have to do that much and that they were happy with their spelling schoolwork. I didn't have to prompt that answer or anything!
Reading is going so-so. They are memorizing the books after one reading so I decided to shorten the number of days we read them for (from six to three). I have a new idea for Spelling and Reading, but we won't do it until next quarter. However, I had another new idea which was to write up sentences using just previous spelling words to see how they do. About 50/50, so we now do this every quiz day as well. Kind of like a reading quiz, I guess? We might start doing it every day next month. I haven't decided yet.
Logic & Art are both going good. They are grumbling a bit over the lack of Logic everyday and the number of pages we are doing. They want to do Logic more often and they want more pages. I'm torn over whether to rewrite our schedule for this quarter to oblige them or just wait until next quarter. We'll see.
So, this was our first two weeks or First Grade & Pre-K. On a final note I just dropped off the paperwork for Optimus Prime & Bumblebee to start football in a week, so I'm excited. They are too, they've been looking forward to football ever since tee-ball ended, and now that the pool (in our park) is closed (as of Saturday) they've been itching for something to do.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Scooby-Doo! Mysteries
After doing a Spiderwick post it seemed only natural to do the same for the one Scooby-Doo series we have finished off, especially since we will be starting The Magic Tree House in a couple of days (which last I checked had 50 books) so I really want to shorten our list.
Synopsis - Fred, Daphne, Velma, and Shaggy are in high school (mentioned a few times) and travel around the country with their dog Scooby-Doo running into - and solving - mysteries where ever they are. Each book is a stand alone book and they do not have to be read in order.
Ash Falcon - "I loved Scooby-Doo as a kid, I loved Scooby-Doo as a teenager, and I still love Scooby-Doo as an adult. I bought these books back when I was in high school. I read them (and loved them) back then and I loved reading them to my boys. They are wacky, they are silly, they make you roll your eyes at their outrageous plots (a giant stuffed animal that terrorizes a store, a seaweed monster that wants to scare away a town's pelican, a giant cactus that wants to prevent a music video production, a basketball team's mascot come to life to destroy the team - come on, these plots are ridiculous!), but most of all they are fun and they made my kids imaginations run away to some awesome places. Except for book one which was only so-so I would totally give this series a 100/5."
Optimus Prime - "I really, really, really (followed by about ten more "really's") liked these books! My favorite was the one with the fangs - the vampire!"
Bumblebee - "Do you know who my favorite is? The Hoopster Horror! I liked the books."
Scooby-Doo! Mysteries by James Gelsey
Synopsis - Fred, Daphne, Velma, and Shaggy are in high school (mentioned a few times) and travel around the country with their dog Scooby-Doo running into - and solving - mysteries where ever they are. Each book is a stand alone book and they do not have to be read in order.
Ash Falcon - "I loved Scooby-Doo as a kid, I loved Scooby-Doo as a teenager, and I still love Scooby-Doo as an adult. I bought these books back when I was in high school. I read them (and loved them) back then and I loved reading them to my boys. They are wacky, they are silly, they make you roll your eyes at their outrageous plots (a giant stuffed animal that terrorizes a store, a seaweed monster that wants to scare away a town's pelican, a giant cactus that wants to prevent a music video production, a basketball team's mascot come to life to destroy the team - come on, these plots are ridiculous!), but most of all they are fun and they made my kids imaginations run away to some awesome places. Except for book one which was only so-so I would totally give this series a 100/5."
Optimus Prime - "I really, really, really (followed by about ten more "really's") liked these books! My favorite was the one with the fangs - the vampire!"
Bumblebee - "Do you know who my favorite is? The Hoopster Horror! I liked the books."
Scooby-Doo! Mysteries by James Gelsey
- Scooby-Doo! and the Haunted Castle
- Scooby-Doo! and the Mummy's Curse
- Scooby-Doo! and the Snow Monster
- Scooby-Doo! and the Sunken Ship
- Scooby-Doo! and the Howling Wolfman
- Scooby-Doo! and the Vampire's Revenge
- Scooby-Doo! and the Carnival Creeper
- Scooby-Doo! and the Groovy Ghost
- Scooby-Doo! and the Zombie's Treasure
- Scooby-Doo! and the Spooky Strikeout
- Scooby-Doo! and the Fairground Phantom
- Scooby-Doo! and the Frankenstein Monster
- Scooby-Doo! and the Runaway Robot
- Scooby-Doo! and the Masked Magician
- Scooby-Doo! and the Phony Fortune Teller
- Scooby-Doo! and the Toy Store Terror
- Scooby-Doo! and the Farmyard Fright
- Scooby-Doo! and the Caveman Caper
- Scooby-Doo! and the Rowdy Rodeo
- Scooby-Doo's High-Flying Adventure
- Scooby-Doo! and the Ghostly Gorilla
- Scooby-Doo! and the Vicious Viking
- Scooby-Doo! and the Karate Caper
- Scooby Doo! and the Seashore Slimer
- Scooby-Doo! and the Bowling Boogeyman
- Scooby-Doo! and the Headless Horseman
- Scooby-Doo! and the Deep Sea Diver
- Scooby-Doo! and the Sinister Sorcerer
- Scooby-Doo! and the Witch Doctor
- Scooby-Doo! and the Gruesome Goblin
- Scooby-Doo! and the Virtual Villain
- Scooby-Doo! and the Hoopster Horror
- Scooby-Doo! and the Cactus Creature
- Scooby-Doo! and the Scary Skateboarder
- Scooby-Doo! and the Monster Menace
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Spiderwick
Okay, still really busy and won't be online until at least the day after tomorrow, however while updating our Reading List/Book Series We Have Read pages (which I do 2-3 times a week) I realized that the second one was getting rather long... So, since we finished Spiderwick first, here is a post about the series, along with our opinion on the books and a list of the books so I can delete them from the page (however, the page will carry a link to this post - at least for now).
Synopsis - Spiderwick by Holly Black follows the "true" story of the Grace children (oldest Mallory, followed by twins Jared and Simon) after they move to an old house owned by their mother's family. Their mother and father are recently divorced and they lack the money to remain in the city where they used to live. While exploring the house Jared finds a book written by his great-great-uncle Arthur Spiderwick, which gives details about the different types of fairies that live in the region. Chaos ensues as different fairies try to steal the book for different reasons, the kids try to find Arthur Spiderwick, and they try to stop Mulgarath's plot. Some of the book is slightly graphic (cats get eaten, etc.)
Ash Falcon - "It was a cool story line but I've already read Fablehaven (by Brandon Mull) which was an awesome story line (admittedly, geared towards older children) and this felt a bit like a watered-down version of that. However, two things that this series does have going for it is the kids come from a divorced family - which is something that I have not come across in all of the books I have read to my kids (and we read A LOT!) and the main character - Jared - has some anger issues because of the divorce. So it was neat that the story line explored this aspect of family life. Actually, embarrassingly, my kids had no idea what divorce was before this book. I would give it a 4/5."
Optimus Prime - "I really, really liked the books and I liked the end of the bad guy."
Bumblebee - "I really, really, REALLY liked the books! I really liked Thimbletack the brownie!"
Synopsis - Spiderwick by Holly Black follows the "true" story of the Grace children (oldest Mallory, followed by twins Jared and Simon) after they move to an old house owned by their mother's family. Their mother and father are recently divorced and they lack the money to remain in the city where they used to live. While exploring the house Jared finds a book written by his great-great-uncle Arthur Spiderwick, which gives details about the different types of fairies that live in the region. Chaos ensues as different fairies try to steal the book for different reasons, the kids try to find Arthur Spiderwick, and they try to stop Mulgarath's plot. Some of the book is slightly graphic (cats get eaten, etc.)
Ash Falcon - "It was a cool story line but I've already read Fablehaven (by Brandon Mull) which was an awesome story line (admittedly, geared towards older children) and this felt a bit like a watered-down version of that. However, two things that this series does have going for it is the kids come from a divorced family - which is something that I have not come across in all of the books I have read to my kids (and we read A LOT!) and the main character - Jared - has some anger issues because of the divorce. So it was neat that the story line explored this aspect of family life. Actually, embarrassingly, my kids had no idea what divorce was before this book. I would give it a 4/5."
Optimus Prime - "I really, really liked the books and I liked the end of the bad guy."
Bumblebee - "I really, really, REALLY liked the books! I really liked Thimbletack the brownie!"
Spiderwick by Holly Black
- The Field Guide
- The Seeing Stone
- Lucinda's Secret
- The Ironwood Tree
- The Wrath of Mulgarath
- The Lost Chapters
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Settling Into First Grade
I realized that it's been over a week since I've posted - and I'm sorry. I should be back online in a day or two. We've been pretty busy settling into our new schedule and we've been working on our house. I am working on a post about our first two weeks of first grade & pre-k - however that won't be up until Friday! See you in a couple of days.
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