Week in Review - Dec 7, 2012

I don't do these very often, but thought you might like to know what we are doing recently!

We have just started Term 2 of our AO year.  So for Delta, he is in term 2 of Year 2; Echo is in term 2 of Year 1.  Things have been going quite well this year overall - once we got the routine going.  That said - I made a minor change this term....

I decided to try having Friday being a "Family Studies" day.... instead of having a Rotation of things like Hymn Study and Folk Songs, and Drawing, etc.... (that often seemed to never happen) - these will now happen on Friday.

Here is a breakdown of our new Fridays!  They will go roughly in this order.... but not always

• Scriptures (everyday)
• Memory Work  (everyday)
• PhysEd  (5BX or XBX)
• Hymn Study
• Composer Study (will probably try to have this playing in the background mostly)
• Picture Study
• Mapping
• Timeline
• German Songs
• ASL Songs
• Folk Songs
• Drawing
• Poetry
• Math Lesson (usually a game)
• Leftover Readings from the AO Week (or a Free Reading)
• Nature Study

I think this is going to work out well.  That said - we haven't done Nature Study yet... (sigh).  But most of the rest was done - and I hope to get things going smoothly by having things prepared the day before.

Oh, one other change I made - I've taken our scripture memory box - found out which scriptures Delta and Echo knew well... and made scripture cards in different colours for each child.  Doing it together as a family wasn't working for Foxtrot - and sometimes Delta and Echo didn't know them either. This seems to work better so far.

As for the rest of the week - here is the basic plan we use...   I do mostly encourage them to do it in order (because I have it setup to try to vary items - and they are more likely to miss things if they do it out of order.)  They have a list of the AO (and modifications) Readings for the week, and choose when to do them.  This is working out great - I remember our first year trying AO I had things assigned on certain days - and we ended up being on Week 12 of some book, Week 9 of another, etc...  it got confusing.  But by just having times scheduled to read from the list, with the rule that they must finish the readings from one week before starting the next - well, it is so simple!  And as a bonus - I get to find out which books they love and which ones they really don't....

• Scriptures
• Memory Work
• PhysEd (5BX or XBX)
• Copywork (& Dictation)
• Readings from List
• Foreign Language (German one day, ASL the next...)
• Readings from List
• Math
• Free Reading

So - what are we up to?

Delta

• Enjoying learning about the Crusades and Richard the Lion Heart. He can't wait to start Robin Hood next term.
• Doing great with RightStart Math.
• Writing quite neatly with Joined Italic.  Moving towards no longer using a middle line, and then copying from another book (no model)
• Loving Tree in the Trail
• Was thrilled that Understood Betsy is done.  (He never liked that book....)
• Wants to draw a map of Tree in the Trail (although the other week he said of the Crusades.....)

Echo

• Discovered that Moroni hid the plates close to the time that the Romans left Britain.  (You have to love timeline books!)
• Enjoying RightStart Math level C
• Doing much better at writing with Italic.  She was thrilled to be moved to using the Copywork Jar.  She does still sometimes write letters/numbers backwards still (something she has always struggle with more than the other kids.)
• Loves Paddle to the Sea

Foxtrot

• Is on Lesson 90 in "Teach your Child to read in 100 Easy Lessons".  She is also reading books on her own to herself.
• LOVES RightStart Math Level A
• We are starting "Drawing with Children"... and I did the evaluation exercises to see where to start - she is firmly in Level 2!  Wow!
• Is happy to have her own Scripture to learn
• Enjoys Picture Study - wishes she had her own "Masterpieces" Album.  (That is something they get when they start Year 1 - as a special thing....)

Golf

• Loves to play with Tally Sticks and Tiles while I do math with Foxtrot.
• Loves drawing and colouring (and is definitely Right Handed)

Well - not sure how interesting this is - but that is what is going on here!