Week 1

Week 1 of our school year was delightful!  Truman and Henry woke up Monday morning to see everything arranged in an exciting way-with the present on top, of course.  Truman had been itching for weeks to get his hands on the new books, but to see all of his work for the day ready for him, plus a present (Pac Man), plus  a candle to light...he was in pig heaven.  This photo was taken while he was still groggy from sleep but trying

hard to wrap his brain around all the new stuff that he hadn't seen accumulating (pencils, games.)  At the last minute (2 days before) I bought the red hanging file you can see, and I stick all of his work in the openings-in no real order.  I put sticky tabs and sticky arrows on the work he is to do alone, or with Mom, and when the file is empty, he is done.  He stacks his finished work under the bookshelf, at the end of the day I put it back on the shelf or in the pile for tomorrow.  Suprisingly, I didn't think through the actual operational system, but this seems to work just fine, and is already habit...and keeps the school area nice and neat.

HISTORY/GEOGRAPHY Our first two days involved a bit of review of Ancient Egypt the division of the Roman Empire with our old Story of the World.  Truman colored a couple of maps of the area to refresh his memory, and we read the first chapter in the shiny new SOTW book 2, about the Fall of Rome.  I am thrilled that some dear soul on the yahoo groups had already assimilated AO and SOTW, so I have a nice neat map laid out for us.  Our history tale is the Little Duke, a biography of Richard, the Duke of Normandy. We read half of the first chapter, and then I had to hide the book because Truman wanted to sneak off with it and read more.  It was hard for me at first to understand the value of reading a book slowly over time to allow it to sink in, but I am definitely a convert now.  Excitment is already building about what will happen to the little boy in the castle...

READ ALOUD Truman's books to read outloud include Tree in the Trail, of which he read the first chapter, and The Little House on the Prairie-which he isn't thrilled about quite yet. 

SCIENCE We read the first two chapters of the Burgess Animal book, then  identified and carefully colored several different rabbit species using the Peterson's Field guide.  In chemistry we are reading about magnesium and we did an experiment with Epsom salt and crystal structure, inadvertantly learning a whole lot about evaporation because our solution was kept covered for too long...no biggie, though.

LITERATURE We read Shakespeare for Children, The Two Gentlemen of Verona.  I have to admit-this is not fun for me, but Truman really enjoys it.  We usually have paper dolls to help us act out the plays, but our paper doll Elizabeth, who has 16 different Shakespearian costumes, apparently cannot play the role of a man, and so this play is not included in our paper doll book.  We started Dangerous Journey, a highly illustrated version of the Pilgrim's Progress, and got such a kick out of Christian being bedaubed with mud in the Slough of Despond....Truman had to use the phrase multiple times that day because it was so novel.  I am supposed to be reading the original version of Pilgrim's Progress following my adult plan for the classical education you never had...and I did read some of the book-but fairy tales like this cause me more grief than they are worth.

COMPOSER/ARTIST Our Composer this term is Beethoven, and our book The Chiming Tower Bells is moving along, read silently by Truman ( I have read this before and so ask for narration).  We are in Beethoven's teen years now, and today is the day I start playing the music for him, now that we have the background to appreciate it more. Our Poet is Walter de la Mare, and so far, so good.  Poetry is another subject that Truman enjoys far more than Mommy, although I am very good at reading it out loud these days.  We read and listened to a folk song, The Golden Vanity, and it scares and dazzles Truman that someone could be allowed to drown.  It never ceases to amaze me what people put on YouTube, but there are many different artists performing this song, many quite good.  I am not following the AO folk song rotations, but I have no good reason why not.  Perhaps because it was easier to just spend 16 dollars on a Folk Song book plus CD.
 
HANDCRAFTS At our local homeschool conference Truman watched a leather stamping presentation, and just knew that he would be a fabulous leather-crafter, so we bought the kit.  Truman actually sat through the entire excruciatingly boring 50 minute DVD where a very old man gave a long-winded explanation of the whole process.  I decided to leave this entire area completly up to Truman.  I had to consciously hold back my hands and shut my mouth when he was decorating his little project, although I did have to insist on Truman taking the dye outside.  This is not a great craft for Mommies who deal badly with a lot of pounding and noise....like me.

Truman is still working on Cursive, he writes his and his brother's names beautifully.  He took 4 spelling tests this week (Sequential Spelling-never any memorization, just teaching the rules and writing the words.) This is a fabulous resource, and I can see that he is truly learning to spell difficult words.  His printing is all of the sudden very nice, too!

MATH This week our work is review, Adding 8's and 9's, with multiple card games.  I can tell that our Right Start curricula is ramping up for multiplication.

Truman is working on his Piano Theory, and is progressing just fine, which daily practice and carefully selected pieces that appeal to him, ie; Roller Skate Rock over Lavendar's Blue...

Our service project for the week was to pack paper bag lunches for homeless folks to keep in our car.  We see a lot of homeless people on the corners in town during the week.  Truman always wants to give them money or take them home, and we have, but too many times I was short on cash because I gave it away, so this is my solution.  The boys loved shopping for non-perishable food and assembling the lunch bags, Truman being very considerate to remember Wet Wipes so they can have clean hands to eat.  In the end, their desire to eat the chocolate pudding cups overwhelmed their desire to help more unfortunate people, and they tried to convince me that homeless people really don't like chocolate.

The last bit I will include is our NOT Back to School celebration.  On Wednesday all the neighbors had to go back to public school, and to celebrate being homeschooled, we sat on the porch and waved at all the neighbors walking to school with their moms.  Then we went to the empty skateboard park giggling.
It was pretty satysfying to be skating while all the big yellow school buses rolled past.  You could see the bused kids eyeballs staring at Truman and Henry.

                                                                                

After the skatepark, we had a Not Back to School IceCream Lunch, Mint with Gummy Bears for Truman, Cotton Candy with Cookies for Henry. Espresso for Mommy.