Homeschool Wrap Up~ Autumn

Our basket on the hearth. This is where we keep all of our books that we read together for the most part. We usually start the day with reading together on the living room couch. It doesn't matter how old or how many books they read on their own, they all like to hear mom read to them.

M-7 's Fairy Tale Language Arts curriculum from Christopherus. So gentle and dreamy. We love coloring the pictures in our main lesson books with beeswax crayons. I would usually have a certain 10 year old boy listening in as well.

M-7's~

Mom's~

Mom's~

M-7's~

The Christopherus math main lesson was a story about four little squirrels. Waldorf math works with all four processes together showing how they interconnect. We used real nuts as manipulatives to tell stories of the squirrel's adventures with addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. The next day we would create a picture of some of the math problems and the part of the story we told. This is a two day rythym that goes from the concrete (manipulatives) to the abstract (drawing the math sentences pictorially).

Poetry~ We have been reading my favorite poet, Robert Louis Stevenson. I read either one longish poem or a couple short ones every day then we discuss unfamiliar words and the rhyme scheme. M-7 reads the last word of each line, finding the rhymes, then we all work out the pattern (ABAB etc.). The other book, Around the Year, has a poem for each month of the year. Ideally, we read the designated poem at the start of each month, but I think we missed a few. Well, it's January so we can start fresh!

Math~ We read through Mathematicians Are People, Too and it was a favorite of the boys especially. Often we would take the ideas of whatever mathematician we had just read about and do some math! Everyone also likes the Sir Cumference books and then doing some problems. The World of Numbers is from a waldorf curriculum called Live Ed. It has some great stories about knights and the quality of numbers that everyone enjoyed.

Seasonal Stories~ Autumn is my favorite season! Usually I would include lots of Halloween and Thanksgiving books but this year we were too sick!

Virtuous Living~ We read through The Children's Book of Virtues series and had some great discussions. A favorite was from the Book of Heroes about Father Flanagan and Boy's Town. We went to the Boy's Town website and I still mean to rent the old movie for us to see. The Lion Storyteller Bedtime Book has short versions of fables and folk tales while the Oakmeadow Folk Tales book has longer versions. I use the Aesop's Fables for M-7's narrating. She usually chooses to act out the story which can be fun. I read one Aesop, one Book of Virtue story and one Folk Tale a day.

Five in a Row unit study~ It's pretty sad that we only got through two books considering it's my all time favorite curriculum that I recommend to every new homeschooler! I mostly use it with just M-7 now, but sometimes the older ones will join in. We made a great Fold n Learn of The Wild Horses of Sweetbriar that I might show in a separate post.

Read Aloud and Beyond Five in a Row~ Oh dear, I was really slacking this fall! We usually read at least 5 books by December! (Again, I am blaming us all being sick with the flu starting in October, Thanksgiving trip and taking December off for my surgery!) We did a quick Beyond Fiar unit with The Cricket in Times Square. Usually these units work through a chapter a week, but there is NO way my kids could wait for that. We read one chapter a day and discuss the lessons in the manual in a conversational way. A different way than intended, but it works for us. The Little Princess was M-7's book club selection and we all loved it. (It's my favorite!) I am not including books that the kids read on their own. Honestly, I can't keep up with them. They all read. All. The. Time.

History~ The truth is we don't read from the book but the boys in particular listen to the cd. (Over and over. All four volumes.) It would be redundant to read it again. We go to History Club twice a month where they do projects and discussion from the book and activity guide. I really love this resource and the cds have been a big part of our education. My kids know a LOT about history.

Science and Core Knowledge~ That Berenstein Bears book might look too simple, but I'll say it has good science information in it! Physics, simple machines, matter. It's all in there in an engaging way. I liked how my boys would say, "Oh, I know about that." and give us the expanded version of whatever concept I was going to read about. Great review! I also started to read the Core Knowledge books science section, but it is a bit dry. I do really love the poetry, literature selections and other language arts sections of the book, though and read those. The kids particularly like the idioms section and telling me what they mean. I think I'll use other resources for science this next semester but continue the Core Knowledge books (I have them up to 6th grade) for scope and sequence and a starting point for the art and music sections.

**************************************************************

L-14:

Math with weekly math mentor

Co-op Writing class

Co-op Shakespeare class

Piano

Choir

C-12

Spectrum Math and Calculadders

Spelling: Phonics Pathways

Writing: Copywork and fact finding

Violin

P-10

Spectrum Math and Calculadders

Spelling: Phonics Pathways

Writing: Copywork

Piano

M-7

Calculadder (drill sheets that she begs to do!)

Spelling: games

Piano

That's the wrap up! I think we got a fair amount accomplished, considering.