What's new in school
Since Kara and I did school through the summer, she was ready for a break by October. You may remember I posted about it - we took about 3 weeks off, Kara was "unschooling" the whole time (writing her book, writing code, drawing, drawing, drawing, and we were reading novels at night). After that break, we jumped right into casting. I thought we'd have more time for school since we were staying home from so many things, but casting makes Kara tired. While she adapted super quickly, the casts are heavy and we know her muscles are weak, so she is definitely working extra hard just to carry those things around. A tired girl does not equal a girl who is up for loads of learning. Since we are done with science and history for the year, I am using this time to catch up on health and math. And I'm trying to keep all the grammar we've done in her brain.
So, firstly, we always do Bible. Since Kara isn't going to Awanas (she can't run and jump and play during play time, so she wants to sit it out for a while. No biggie - casting is only through Christmas), we found a different Bible curriculum. I decided to do "The Case for Christ - for Kids" book my friend gave me. She did it with her kids and they really liked it. The book goes through every question anyone has about Jesus and gives her Biblical and historical support to answer all of those questions. I thought it was really good! (We are almost done with the book - now we're just going through scenarios/stories for what to do in situations when people try to argue Jesus wasn't real, or he wasn't really the Messiah.)
For English, we do a lot of sneaky things that don't feel like school. :-) We are reading novels at night and discussing all the things required for the curriculum - character development, comparing/contrasting characters, types of fiction, inferring extra information based on what they've said so far, etc, etc, etc. Every time she knocks it out of the park. Her comprehension is so great, which helps so much. I do have to say that poetry is getting harder and she isn't understanding that as much as she used to. Join the club, sweetie. I'm a literal person just like her and symbolism is almost always lost on me. We'll work through it and get there. I am also having her review what we learned in grammar by playing educational apps on her tablet. She is still writing her book, too, which covers a lot of the writing we need to do this year (including spelling, grammar, vocabulary). We aren't doing spelling tests right now. Abeka's 4th grade spelling is no joke and honestly looks like every other curriculum's 6th and 7th grade spelling. We will get back to it, but we are taking a break for now.
For Math, we are solidifying her multiplication tables. She is learning to multiply 2 and 3 digit numbers times each other, as well as long division. These things are certainly easier when you know your multiplication facts super well. So, we use flash cards and make up all sorts of games. We skip count. We make tables. We do something to review them every day. She is also learning geometry and she really loves that - she already did triangles (isosceles, acute, equilateral, etc), now she is doing circles (radius, diameter, circumference) and quadrilaterals (rhombus, trapezoid, parallelogram, etc.). Then, as a reward, we do Life of Fred. She begs for more and more and more of these books. They teach math concepts while telling a silly story. It also includes things like astronomy, geography, spelling, word origins, and a bunch more. We go through these books so quickly.
Lastly, we are catching up on health, which we have only done once a week up until now. We are using Abeka's 4th grade health, which I really like. The first chapter was all about bones, the second chapter was all about muscles, and we are reading the third chapter about the respiratory system. After this, health starts getting away from scientific concepts and turns more into good health habits.
And here are the books we've been reading at night: all sorts of Pippi Longstocking books (Pippi goes Onboard, Pippi in the South Seas), Ingraine the Brave (a king Arthur times book about a brave 12 year old girl who wants to be a knight and saves her whole family), and next we are going back to Warrior Cats.
Soon I will bring more writing workbooks in, then we will review everything we did in science and history to be sure she remembers them. Then I will make sure we are on track for English and Math. Then we will start bringing in composers to learn about for Music.
I've said it before and I'll say it again - I am so grateful that we got our groove of homeschooling before casting and moving. I feel super confident about it and about where we are now. Thank you, God, for this extraordinary life!!
So, firstly, we always do Bible. Since Kara isn't going to Awanas (she can't run and jump and play during play time, so she wants to sit it out for a while. No biggie - casting is only through Christmas), we found a different Bible curriculum. I decided to do "The Case for Christ - for Kids" book my friend gave me. She did it with her kids and they really liked it. The book goes through every question anyone has about Jesus and gives her Biblical and historical support to answer all of those questions. I thought it was really good! (We are almost done with the book - now we're just going through scenarios/stories for what to do in situations when people try to argue Jesus wasn't real, or he wasn't really the Messiah.)
For English, we do a lot of sneaky things that don't feel like school. :-) We are reading novels at night and discussing all the things required for the curriculum - character development, comparing/contrasting characters, types of fiction, inferring extra information based on what they've said so far, etc, etc, etc. Every time she knocks it out of the park. Her comprehension is so great, which helps so much. I do have to say that poetry is getting harder and she isn't understanding that as much as she used to. Join the club, sweetie. I'm a literal person just like her and symbolism is almost always lost on me. We'll work through it and get there. I am also having her review what we learned in grammar by playing educational apps on her tablet. She is still writing her book, too, which covers a lot of the writing we need to do this year (including spelling, grammar, vocabulary). We aren't doing spelling tests right now. Abeka's 4th grade spelling is no joke and honestly looks like every other curriculum's 6th and 7th grade spelling. We will get back to it, but we are taking a break for now.
For Math, we are solidifying her multiplication tables. She is learning to multiply 2 and 3 digit numbers times each other, as well as long division. These things are certainly easier when you know your multiplication facts super well. So, we use flash cards and make up all sorts of games. We skip count. We make tables. We do something to review them every day. She is also learning geometry and she really loves that - she already did triangles (isosceles, acute, equilateral, etc), now she is doing circles (radius, diameter, circumference) and quadrilaterals (rhombus, trapezoid, parallelogram, etc.). Then, as a reward, we do Life of Fred. She begs for more and more and more of these books. They teach math concepts while telling a silly story. It also includes things like astronomy, geography, spelling, word origins, and a bunch more. We go through these books so quickly.
Lastly, we are catching up on health, which we have only done once a week up until now. We are using Abeka's 4th grade health, which I really like. The first chapter was all about bones, the second chapter was all about muscles, and we are reading the third chapter about the respiratory system. After this, health starts getting away from scientific concepts and turns more into good health habits.
And here are the books we've been reading at night: all sorts of Pippi Longstocking books (Pippi goes Onboard, Pippi in the South Seas), Ingraine the Brave (a king Arthur times book about a brave 12 year old girl who wants to be a knight and saves her whole family), and next we are going back to Warrior Cats.
Soon I will bring more writing workbooks in, then we will review everything we did in science and history to be sure she remembers them. Then I will make sure we are on track for English and Math. Then we will start bringing in composers to learn about for Music.
I've said it before and I'll say it again - I am so grateful that we got our groove of homeschooling before casting and moving. I feel super confident about it and about where we are now. Thank you, God, for this extraordinary life!!
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