Week in Review Sept 23-27/2013

Oh my goodness what a week. I felt like I was on the go non-stop and yet when I look back we really did not accomplish much at all.

Monday morning I went in for my blood work and ecg. With the amount of blood sampled I am surprised I was able to walk out of there. This dr is definitely being thorough. The teens had shooting again in the evening. A proved his ability as a marksman again. C came within 3 mm of getting her cross rifles award.

Tuesday C had her online latin class. From the feedback I am hearing she is pretty much head of the class right now. She had to leave class a few minutes early for another trip to the city so I could see the pediatric dentist and do the consult for her upcoming dental surgery. We rushed straight to cadets upon getting back into town and the teens enjoyed their meeting while I worked in the supply room outfitting new cadets in uniforms and FTX gear.

Wednesday A had his online LOTR literature class and both teens had their online Modern Classics class where they continued to discuss Oliver Twist. In the evening I began my new job as a line cook in the diner that just opened in town. I have never cooked like this before but it went well and was not nearly as scary as it seemed.

Thursday was C's latin class again. The teens worked on their lit homework from the day before and I rested my sore back from working the night before. In the evening was kids church/youth group/adult bible study.

Friday H built himself a tipi on the front lawn, the 3 oldest kids spent an hour at the library, and I went for a play date with a friend. And I tried to focus on chores around the house because I will be working all weekend and not going to be able to do much.

Saturday I goes to her first Spark day camp and she is very excited. A friend is picking her up in the morning because I will already be at work by then. So it was a busy week, with no photo ops and no real academic work outside of the classes, but that is the way life is sometimes. We need to adjust to the addition of me working outside the house 3 days a week and tweak our schedules a little more to make it work.

Week in Review Sept 16-21/2013

Wow what a busy week this was and it wasn't a focus on academics at all.

Monday we went bowling with our local homeschool support group. It is a rare treat to have time to attend these functions and the kids were quite thrilled.

On the way home we discovered there was a community health expo in the local school so we decided to check it out. There was several community clubs there plus booths about peer pressure, exercise, healthy eating etc. The kids really enjoyed the booth about the affects of drugs and alcohol and trying on the "beer goggles" showing how various amounts of alcohol affect their ability to walk straight, reaction times etc.

Monday evening was the teens first night back on the range with cadets. A shot so well he earned his cross rifles badge and is one of only 5 in his core to have reached this achievement. The CO was quite impressed with how well A did, especially since last year his shooting wasn't so hot and he has had no practice since then. What he did have was unwaivering belief in himself that he would earn this award. He talked about it everyday over the summer, how he was going to earn his cross rifles this year. And sure enough, first night back he did. CO believes he may be able to reach the highest level of shooting award by March if he keeps it up. A has so many strikes against him and struggles with everything he does but CO says he has the makings of a true marksman. C did not fair nearly as well. She is improving, her shots are in a beautiful line, but she has some work to do on her trigger pull so she shoots true and hits the mark every time.

Tuesday and Thursday morning C participated in her online Latin class. She feels her tutor is a bit of an airhead and is frustrated at the students in the class who at 14-15 do not even know english grammar, basic parts of speech etc. It makes it that much harder to progress in Latin when the teacher has to explain everything right down to what a noun and verb are. C gets frustrated because even her 6 year old sister can recite what a noun and verb are. She is determined to do well in the course however and has asked that I create a concurrent plan for her with LC1 to challenge her further without over doing it.

Tuesday evening was the open house night at cadets. Unfortunately we did not have anyone show up other than those of us on the parent committee and the dignitaries. The media did show up at the end of the evening as the new CIC officer was sworn into the Canadian Forces. The cadets went about their normal evening and we hoped at least the parents of the new cadets would come and see what was going on this coming year, hear about what the parent committee is doing etc but nope. Pretty typical, but still unfortunate.

Wednesday morning A had his online LOTR lit class and for the first time ever he stayed not only seated listening to class but actually participating. Normally I have to send him back to the office repeatedly to stay in his class. In the afternoon I had to attend a Dr's appt. More appts to come in the upcoming weeks.

Thursday we headed for the city to see a specialist for H's leg per his lawsuit. Only we got lost and by the time we found the place the specialist had left. So we have to wait for a new appt to be scheduled. We celebrated I's 6th birthday with gramma and poppa that evening, took advantage of being in town to go to the teacher store and then headed home finally.

Friday was a double field trip day. We went to the Museum in a town 1 hour from here and explored the new exhibits, the taxidermy/hunting cabin exibit (which wrapped up our study of Frontiersmen/tracking/predator/prey with konos quite nicely), and the travelling exhibit. The travelling exhibit was beautiful water color painting on silks. They were hung around the room and soft music and water fountains were running. The silks would ripple in the breeze and give a wonderful feeling of movement within them.



Following the museum we headed to our favorite Border City Petting Zoo and saw the new lemurs they aqcired in July. This was a family farm turned into exotic animal rescue and is so much fun to go to. The owners are a wonderful couple who do their best to care for these animals. The farm animals you can go into their pens to pet them, the exotics you can't. The wife remembers us from year after year (even if we only make it there once a year) and she and I usually have a good talk about the animals, future plans, teaching natural studies etc.

For fun before we got to the museum we decided to take some pictures at the border marker. The city we head to has the border between Alberta and Saskatchewan running right through the middle, so we parked in the Arby's parking lot and stood on the sidewalk in front and took pictures of the kids being in 2 places at one time which they thought was terribly clever lol They all have their eyes squinted shut however due to the sun shining right at them.

Of course after the field trips we zoomed back to town for the kids kuk sool won classes. This week they really got into it and are thoroughly enjoying their classes.

Academically we did finish a bit of work this week but not a great deal. As mentioned above we finished the Konos study of Frontiersmen/tracking/predator/prey. We discussed camoflage and ways animals protect themselves further such as through trickery. We discussed how the devil lies and tries to trick you into sinning and how he can camoflage himself to look like something is good when it is not. We discussed how bad guys can use trickery to lure you into danger and how to avoid those pitfalls. We read more about Daniel Boone, how polar bears hide their noses to blend in with the snow, and then played with th track rubbing plates and track rubber stamps.

A and C each completed a unit in spelling. H completed another unit in math, this one was about estimation and rounding. And of course the online classes and subsequent homework mentioned above. The teens missed their modern classics lit class this week due to my dr's appt but they got their homework assignment for next week and they will be right back in the mix.

So it was a very busy fun week. Next week will be back to being a regular academically focused week.

Week in Review Sept 9-14, 2013

Wow another week has blown by. This week marked the return of extracurriculars and of online classes.

Monday was I's first night in sparks (the youngest level of girl guides of Canada) and the parent meeting outlining the new year. We already got the paperwork for her first daycamp of the year to take place on sept 28th.

Tuesday C was in her online latin class from 845-945am, normally she will have this class every Tuesday and Thursday at that time slot but this week there was no Thursday class because it was orientation week.

Tuesday evening A and C returned to cadets. Both were chosen to participate in the Army cadet challenge the weekend of Sept 27-29/13. They are also both going to be going in every Monday afternoon for range practice as they try out for the new shooting competition team.

Wednesday morning marked the start of A's online lit class "Lord of the Rings". His homework this week is the first 5 chapters of the Hobbit. In the afternoon both A and C had their lit class "Modern Classics" homework this week is the first 13 chapters of Oliver Twist.

Thursday was the return of kids church for H and I, Youth group for A and C and Adult bible study for myself. Kids church has new teachers but it looks like it will be a great year.

Friday all 4 kids started in kuk sool won. H and I went for the 1st hour block for the children's class. They are 2 of 6 students so a nice small class. A and C are in the adult class that follows the children's class. There is 1 other adult in the class so they get a lot of 1-on-1 instruction. All 4 loved what they learned already and can't wait for next week.

Around all of that we also did school:

In Konos this week they continued their study of Frontiersmen, specifically Daniel Boone and also did a study of predator and prey. They:

*read several more chapters of our Daniel Boone book

*discussed the difference betwenn carnivore and herbivore

*discussed what a predator is and what prey is and how an animal could be both

*discussed methods in which different animals protect themselves from predators (quills, claws, shell, teeth, playing dead etc)

*Played Top Trumps Predator card game

*searched for signs of beavers by the trout pond in the provincial park

*discussed how animals/insects use camoflage to hide

*searched for critters hiding using camoflage
*used tye dye to make their own camoflage t-shirts
*went to store to examine various animal traps

*studied a rat trap up close to see how it works to trap the rodent

*Discussed how mountainmen make markers to signal where they went/have been, and made their own signs with sticks and rocks

*learned how a polar bear hides it's nose when it is hunting so that it can be "invisible" on the ice.

In math

A & C did another unit in MUS Delta, unit 12 for A, unit 15 for C. H completed unit 3 in MUS beta, and I did 18 pages in mathematical reasoning beginning book 2.

In Language arts

H & I did 4 days in learning language arts through literature

I did 4 lessons in language lessons for little ones

H did 2 lessons in R&S 2

Both did 4 days in HWOT, AAR and H did 4 days in AAS

Both did 1 week worth in WWE 1

In English the teens focused on their online lit classes today and C finished off week 9 in meaningful composition book 4+. Both completed some cursive practice.

In Science we read from Apologia elementary Botany book and documented in the nature journals the midrib and veins of leaves. The kids examined a horned tomato worm, grasshoppers and the holes drilled by woodpeckers. The teens completed another reading selection from Apologia physical science and will be doing another lab later this afternoon to catch up on missed work from this week.







The teens continued to work towards their physical fitness goals they set last week and spent time running lines, doing crunches and push ups and today added in practicing their rolls from kuk sool won.

Friday we decided to enjoy the beautiful day and freedom we have as homeschoolers and went for a picnic lunch in the provincial park. We pulled out our books and got quite a lot of school work completed including much of the konos listed above that needed to be done in the great outdoors. Climbing trees, exploring for nature signs, and playing with the dogs were the highlights of our afternoon.