I realise that (not including the first month of September when A was in kindergarten) we have been homeschooling for an entire Semester/ term. I thought I'd evaluate how things are going and think about plans for the new year.
Reading - A is doing so great with her reading. There are several books now that she ca read entirely on her own....she reads, for the most part, phonetically. Her favourite book is 'Ducks can't count' which is an 'independent reader' and has several short stories inside. She reads signs and subtitles on tv and can read enough to scroll through the channels on the tv guide to find her favourite shows.
Writing - A goes through phases where she loves to write and then other phases where she just isn't interested at all. Right now she's not interested at all so I don't push it.....I just bought a book called The Three R's by Ruth Beechick, so maybe I will get a few ideas from there - I also have the Write Now books which the others loved and I may even do a little copywork a la Charlotte Mason! Who knows....I do know A would like to make some books and have them made ring-bound...so maybe we will do that in the new year....
math - A continues to do great in math - most days her computer time is spent using her math cd which is for 6 - 7 year olds and most of which she can fly through....she ahs to get 14 stars to finish the cd and each time she plays she starts from scratch again - well she almost always gets around 12 or so stars.....it doesn't take her long. Math is still her favourite thing to do!
art - arts and crafts are just constant here - we've done a lot of work on mixing colours...not just the typical colours, but different shades too! We've used all kinds of materials to create works of art...and we also followed an online site to learn about other works of art such as music.....
science - a trip to the science centre.....reading through A's science pack of books which each comes with questions to ask to check understanding as well as a little experiment to show one of the ideas from the book.....we made gak.....lots of conversations about the weather.....a trip to a honey bee centre.....trip to vancouver Aquarium.....lots of baking...In the new year I plan more trips to the science centre.....and just a continuation of what we have been doing....
phys ed - swimming, walking, running, sledding, rock climbing in Whistler, indoor playground at MP, A also does various dancing, yoga etc using dvd's etc at home with her sister, trampolining, monkey bars......juggling, skipping, slide etc etc
social - learning about Margori - the little girl we sponsor in Peru.....Peru is one of the countries covered in a later grade but I figured it was good to learn about it because of our connection with Margori. We just sponsored another child and will learn about her and her country in the new year as soon as we get more information on her..........I think in the new year I would also like to start learning about Canada - just the basics like where we live, the provinces...where it is on the globe....and have her place Vancouver and Toronto. We are visiting Toronto in April so it will be good to learn a bit about the city before we go. I think its a good excuse for another visit to the Royal Alberta museum too :)
Generally I think things have gone really well - most importantly A is back to her usual happy self - no more doing her nervous nose twitching thing she was doing while in school......back to loving math and advancing with her reading etc....and she is still able to have a relaxed lifestyle, lazy days when needed, spend day after day doing crafts or day after day doing math - whatever she feels like doing :)
For now we are enjoying doing plenty of Christmasy activities and crafts and learning all about own own traditions.
3 days ago
