We tried something new this week: spelling first. Things went so much better. I know people always say start with Bible, but starting with spelling really changed the pace of the day. It seemed like it helped the kids get in the mindset of school time, and it gets our longest rotation out of the way.
In Bible time, besides continuing in Matthew, we also learned about Haiti and the needs of the people there. Haiti has a special place in our heart as last year our Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes went to Haiti. Someone on the Facebook ECC group suggested not only putting the flag sticker from the country we're studying for geography in our passports, but also the flags of the countries we study during Bible time from Window on the World. I think I'm going to start doing that. I also found a great article on World Magazine's website about some more current work in Haiti: Bearing fruit.
It seems like we're playing the geography game every other day now. It has been good for the kids to learn the North American countries. Pooh wins most of the time. This of course brings out the ultra-competitive nature of my boys!
Science has continued mostly on deserts. Properties of Ecosystems has gotten more interesting and we even done the demonstration/experiments.
In Math the boys started long division. That one is tricky. I suspect we'll be working on it for a while.
Both boys have finished their All About Spelling levels. We are now going through all the word cards. Any words misspelled will be put in the review section for the next level.
Rabbit is really struggling again in math. I think it is because she forgets how to set things up. And sometimes she forgets to finish a problem. For example, the question will be to find the volume of a cylinder. She'll get the area of the circle on the end, but then forget to multiply that by the height. Little things, but they add up to some big frustrations for her. I'm not sure what to do. She doesn't want to change programs. I have thought about giving her a break from math once we finish up 8/7. Maybe not start up Algebra 1 until January, and just do math facts and whatever math comes up in science. It would give her brain some time to process what she has learned and some rest, too. Just a thought that occurred after praying about it.
In Apologia Physical Science we had a total fail on one of the experiments this week. We couldn't get the test tubes to balance on the battery, and "London Bridge came falling down." Plus, when the text said the water would be toxic, that made Rabbit nervous. But, our water as a solvent experiment went well.
The kids are still working on our piñata. They have two sides done, but I'm not sure they will ever finish!
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