Dictionaries

I remember when I was homeschooling my older children every curriculum recommended a dictionary. That was the must have to complete any curriculum you chose. I have hung on to the dictionary that my kid’s used way back when. The other day in our reading, Selena came across a new word, she read it then asked, “Mama what does that word mean?” Not even thinking I grabbed the dictionary off the shelf and said let’s look it up. With a little assistance Selena found the word easily and we learned the definition of the word and how it is used in a sentence.

After we put our school work away, Selena now fascinated with the dictionary grabbed it and planted herself on the floor. She kept asking me to give her words. She worked very hard to think of how each word sounded and found them all in the dictionary. I did start with some easy words at first that I knew would either have a picture like bird, or words I knew she would easily recognize when she seen it. We then proceeded on to harder more difficult words. Selena looked each and every word up with little effort. She then decided the dictionary would be an interesting book to just sit and read, so she could learn all sorts of new words, according to her.

She loves her new found tool, and I am thrilled that I did indeed hang on to this little treasure. It is so easy for us today to run to the computer and with a quick search find the meaning of any word we want, but I think it is even greater when a child takes the time to learn how to find that same word in the pages of a dictionary.

Analyzing Our Classroom By Selena

On Tuesday evening Selena got so into writing out her numbers 0 through over 100 counting by 10s. It was fun to watch as she followed the pattern and so confidently wrote her numbers. While this is something we have played with in the past, I really wasn’t sure it was making much sense to Selena until she finally showed me her ability. I drew her close when she was finished and asked her how well she is enjoying school this year? and What changes would she like to see? Her answers did not surprise me, “I like my school work, especially my books. I would love to have more free learning of my choice, geography, crafts, Internet searches and exploring.”

We woke yesterday morning and Selena quickly jumped in and did a page of Math. I then called the day our official unschooling day with all books set aside for the most part. One of the first things I wanted to do though was start our Time Line based on our curriculum. I explained to Selena what a time line is, and how we can refer to it for so many things. We decided to pull out all her little booklets and begin our time line from the very beginning of creation.

We wrote the information on large index cards starting with Day one of Creation and moving on to Day 2 and then Day 3. This brings us up to current of where she is in her curriculum. She of course wanted to hang these on the wall, but I talked her into getting a file box instead. Though I wanted to dig deeper, as anyone who follows my blog knows we do a lot of that. I set out to explain to Selena God’s perfect plan.

We broke this down into each day. On day 1 God created light, sun, stars, and moon. We then discussed why did he create the sun. Selena was very quick to point out that we need the Sun for warmth and with out the Sun we would not have life. We moved on to Day 2 God created the land and water. Selena pointed out that we need water, we all have to drink water, we need the dry land and good soil to grow food. This brought us to Day 3 God created all the plants and trees. This is where I took over the discussion and dug in deeper explaining the importance of plants and trees to our environment and life then just the foods we get from them. Selena loved seeing my ease of use of Chemistry abbreviations for Oxygen and Carbon Dioxide that I started to loose her a bit, she wanted to see more of these abbreviations. Pulled back on track it wasn’t long before Selena announced, “God knew just what He was doing and had us in mind throughout all creation, everything was created for us!”

We moved from this to the computer and discovered that a Killer Whale was tagged or tracked in the waters off Grays Harbor. The first thing Selena asked, “What does a Killer Whale look like?”

No sooner then the picture loaded Selena shouted, “That is an Orca!” I love Orcas!” I pointed out that the Orca and the Killer Whale are one in the same. I thought we would dig deeper into this concept but Selena decided that was enough for today, she was still hung up on the fact that a Killer Whale is truly an Orca.

On one of our adventures out to the barn Selena discovered a bird’s nest, which brought about so many questions, “How did it get there?, What type bird built it? and Why would birds build a nest so close to where the horses eat?”

We set out to answer some of these questions. We quickly discovered that this nest would be the home of a Swallow or Barn Swallow.

We read how this little bird builds it’s nest, by gathering mud pellets in it’s mouth, then mixing this with it’s saliva to create a sticky paste to hold straw or hay on the side of the barn wall or in this case beam. We then discussed that many birds like to hang out where horses live, because horses provide a great source of nesting material as well as when ever they move, they stir up bugs that birds like to eat. Selena of course was worried that the horses would hurt the birds, but that was quickly explained that most of the time the horses don’t even know the birds are around them.

It truly was fun to have a day of free child led learning. I know we will be doing a lot more of this. We both love our little curriculum, and Selena is mastering a lot of skills from it, but we both want to get back to extending our schooling back on the unschooling side. I think we are off to a very nice start.

Our January

Poor Pal, in the above picture dressed up in a baby sleeper, but boy if he isn’t good about putting up with what ever torture Selena puts him through. That look on his face is so cute and you can see him looking at me just begging, “Hurry up take the picture and get me out of this mess!” No, really Selena is very good with Pal and doesn’t torture him too much.

We had a rough time getting back into school after a long break. I really wanted to get back to school before we did but I also wanted to make sure Selena was totally healed from her tonsillectomy. Right after the first of the month she had her yearly physical and received her flu vaccination, well she came down with a bug right after that and was pretty miserable for the rest of the week. Finally she got over that and we were able to get back to school.

Selena is doing very well with her writing, it is improving all the time. She told me the other day, “Grandma I love my school books!” I am really happy to see her taking to her curriculum so well and working so hard. She is becoming more independent and so we are in the process of making a check off list that she can follow on her own.

She is truly showing us that she is six years old. While, I have seen worse, we are having a little of the testy attitude. Through consistency though she is improving and now we see it more when she is tired in the evening. I had a good laugh the other day when she asked me, “Grandma how long do I have to wait for my Birthday? I can’t wait to turn 7.” I couldn’t help but think, “I can’t either!” I asked her why she wanted to be 7 and she informed me, “I don’t want to be 6 anymore, I want to be 7 now.”

One of the things the doctors told us going into the tonsillectomy, and I had read it somewhere here in the Internet is that sometimes slight hyper activity can be caused by chronic tonsillitis. It is amazing the difference we are seeing in Selena since her tonsillectomy. She has her moments like any child, but she quickly calms herself and transitions into a quiet play or cuddle time. Who would have thought that the tonsils would affect a child in such a way?

It is very obvious though that Selena is getting cabin fever, just as she healed from everything our weather dipped way cold, freezing through the night. We had hoped to get out today for some fun time and burn off some energy, but we had quite a cold breeze all day long which was very bone chilling. I know her and I have to go to town and get her a new softball mitt, so we are hoping for one more sunny day even if it is cold, to just go and have some fun girl time. We do have a couple of play dates for next week, so that should help with some of her cabin fever.

Why Did God Make Holes?

We were reading today in our Science that on the third day of creation God made earth, but he also made holes in the Earth. I stopped Selena right there and asked her, “Why do you think God made holes in our earth?” She wasn’t too sure of her answer, so I ran and grabbed some supplies, we moved quickly to the dining room table where we explored the answer to this question.

Normally this would be an experiment that I would have taken outside, in the dirt for some real muddy fun, but our weather is not quite cooperative for this type of experiment this time of year. With that said I went to the next best thing, a pie tin, some flour and water.

With a cup of flour in the pie tin, I tried to flatten it out as much as I could and we poured a little bit of water on it. Selena could quickly see that the water went where ever it wanted.

As you can see, Selena quickly made a hole before I could even snap the picture, she was going to have as much fun before Mama said this is enough! With our hole made we then poured water just into the hole. Selena quickly could see a lake form.

Then the fun really began, as we attempted to make a river. Once the first river was made then Selena was ready to dig right in and create as many rivers as she could, knowing Mama was going to put everything up too quickly.

This will be an experiment that we will do a lot more with when we can get outside and get really muddy.

I am linking this up at Adventures in momydom’s Science Sunday.

Quick Update

It’s been a while since I have done any sort of update on what we are doing in homeschool. With the Christmas tree in the house we had to move Selena’s desk, so she now does school in the dining room. She hasn’t seemed to mind the change and is still eager to get to school as early as I will let her.

I am seeing a lot more maturity and self confidence these days. She is more willing to sit and do as much as I ask her to do. That is not to say that when she has had enough she isn’t afraid to tell me so, but usually by this time we are finishing up, so she will hang on until I say so.

A couple of funny things that happened this week to share with all of you. Selena had a final test in her Social Studies. She made a couple of mistakes, basically just from not paying attention to what she was reading, but it dropped her grade from 100% to 95%. She was so upset to not see me write 100% on her paper, “It’s not fair, that grade is too low!” I tried to explain that 95% was a good grade and still an A, but she wasn’t going to buy it. After numerous of my friends on Facebook wrote her a sweet note of encouragement, she finally felt better about the 95%. If anything maybe she will learn to slow down and pay a little more attention.

In her Science there was a reference as to how men use to think the world was flat. I decided it would be fun to talk about this and found a lot of information about Christopher Columbus. As I presented the material, and explained that at one time yes, indeed men thought the world was flat, Selena looked up, and told me, “I am not buying this, after all God made the world round.” That was it she was done and wasn’t going to listen to any more. Who can argue with God? We will revisit this discussion another time.

Selena is becoming more confident in her writing and is often found writing on the white board, letters, words and her numbers. I know her confidence growing in this area has made school easier and more enjoyable for both of us.

We are still struggling with the sore throats and tonsils. We take her back to the ENT on Friday. I am so tired of having a sick child, and believe me you can see it on her face that she is not feeling well, that and the fact that she lays around most of the day and her appetite isn’t as healthy as it should be. This time though Papa is going with us, we feel strongly it is time to do something different here. I will let you know what we decide.

Weekly Wrap Up

With it being a short week, it seems like the week just got away from me. Missing Monday really threw me off, but how could we do school when Papa was home? We always cherish every moment we have to spend as a family, even though the weather was not suitable for outside activities we had so much fun laughing, playing, and talking throughout the day.

Selena continued to insist this week that all she wants for Christmas is a padded oven mitt, a jar (to put the food in that she makes), a dinosaur train, and a soft cuddly blanket. The jar just threw me, I was trying to figure that out all week long, did she want a mason jar? What type of jar did she want? Finally she told me again, I want a jar with poke-a-dots on it. I still was not getting it, so I asked her if I had one? She said so matter-of-fact, “Yes, in the cupboard!” As soon as I opened the cupboard, the light bulb went off and of course as soon as she spotted it she had to have it.

Boy if this is truly going to make her so happy I will gladly go to the dollar store and buy as many as I can!

As for school this week, we continue to work our way through all our subjects. Due to the higher volume of handwriting that meets us daily, we are making a few changes. We will probably cut back by doing Science one day, then Social Studies the next. Even the math drills are getting quite lengthy but so far Selena is not complaining about that. I am thrilled to see her handling all the reading, which really shouldn’t surprise me, as well as her ability to recall the facts of what she has read days later. She is getting more confident in her writing abilities both with the alphabet and numbers.

On another note, Monday we take Selena to a ENT Specialist. For the past month now Selena has had swollen tonsils, and is going through her second bout with strep. While she doesn’t complain too much I know she isn’t feeling herself, some days the appetite is good, and other days, well lets say she just eats softer foods. I will keep you posted on what the ENT has to say.

We are looking forward to another short week, and for Thanksgiving. We will be staying home and I will be cooking our feast. We use to go to my Uncle’s for Thanksgiving, and while I love to see my family, I truly just love to be at home doing the cooking myself. Plus then we get all the left overs! 

Week Wrap up

Our week started out a little rough, Selena wanted to push the limits in school, she was wanting to only do half the work, hurry through making careless mistakes, or scribble on some of the pages. I finally had to put my foot down and establish a few new rules.

1. No cartoon until all school work is done.
2. No cartoon if school work does not show that she is trying her best.
3. No cartoon if we have a bad attitude.

Boy, Selena has taken all these rules very seriously. She awakes of a morning, waits patiently for her breakfast, then runs and gets dressed and is ready to get started in school. She will sit and do all her school work in one sitting and with not one complaint. Though at times she tries to talk me into letting her do something the following day, if I say no, she does the work without another word.

We had been having some problems with math early on this week, I couldn’t figure out what was going on, we added the math buddies back in, tried M&M math, but Selena just wasn’t quite responding. I even tried the simple number line.

That still wasn’t quite cutting it with Selena. Finally it dawned on me, she has been working with these methods for the last couple of years, she is wanting something new. We are now focusing on counting forward, that has her intrigued to think she can look at 5 + 4 and just start from 5 and count 4 more to get the answer. She is allowed to place 4 small dots on her paper next to the problem, to assist her in her counting.

We’ve taken a lot of relaxed time with bird watching, a lot of play filled with laughter, watching the Lion King II, and a little money play. I thought it was so cute when Selena took quarters and pennies to make Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, and a second Mickey Mouse.

Of course Selena had to show me how she could turn herself into Mickey, if only I would have had a bow handy she would have been Minnie.

We all had doctors appointments yesterday. Selena’s tonsils are still enlarged, so yet another culture. She really wants to avoid having her tonsils removed, but is not totally dismissing that at this point. I had to go in as early in the week, I thought I was getting a pimple on my nose, but it just was refusing to come to a head or heal, as it ends up I have an abscess so on antibiotics I had to go. I will be so glad when this family is finally all well, this has been a tough year for everyone in the community with colds, sore throats, and nasty colds.

It has been extremely damp and cold even though we have had a lot of sunshine. The cold has kept us indoors which has been rough as I know Selena truly sees the sun and yearns to run around or ride her bike.

So Proud

Today Selena had a lot of school work to get accomplished. One of her least favorite subjects is math. I get such a kick out of her though as we incorporate her math buddies from last year and M&Ms or blocks to give her more hands on to solve her math problems, half way through the page she gives up these manipulates and uses her number line or solves the problems in her head. I feel at this point it is not a matter of her not knowing how to do the math, but more of it just not being a favorite of hers.

Her writing is improving every day. I do however need to post an alphabet chart so that she can refer to the letters just to refresh herself on how they are made before writing them. I did this with her numbers and it has made a world of difference for her. I was especially proud when she wrote out her own homework from Team Kid this weekend. In the past she would dictate it and I would write it for her, but not this week, she felt confident enough to do the writing herself.

The other observation I am noticing is that Selena is becoming very competent in remembering the information she read, even if a few days have gone by. If she is unsure, she easily looks back  through her reading and finds the answer. Along with this is coming the skill of spelling the words she is asked to fill in the blank with. Many times she is able to choose the word that completes the sentence, and write it with much ease and confidence in the spelling of the word.

The other thing I have added is a notebook, that Selena uses to express her thoughts in, sometimes she draws pictures and sometimes she writes words. It is fun to see how comfortable she is becoming in both areas, drawing and writing. For a girl who lacked confidence in both areas last year, she is sure coming a long way this year.

We are moving into mid booklet tests and final booklet tests tomorrow. I am looking forward to seeing how well she does.

Week in Review

We had a fairly busy week. While we do not celebrate Halloween in the traditional manner, we still enjoy some pumpkin fun, art time, and of course eating candy. Selena had so much fun yet again this year with her pumpkin. Papa picked it out this year and surprised her.

 

Our pumpkins always get cooked off and froze for pumpkin pies and cookies. Just out of this pumpkin alone we got enough pumpkin for 10 pies and two batches of cookies.

Selena and I both love the Autumn colors. We enjoyed a lot of exploring these colors in nature, while it rained for a good part of the week, there were still a lot of looking going on, looking for all the red, yellow and orange signs of Autumn.

After observing all the colors of Autumn around us, it was time to pull out the paints and create our own Autumn art.

We finished up our first booklet in our PACE History curriculum and are very close to finishing up our first Science booklet as well. Selena is looking forward to digging into the new booklets to see what new words she will learn to write. We also had fun in math, adding a little hands on just to try to take some of the hum drums out of the repetitiveness, one of Selena’s worse complaint is the repetitiveness of most subjects.

First grade is moving right along, Selena is learning a lot and we are having fun making new discoveries.

Tests, Fun and Art

Yesterday, Selena had to finish her first booklet of her curriculum in History with a 4 page test. Not that there was a lot of work on each page, but she was tired of writing the same words throughout the booklet. I encouraged her to keep going, she moaned, she complained, but yes, she finished, well not before I showed her the second booklet so she could see that she would be learning new words. She was very proud of her accomplishment and enjoyed seeing me sign off on the booklet. We might see this struggle as we near the end of each booklet, but we will push through, since it is not a lot of repetitiveness and after all Selena does have to learn that some repetitiveness is expected.

Now math was even a little trickier to keep her engaged. She knows her math facts, and so to see three pages of math facts was very unappealing to her. I thought about it, and after taking her learning style into consideration, I decided to help her make her math a little more fun.

I allowed her to use her pattern blocks to work each problem on the page. Even though she had the answer to the problem before she started laying it out with the blocks, this broke up the repetitiveness of just writing the answers. I hear many ask how to keep their child engaged, or how to make them finish their work, my answer is just make it fun.

When all our school work was done, I decided it was time for some fun art. Selena didn’t want to bake cookies, so I went into the art supplies and we had fun painting.

This was also a great time to work on following directions. I covered the table with plastic, then took a square piece of plastic and taped it down. I explained to Selena that the tape was like her frame, and no paint could end up on the outside of the tape.

Selena listened enthusiastically as I gave her the rest of the instructions.

1. She was not to blend the colors.
2. She could only use her finger tips.
3. Have fun and be creative.

After a little bit of thought Selena started in. She had a lot of fun. By the end she finally was allowed to blend some colors, and add a little texture to her art work.

Her finished art work. When it dries we will hang it in the window, since it is on plastic, I have a feeling that the colors will look really pretty with the light shining through it.

Lessons I’ve Learned

Do you have a self motivated learner who does not like repetitive work? I know I have one! We always knew she could write more then she was willing to show us, it was a matter of getting her to do so. We told her this year we were going to focus on handwriting, we didn’t expect it to be perfect, but we did expect her to try. With that said, I thought to myself now how do we make this happen?

Here are my suggestions for those who have a hesitant self learner, just not wanting to do repetitive work, yet wanting to learn to write. Keep in mind that this is a skill that some come to early and others need more time to develop.

1. Throw away all the curriculum that asks them to copy the letters, then repeat it over and over again in order to perfect them.
2. Find workbooks or make your own, involving reading and filling in the blanks with simple words, which get more difficult as they go along. Some might just start with filling in a missing letter, to a three letter word, then so on.
3. Don’t expect it to look perfect.
4. Praise when they try, not when it looks perfect, but when they try. This takes the pressure off for perfectionism.
5. As they begin to show much self improvement, then begin to show them the proper techniques.
6. Allow them time to explore, don’t worry about letter size, are they keeping it in the lines, or do all lines and circles connect…let them play.

Since we have figured this all out we have seen great improvements and more of a desire to try from Selena. Below are two work pages, the first when she began this year, and the second where she is now, notice the improvement?

She is now writing with so much more confidence, is now experimenting with letter sizing, and working her own way to a more perfect style. I am a  happy Mama, that we do not have tears, complaining, or the “I can’ts”

We are using the same method for our numbers, and let me say we are seeing the same results.

Week in Review

It has been a busy week between appointments and with Papa’s hours changing at work, We didn’t get as much accomplished as I would have liked, but yet we really did accomplish quite a bit.

Selena continues to love her PACE curriculum and was very excited when her Math and English came in. It has been fun to watch as her writing skills continue to improve. There is a lot of writing in this curriculum, but so far she is enjoying exploring how to make her letters and numbers.

One of her first assignments in her English though simple dot to dot abc’s, but with a twist she had to use a strait edge to make her lines between the dots. She was so excited to think she was going to use a ruler, too bad I couldn’t find her ruler but this worked even better for her small hands.

Selena asked me if we could map out the planets, so that will probably where we will go next week.So long as we have red for mars, according to Selena!  We would have sat down yesterday and started this fun project idea, but Selena had invited a little friend over for a play date. Selena has had play dates before here at the house, but this one was really a special one, as she made the invitation and gave it to her little friend who attends Team Kid with her. Also this young girl is the same age as Selena, so they were able to relate on so many more levels. We couldn’t have asked for a better day this time of year, while the sun was not out, it was really pleasant and wasn’t raining, so the girls spent a lot of time playing outside.

We also took a break from our outside play to come in and eat popcorn, watch a little TV and play on the white board, along with other games.

We look forward to having Selena’s friend over again soon. I have to say it was so nice for me just to see Selena making friends with girls her own age. This is the beginning of a whole new world for Selena now.

Weekly Wrap Up

We had a very productive week even with the consideration that we were dealing with Strep throat around here. Selena was very happy to be back to homeschooling, I don’t know what ever made me think of trying public school. Anyway we tried and are now very happy to just have her home learning and watching her grow.

I already mentioned that Selena loves her curriculum and she works very hard in it. We only ordered the First grade Science and History until we decided how she would really take to it, well since she loves it, and the fact she has already worked all the way through the math book I had here at home, we have placed our order for the Math and English books as well.

This week took us into a new discovery of loving to learn to write. She finished the entire section of History and Science, completing the quizzes all on her own.

We did a quick unit on sheep since her curriculum at this time introduces a lamb named Baba. I found a very nicely done unit study from Wyoming that we printed out and incorporated our geography lesson as well.

We incorporated a Bible lesson when Selena asked, “Why is Jesus called the Lamb of God?” I basically had her compare all the things we get from sheep, clothing, blankets, and food, then we compared this to all the things Jesus blesses us with. For a little deeper meat we looked in the Old Testament to how they sacrificed the first born or best lamb which was in atonement for their sins. Then jumped to the New Testament and Selena’s understanding of what Jesus did for us. It wasn’t long before she caught on and announced, “Jesus deserves the title of The Lamb of God!”

She insisted that I try to teach her to crochet. While she did get a few stiches made in a simple chain, she finally decided she would wait until she is a little older to try learning this again.

It wouldn’t be Autumn without some leaf crafts. We found some leaves which we tried to identify what trees they came off of. We then did some leaf rubbings.

What would our week be without a Science experiment. After a record dry spell we finally got rain. I decided to revisit an experiment we did a few years ago. Selena had fun making clouds and rain in the kitchen while she learned and made observations of the clouds in the sky as we learned more about clouds from this site.

We had a very fun and exciting full week back in the homeschool world. We look forward to learning so much this year.