We are back in action after taking nearly a month off of regular school. It's good to be back. I am doubling up on math lessons so we can finish on schedule for the end of May. Caley is up to lesson 43 in her Saxon Math K book and we are dabbling in telling time, counting money and other fun math concepts. We also started a new phonics curriculum called "The Sorensen System to Succeeding with Reading" by Nancy Sorensen. It's a compact spiral-bound lesson book that we are liking so far. It focuses more on writing and reading, more so than the Engelmann "Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons" book. I think this curriculum is relatively unknown and not flashy at all, but the principles are basic and frugal. Check out more at the website here. Looking at the website, I just realized the authors are LDS (Mormon). Didn't expect that! But their principles for teaching phonics look pretty good so far so it's worth a shot.
We started a new unit in KONOS about Obedience which includes Authority (light and the Bible) and Kings and Queens. I'm really excited about this mini-unit on kings and queens. We are going to do a medieval feast with our playgroup friends and Caley is going to do a research project about a queen or princess of her choice. By research project I am intending that she learn how to use the library resources to some extent, scan information from books and put it together so she can present it. It's less about her learning the facts about some princess, but more about what she'll learn during the whole process. This is going to be a great opportunity for her to use her library card! We have casually been reading fairy tales and watched Disney's Robin Hood so they can begin to understand the concepts of kings and queens. It's convenient that they are naturally obsessed with Disney princesses for this unit! Recently they have been pretending that they are Ariel and Flounder from "The Little Mermaid" and "swimming" around and getting married to the prince. Wesley usually is Sebastian the crab who they try to run away from.
This week we did some projects about light and I tried to relate it to Jesus being the light of the world. We made candles and observed how a little flame lights up an entire room. They were quite fascinated with it!
I've also been reading "The Power of Motherhood" by Nancy Campbell which has really be helping me not be so crazy about sticking to a strict schedule and just enjoying my children while they are little. It's a helpful bible study and I intend to re-read it again after this first reading, taking notes and looking up the Bible verses.
Hopefully I will post again soon! We are all kinds of learnin' 'round here!
