What a fantastic time off for thanksgiving with family and friends. Our bellies are full, our blessings are many, and we are ready for a couple more weeks of school before our Christmas break.
At the beginning of this week, our outside time was spent as a family raking and bagging leaves day! There were so many that had fallen in our yard and the kids had an awesome time "helping" and playing in the leaves! Still loving this time of year and it isn't to cold yet!
We started off the week with a new verse, Proverbs 15:3. 'The eyes of the LORD are everywhere, keeping watch on the wicked and the good.'
We talked about a new character trait of integrity and doing the right thing even when no one is around watching. We are never alone and God sees everything we do good and bad even when no one else does.
Our poem this week was "God, Who Made the Earth" by Sarah Betts Rhodes.
Copywork is never a favorite for either my 6 yo printer or 8 yo cursive writer but, I'm daily impressed by the improvement I am seeing in their penmanship. This week the poetry was long and they both completed it without out too much complaining!
In history, we talked about how the Indians were at peace with the settlers for nearly 50 years. The settlers would trade beads, blankets, and knives for the Indian land.
Our art project was to weave blankets using construction paper. The kids both had fun with this!
Yes, my son couldn't resist turning his into a Nascar flag! :)
The Indians learned over time that the material things would wear out and break and the settlers land remained. This made the Indians feel cheated. When Chief Massasoit passed away, his son, Phillip was angry with the colonists. King Phillip of the tribe called for war and the Indians struck in the evenings burning down the colonists houses and villages when they least expected. It was a dangerous time for colonists.
We read in Stories of the Pilgrims about 2 girls who were left alone as their parents journeyed to a nearby village. The girls heard Indians on their land and had heard many stories of the Indians taking items and burning down homes. The girls decided to work together to scare the Indians with lanterns. The Indians were afraid of things they did not understand and they ran away frightened by the burning fire in the lantern. We talked about the reflection of light.
In Science, we talked about how God gave 5 gifts to man to help them live on Earth - eyes to see, ears to hear, a nose to smell, a tongue to taste and skin to touch. We are starting with the eyes. We took pictures of the kids eyes so they could see what they looked like up close. Then, they colored their own eyes to match while we talked about the parts of an eye and then labeled it! This free eye printable is on my homeschool pinterest board. You can print it here.
We experimented with shadows! Even the dog was a forced volunteer for this experiment! We learned that the shadow was small when the light was directly overhead and the shadow grew larger as the light went down.
In math, both kids are moving right along. Proud of our 1st grader who is doing above grade level and learning to carry her ones with double digit addition!
My ds, 3rd grader, is stepping it up with multiplying double digit numbers. He struggled a bit with this but, we will refresh and repeat next week.
We are continuing to read Charlottes Web and will be finishing up by watching the movie soon. The kids are really enjoying the book so far as I read it to them. We generally are reading about 2-4 chapters per day.
Our emerging reader this week was a level 4 reader called Prairie School by AVI. Here is a review from my dd:
This is Aunt Dora in her wheelchair teaching her nephew, Noah how to read out on the prairie. I just love the old fashioned wheelchair my dd drew with an umbrella covering Aunt Dora for shade.
Our writing prompt this week was inspired by our day reminiscing and putting our Christmas tree up. We discussed our favorite ornaments. For my 3rd grader, he wrote his and then edited his mistakes. For my dd, who is 6 well.... good luck trying to read her writings. :)
You can get this free writing prompt on my Pinterest homeschool board here. * HINT* it will connect you to Teachers pay Teachers but when you view the preview you can print it for free.
We took a break this week for a social activity to visit the library and meet up with other homeschoolers in our area to do several Christmas crafts. There was quite a turnout and the kids enjoyed it. It is important to us to keep our kids active and social with other children who are homeschooling too. They had a great time making crafts and meeting new friends. The marshmallow snowman was a cute idea... and the dog liked it too when we got home and hung it on the fridge. YUM! :(
We also enjoyed the festivities and fireworks at City Centers, Holly Dazzle. It was crowded and chilly but, didn't keep us from window shopping, sipping on hot chocolate and singing along with the merry trombone players as they watched the lighting of the tree! Tis' the season!
These 2 are very excited about the next few weeks with Christmas being so near! I guess, I am too... but, it is such a busy time of year. It'll be much better after all the hustle and bustle of shopping and crowds, performances and parties. Then, we can focus more on the joy of the reason for the season with our family and friends.
Please feel free to post your comments below. I'd love to hear from those that are following our journey!
Be blessed! See you next week!
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