Natural History and Geography
Batman, Spidey, Stuntman and I will be finishing up the Herriot this period and reading Plant Life. Next period we will work on a Geography book and another Natural History. Diva is reading Madam How and Lady Why and Minn. I ordered a new Holling map set for us today.
Phonics and Reading
Here at the Academy, we use Phonics Pathways for our beginning reading instruction. We also use Pathway Readers, Abeka Health and Christian Liberty Nature Readers, once the child can read a bit. We continue this until the child is reading beyond the level of the readers.
So, this period, Batman is going to be a beginner reader, and he will have a lesson out of Phonics Pathways each day. Spidey will read to me 3 days per week and do Phonics Pathways twice. Stuntman will read to me twice per week, and do Phonic Pathways twice. Diva will read to me once per week and do Phonics Pathways once per week. Country will read once per week, just so I can help her catch some pronunciation errors. She reads everything phonetically, LOL.
Bible and Lit
I will continue to read from the Children’s Illustrated Bible for the younger ones and the older ones will read from the Bible.
I’m putting Literature with Bible because the two just go together in my mind. First, you feed the soul and then you fire the imagination. I’ll be reading a fable and a poem each day, and we’ll try once more to read the Blue Fairy Book.
Stuntman will read from Wind and Tales. Diva will read from Daughter, Chitty and Wheel.
Stop me!
Hot on the heels of that post about National Sewing Month (Isn’t it time I made a category just for sewing?), I’m looking at fabric. Yes, in spite of the fact that I have a bottom-of-the-cabinet-full. Because, the fabric, it is like the yarn, and too much is never enough, and so! we! must! look! We must look at the discount Scalamandre fabric. In fact, we must absolutely drool over it. Isn’t that magnificent?? It’s very spendy, but if you used just a bit, in combination with that burgundy, it could be stunning. Think pillow, with a burgundy slip cover, see.
Or what about this one? It’s a Brunschwig & Fils “Grande Arbre” Linen Print. (Go ahead and click it.) I need new cushions for my glider-rocker, and I already have the pattern, since I have made them before. Decisions, decisions, I guess.
So why do I need you to stop me?? They sell samples. Sigh. Totally unfair.
National Sewing Month
Hey ya’ll, September is national sewing month! I might have to set the yarn aside and rock out some other types of projects, huh? The thing about knitting though, is that it travels so well, and I can’t haul that machine around like I do my knitting bag.
And also, my Joann.com email came today. Free shipping with code SEPFSE735. Hurry up though, it ends on Monday!
Furiously Knitting
Not because I am angry, but because I am on the downhill side of Sonnet. I finished another ball this morning, and yep, still hanging on the edge of my seat to see how this turns out.
You know, when it’s this suspenseful in a movie, the angst is over in an hour or so. I’ve been out of breath over this sweater for a very long time now.
Photo Blanket
I saw something tres cool today! Look and see for yourself! Isn’t that the awesomest thing? It’s a blanket made with pictures on it! And these photo blankets aren’t as spendy as you might think! They start at less than eighty bucks. I know you’ve probably seen picture afghans for less, but if you look at this photo comparison, you will know the few extra dollars is well worth it. That blanket is just an example. You can get different sizes, and you also have choices about how many pictures to use. I’m thinking that one with all my football players and cheerleaders would be too cute. Or maybe I can give my kids the ultimate in narcissistic presents: blankets with my face all over them!
Musical Interludes and Memory
We are doing several musical type things this year. I have ordered hymnals for us, and we’ll be working on a new hymn every 3 week period. This time, it will be Jesus Paid it All. Eventually (after “the rules” etc, we can also use hymns as copywork.)
I’ve ordered the Homeschooler’s Folksong Collection and we’ll be listening to the first cd once a week on Tuesdays. This won’t necessarily be a focus, but it will be in the background.
Our composer for this period Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and we’ll be reading his biography on our special day and listening to the cd below on Thursdays. Again, it will most likely just be in the background.
That’s all the music we’ll be doing, but after we sing the hymn each day, we will work on out memory work. Because I once again have very young students, we’ll work on the basics: alphabet, days of the week, months of the year, Psalm 23. Whatever we don’t master will carry over to the next 15 day period. Additionally, LLATL occasionally assigns memory work, and students who get that will work on that independently (unless I think it’s good for all of us).
