School Day Outtakes ~ Art Shows and Swimming Lessons

Hoping to get back in the grove of doing weekly updates.  I enjoy sharing and it keeps me on track!  But, I went to upload my photos for the week, and when I did something happened.  And, now some of my photos are missing :(.  You will just have to use your imagination.

**Mustang**

This week was the final week of her art class at the local art center.  Her class hosted us for a mini art show where they all showcased their work for the class.  I can certainly tell you she had a lot of fun, and now I have lots of new creations for my china cabinet :).  

In her swimming class, she has been focusing on putting her head underwater.  For whatever reason, this has been a fear of hers.  So, for her to decide this is something she wants to do is a big deal.  I don't think she will be learning to swim by the end of this class session, but she certainly has gotten over most of her fears of the water.  That's a big improve
ment!

Her chosen works for this week (she chose many of these multiple times):

• Addition facts-doing quick worksheets to test her memory of them.  She loves this work and did it daily. 
• Multiplication bead board-she is working on equation slips.
• Negative snake game-to be honest I don't think we did this right.  It was too simple for the way I read, so we turned it into subtraction of double digits.  She really enjoyed it!
• Roman numerals (tens)-Once again we played the game from Relentlessly Fun, Deceptively Educational.  
• And handwriting using Logic of English.

In her free time, she has been writing a script for a movie she is working on.  Not sure if the movie will materialize, but I love her interest in voluntary writing and spelling (she has been trying to memorize the spelling of words so she knows them-what an easy spelling lesson!).

She also completed her final AWANA section required to get her Skystormer (book 3) patch.

**Charger**

In swimming, Charger is facing a major roadblock-and it has nothing to do with the water.  He is having to learn how to obey and listen to his teacher!!  He loves to swim and would love to spend the entire time underwater.  That's all well and good, except there are many other kids in the class!  This has lead to some interesting conversations and timeouts.  I do believe it is good for him, since he won't always be with me!  The swimming has been going very well and he has decided he is a fish and loves swimming underwater.

His chosen works for this week are limited as he is *almost* done with with his workplan and ready for the next.  

• Parts of a fish booklet
• parts of a root booklet
• multiplication bead board
• All About Spelling level 12
• Labeling geometric solids and sorting cards

Charger did a LOT of the multiplication bead board.  Simple fact, he dilly-dallies on this.  He would gladly take ALL day to do this work and it gets annoying (especially since others want to work on it).  But, he does at least get it done!  BTW, if it sounds like I am hard on him, it's simply because I can see that he is a super smart kid and could get the work done quickly and efficiently if he put his mind to it.

For AWANA he practiced 2 sections, but said three.  He is now one section away from his Sparks HangGlider patch.  Very impressed with his memorization abilities.  They are great!

**Mini Cooper**

I am going to fess up and tell you that I need to plan more options for Mini Cooper.  This is something I really want to do, I just need to figure out how to find the time!

We have been learning about parts of fish (which will get its own separate post).  So we did a few fish extensions.

She counted out bubbles for the fish.  And, she and Explorer sorted colors of fish into bowls.  She also did her first parts of a fish book and did excellent!

We worked on sorting sound circles from the reading series printed from The Helpful Garden.  She did great!  I was very impressed!  I think we are getting closer to moving on to harder reading lessons.  

She also completed the spindle boxes without error.

**Explorer**

Mostly just tagging along for now, she sorted fish by color and did lots of coloring :).  We also used the sorting sound circles from Mini Cooper's work to practice saying more words.  She has very limited vocabulary that others can understand and needs some attention in this area.  She tried them all with varying levels of success.

**Group Work**

Last week we went to an Artober fest at the local art museum.  We made a little splatter art, did an art scavenger hunt, and learned Oragami.  It was a lot of fun!

In Bible Study for All Ages, we completed lesson 17, which means we are now learning the judges of Israel!  That's something I never learned so I'm having a great time learning alongside the kids.

We also worked on parts of a fish (post coming), and did a mini lesson on corn since Dad is in the fields combining corn (it will also get its own post).

For a  review product, the kids have been using IXL.com.  I enjoy seeing how they do in a different, computerized, setting, and they love 'playing' on the computer.  Looking forward to seeing how they grow using the program this year!  (review coming soon)

Picture day was Tuesday, so we lost a day of 'school.'  But, this week should be a bit quieter (thankfully).

So how was your week?  Any great break-through? Just happy to make it through the week?  Something fun and exciting?  I'd love to hear about it!

Have a great weekend!  I'll catch up with you next week :).

God Bless,

Lisa

We are linking up:

Mini Cooper and Explorer's School Day Outtakes

I haven't talked about my little girls much at all lately!  But, here are some things that they have been doing over the last few months.

Cards and counters using the sandpaper numbers (we don't have both).

Matching ladybug letter puzzles.

Working together on their quiet book.  I promise I will do a post on this soon!!

I picked up this fun eBoo Lotto game on vacation.  We just use it for matching.

Folding napkins.

More folding.

Explorer actually does a pretty good job of both stacking AND sorting now.  It's fun to see her progress.

We love the letter sound box books.  Mini Cooper likes to get them out all at the same time.

Looking at beach cards free from Montessori Materials.

Pouring water.  She LOVES this one!

Creating her own extensions with the knobless cylinders.

Explorer's puzzle skills have greatly improved.

She was quite pleased :).

Reading the letter books again.  I read them one each day, so they both enjoy them quite a bit.

The Triangle box has been a hit with Mini Cooper.

I have backed off the photo taking quite a bit lately, but I've got some 'how we do this' posts planned shortly that should hopefully make up for it.  

Thanks for stopping by and checking out our school week!

God Bless,

Lisa

We're linked up:

School Day Outtakes #7

It's been a little while since we had some school day outtakes, so here's a quick look at what we have been up to:

Learning about the differences between triangles using the 3 part cards.  

Here Mustang is doing online research for her Land Animals of the 6th Day from Apologia which we reviewed here.

Mapping animals of North America (also from Land Animals of the 6th Day).

Parts of a tree.

SNAKE GAME!!  Finally!! He really loved it!!

Using the Kindle Fire to do Knobless Cylinder extensions from Our Montessori Story.

Playing a reading action game from our IEW Primary Arts of Language curriculum.  I have found this to be a reading curricula that fits in very nicely with the Montessori education method.

Turns out, Mini Cooper has been pretty board with the materials I have been letting her use.  So, we got out the number rods-and she mastered them the first time!  She is only 3 1/2 and I didn't figure she would be ready for them.  Boy was I wrong!!

Completed hundred's board!  That is quite a challenge, too.  Not so much because it is hard work, but it takes forever and it's hard to stick with it.  I had to really encourage him to continue.  He was so please with himself when it was done, though!!  And yes, our #14 is missing-boo!

Day two of the red rods I thought I'd just see if she could label them.  Yep, all of them, first try!!  Excuse the outfit, she picked it herself :).

Explorer has been interested in coloring lately.

And she is so focused when using the letter board!  Think she's going to be a lefty??  I'm thinking maybe so!

Sorting kitchen and bath items from Montessori Materials.

A new favorite book great for I Spy lessons Daisy Gets Dressed.  Loved this one!!  It's actually one we are likely to purchase after checking it out at the library and using up all the days we could.  It's Mini Coopers favorite!

Labeling fractions.  I used the labels I found here.  They are from amonco.org, but I could not find the direct link from their page. I had located the printable file through Google.  I hate to link directly to the file, but I don't know how else to get you there.  

We've also been playing a lot of I Spy using the free cards at Montessori Print Shop.

Of course we have been doing more, but these are what I could catch on camera :).  I hope you have been having a great few weeks of school!!  Thanks for stopping by!

God Bless!  And Happy Easter!!

Lisa

School Day Outtakes #6 New Materials!

Since we've been selling off things on our journey to minimalism, I had the opportunity to order a few new materials for our home.  We purchased the Fraction Circles and stands, Botany Cabinet, Tree and Leaf puzzles (we already have the Seed and Flower) and the Fish puzzle (we already have the Horse).  You will see they have been in action a lot this week.

Before I even got out of bed, they had the Fraction Circles out and were working with them.  Since they had not received a presentation, they just treated them as puzzles.  They got the first 1-5 easily, but 6-10 just ended up sitting in a heap until I could fix them.  Excuse the foam all over the floor-it came in the same box as the Fraction Circles and stuck to the circles, I'm still finding it all over.

New puzzles meant that they needed to get them all out at the same time!

And, just in case you wonder why I don't ask the kids to use rugs?  I do!  There it is, without any puzzles on the other side of the room!

The Botany Cabinet wasn't quite the draw I would have hoped-except to Explorer.  She really enjoyed carrying the trays all over the room.

She totally enjoyed her new puzzle!  She actually got a few of the leaves in place.

Mustang was busy drawing house plans.  I'll have to get a picture of the finished product.  I was interesting!

Formal presentations of circles 1-5 followed that afternoon.

Charger decided to be creative.

1/2  looks like a boat, Mom!

Group work on the North America Continent Puzzle.

Another day, Mustang decided to put the 6-10 circles together.  She got done with 6-8 and then gave up.  I have to admit, they are pretty hard if you mix them all up.  Maybe just do 2 or 3 at a time!

It was a little hard to focus with all that snow coming down!

HUGE flakes!  We even had thundersnow!

Copywork and Grammar with Primary Arts of Language {Mustang}.

Lots of Small Bead Frame work, here she is working on Static Addition.

The puzzles come out everyday!

I hope you enjoyed our outtakes!  Thanks for stopping by!

God Bless and Happy Schooling!

We're linked up: