Seventh Game. June 2, 2012

 Andrew's last game. It was good. All of it has been good. He has a nice soccer ball as a trophy to practice at home now. Thank you, Upward Sports, it was a blessing.

Week 36 Day 5

 This morning held a few nature surprises for Andrew. The top two were a small snake skin he found in my flower bed and his six-foot sunflower finally opened up. The morning was so gorgeous that we decided to do all our reading assignments out of doors. By 11 o'clock the heat started to kick in and we moved inside to practice some place values and subtraction. Here, Andrew loved using the craft sticks so much he asked me if we could do it again. By all means: my boy who has to discipline himself when it comes to solving math problems is asking me for more?! That is nothing short of a miracle!

Andrew and his new pride and joy. I am so thankful for our home in the country!

Sixth Game. May 31, 2012

One can not expect too much of a cranky boy on a hot soccer field. Andrew was doing all right until his uniform got all muddy. Mud is fine, but - as I learned now - not on Andrew's 'precious' soccer shirt.:o) He got over it. Mainly, thanks to his coach who held him upside down over a mud puddle. All I heard was Andrew laughing.

It was hot and wet as the afternoon rainwater had not quite soaked into the ground yet. One more game after this. Kind of sad.

Week 36 Day 4

 We had already some time ago decided that Andrew will be taking music lessons come August/September. Today, he proved he is ready. Andrew found an old sheet of music and was half pretending to 'read' it. I went a step further and printed out children's sheet of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star". He has been glued to his little keyboard practicing away. Andrew promised to perform for Dad when he comes home.

The rest of the day was somewhat rainy (finally) which puts a damper into our soccer game this afternoon, but it did not disturb us a bit as we were ploughing our way through today's assignments. Even our math lesson went by well. I got inspired by an article I read on crosswalk.com about how to help children with their math problems. I am going to try out some of the things they suggested there. Here's a link to the article:

http://www.crosswalk.com/family/homeschool/taking-the-frustration-out-of-math.html?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=fbpage&utm_campaign=dailyupdate

Story sequencing. Andrew piecing together the story of Snow White.

Week 36 Day 3

I really liked the creative writing assignment today. Andrew had to tell a story about a painting. I found this adorable picture of Charles Edenshaw "Breakfast In Bed" and asked Andrew to tell me what he thought was going on. He came up with a nice account. I loved the part when the dog ran in the kitchen and barked at Mom so she would come and clear up the breakfast dishes on the bed. :o)

Literature and writing seem to be an easier challenge for Andrew than solving math problems. I have long stopped writing words and sentences out for him to copy. I just dictate and Andrew gets them right 99% of the time. That is pretty amazing. At the same time, math... The boy is brilliant and he knows how to add and subtract, but if it is just plain paper with a bunch of numbers on it, he loses his focus and the task becomes a struggle. I have tried to make a game out of the drills and he does perform so much better. I do know one thing, come summer break, we will be sitting down with math problems on a regular basis until the new school year begins.

Week 36 Day 2

Today went past super fast. We have been knee deep in getting to know the planets in the Solar System. It is so fascinating. The only thing I remember from my science class when we were covering the subject of planets was that our teachers kept changing, nobody stayed long enough to teach us. Sad. 

I, however, am a constant, and Andrew and I (and Saara) have been watching some truly interesting videos on the internet. Of course, ALL of them have been presented from the Big Bang view point, but we have already learned to successfully ignore the godlessness and focus on the beauty that God has created. A very good clip is right here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2EU96xqEk4

Week 36 Day 1

Memorial Day. We ended up doing some schoolwork. It has become very obvious that Andrew will complete the Core A course sometime it mid June. Which is fine. Which also means, I will use every day available to do school work. Not that I am rushing, but it would be nice to be done. I have already lined up so many wonderful projects and things to do during the summer. 

But as to today, and Saturday, we did a lot of experiments. Our main focus was science and it was delicious. First, we learned a lot about juice. We looked at different fruit and where they store the juice and how easy or difficult it is for us to get it out. And, of course, the kids ate their school work, again.

Second, we revisited the lesson of heat and cold and what happens to air when it heats up or cools down. Our table tennis ball experiment fell through because Mom made a dent in the ball that was way too big and no amount of hot water around the ball could not heat up the air inside the ball to pop the dent out. Our other experiments were more successful.

And third, Dad lent a helping hand and read to the kids about the sound systems and CDs and how all that electronics works. He did really well and I might use him as a substitute teacher when it comes time to teach the kids about computers - Dad used to build them, so he knows way more than I do.

Over the weekend Andrew also colored and built a patriotic windsock and we found another bird family living in a very unusual place: the hanging basket with my petunias is hosting a mama bird and her two eggs. Both kids are super excited about two birds' nests right by our doors.

After squeezing and examining the fruit, the kids ate their school work.

Strawberry juice on a white linen. A lesson in why it is important to wipe your fingers in napkins and not your clothes.

Painting with lemon juice. I remember doing that as a child with milk.

The hot iron revealed Andrew's lemon juice painting.

The ping-pong ball in the hot water did not lose it's dent.

Daddy teaching about sound systems.

Andrew's patriotic windsock.

A peek inside my petunia planter.