Preparing Hearts for His Glory:
Riley is a rhymer - who knew? We have been getting into a good groove with his creative writing for poetry, and suddenly, out of nowhere, came this ability to rhyme well - and also to hear good rhythm. HOORAY! We had some more difficult times at the start of the creative writing for poetry, and this week was just plain fun together. Here he is with his poem - I think you'll be able to read it on the second picture...
I am thankful for an odd reason for the comprehension questions in science this week - Riley is using periods and capital letters now!
He is finally transferring those copywork and dictation skills to his own writing. The first quite a few units' worth of answers to science comprehension questions were "capital letter and punctuation free".
It's nice to see they've joined his answers now.
(This photo was taken before I had him correct his spelling, so MICROSCOPE was fixed, rest assured - you can't write a word that BIG and not have to fix it if it's misspelled.
Triple digit times single digit multiplication was tricky at first, but something just absolutely clicked this week, and he is so loving it. He likes to talk through it out loud, and he's very exuberant about it!
We like to use the markerboard, as it gives a bigger work area and lets us focus on one problem at a time without the clutter on a page. I could not be happier with the things Singapore math is teaching our dc.
Riley continues to LOVE the science in PHFHG! I like how it ties into the history. Science is often such a separate entity of its own. I love how it is linked to other things Riley is learning. I can see him really being able to imagine what it must have been like to cross the desert for Moses and the Israelites because he can visualize the specific challenges of the desert thanks to all he is learning in science, "One Small Square: Cactus Desert". Here Riley put molding clay in the bottom of a pan and crushed cereal pieces into to signify the hard, baked desert. When he poured water on it, it ran right off, and this portrayed how even when it does rain in torrents in the desert, the sun-baked surface can't absorb much water.
This progressive science notebooking assignment was fun. Each unit as Riley learned more and more about the desert, he added more and more to his picture. He hung it on the fridge to show Dad - he was so happy with the end picture:
We've been learning about the meanings of different names in history, and Riley enjoyed the research project where he got to look up the meaning of various names we'd read about, as well as his own (and we did choose it with this meaning in mind).
I am seeing improvements in Riley's written narrations. They are all good, as I am partnering with him to help his finished project be good, but he is taking over more and more of it himself, and I am working alongside him to help him keep improving week after week.
Riley's Common Place Book is off to a beautiful start. I credit HOD's pick of "Cheerful Cursive" for his lovely writing. I have not done one other thing to teach him cursive.
Riley's enjoying his "Mystery of Pelican Cove" for DITHOR, and he is doing a good job with his DITHOR Student Book. This is his second year doing the DITHOR Student Book, and I can see real improvement from that consistency.
Lots of good things happening here - I hope you had a great week too!
In Christ,
Julie
