heartofdakota.com

Ok Ladies,

What was YOUR week Like?

You can post:

a- A picture
b- A blog Link
c- A written synopsis
d- Your favorite memory
e- Anything you want that shares your HOD excitement!

Important Note: If you are linking us to your blog, please make sure it's not just a general link, but to your specific post of HOD. That way if someone reads through these a year from now they can find your share without needing to hunt!

In Christ,
Julie

USII High School:
Fall is here, and it is so lovely! Wyatt is in such a good groove with his guide at this point. He did 5 days of the guide's plans this week. He primarily learned about The Harding Scandals, Silent Cal, the Scopes Trial, and Mein Kampf. He read from his America: The Last Best Hope Vol. II book and did an oral narration on President Harding. He also watched the American Testimony DVD Set 2 and learned about the aftermath years of war and turmoil, and how Americans just wanted to get back to some kind of a normal way of life again. Miles to Go For Freedom, his living library book, further told the story of the difficulties of post-war living. The Mystery of History readings really helped him make connections from past and present issues, and his timeline helped him have a visual way to connect what he has learned, is learning, and plans for what he will be learning the rest of this final year of high school. I love how this history all flows together! Connections are made every day, and those connections make history come alive for Wyatt in a way that he thoroughly enjoys - and actually remembers (a different experience than my high school experience with history, I assure you)! Here he is with his notebook entries this week...


Wyatt is completing his College Algebra credit through www.mathhelp.com, and it is going well, though it is definitely difficult enough! He usually watches the lesson, prints the lesson notes, works through the practice problems, and then takes the test. The test only has 5-6 problems, but they are quite involved, and if he misses any, he needs to retake it. He usually ends up retaking the test once or so. He works his problems out in his notebook...


Wyatt chose to do Latin/Greek for his high school foreign language credit this year. He decided to keep a notebook, logging notes about the words he is learning to help him better remember them this year. This was something he did near the end of Spanish last year, that really helped him better retain what he was learning. He also completes his written exercises in a notebook...



In Christ,
Julie

World Geography:
One of my favorite things we are doing together this year in WG is Bob Schultz's Practical Happiness devotional. I truly love his writing style, and Riley does too. This week we read about getting along with family members and friends, and how we often think we are in the right all of the time - but no one can be right all of the time. We are also often annoyed by other's habits, especially the ones we live in close quarters with - whether that is family, friends, or neighbors. We often don't realize, we have habits that annoy others too. Such good discussions we are having with this book!

In history, Riley has been learning about Greek Geographers and Astronomers: Eratosthenes, Pytheas, and Strabo. He has been adding to his Mapping the World with Art maps as well as to his notebooking entries...



His Rooted and Ground study is teaching him so much about the Bible. He is enjoying learning about the different people groups around the world and how to pray for them...


Riley has always enjoyed artistic assignments in HOD, and he is really loving coloring each of his timeline portraits and seeing his Book of Centuries grow from day to day...


R & S English continues to be a solid grammar program, and he has become better and better at diagramming and at remembering what he has learned from week to week. I occasionally photocopy a page for him to edit, if editing is the goal of the lesson...


Essentials in Writing is teaching Riley a solid prewriting format to prepare for his writing piece. I like the ease of this format and how it can be used and applied to virtually any writing assignment...


Science is hands-on, so it's always been a favorite of Riley's! The IPC course has engaging readings by John Hudson Tiner that Riley enjoys, and the MicroPhySci kit has labs that he gets to complete. Some of the labs are hard, but that's ok! High school science should be more difficult. Some of them don't turn out perfectly. Also ok! That is the result of margin of error and the very nature of scientists completing experiments in real life! He is learning so much, and this was a favorite of his this week...


In Christ,
Julie

Creation to Christ:
An ongoing skill we are working on this year is for Emmett to 'shrink' his writing. Little by little he is beginning to write smaller, with more spaces, and straighter across the notebook entries. I know this will keep improving from having had 2 other sons go through this guide, so it is worth the time to work on it with him rather than modifying the assignment. Of course it's different if a kiddo has been diagnosed with special needs that truly may require modification of an assignment, but for Emmett, that is not the case. It's more the case of a mama (a.k.a. me) not having him write all summer. Yes, I confess, he had a writing-free summer. I had good intentions to keep him writing, knowing those little hand muscles would suffer the next school year with no use over the summer. But, my good intentions didn't happen. He DID read this summer, and well, he just had a glorious summer being a boy loving the outdoors and loving where we live. Next summer, we shall see what happens. Anyway, you'll see not so perfect writing here, with not so perfect spacing, but that's ok - I know he'll keep improving given time!


In Singapore Math 5B, I often write the Textbook problems for Emmett on marker boards. He solves one while I write the next one, and then we switch. It works well, as these are longer lessons since he is learning how to do larger number multiplication and division with remainders...


Here is Emmett's watercolor painting of rocks in conjunction with his Robert Frost poem "One Step Backward"...


In Write with the Best, Emmett wrote a story about his Beanie Balz Speedy, who he adores!


Emmett continues to add to his Science notebook of Animal Tracks...


Here is his latest science lab sheet...


I have really seen marked improvement already this year in DITHOR for Emmett. He is doing Level 4/5, and he loves to read! He doesn't love to write as much as he loves to read, but that's a battle he won't win with me - writing is a necessary part of the assignment and a very necessary skill to have!


To help Emmett 'shrink' his writing, I often will write his answers to a portion of his R & S English lesson on notebook paper, so he can look at my writing as a model. I remind him the goal is to try to shrink his writing to a similar size as my example, as well as add spaces that are similar in size to my model. Never assume kids just 'know how' to write on notebook paper! Yes, even this skill improves greatly if it is modeled and taught!!!


In Christ,
Julie

http://gracefilledhomeschooling.blogspo ... r-2-6.html

Grace - 2nd grade Bigger Hearts Unit 9
Beth - 5th grade Creation to Christ Unit 15
Rose - 7h grade Revival to Revolution Unit 1