Update for the week of 4/23/2012

You can tell it is near the end of the year as I am falling behind in posting on my blog.  The month of April has flown by.  We have 3 weeks left of RTR and then a few days of testing and finishing up math. He continues to just plug along.  He was starting to get a complaining attitude about math, but some of the things in Boyhood and Beyond really spoke to him and now he is focusing on having a positive attitude.

In Bible Study he finished the actual book part of his Philippians study.  He was sad to finish it.  When we went to convention and he looked at next years things the first thing he went to was the Hebrews book he will be doing and was so glad to see it was in the same series as the book he has down this year.  He and I also finished Boyhood and Beyond.  I can't recommend this book highly enough.  It is a wonderful book for teaching our boys what it means to be a Godly men.

For his Independent history he drew a musketeer using Draw and Write through History.  You can tell by his death grip on the colored pencil that it isn't easy for him to do, but he loves it.

In science he continues to read "Planet Earth" by John Hudson Tiner.  Last year when he did a Tiner book he really struggled with finding the answers to the questions in the back.  This year it has come much easier, which is encouraging for me to see.  He did an experiment about pendulums and was fascinated with how that worked.  I really see the science sparking his deeper thinking and often asking "What if...". 

In DITHOR he finished the first part of "Little Pilgrim's Progress".  He has loved this book.  In fact he is going to read the second part in the 3 weeks of school we have left since we are done with DITHOR for this year.  He made a Lit Box for his project.  He made a castle for the Celestial City and inside it put objects that were significant in the story.  He also made a story board with the characters and he dictated a summary of the story to me.

In storytime we finished up "The Story of Blaise Pascal".  This story started a little slow, and I wasn't sure how well he was following it because he was struggling a bit with the oral narrations.  By the end however, he was really in to it and said that he liked it.

I had a friend ask him this week if he was ready for the school year to be done.  He got a very funny look on his face and said "No, not at all."  I love that.  I love that he loves school even though it doesn't come easy for him.   

Cows, college and other things

I don't update on S. very often, but here goes.  She is really enjoying her Junior year.  She has enjoyed her subjects this year for the most part.  Algebra 2 has been known to make her crazy, but math will always be her least favorite subject.  We did 2 college visits, both private Christian colleges.  The one that is her first pick has online dual enrollment classes.  She just finished applying for that program.  She would love to be able to take 2 classes each semester and get some of her general education credits done.  She should find out in a few weeks if she is accepted.  She also took the ACT for the first time on Saturday.  She was very stressed, but knows that she can take it again.  She also just keeps holding on to the knowledge that God is in control of her future and she posted on facebook on Friday  "I know that I will get the score God wants me to get and will go to the college where he wants me to go." This is such a change from where she was a few years ago.

One fun thing for her has been getting to be the Chick-fil-a cow at work on kids nights.  I guess she has done a good job because she was asked to be one of the Chick-fil-a cows in the opening day parade for our cities major league baseball team.  This was a great experience for her.

Co-op is now over.  She enjoyed this years co-op and made some strong Christian friends.  She also learned to play the guitar.  This is serving as a nice stress reliever for her.

We had a wonderful Easter with just us and I love that this picture of my 2 kiddos.

Now it is time for the homestretch of her Junior year.  Hard to believe that next time this year she will be graduating.  I can't think about that too much or I get very emotional.  I am so thankful to have these past 2 years of homeschooling her to get to know her better and to watch from a front row seat as she becomes the young lady God wants her to be.

Update week of 4/2/12

This week we are actually on spring break which gives me time to catch up on this blog. It seems like the weeks are just flying by and it is so hard to believe that we only have 6 weeks left of school. 

In the past 2 weeks we finished up listening to The Legend of Squanto for storytime.  He also read about Squanto in MOH 3 and watched a NEST video on Discovery Streaming about William Bradford that talked about Squanto.  Each version was slightly different and we discussed how sometimes it is good to read from several sources and compare because facts can get altered over time.  We have just started reading "A Piece of the Mountain: the story of Blaise Pascal.  N. loves books about scientists so I am sure this one will also be a hit. 

In Science he continues to read the story of Isaac Newton.  He has had a good time with his science experiments.  Although they are simple they have really sparked an interest in Newton's laws.  He has even been making up experiments on his own to show Newtons Laws.  I love that. Here are pictures of the experiments that his guide had him do.  First he looked at how gravity influences the orbit of the earth.

Then he did 3 experiments that demonstrated each law of motion.

His history project for the week was to make a paper mache shaker like the Algonquin Indians would use. I have usually avoided paper mache, but he was so excited to do this.  It was messy, but he really enjoyed making it.

 He is really excited to start learning more American History.  Since we started HOD at Preparing he didn't get the 2 years of American History in Beyond and Bigger.  In fact he thought that Pocahontas wasn't real.  I asked him why he would think that and he said it was because Disney made a movie about her and they don't make movies about real people.  I had to laugh, but then we talked about who Pocahontas really was.

In Grammar he is learning more capitalization rules.  These are mostly review which is nice after learning many new things in the last chapter. 

He is learning to write a response to a writing prompt in IEW.  This has been really good for him.  It is making him think through things on his own and back his thoughts up with examples. 

All in all a great last few weeks.