Week in Review: April 8-12

Next week is spring break! My in-laws will be visiting with us next week and we'll be enjoying the company of Grammy and Grampy! We'll also get to see my niece play Amaryllis in The Music Man at the end of the week. I can't wait to blog about that field trip!

Don't forget to stop by and enter the giveaway I'm hosting this week! It ends Sunday (4/14) at midnight! This is a really fun one and my daughters have thoroughly enjoyed this particular review!

Little Hands to Heaven: Off Week

We're half-way through Little Hands to Heaven and I'm so pleased with Grace's progress. I decided to take a week off because of some plans for major house cleaning! We still did "lessons" because Grace won't let me get away with much of a break. We just didn't follow the plans in her guide.

This is a fun math activity I've had tucked away which I found a while back. Unfortunately I can't find the link to where I found this! If I find it I'll add it in later. Each flash card up to 10 has a stack of legos. Grace simply counted and stacked until what she had matched the card. This is done to scale, but since we only have duplos our towers were MUCH taller! 

We began learning about O even though we didn't move forward in the book. I intend to go through the guide a second time next year since she loves it so much for preschool and I found a new book of worksheets for each letter at Scholastic's dollar deals sale. If you haven't checked out Scholastic Teacher Express I encourage you to do that. I have found a number of resources during their Dollar Days Sale (On right now!) which have enhanced our HOD studies and provided more learning fun! I plan to use the book I found next year.

Grace also enjoyed another of my own creations for a math game! She found the correct number of dots on the ladybug wings and matched them up to the correctly numbered ladybug. This was another activity I made several years ago and never got around to printing and using. I regret not doing so for Rose and Beth, but I'm glad I did get them done in time for Grace! She loves staying with us in the schoolroom, but so much of my time is needed to be focused on the older girls' studies. I like providing new learning for her so she can stay with us, not be a distraction to the girls, and still be learning! 

She also insisted on working in her Rod and Staff books. They are also having their huge spring sale right now for three more days on all their curriculum. I need to get my order in!

Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 26

Rose loved our unit this week! I didn't get any shots, but she particularly liked the poem about the start of the American Revolution which included Patrick Henry and the Boston Tea Party. She also seems to enjoy handwriting now, which is a blessing because it wasn't always so! We've moved into handwriting which practices phonics (Thanks to this book my mom found for free!). It is such good practice and each page has a coloring or drawing activity to get her excited to finish well.

She continues to thrive in spelling as well. I honestly can't say enough about All About Spelling. This has been the best follow up for phonics instruction I have found because it causes my girls to think about phonics in a reverse way. Both girls' reading skills have improved as a result and neither one complains when it's spelling time. I usually hear the opposite, "Can we please do spelling now?" Now that indicates a good spelling program! 

Our Word-Wall letter for the week was Q which I don't believe we finished so we'll pick that up again after our break. Her words were quill, quail, quake, and queen. I love how many of these words she is finding on her own. Sometimes her eager older sister wants to jump in when Beth gets stuck, but I've convinced Rose she at least needs to give clues, not just the word!

Beth is over-the-moon excited to be working on time! She is flying through her 1st grade math curriculum and the concepts are sticking! Rod and Staff takes a more traditional approach to math, but it seems to be the right one for our girls. I'm so happy to have found a math which is a blessing to our family instead of a trial. It has been a lesson in showing me just how unique each family is and how different curricula will work differently for each family. 

Bigger Hearts for His Glory: Unit 28

We are getting so close to finishing up this guide! we only have 6 more weeks left in Bigger Hearts and it only keeps getting better. When your kid begs to read, "...just one more chapter, Please?" You know it's good! We moved on to studying the Wright brothers and their sister this week which is interesting considering the new controversy surrounding them which has just come to surface. I haven't decided if I'll let her in on that or just stick with what we're learning!

Where I once heard grumbling about vocabulary I now hear excitement about learning new words. Sometimes it just takes a while for a new skill to sink in. She now enjoys learning new words, illustrating them, and even writing sentences which are also getting more creative and wordy. Heart of Dakota is so gentle in its instruction and I love seeing how much she has matured over the last year. 

We also finished up our biography unit on Sacagawea with a book by Knowledge Quest. She loved this really great, interactive e-book. I've already written a review about it, so if you want to see more click on the picture. I was very impressed with the quality and she loved being able to quickly research more information! 

Here are samples of her post-reading projects: 

I intend to blog very soon about out language arts plan because it deviates a little from the Heart of Dakota guide. If nothing else it will come this summer!

Just for fun here is what our room looks like after a day of learning! (Notice the kitty still hanging around!)

I hope you had a wonderful week as well!