Weeks 1 & 2 (2009/2010)

Well the first week of school is behind us and the second is about to begin. It's always a good feeling to get past that first week. It takes time for our bodies and minds to adjust to the new expectations.

I feel terrific about our start this year. We've really jumped in with both feet and have covered a lot of good ground. I've been really pleased with our fluency practice. (I listed our resource materials in the last post.) I noticed a great deal of improvement in Wes just from Monday to friday using the program. I think he's going to get a lot out of it.

History was our biggest emotional struggle. I'm definitely pushing Wes to think harder and be more independent. He's not sure how he feels about this yet, I can tell. He's so capable and I'm not asking anything of him that he cannot reasonably do. I'm really emphasizing research. When he doesn't know what a word means, I hand him a dictionary. We have spent our first week learning about 8 prehistoric groups of peoples, and this week we will be turning our research into a paragraph about each one.

I've also added religious studies one day a week. I decided this after Wes asked me, "What does B.C. stand for?" We are going to be studying so many different civilizations this year, that it only makes sense to understand their beliefs and how they influenced their actions. So I've picked up one more book: The Kids Book of World Religions by Jennifer Glossop. You can find it on Amazon. It has a world map showing the dominant religions in each region. It discusses 15 major religions and also includes indigenous groups. I think it will help us greatly in our study of different cultures.

This week we will be moving forward with all of our studies. Math is still reviewing 4th grade concepts. I predict we'll be moving on to 5th grade by mid second quarter. In Science we are studying the environment and world processes. This week we will do a project using recycled materials that we've been saving. As a matter of fact. All of our art this year will be made from recycled materials!

This week in Vocab we'll be reviewing homophones. We will also be talking about major and minor characters as we read our fiction. I guess I haven't shared what we are reading. It's actually The Complete Tales of Winnie The Pooh by A.A. Milne. This might sound young, but as a video game player, one of Wes's favorite games is Kingdom Hearts. This game features characters from Disney. This has reignited an interest in the Hundred Acre Woods. The stories, as written in their original form, are a good age appropriate read. It's even a bit challenging at times since the language is less modern and the phrasing unfamiliar. It's also interestingly written in an omniscient point of view with the reader becoming Christopher Robin and the narrator speaking directly to the reader. After we read, we put on the old Disney videos and watch what we have just read. This has been very fun and Wes has already started wanting to ready further each day so he can watch the video longer. When you have a child that has not always liked reading, it's pretty awesome when they start asking, "Can I read just one more page?"

So I guess this teacher is ready for the week ahead and ready to call it a night!

2009/2010 Schedule and Resources

Well it's day 3 of the new school year and we've jumped right into the learning. I've already revised my schedule once and it will probably happen again, but here it is as it now stands. The times are loosely set. A guide more than a hard fast rule, however we do try to stick to a good schedule.

9:00-9:15 Following Directions ~ This is a warm-up activity using a publication by Creative Teaching Press. The book is called Following Directions and it is written for 3rd and 4th grade. I think following written and oral directions while doing fun activities is a good way to warm up the brain and begin to focus on the day.

9:15-9:30 Reading Fluency ~ This is a reading activity where the focus is on fluency. The text includes an audio CD and 20 lessons. We are spending about 1.5 weeks per lesson to really work on our fluency. I think this is a good morning activity as well. It's very independent and it also helps to warm up the brain for a day of learning. The program is published by Shell Education and is called Increasing Fluency With High Frequency Word Phrases.

9:30-10:30 (M,T,W & F) History and Social Studies ~ There's a lot in the curriculum this year, everything from learning about your home state to prehistoric peoples and early civilization. (Thurs) We will study religion as it is pretty hard to study civilization without it. This will not be about what we believe as a family, but religious studies in general and how it relates to the groups of people we study.

10:30-10:45 Snack Time

10:45-11:00 Fiction Reading

11:00-11:30 Math ~ We covered nearly all of the 4th grade concepts last year. We are using Total Math published by American Education Publishing to review and then we will move on to 5th grade math.

11:30-12:00 Vocabulary ~ We are using Sylvan's Vocabulary Success for 4th grade to increase our vocabulary and study word concepts and grammer.

12:00-1:00 Lunch and Play Time

1:00-1:30 (M,T,W) Science (TH) Literary Elements ~ main idea, plot, conflict, etc. (F) Review ~ We will spend this time going over all of what we have covered during the week.

If you are wondering where writing comes in, we will be using our history topics and our fiction reading to work on our note taking and writing. For example, right now we are studying prehistoric peoples. We have created a time line and are using two sources to gather facts about the different groups. From there I'll have Wes write one paragraph about each group. Then we will write an introduction and conclusion. Then we'll type it into the computer and then edit it before printing a final draft. Wes won't even realize it until he's almost finished that he's written his first big paper. Then we can go back and discuss all of the steps we went through. We will explore other forms of writing as well using similar strategies.

We also have some new resources in the classroom. A gorgeous laminated timeline that begins 5,000 yrs BC and goes all the way to present day. I found it at Learning Through History. We also have a new Scholastic Encyclopedia, The New Way Things Work, The Clear and Simple Thesaurus Dictionary (love this!) and One Million Things - A Visual Encyclopedia

Welcome to the 4th Grade!

The first day of 4th grade is almost here! We start Monday to be exact. Today is meet the teacher day at our little homeschool. Of course Westen and I have already met, but I have a lot of new things to show him. The classroom is all set up and waiting. Today we'll take a tour of the class and talk a little about our schedule and some of the things we'll be covering this year in school.


If you just happened upon this blog, this is my teacher's log. I keep a record of what me and my 9 year old son are up to. I also do my best to honestly share our experience. For us homeschooling is temporary. We started in the middle of the year last year and will do all of 4th grade at home. The plan is to go back into public school for 5th grade. For that reason and because it's just kind of our style, we keep our school time pretty structured. It would be hard to integrate back in if we were loose and wild with the schedule. I also stick to the curriculum of the school district we attend. Sometimes we do more than it suggests, but we cover everything!

In my picture are my little motivators for good behavior. My philosophy is that if there is a lot of whining and complaining, we do more and not less. It's amazing how many kids think they can whine their way out of things. That's where my shoe box of worksheets comes in. On the top it says, "You must not have enough to do so let's review!" I find it a very effective motivator to give a little extra task when the behavior isn't up to snuff. Of course Wes knows this about me, so all I usually have to do is hint at the consequence and he gets right back to work.

Lest you think me a cruel teacher/mom, I believe more than anything in positive reinforcement. Wes gets to hear all day how bright and talented he is and he truly is! This year I've designed a "Passport to Half Day Town". As a reward for his good efforts, he'll get a half day off school after he collects 100 stickers.

That's all for now. I'll be back with our schedule, some of the resources I'm using this year and what we'll be doing in the first few weeks of school.

End of Third Grade ~ Beginning of Fourth

If you scroll through this blog, you will notice that my posts kind of fell off at the end of the third grade year. This is more due to my Spring fever than our lack of activity at school. Third grade ended with us maintaining our schedule and reviewing materials from throughout the year. We also combined all of our friendly letters into one last grand edition of our newspaper the Indie Press.

Wes made great strides in the second half of the third grade. We held onto our schedule, but as the year drew to a close, I would often let him pick the order of our subjects. He surprised me with his choices, reading over music for instance. As I now look over the curriculum for the coming year, I realize the we have already covered much of the math concepts. I will keep Wes moving forward as that is his favorite subject, but we will perhaps concentrate our heaviest efforts in Language Arts. I am already seeing a path in which we can combine our comprehension, research and writing skills with our social studies and science subject matter.

Mostly, this message is to serve as closure and the completion of our third grade posting. I am now busy collecting materials and forming our curriculum based on our school district and the national standards. Some of the things typically covered the fourth grade year are already favorites for Wes like US geography and state history. This is a kid who, two years ago, could recite the states and their capitals in the order in which they were admitted into the union!

Just For Fun

This isn't about school, but it's always fun to share home movies. Wes decided to make his own Book of World Records and to be the first person to make it into the book. Here's how he set his own record:

You know what happens after you break a record? You get your picture taken and it goes into the book! Here's Wes posing with his trampoline. What a ham!

The Fourth Quarter

I must have a touch of the Spring Fever because I haven't managed to blog since Spring Break. You must think Wes and I are taking the rest of the year off, but that is far from true. It's already the third week of the last quarter and we've been hard at work. So lets break it down:

Cursive ~ This quarter we are writing EVERYTHING in cursive!
Writing ~ We launched a Letter Writing Campaign. Every week we are writing a friendly letter to someone we know and providing them with paper and a stamped envelope in the hope of getting return mail. Our last issue of the Indie Press this year will be the Friendly Letter Edition and will showcase our efforts. Each letter is written over the course of two days. On Tuesday and think the letter through and record what we want to say on our mini tape recorder. On Wednesday Wes can use that recording to transcribe his letter into a beautiful cursive not with proper Friendly Letter Format.
Language Arts ~ We have made grammar part of our daily routine by incorporating our Practice and Learn Third Grade workbook into the schedule. Each day we do at least one page.
Reading and Comprehension ~ After easing back into this kind of work last quarter, now it's full steam ahead with daily reading and one-a-day comprehension practice from the Third Grade Reading Comprehension Master Skills.
Math ~ We are mostly reviewing in this last quarter to make sure we are in a really solid place going into next year. An exception to this is that we are tackling multi digit multiplication which is new. My rough plan is to go from Multiplication to Division to Fractions and then some basic Geometry if we have time.
Social Studies ~ We are reading about Early American life.
Science ~ We are studying the human body. We have already done an overview and now we are looking more closely at specific areas of the body beginning with the brain.
Extras ~ We are still publishing a bi-weekly paper which we call the Indie Press. We are also still incorporating Piano and Keyboarding and our Recipe of the Week into our schedule.

So you see, we are still working hard. Don't let my lack of checking in make you believe otherwise. I'm also behind on my photo sharing so I will leave you today with a few pictures:

Chilly Burgers


Space Spuds


Anatomy

Oh and I just remembered! We have also taken a field trip to the Arizona Science Center. We have another field trip to the Wild Animal Park this Friday and I want to buy tickets for the Childsplay Theater production of Never Ending Story. So see? We are busy!

St. Patrick's Day Video

I probably should have ended the third quarter with more than a picture of pancakes. We actually had a regular full week of studies in addition to our Recipe of the Week. Now we are enjoying our Spring Break.

Wes made his first movie today. So here it is:

St. Patrick's Day 2009