Day 40 or, Week 6 of winter term

Yay! We’re half-way done the term! At the end of this week I’ll re-evaluate where we are and decide if we’ll take next week off (it’s a short week anyway, since the Monday is Family Day- A statutory holiday here in Ontario).

Gracie's schedule can be found here

this term's composer~ Chopin (we’ve stopped playing his music during table work, because The Boy finds it too distracting- and doesn’t like it much, either ;-)

fun read-aloud~ we’ve finished The Borrowers Afloat, and we have moved on to The Borrowers Aloft (we read the first two in this series last fall)

classic~ we’ll be finishing up Little House on the Prairie and starting Farmer Boy

table work~ penmanship, phonics

continuing~ both The Boy and Shmoo finished the first half of their math programs a few weeks ago, so we’ll be taking a break to work on cementing math facts and keeping the four operations straight. Shmoo wants to continue with some fun math we played with over the summer, and The Boy wants to work on some notebook pages in his math mainlesson book (I’ll post some things he’s working on when I get my pictures uploaded from my camera).

mainlessons

Canadian geography (S is for Spirit Bear- British Columbia):

I (the Iceman- Kwaday Dän Ts'inchi)~ read the relevant chapter from Bodies From The Ice: melting glaciers and the recovery of the past by James M. Deem

J (Jade, Steller’s Jay- provincial symbols)~ colour pictures and add to notebook with geological/ ornithological info

Plus:

Continuing our Native Peoples of Canada study (A is for Aboriginals), we’ll read some more from our list of books on the Northwest coast natives. List later.

For our Artist Study (E is for Emily Carr), we’ll read some more about her life and study a new painting this week. Gracie is reading Klee Wyck, Carr’s story of her time among the Northwest coast natives as a young woman.

We’ll be continuing to learn about the Overland Trail (G is for Gold Rush), reading:

Pay Dirt! : The Search for Gold in British Columbia by Laura Langston

A Trail of Broken Dreams: The Gold Rush Diary of Harriet Palmer by Barbara Haworth-Attard. So far we’re enjoying it and there haven’t been any many content issues, but if I’m not happy with the storyline/content, we’ll ditch it.

science:

~ add narrations and illustrations from Born With a Bang to notebook

~ read books that flesh out topics touched on (this week- star formation and galaxies)

poetry (R is for Rhyme):

~ read C (Cinquin) and take ideas from lesson here (Wow, we’re slow with poetry this term! We’ve been picking away at it, but there is just so much to read and do, that it seems to be dragging on- but that’s okay, we’d rather take it slow and enjoy it.)

natural history:

native moon (snow)~ read from list of both fiction and non-fiction books (list later)

~ we finished The Tough Winter by Robert Lawson (fabulous book!) and are moving on to Bambi by Felix Salten

~ walk to look for tracks in the snow (lots of bunny tracks in our backyard!)

~ we’ll try to catch snowflakes on a piece of felt to get a closer look

nature calendar~ We’ve ditched this idea for this year- we just have too much going on. We’ll make this the focus of our natural history studies next year, instead.

religion:

~ read two chapters from The Golden Children's Bible

The Holy Twins: Scholastica (10th) and Benedict (11th): we’ll read Tomie dePaola’s book

St. Valentine (14th): we’ll read
~ Valentine’s Day by Gail Gibbons
~ Saint Valentine by Robert Sabuda
~ Saint Valentine by Ann Tompert
~ The Valentine box by Maud Hart Lovelace
~ The story of Valentine's Day by Clyde Robert Bulla

other stuff

art:

~ this week we'll be doing a painting in the style of Emily Carr

~ we’ll decide what crafts we’d like to make for Valentine’s Day and gather supplies

handwork:

~ continuing with the crocheting and finger knitting, and doing a little sewing and knitting

French:

~ review and a new lesson (oral for the littles, Gracie is doing the reading and written assignments), work vocabulary into daily life.

home ec. and habits:

~ keep up our peaceful (and predictable) routine, reinforce our cleaning schedule

~ work on our decluttering project