Week in Review-- Week #3 Year 4

Looking at our calendar over the long weekend I wondered if it was even going to be possible to get any schoolwork done this week.  It's been another super busy week but we've been having so much fun that I wouldn't have wanted it any other way.  I'd be lying if I said I wasn't anxious about starting back to school.  I'd by lying if I didn't admit that I keep looking at our calendar wondering when we'll finally have a normal week where we get back to school and focus on book work but I also know all the "fun" stuff we have signed up for is educational too.  It's just so hard to shake that public school mentality I grew up with!  Luckily, as I sit here going through our week I can see that we did somehow manage to cover tons of schoolwork as well.  So it was a fantastic week!

Reading-- We tried to finish up The Hero's Guide to Saving Your Kingdom and came pretty close! We also started reading another Magic Tree House book; High Time for Heroes.  We've finished up our book on CD and while waiting for the next book to come in Alec and Ian have been taking turns reading chapters aloud in the car; not something they love but they've been doing it for us anyway.   Alec started reading Seekers and loves this new book series reading more than 7 chapters in one sitting!  Ian read a few more chapters in Divergent.  Evan and I have been playing some reading games like sight word cup stackers, sight word memory, and file folder games for reading.  He's also been reading some more Sight Word Tales books to me.

Math-- The boys have completed a few timed/ review sheet for math this week as well as completing a few pages in their math workbooks.  The older boys also completed a compute and color page for math one day working on reviewing multiplication facts.  Evan has been working on telling time and since we don't have any analog clocks in the house he's been finishing up some work sheets where he has to tell the time on the clock to the hour.

History-- We continued our Vietnam/ Vietnam War study by reading Year of the Jungle, Leaving Vietnam, and Journey Home.  We're also learning about Florence Nightingale while reading High Time for Heroes.  We also played a few board games where we learned about history like American Trivia.

Science-- We watched a few episodes of Wild Kratts and learned about some new animals and their adaptations.  We watched Mythbusters and learned about the myths behind the Star Wars movies.  It was so neat to see all the cool things they made; like the realistic light sabers!  We spent a day at the beach with my sister and walked the marshes looking for crabs and waterfowl. We saw baby sand sharks, schools of tiny fish, and a large shell covered in barnacles.  Alec read his whole Zoobooks magazine this week and funny enough it too was all about water birds and he shared all that he read and learned.  Alec also taught us about barnacles and how they are living things (after we saw things moving near all the holes in the barnacles). We watched a few episodes of Fetch With Ruff Rufman and Magic School Bus too.  I have some great experiments planned but we just haven't had time to get to them yet!

Socialization-- We met up with a bunch of friends at the lake last Friday and the boys spent a fun day swimming, slashing and playing Marco Polo.  It was nice to see Ian branching out and playing with other kids near his own age instead of hanging out with us adults, like usual.  We also had a party at my sister's house over the weekend and the boys happily played with their cousins and all the other kids who turned up at the party.  Even though they didn't really know any of the other kids or adults they were interacting nicely and for the most part left us alone so I have to assume they found some way to keep themselves occupied. We met up with some new homeschool families at the beach and the kids had a great time playing altogether.

Physical Education-- We've all been riding our bikes quite a bit and going on family rides.  I biked with the two younger boys over to their grandmother's cottage a few times.   The boys all started back to karate this week and were happy to see lots of their old friends and meet some new ones.  Ian has discovered my husband's old four wheeler and spent part of his weekend riding around our trails in the woods.  He came back all sweaty and happy.  While not the greatest form of exercise you do have to move with the bike and it does leave you feeling a bit achy afterwards so it's got to count towards something in my book!  Alec and Ian tried their hand at playing ladder toss over the weekend.  They were a bit dangerous at times with the tossing but they sure had a ball trying to wrap the cords around the ladder.   They've swam and ran and have been playing on the swings and monkey bars all week too.

Cross- curricular--  We had a game day one day this week.  I had given the boys a packet of back to school coupons that they could redeem whenever they wanted and they decided to hand in Ian's game day coupon this week.  We spent the day playing all sorts of games; Sudoku, hangman, Qwirkle, Scrambled States of America, GeoBingo, America Trivia, etc.  We've also been using our Brain Quest Trivia cards in the car while driving around quizzing each other on facts from all the subjects.

Life Skills-- The younger boys have had a job to do this week.  Their grandmother was gone on vacation and they were put in charge of feeding her cats, cleaning their litter boxes, and making sure they were all safely in the house at night.  They did a great job working together taking care of the cats.  Evan also went to work with my husband a time or two this weekend learning how to use the excavator (with my husband driving and showing him how to use the controls).  Ian went with his father to the shop one night this week to make a new handle for his fishing net.  The handle had broken off and he had the idea of fixing it.  They ended up making a whole new handle using the various metal working tools and Ian proudly came home with a better than new fishing net.