-Math and Painting Day-
We finished lesson one from Math U See today. We watched the video for the lesson and Devin completed work sheets that he really liked doing. Fiona went on to do today’s worksheets to the best of her ability…twice!
We painted dragons using the wet on wet painting technique. This was the suggested activity for Michaelmas in our painting guide. We are a little late…or early for that but it was still a nice process:)
-Language Arts Day-
We worked through three word families today. For “IG”, we drew pictures of pigs (Devin’s is in there somewhere;) and wrote the words in our main lesson books.
We played a card game for the “ILL” words. Devin helped write out the cards. He loves these Sharpie metallic paint pens and is always willing to practice writing if I offer them.
For the “IM” words, we first wrote the words on watercolor paper with crayon, then wet painted a beach scene over the words.
-Math and Painting Day-
Our fourth painting lesson had us “plowing the fields” with green. I love this weekly activity and so do the kids. We used some of our paintings that have been put away to make Valentines for friends today.
I’m going to give Math U See curriculum a shot and see how Devin enjoys it. I ordered Primer and the manipulative blocks. I ordered everything but the workbook used.
He did his first lesson and said “This is so easy and fun!”, so that’s promising:)
The day the blocks came in the mail, both kids played with them for over an hour. Devin built an impressive structure.
-Math and Painting Day-
We got a little behind last week, so we are still working on week sixteen. We finished up King Maximo and the Number Knights today! Devin has been looking forward to drawing this coat of arms for a while now! It was complicated but we managed:) Overall, I would recommend this resource. It was a nice, closer look at the value of each number and there were definitely several light bulb moments for Devin about certain things that were pointed out in relation to each number discussed. The little poems are great for copy work/practice writing, although, he did ask me to stop asking him to write them, so I did stop for the last few weeks. I would rather him not resent the process and continue appreciating the goods parts. Devin didn’t really love the wording through the story but always enjoyed drawing the shields.
We had a little painting lesson today too. We are really enjoying this weekly ritual and love the guidance that this manual gives. It’s called Teaching Painting: Wet on Wet Watercolor in the Waldorf Tradition Volume One: Grade 1-2 by Marsha Johnson.
Today is the first day of the second quarter in our Oak Meadow curriculum. I introduced “word families” today and Devin responded nicely to the first activity. He liked drawing seven dogs and really had some moments of understanding while we spelled out the different words on the dogs!
Next, I read a book about stars. I switched the science activity this week with lesson eighteen since lesson thirteen was all about snow and winter weather. I wanted to wait until our season matches a bit more.
This was a good, light read with some really cool information that Devin liked a lot.
We visited our local science museum a few weeks back and talked about the constellations we saw in the Planetarium there.
For math, I read the story of King Equal from the curriculum. I explained what the equal symbol means in an equation and we drew scales to represents the equal sides of a simple math problem. I had Devin name two numbers to form an equation and asked him to figure out the answer using our counting stones.
Later, I read a lovely book called A Ladder to the Stars. Such a magical story. We liked this one a lot.
Today was the second homeschool day we had this week since we have been so busy with out of the house activities with friends. I packed a lot in but Devin was very willing and happy to do it. He asked to school outside today.
I read Weaving the Rainbow, which I chose since we had just read such a nice and informative story about wool earlier in the week. A lovely story about a weaver who raises her sheep well and makes a beautiful picture with their wool.
I took out our needle felting supplies a few days ago and have been making little things while the children watch.
I changed this week’s drawing. This is the first time I’ve done that since I really like all the alphabet pictures. Here is the letter W, made out of skeins of yarn:)
Next, I read At the Crossroads. The illustrations are beautiful in this story. Boys wait at the village crossroads for their fathers to come home from the mines.
We drew our X crossroads in our main lesson books. Our crossroads probably shouldn’t have so much grass but we didn’t think of that at the moment….I rely on the curriculum a lot for the drawings.
Devin practiced printing the letters V, W and X in his writing book.
Later, we read chapter seven of King Maximo and the Number Knights and drew the shield in our main lesson books. At this point, Devin is getting bored with these chapters. He enjoys writing the poems and making the shields but not much else right now.
Finally, I shared such a special and wonderful book, The Story of the Root Children. It is stunningly illustrated and delightful to read. Devin was laughing so much and really loving it! This was part of the curriculum, not something I added.
Devin has been sick since Sunday but he felt up to some school work a few times today. I read The Valley of the Weavers from the curriculum fairytale book. I was really happy with this story. Definitely a little dark at times…as all fairytales should be. It sent a cool message about starting your own business and also goes through the process of carding, spinning, knitting and weaving wool.
We each drew the letter V, in the shape of a valley in our main lesson books.
He counted out 70 stones, making groups of ten until he got to seventy, then practiced writing numbers sixty through seventy.
Before bed, Devin made a diorama of his bedroom. He and his dad figured out the direction each wall faces with a compass and used dollhouse furniture to show where all of his things belong.
I read Me On The Map at bed time. This pairs well with the diorama activity and breaks things down well.
We went to our local Waldorf school’s holiday fair over the weekend and it was magical. It’s such a beautiful environment. A friend described the visit as feeling like the whole place gave her a hug and I thought that was pretty accurate.
I was very excited to stock up on single block crayons to add to our collection…I got skin tones;)
Today’s letter was R, so we read Rumplestiltskin. This is the fairytale the curriculum suggests, so we found a good library book version like we’ve been doing for each story.
We drew an R into our main lesson books, in the shape of the spindle from the story.
Next, I read The Cloud Spinner, which we really enjoyed. The illustrations were unique and the story was nice.
We read outside and observed today’s clouds. It was an overcast, damp day today.
Mud between the toes was Fiona’s assignment;)
I really like how Oak Meadow guides me to explain clouds. The main cloud types are broken down into “blanket, feather and fluffy”. This is a very age appropriate way to get kids noticing that there are different kinds of clouds that produce different kinds of weather. I shared the actual name of today’s clouds when we made our cloud models with cotton balls and Devin did remember later while talking to his dad but I’m not pushing him to memorize the names. I find that he shows a lot more interest with less factual information.
Later, we worked through chapter five of King Maximo and the Number Knights. Starting with forming 5 little balls and practicing the shield shape on the chalkboard. This is a very challenging shape for Devin and he’s still working on getting it just right.
Today’s coat of arms was so pretty!
Today’s letter was Q. I’m glad we’re working on this letter since it really seems to confuse Devin…which is understandable! I read a book called Isabella Abnormella and the Very, Very Finicky Queen of Trouble. It was a fun story about a restless queen.
We drew our letter Q in the shape of a queen with a flowing robe.
Next, I asked Devin to count to fifty using our counting stones. I showed him how to count by twos and group the stones into groups of ten. Then we practiced counting by tens. He practiced writing the numbers forty through fifty in his main lesson book and I touched on horizontal equations during this time. I also showed him that twenty five is half of fifty, by having him draw twenty five dots and then draw the same amount under them. This was a good time to remind him that there are twenty five cents in a quarter and that two quarters make fifty cents.
I read an informative book about clouds that we found to be boring and dry;) We had a rainy day outside today and determined that there were Stratus clouds in the sky.
Later in the day we read a much more whimsical and enjoyable book about clouds.
I made some “cloud paint” in hopes of having Devin create a model of today’s clouds on paper but things went a little out of control! This was very fun for the kids and very stress inducing for me. Not such a fun clean up either. Devin turns this type of activity into a full body experience pretty quickly;)
It should be announced that Devin lost his first baby tooth last night! So crazy for me to think about. I have a six year old BIG KID!
For our last day of week eight, I set up a painting session to start our learning time. They used crayons on some of the paper first to see what happened when painted with watercolors.
I shared two books about weather. The Magic School Bus books are always just okay in my opinion. Devin likes them but they’re not my favorite.
The next book we read is definitely going to be purchased. Come On, Rain. I love it. It’s a book that makes you feel like you are THERE, in the story.
Next, we filled in the last day of the weather chart.
The letters this week were O and P, so he practiced writing those in his lined notebook.
As soon as I took the story notebook out, Devin was excited and thinking up his story. This makes me so happy! He was squinting his eyes thinking hard about what he would create.
We played a game to learn more about short and long O sounds. I called out a word and we built the object out of clay. Then, I had Devin tell me if the word had a short or long O sound. If he got it right, he could SMASH his sculpture up! We used the words snowman, clover, crow, cop car, dot and pot.
Through The Meadow, Into The Oaks 