Madeline

I’m happy to report that it’s the third week of school and we have momentum and aren’t ready to take a break, haha! This is actually a big accomplishment with a baby and toddler who try to derail us all.day.long. It’s okay they are cute and worth it. This week, there were more opportunities for them to participate because we were studying Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans. 

In the morning, we continued with our quiet time. In Handwriting, we worked on the letter M for Madeline. And in the afternoons, we continued daily with our math and reading lessons. Reading is getting more complex so we are trying to move at a little bit of a slower to keep progressing and having an enjoyable experience…so far so good.

On Monday, everyone was introduced to our Madeline doll we borrowed from a friend and we read our story. It was fitting that Madeline has an appendix surgery in the story because it gave us a chance to talk about surgery and how it went positively...so much so all the other girls wished they could have surgery too! Even Madeline, the doll, had a perfect little scar! Madeline lives in France so we flew all the way from Ohio to France. We noticed that when we put our story disc on the map that Madeline lives half way between America and China. We made the flag of France and learned how to say hello and good bye in French. We took a break to watch Madeline and eat Madeline cookies from France :)

Afternoon reading work!

Tuesday, we learned how to draw Madeline and Silas did such a great job! I’m in love with his drawings. We talked about compassion and how the girls “smiled at the good and frowned at the bad”. Silas awesome built a great Eiffel tower out of legos.

Wednesday, we abandoned our morning activities to go to the library like the girls went our a half past nine and we checked out all the Madeline books we saw, and some other really good ones like a CHOMP book for Ezra and The Little Prince because we have been wanting to read it! We came home and read a few of our books and then returned to our Madeline and France studies. We read the other Madeline books and they were just as good as the first! They also are written like a poem and have several rhyme words. We thought of many additional rhymes. We also learned how to draw the Eiffel tower. Silas did such a good job and really loves drawing and art. Sadly, mommy's phone broke right here and so ends the pictures that day!

Thursday is our experiment day and we experimented making the Eiffel Tower out of wafer cookies and frosting. Our towers came crashing down and then we gobbled them up. We also studied how some of the art was true to life and other drawings were monochromic and we practiced doing that with two identical pictures of the Eiffel tower. We colored 12 little girls and drew Miss Clavel to finish off our unit study. 

Ezra wanted to be apart of it! 

We had such a great time this week and the unit studies are our favorite...so thankful for Five In A Row! These studies are helping us creating such rich memories!

Lentil

This week we continued with our quiet time and calendar time in the mornings. In Handwriting, we worked on the letter E. And in the afternoons, we continued daily with our math and reading lessons. For our unit study, we looked at Lentil by Robert McCloskey. Lentil is the story about a boy living in Alto, Ohio in the 1940’s who couldn’t sing or whistle but became an expert at the harmonica and saved the town’s parade from Old Sneep’s sour sabotage. We enjoyed the story and it gave us the opportunity to talk about what makes us unique.

On Monday, we traveled from China with Ping all the way to Ohio with Lentil. When we learn about a new story, we make a story disc and put it on our world map. We talked about America and patriotism and Captain America, of course. We also looked at music and sound and experimented with why the harmonica sound “improved by 100%” in the bath tub”.

Ignore the stripe on my bathtub...

On Tuesday, we read our story and studied art. We noticed that most of the artwork is done with charcoal. Since pencils are very similar to charcoal, we practiced drawing Lentil and worked on shading. In the book, Old Sneep sits on a bench a whittles. Apparently, there are several YouTube videos of people who whittle all sorts of things from blocks of wood- like spoons, bowls, even decorations. Silas practiced whittling with a bar of soap, toddler knives, and toothpicks since Mom wouldn’t give a piece of wood and a pocket knife ;) We practiced teaching Ezra about facial expressions (something he knows too well) and we also made fresh squeezed lemonade. This was super delicious and Chef Silas was very into this idea and said we should have a lemonade stand. We also had lentil soup for dinner, it reminded us a little bit like chili.

 

On Wednesday, we talked about being different is okay. Lentil couldn’t sing and couldn’t whistle but he did learn how to play the harmonica extra well. We talked about the things that make Silas and Ezra different. Ezra loves to catch lizards and touch bugs. Silas hates to touch bugs and runs from lizards but both things are okay. Silas loves roller coasters and bounce houses. Ezra does not. God made us all different and that’s great!

 

Thursday is our science and game day. In the morning, we talked about sour lemons and how they make our face pucker. We learned the way we taste is through our taste buds and also our sense of smell. Silas learned the location of our salty, sweet, bitter, and sour taste buds and we did an experiment where we tried each of these flavors with a dropper on our different taste bud locations. It was really funny and Silas would say that the flavor was strongest with the appropriate taste bud! Silas also tested how smell affects taste and pinched his nose while he ate two different yogurt flavors. He said he couldn’t tell a difference but maybe it is because of his tonsils being so large. We colored our taste bud worksheet and noticed that we should make an American flag for our Lentil pages of our book.

Lentil was a fun story and Silas enjoyed it, you know Cap’ loves anything to do with America! :)

Kindergarten!

Summer went by super fast and August is already here!! I can’t believe my big boy is in Kindergarten! Although we began working with All About Reading through summer, He saw all the new books and curriculum coming in and has been anxiously awaiting school to start so he can do ALL OF IT! Me too. Our school time is not bound by a super strict schedule (thanks Ezra and Ruby haha) but rather adds a very nice rhythm to our days and there is a lot of comfort in that. This year our rhythm is divided up into morning time and afternoon work (when the babies are asleep). 

On Monday, we started school with our obligatory First Day picture! Silas said his favorite thing about school is that I am his teacher (heart swell!)! 

We set our calendar up, and took a look in our morning basket. Our morning basket holds all of our Morning Work. This year, we are using a daily Calendar Notebook to keep track of what day we are, how many days we have been in school, seasons, time, and copy work practice.  After that, we started Handwriting. We are using a program called Handwriting Without Tears and each day we use a different aspect of the program. This week we were working on the letter F. So Monday, we used our wood pieces to practice making F, and our slates for “wet, dry, try” (Silas and Ezra’s favorite), and our worksheet.

After handwriting, we took our Five In A Row story out of our basket. Our story of the week was The Story of Ping. We read our story, which takes place in China, so after reading we put Ping on the world map in China. We also colored the Yangtze River on a map of China. After lunch, we started Math. Silas LOVES math! We reviewed a little Reading and colored our butterflies that we drew in Key West. Great first day, even the little ones were busy in school room all day!

Tuesday, I decided to add in a quiet time to our Morning Time. It is something that has been on my heart but I hadn’t quite figured out how to go about it, without it seeming like, I am making you do this, but the Lord impressed on me that I am not making him have time with Jesus but rather guiding him to do so….and isn’t that what my whole entire role in my child’s life suppose to be? So I decided to make him a journal with blank paper so he can draw or color while he listens to worship music. I told him we would just do one song and when it’s over we will move on because it’s just a tiny bit of our day we will give to God and focus only Him and make art for Him and if it’s a prayer, I can write the words for him. He said okay and we chose his favorite song by Phil Wickham. Right away he started drawing an anchor :) Once the song was over he told me he needed more time so I said sure thing! He then told me he was thinking about his dad and all the youth leaders. 

After that, we did calendar time, handwriting, and our story. We made the Chinese flag. In Math, we worked on patterns and Reading final word blends.

Wednesday, I told Silas that it was time for school and he said can’t wait for quiet time! I love that he looked forward to it! We listened to Spirit Move by Bethel. This time, he drew, daddy on drums, Bryan singing and playing guitar, all the people, lights, and God smiling and holding the world. 

After quiet time, we did calendar, handwriting, and Ping. We discussed how Ping went after something he thought was good and it wasn’t and it got him in trouble. We learned the word, discernment. We also talked about how Ping tried to avoid punishment and that it didn’t work out to well for him. We noticed all the art in the book was done with colored pencils, and we drew the sunset over the Yangtze River with colored pencils. This was perfect because we looked at pictures of the sunset we saw in the Keys and studied reflection and ripples and it really brought it all home for us. We also learned how to draw a duck and did math, and reading.

I love how Ruby is right in the mix as often as she can be :)

Thursday’s highlights started with our focus of quiet time being the scripture “When I lie down to sleep, I wake again because the Lord sustains me” Psalm 3:5 since we have another sleep study tonight. Silas drew him and God in a bed and also him sleeping in a bed with an air mask on. We listen to You Make Me Brave and I prayed for his little heart to be so brave. 

This was our last day of Ping, so we had a Chinese feast. Our snack, while we read, was a rice cake just like Ping had. Ruby especially liked that. And after reading, Silas helped make pot stickers, fried rice, and spring rolls. Yum yum. 

We also learned that Ducks don’t get wet because of an oil they produce and we read a book about it and did an experiment with oil and water. 

In the afternoon, we did reading and also double math lessons because he really loves it. He has a teacher at church who always speaks life over Silas and comments how smart Silas is and how good at math he is and I don’t know if that is his motivation but he really is good at it and I want to keep fueling that fire. He is so into the RightStart math and I really am glad I took that plunge. 

playing in the math supplies after the lesson

I sit here reflecting on this week, and seeing the smiles of all the kids, and Silas’ eyes filled with wonder, and Ezra SO so busy, and Ruby is right there with them, and know this is exactly what I’m suppose to be doing, and exactly what they are too- getting to experience life with their built-in best friends and growing in their calling. Scratch that, FULFILLING their current calling as living as wild and free children of God. I’m so very thankful for this season.