Rethinking history...

History is just not getting done in the time frame I would like. I was aiming for a 4 year cycle, repeated 3 times, but that is just not going to happen, so now am aiming for repeating twice, some areas three if it happens.

This allows us to slow down and change direction as needed. Such as this month... Instead of studying ancient history, we are covering American history, specifically the arrival of the Pilgrims. How fitting! LOL. We will keep moving through our main curriculum, but I refuse to feel guilty about side trips anymore. It will get covered.

She is having a blast learning about our early history and it is very hands on. I found this book at a local learning store and figured why not? I have been eyeing stuff from Evan-Moor, and if she still likes this format by the time we are done, I will probably get more.

Amelia Earhart

 

A Halloween poem for you

Here is Emma's latest memorization. Almost forgot to get it videoed!

Weekend Excursions part 2

 

As I sit here waiting for the oven to preheat so I can bake some cupcakes I thought I would write up and post our second weekend of waterfalls.

This was last weekend and we went to explore the north fork of the Lewis River.  This will be a lot closer to us once we move.  We were on the south side of Mt St Helens.

Not much to say about these…  Thought I edited a few more but I guess not.  Enjoy!

Weekend excursions part 1

 

We have spent the last couple “weekends” exploring and hiking. 

Our first weekend was on the Oregon side of the Columbia River exploring fish hatcheries and waterfalls in the gorge.

Along the drive...  On the right of the photo, very small, you can see the Vista House.  When we drove by, it was way too windy to stop.  We ended up stopping on the way back, still very windy.  Those pictures will be at the end,

Beautiful bridges!

 

They do not do stone work like this anymore

Multnomah Falls

Emma taking photos at one of our stops.  This waterfall is at the same location as the stonework up above. 

Another waterfall after a nice short hike!

Stopped at the Vista House on the way back.  I would like to go when it is not so windy so I can take more photos.

Pumpkin Patch 2011

We made the annual trip to the (new to us) pumpkin patch today.  We were disappointed at first at how rotted the pumpkins seemed at first and Dave made a comment that we are in warmer climate and that might why.  Everywhere else we have lived usually has a good frost or two, if not some snow by end of October.  We kept moving back further from where the hay ride lets people off and we finally found Emma’s pumpkin.  Then we headed over to the smaller pumpkins and found a couple for mom and dad!

Pictures from today:

Is this the one?

I think so!

With all three pumpkins!

I love this shot! 

And after the carving:

 

Bed in Summer by Robert Louis Stevenson

Here is Emma’s latest memorized poem! (A heads up that she did have an orthodontic appliance put in a few weeks ago, so her speech may seem a little different. I can not tell where she is compared to before she had it put in, but she has come a long ways in the past few weeks!)

We are hoping to have her next poem up this coming week! She is working hard on polishing a Halloween poem!

Real life math

I love real life math... We are off to the grocery store in a few minutes. Emma has been really into sales ads and such lately for grocery stores, so today we sat down and I point out the items we knew we were going to get. She wrote down the quantities and prices (already including store coupons). She then used multiplication to figure out how much per type we were going to spend. I let her know what types of manufacturer coupons I had and she took that into consideration. And then she added everything up (well, I had her add as she went to keep it simple).

Now we will go see how she does! I am hoping the store is slow today because I want them to give me a subtotal of her items, including coupons. We have a coupon for so much off our total, so I am not willing to do separate transactions. The only thing I did not have her figure out is sales tax because it gets down right confusing at the grocery store! She knows how to do it, but I am not sure what is taxed and what is not.

recent pictures

I still can not find the card reader for my camera so here are some pictures from the point and shoot...

Emma and her US states map:

A few from our trip to the zoo last month:

I love mornings like this!

Today is going really smoothly and I wish we could be in a groove like this most of the time. It is even better since it is the first day of our week, so maybe we can keep it going!

So far this morning, both Emma and I have skyped with my friend and her 5 yr old son, memory work (including 3 different maps), Writing with Ease, violin practice. She is now working on fractions in math, and we will do vocabulary, history, and will break open her new latin program that just came in the mail! After that, possibly in the middle of all that, off to an orthodontist appointment and to her violin lesson!

Tonight, we will continuing on a multi-day art project and possibly start another multi-day project... both for Halloween. To top it all off, I ran across a week long history unit on Amelia Earhart that I have not told Emma about. It will make her day and be something fun for her to do in her free time. It is all online with video and other fun stuff! (She is going to be Amelia for Halloween so is very excited to learn about her!) We will start that at some point in the next week.

Was going to throw some photos on this entry too, but can not find my card reader... will have to wait!

Almost 4 months into moving we are settled, but at the same time not. I think part of that is that we are in the process of trying to buy a piece of property so we are thinking ahead to that. If all goes well, we will close end of November and start working on the house. It is an early 1980's mobile home that needs a bit work. What we are really buying is the 2.25 acres. We will be redoing the two bathrooms and painting to start and consider what else to do once we are in. the apartment living has been rougher this time around. The complex is not as nice as the one in Denver and having the dogs have made it rough. The constant outside noise is tough at time too. We have been fortunate that the walls seem pretty sound proof. We do not hear our neighbors, and they have not complained about us (rather the dogs). The only noise I hear is the downstairs dogs, which is getting old.

Things are going pretty good here. Getting Emma into violin ended up being more of a struggle than I thought it would be. We are finally settled with a teacher that we both like, and one that works well with Emma and challenges her. The process in getting her involved teachers who were not a good fit. When she told me she no longer looked forward to going to lessons, that was the final straw. I had already made my mind up after the eye-rolling and sighing. By the way, that was from the teacher, not Emma. Because we left the business that also did orchestra, I pulled her out of that. It ended up being a good choice for now. Dave's days off changed and orchestra would have been right in the middle of his days off. She is now completely sight reading her music too! I am really impressed with how she is doing. In addition to working through her Suzuki music, she is also working on "We Wish You A Merry Christmas!" Her teacher thinks she will be able to work on at least 2 Christmas pieces this season.

We are doing pretty good with school. This past couple weeks, Emma and I have had to adjust to schooling on the traditional weekend. A few times she has protested that it "is the weekend!" and I in turn, give her the choice of getting work done now, or waiting and doing it on the traditional school day when Daddy is off. She gets back to work pretty quick!

She moved onto the next year books for LA. Same program (Writing With Ease) but it is book 2. It is a set up for her and she is doing really well. It focus a lot on narration and dictation and she is doing really well with both. With dictation she is doing two sentences at a time. With grammar she is learning what adjectives, interjections and conjunctions are.

Spelling, we are 1 lesson away from finishing book 2. That will be finished up next week I think. She is also working through a 300-400 word spelling test of all the words covered in book two (minus the last lesson) so I can judge where we need more review. I have noticed a huge growth in her spelling these past 6 months, even with stuff we have not covered. When I asked her, she said it is due to her reading so much :) She is picking up a lot from her books. As for reading, she is really enjoying American Girl books, Goosebumps, and almost everything from Beverly Clearly! I love that in addition to fictional characters, she also enjoys non-fiction and fiction about real people. She is now reading about Amelia Earhart (who she is going to be for Halloween). Another book she is really enjoying right now is a book of Greek myths.

Memory work is going really well. She has passed off on the 50 states (locations and spelling) and is only doing that map 1x week as review. There are usually 2-3 misspelled and they are never the same, so I am pretty sure she is just not paying attention! She is now working on the 7 continents, 5 oceans, Equator, Tropic of Cancer, and Tropic of Capricorn. That is also ready to go to 1x week. Next will be countries in North America (will probably go ahead and learn Canada's provinces/territories at this point). Then I think Central America, and then South America. That might change though. She is also working on Greek Gods/Goddesses, a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson, and a Halloween poem.

In math she is in the second half of Singapore Math 3B. We skipped ahead of the last part of measurements because I want to go more in-depth than the book does and this is not the time. She grasped the metric part very well, but there was not enough substance for imperial. So she flew the money unit and is now working with fractions and is having a lot of fun. She amazes me how into math she gets and really enjoys the challenge. Right now they are introducing equivalent fractions but in addition, we are working a little ahead and learning how to convert to equivalent fractions.

Getting ready (I hope) to get a few posts up with photos of what we have been up to... Lots of photos to sift through and pick out.

Things are going really good here. Emma and I finally ran into the local homeschool group after a couple weeks of looking. The swimming and ice skating appear not to be well attended but it is summer so it might pick back up once school is back in session. We have been going to the park day group and have also been attending a group (pretty much same families plus others) at the local UU church. Emma has been making new friends which is nice!

We met with the orchestra teacher and he "auditioned" her and she easily made it into year 2 orchestra and he said that she will probably be one of the more advanced students there. She has also been taking private lessons and next month we are going to "test drive" another teacher. The first one was fine, but she had a sub yesterday and we are going to try her for a month. As it is, when orchestra starts in October, I would like her private lesson and orchestra to either be on adjoining days or on the same day. Frees us up if something comes up that allows us to travel. Her teacher for July would not have allowed that schedule. The new teacher allows us to to adjoining days but not the same day as orchestra unless we switch orchestra days. I purposely put her in Tuesdays orchestra (rather than Wednesday) due to it having a very short list compared to a very long for Wed. I am sure it will fill up more but the way I look at it is, less students, more individual attention, more progress.

Have slowly been getting our feet wet with school work again. About 1 hr a day (not including violin) and that it going well. We are 3 weeks away from finishing her writing curriculum which is my main goal right now, I just want it done. We have also been doing some math (getting into measurements), science and history.

Plenty of day trips to explore (hopefully you will see photos of those soon). We have been to Portland, the Columbia Gorge to hike, the beach (a couple times), Mt. St. Helens, bike riding, and a lot more hiking!

Homeschool Happenings In Washington

Getting a little excited the more I look at what is available where we are moving. I finally found a secular homeschool group online and joined. So far I have seen them posting for swim days (1x week), ice skating days (1x week), park day (1x week), and bowling (1x month). Emma is really excited, especially about the ice skating day.

I looked up the location of some of these and was amazed that they are actually pretty close to our apartment! We were somewhat limited in choosing and went in without really knowing the area.... Found two that would take our dogs (one of which is 110 lbs) and then asked a friend who lives out there her opinion. Came back that one was in a good area, the other in an iffy area. The one in the good area was with the same management company we used in Denver so we felt a little more comfortable going in without visiting. Turns out, as of right now, that location was a good choice!

Continues with more research today. One thing I have not figured out is violin lessons. We are moving to an area that has centers dedicated to Suzuki training but they cost big bucks and we loose the flexibility of travel that homeschooling allows. We still might go that route but I am going to continue to look at other options.

I found one music store that rents instruments but seem like they might cost more than the local store here (who is willing to rent long distance). On their site I saw something about homeschool option and found that they have 2 days a week they cater classes to homeschoolers, including orchestra! After emailing them, it has been determined she might even qualify for 2nd year orchestra because she has been playing so long. The teacher wants to watch her play first. This also has a weekly commitment though. However, the price is a lot more agreeable, even though I will still add on private lessons too.

Stopped in and said goodbye to her art teacher today. It was good to see her. Emma has been with her since she opened her studio here in town (minus classes when we were traveling).

Off to get some stuff done!

Today (Tuesday) was busy with a last minute showing on the house as well as me getting the living area cleared out so the realtor could get the last of the photos she needed. The living area has been my staging area so there was lots of misc stuff all around it. Now it is clean (minus the boxes of home schooling books that are hiding in the kitchen). the showing went well I guess... By last minute I mean I got a heads up there was interest but the final call that it was happening happened 2 minutes before they showed up. However, he was here for about 40 mins. The Realtor got a call from the viewer's realtor asking about utility costs so that is a positive sign. What I would love is a sold offer before we leave to take a little pressure off our shoulders.

We got a bite on the trailer we need to sell. He is coming by tonight to look at it. Would be nice to have that sold too! (It sold and is gone!)

Stuff still to do: continue packing the kitchen... Down to breakables and food for the most part. then deep clean it and clean out fridge and freezer. Bedrooms are pretty much packed to the point they can be loaded into the moving van... Touch up painted needed in most rooms and cover plates on some outlets... Garage has misc to pack but it is mainly sporting goods and Dave's tools (leaving that to him!). Garage still needs to have the painting finished and the yard needs some stuff hauled off.

Also needed to be done... meet up with a lot of friends to say goodbye. Squeezing that in as much as possible. Trying not to leave too much of that to the last moment in case we run out of time. There are still a few people we have come to know here who do not even know so we really need to make sure to stop in and say goodbye.

Jump starting the blog...

This is going to be an attempt at jump starting the blog again... Not a huge amount to report at this time aside from just plugging away at getting ready to moving. Moving day is a week away. We get the U-Haul Monday and pull out Tuesday morning. We are all REALLY excited but at the same time really bummed that we are leaving behind some good friends.

The first of the goodbyes came today with Emma's last violin lesson with Jessica. Jessica is Emma's 4th teacher in the past almost 4 years and Emma has been taking lessons with her since last fall. On the way there, we stopped by work where I said goodbye to a couple people. Also found out that they finally have enough babies to open the baby room, which most likely would have given me full time. Oh well, I am bummed out at missing out working there again.

It has been an interesting spring here in Western Colorado. Very wet (which we joked was to prep us for the Pacific Northwest!). The Colorado River was also very high this year. Higher than I have seen in the previous springs.

Back to work. Realtor is coming tomorrow to take pictures of the main living area so I have boxes and tools to clear out. It is the one area of the house we do not have pictures up for yet.

DRA2–spring 2011

Emma had her DRA2 testing this past week and did good.  I was not sure what to expect at first because she had tested in the fall.  I was not sure if they would base her testing off of last spring or the fall.  Turns out, with a little research, the highest they would test her would be level 24, which is the benchmark for the end of 1st grade. 

Anyways, she passed with no problem.  Suggestions were given where to improve over the next year.  I see some things conflicting slightly with what we use for the curriculum… For instance, she is learning to summarize stories/fables concisely and the DRA2 was looking for a lot more detail.  That is easy to work with.  Other than that, she does a lot of what is suggested at home in everyday life, comparing what she reads to real life situations,

I was also shown what would be expected at level 28, which is helpful.  At that level, Emma is required to write her answers out, so we can start incorporating that into our lessons.  She already has to tell me what happens in fables and short stories with one of her language art curriculums, so now we can start working on her writing it out.

Suggestions made: 

- Model and support how to use background knowledge to make meaningful connections. 

- Teach how to retell a story: include important events in sequence, use character names, identify important details, use language/vocabulary from the text.

- Model and teach learner how to think about “Why” questions during and after reading a text.

- Ask learner to identify and discuss the most important event in a story.

-Encourage learner to reflect with statements such as: “This reminds me of….(my world) because…”

- Teach learner how to think about relevant background knowledge before reading an informational text.

- Teach how to identify important information (key facts and ideas) to include in a retelling.

- Encourage “This book reminds me of another book because…”

Easter 2011

Easter was good this year :)  A little lower key than normal, if that is possible.  We did not get around to dying the eggs until last night but still had fun :)

By 6:30 Emma was asking to go to bed because she was so excited the Easter Bunny was coming!  It was still after 9pm when she fell asleep though!  At 7:15 this morning she came out with an egg full of dog treats that the Easter Bunny left on her door handle, with her door shut!  She is still not sure how this is happening (happened 2 years ago too and she still talks about it!).

Very excited to see her Easter basket waiting for her on the table!

Then off to find eggs! 

Wait… quick time out… I should probably mention here that I was a “mean” mom and let her keep looking….  the eggs were hidden outside this year since the rain held off!  At one point she started questioning that maybe the eggs were outside, so she ran out and located one and then ran back in to get shoes and a sweatshirt on!

See the blue egg?  I do… on the canoe… far right of the picture

5-10 minutes later, she is back to this part of the yard again…. still there!  Look up Emma!  She looks at the sky… Not that high!  Oh there it is!

Other great story… Emma had one more “big thing” waiting outside from the Easter Bunny, complete with an egg in it…

So she finds the egg, grabs it and is off to find the next egg.

Dave calls out “Hey Emma, what is that pink thing?”

Emma “A pink ball!  Cool!”  At this point Dave and I just look at each other and shake our heads… I mean this glove is A LOT darker than her current one and 2-3 times bigger…  We call attention to it….

Now she is excited!  Said she thought it was her old glove!  Time to hit the ball fields and learn to catch!

The final stash – big egg holds a ring pop and the brown egg still in the basket is what holds the dog treats

Happy Easter to All!