Weekly Wrap-up: Week 5 - The One that Begun Summer Studies

Our Summer Studies began this week. After 4 weeks off, it's time to do a little focused learning. I wouldn't call us "year round" homeschoolers, but some extra work on areas of struggle, a little math review and lots of reading give us a jump start for the fall. And why not EARN those ice cream cones (that I'd get them anyway but don't tell)?

I found this printable years ago, using it on and off as a summer studies incentive chart. When the kids complete 12 lessons of Math and 12 days of Reading and/or other Language Arts, it's ice cream time! (As the teacher, I get an ice cream cone too! It's only fair, right?) If you can find ice cream STICKERS for the squares (unlike me) it definitely adds to the chart.

Incentive Chart Source

Both kids will be participating in the Every Hero Has a Story summer reading program at the library and doing Khan Academy math, but Cati will review sentence diagramming with Grammar Revolution here, a struggle from last year, and Sam will learn cursive using Handwriting without Tears. Just for fun, Jake, my oldest who attends a STEM high school, plans to study Finance on Khan Academy. (Yeah, for fun.) He wants to get a jump start on his year-long project that includes designing, building, marketing, and selling a product.

Now, don't feel too badly for them. We're only spending 2-3 days a week on our summer studies (unless the kids decide they want ice cream sooner or more often), and only when we're not at the lake swimming or fishing, off to camps or enjoying time as a family. Summer studies are just a little something to keep us thinking through vacation.

In the meantime, Tom and I are enjoying fishing together, sometimes with family and the kids. We went to my sister's favorite fishing spot this past weekend. Chris, her friend, caught a sunfish and a perch, and my husband caught his first fish, a large mouth bass.

But anyone can catch a fish with a fishing pole with enough patience. It takes REAL fishing talent to catch what I did...

I snagged a FRESH WATER CLAM, folks! Who catches a CLAM with a HOOK? I have yet to actually catch a FISH...

Sam decided to join us one evening. It was his first time fishing! I taught him to cast, avoiding trees and lily pads, mostly. We saw fish chasing our lures, but no strikes.

Another sister got married this past weekend. I was the official photographer, taking about 2000 snaps. I left the SD card with her though, to go through the photos. I did get a few of the wedding location on my cell phone. What a backdrop, huh?

The sun hasn't been out much this week, but we did enjoy an hour near the lake between raindrops, reading, watching the boaters and paddle-boarders go by.

Happy Independence Day! 

As always, special thanks to these bloggers for their weekly homeschool blog link-ups. Click on over to see what other homeschoolers are doing!

"When one teaches, two learn." - Robert Heinlein

A Peak at Our Week: Session 3 Week 2 - Into the Groove

In My Life This Week
Why do I always slack on keeping bedtimes and no screens until after dark?! ::sigh:: I'm telling you - best rules evah! (That /ah/ at the end is Mainer talk; just so you know. ::wink::) Everyone, well, everyone but my teen son (of course), wake up  "bushy-tailed", and they spend their days being creative, imaginative and productive. Our days just seem so much calmer! Now, to keep those habits in place. Isn't that always the hardest?

My Favorite Thing

Balsam Fir's Writing Notebook Entry

Homeschool High School
Can I just say that White Pine has been "rockin'" school since coming back from vacation? PRODUCTIVE! He's already finished Grammar 101 mod 3 for this session! And a chapter and 3 labs in Biology! And most of a unit in Excellence in Literature II! 

Getting Ready to DNA Labs - Googling Asia History

He's also TOTALLY loving his Google Earth SketchUp class at the high school. He chose to design the hospital for the group's digital town, and has been hard at work creating it. Problem? He's on MY LAPTOP doing it! ::wink:: But I'll give up my Facebook time for him.

Images of White Pine's SketchUp Hosptial - 3D Imaging In Progress

Accomplishments
A Grief Observed, CS Lewis Approach Paper, Grammar 101 Mod 3, Graphs of Linear Equations, DNA and Acid Experiments, Google Earth SketchUp, Asia Geography and History

Homeschool Elementary
Balsam Fir has learned to "borrow"! Such exciting news, huh? We've had a challenging math year with little progress so learning something new was a big "thumps up"! And we've continued to trudge on with Time Bingo and Coin War. Wonder when those concepts will click?

Balsam Fir Reading Fly Guy Books - Balsam Fir's Visual Helper Word Wall -Sugar Maple
Hiding Behind Math - Learning to Borrow

We're still covering the finer points (elementary-level) of states of matter for Chemistry with Chem4Kids and watched this You Tube video and made Rock Candy (crystals).

And we briefly headed to the Americas to learn about the Nazcas who carved HUGE animals, flowers and other things into the earth that can be seen from planes and the Olmecs who made a mud pyramid in Central America and created sculptures of HEADS only. Then we returned to Ancient Rome in SOTW.

Balsam Fir's States of Matter Notebook Page - Sugar Maple's Mapwork -Balsam Fir
Reading

Sugar Maple's Accomplishments
Phantom Tollbooth, Heroes of Olympus: Son of Neptune, Creative Writing (on Computer), Spectrum Reading Comprehension, Sequential Spelling Days 32-36, Operations with Mixed Fractions, Decimals and Percentage, States of Matter, Ancient Rome

Balsam Fir's Accomplishments
In, Out and About in Catfish Pond, Thank You Notes, Book Report, Word Wall, Borrowing During Subtraction, States of Matter, Ancient Rome

Books, Books, Books!
I'm still reading aloud the Treasury of Greek Myths: Classic Stories of Gods, Goddesses, Heroes & Monsters to my younger saplings. Sugar Maple is SO into Greek Myths! (Note: There are some questionable areas in the book. I'm OK with them, but you may not be, so skim through before sharing with your kids.) And Balsam Fir can't wait to hear Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever before bed.

Places We're Going, People We're Seeing
☃ Basketball (SM/BF) ☃ Scout Achievement Awards (WP) ☃ Scouts (BF/WP) ☃ Enrichment Class (WP) ☃ Library (All) ☃ High School Basketball Game with Friends and Overnight (All) ☃ 

Something to Share

Thanks for visiting us at Our Side of the Mountain! We hope that you and your family are well! We're linking up to these awesome blog hops!

A Peak At Our Week: Session 3 Week 1 - Welcoming in a New Year

In My Life The Last 3 Weeks
Nothing like "ringin' in the new year" with purging the clutter! I wanted to start 2013 off with an organized house so we spent copious amounts of time doing just that. Quality family bonding time! ::wink:: We have 25 bags and 200 or so books and VHS movies for donation, and LOADS of recyclables and  trash ready to load up. Seriously! We're not done with our decluttering, but we certainly got a great start and I'm feeling less, hmm, smothered?

Oh, and our final chicken and duck egg tally for 2012: 1605 eggs! That's a whole lotta laying, don't you think? And the hens took a break to molt for 3 months!

What We're Cooking
Oven-baked Caramel Popcorn (without nuts) for Movie Night! 

Homeschool High School
White Pine attended his first enrichment class at a new STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) charter high school this week. Although he was a little nervous venturing into a new school situation, he really enjoyed his first class learning Google Earth SketchUp to begin planning and creating a city such as an architect would do.

Accomplishments
The Screwtape Letters, Approach Paper: C.S. Lewis, Multiplication of Polynomials, Biology: Evolution, World History: Asia mapwork, Google Earth SketchUp

Homeschool Elementary
Session 3 and a new, slightly revamped daily schedule...and back to the good ol' white board (rather than workbox cards). White boards and wet erase markers are the best! Anyway, I simplified Sugar Maple and Balsam Fir's daily assignments, focusing more on those challenging areas, which means Spelling, Writing and Math.

Have you seen XtraMath? It's a FREE site that offers math fact learning for students and reports for us instructors. My saplings will be using it for the rest of the year to get those facts down.

Would you believe that my saplings ASKED to learn about Chemistry? Whoop! You see - I have a Chemistry lab kit that's been sitting on the shelf for a while, collecting dust, waiting for the day when JUST one of the saplings showed an interest in it. Finally! So, in additional to our Chem X100 kit, we'll be notebooking information from the Chem4Kids website. We focused on states of matter.

And we continued on with the Ancient Greeks in SOTW, reading about how life was different in Athens (where education and arts were important) and Sparta (where bravery, strength and fighting skills were important). Both saplings would chose to live in Athens. ::wink::

Sugar Maple's Accomplishments
The Heroes of Olympus: The Lost Hero, Creative Writing (on Computer), Cursive, Math: Decimals, Line Segments and CM, Xtra Math: Addition Facts, Chemistry: States of Matter, SOTW: Ancient Greece, Mapwork

Balsam Fir's Accomplishments
A Kiss for Little Bear, Word Work, Creative Writing, Handwriting, Math: Addition/Subtraction, Xtra Math: Addition Facts, Time Bingo, Chemistry: States of Matter, Snap Circuits, SOTW: Ancient Greece, Mapwork

For the Love of Books

Well, The Hobbit was a bust. ::sigh:: So, we moved onto Treasury of Greek Myths: Classic Stories of Gods, Goddesses, Heroes & Monsters by Donna Jo Napoli. With the shorter stories and vibrant drawings, we're all enjoying this one much better! (Note: Some passages may be questionable for your family.) 

And I started reading Stuart Little and Diary of a Wimpy Kid to Balsam Fir before bed while the other two settle down in their own rooms with books.

Places We Went and People We Saw
☃ Basketball (SM) ☃ 3D Architecture Class (WP) ☃ Library (All) ☃ Rec Center (WP) ☃ Overnight with T_ ☃ Christmas with Family (All) ☃

Around the 'Net
SOTW Tips from Mary at Homegrown Learners
Leftovers: Division Game from Education.com
Keeping a Garden Journal by A Natural Nester

Something to Share
Winter has truly settled into Maine during the last couple of weeks. Snow has blanketed the ground and trees and turned us into a "winter wonderland". 

As always, thanks for visiting Our Side of the Mountain. Here's hoping for an awesome 2013! We're linking up to these wonderful blog hops.

It's a Wrap! Session 2 Week 6 - Let the Holidays Begin

In My Life This Week

Poor Sugar Maple woke up Monday morning with a sore throat and coughing. She spent the day in bed watching Netflix movies on my Kindle, reading or napping. Fortunately she felt better after a couple of days and it doesn't seem like she shared with the rest of us. Yet.

What We're Cooking
French Fried Onion Meatloaf from Tilly's Nest! Meatloaf is such an easy dish to prepare, but it's also "blah". Adding dried onions and cheese chunks sure spruced it up for us! 

Homeschool High School
White Pine assembled some really cool DNA strands from colored construction paper that represented guanine, adenine, thymine, and cytosine nucleotides for a Genetics "modeling" lab. All those G, A, T, and Cs! But mostly he spent the week finishing up his learning goals for English and Algebra.

White Pine and His Paper DNA Models

Accomplishments
Dumas Persuasive Paper, Conrad Author's Profile and Approach Paper, Algebra: Solving for N, Biology: Genetics (DNA/RNA)

Homeschool Elementary
We wrapped up our volcano unit study. Sugar Maple and Balsam Fir put together their lapbooks, reviewed volcanoes and the rock cycle on StudyJams, and made an erupting volcano model. Don't forget to click here to see the creation of our volcano and 2 ways to make "lava" eruptions! Balsam Fir was SUPER DUPER excited with Mt. Boom!

Top L. to R. Front Page of Lapbook and Back Page of Lapbook. Bottom L. to R. Center
Section with Flap up and Center Section with Flap Down

We finished a tad bit of SOTW on Ancient Greece: Minoans, Mycenaeans, Dorians. And, ahem, watched "Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief". It's about mythology, right? ::wink::

Sugar Maple's Accomplishments
The Story of Helen Keller (Hickok), Personal Letter, Creative Writing, Writing Process, Idioms, Cursive, Volcanoes, Word Processing, Ancient Greece, Mapwork, Band Practice, Pasta Ornaments

Balsam Fir's Accomplishments
Little Bear (Minarkik), Creative Writing Notebook (Complete Sentences/Main Idea), Handwriting, Rounding Up, Subtraction with Borrowing, Volcanoes, Ancient Greece, Mapwork

For the Love of Books

With the movie "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" coming out soon - or did it release already ::laugh:: - Blue Spruce dug up his copy of the book and I started reading it to the saplings. None of the saplings nor myself have read this book so it's a new "adventure" for us. Have you read it? I'm still undecided as to whether it's a good read ALOUD book or not.

With Our Hands
Fiori Pasta Snowflake Ornaments from Katy Elliot! Using pasta and Tacky Glue, we created snowflake shapes and let them dry. After 2-3 light coats of white spray paint, we "painted" them with Tacky Glue and covered them with silver glitter. Sparkly!

Sugar Maple Making Fiori Pasta Snowflake Ornaments

Places We Went and People We Saw
☃ Library (SM) ☃ Scouts (All) ☃ Band Concert (SM) ☃ Girl Scout Nursing Home Singalong and Holiday Party (SM) ☃ Boy Scout Camp In (WP) ☃

Helpful Homeschool Hint

Having maps for Geography is a great resource to have! Not only do we label places and landforms, but we also jot down historical notes. Tying events to places can be a very powerful learning tool! Education Place has some great, but simple outline maps to print out for free! 

Around the 'Net
☃ Advent Christmas Lanterns from The Tiger Chronicles
☃ Gift Boxes and Envelope Templates to Print Out and Assemble from Katilbalina
☃ Printable Paper Grinch from The Flying Dachshund

Well, that's a wrap! I've got a few more posts lined up for December so don't forget to come back. Linking up to these fun blog hops! Click over and check them out! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!