Weekly Wrap-up: Week 11 - Rut oh!

EVERYDAY LIFE
On-line time was curbed this week. My laptop is with Eric, the Computer Guy, for a charger port replacement. I suggest never sitting on the charging cord while it's plugged into the computer...I haven't had time to write blog posts or visit your blogs or even play Words with Friends on Facebook. Fortunately, I am able to use my oldest son's school computer for HOMESCHOOL and a little personal use. My laptop is a very important part of our learning!

I've had more time to crochet! Just last week I decided to teach myself using You Tube videos with the Crochet Guru here, then moved on to making a double-crochet beanie after watching this video. I've made a camo beanie for Sam and another in blue for Thomas, my BF. I like to challenge myself though, and crochet seems more understandable than knitting, so I made a single-crochet toddler beanie with a scalloped edge and a pink daisy for a friend's granddaughter.

But then I came down with a bug on Wednesday and Thursday, putting a damper on school and everything else. I'm feeling better today, but I'm still achy and tired.

MENU
• Chicken Alfredo with Spaghetti & Cucumber Slices • Chicken Veggie Pot Pie • Pizza • Hot Dogs, Baked Beans & Brown Bread • Baked Chicken, Rice Pilaf & Peas •

HOMESCHOOL HAPPENINGS
Can I tell you how "on the ball" Cati is this year? Gosh. She certainly matured over the summer months, becoming much more focused on school with a positive attitude. This is a girl who gets up at 5am sometimes (Yes, really!) and gets her Saxon Grammar and Writing and Saxon Algebra 1/2 completed before my alarm even goes off to get Jake up and off to charter school. She does creative writing every day on Wattpad, not part of her homeschool, but because she enjoys it. She walks every day, snow, rain or shine, to improve her health. And she even does my dreaded dirty dishes. I know I'm being braggy, but I'm proud of my girl!

Sam delved into the World of Multiplication this week. (We touched on it at the end of last year.) I wanted to add a little creativity to his learning, so I searched my Pinterest and came up with some games to play to reinforce multiplication facts. (Links are below.) Do you have any games or websites to help learn multiplication?

Cati
Phrases and Clauses, Direct & Diagramming Direct Object, and Descriptive, Proper, Limiting & Diagramming Adjectives
Creative Writing on Wattpad
Equivalent Equations, Reciprocals, Multiplication/Division Rules, Average, Symbols of Inclusion, Order of Operations, and Multiplying/Dividing Mixed Fractions
Geologic Time Scale, Types of Fossils, Carbon Dating, Soufriere Hills, Montserrat Volcano, Mt. St. Helens Volcano
CNN Student News

Sam

Sara Teasdale and Jack Prelutsky Poetry, Ice Cream Poem, Spelling 34 

Multiplication Chart, Multiplication Facts 0, 1, 2 & 5, Multiplication Patterns, and Multiplication Facts

Monitoring Faults, Types of Volcanoes, Soufriere Hills, Montserrat Volcano, Mt. St. Helens Volcano

CNN Student News

READING and VIEWING
• Stuart Little (White) (Sam) •

"Volcano Eruption - The Eruption of Mt. St. Helens (1980)" (You Tube)

PEOPLE and PLACES
 • Jazz & Concert Band Practice (Cati) • Cub & Boy Scouts (Jake & Sam) •

A FAVORITE SOMETHING

Happy Homeschooling!

As always, special thanks to these weekly link-ups:

Don't forget to check out my other blog posts this week!
Six Word Saturday: Forward

And check out these FREE on-line resources for YOUR homeschool!
Multiplication Grid Game
9s Hand Trick Video
Multiplication Video Games
Colorful Multiplication Chart
Color my Number Multiplication Sheets

Weekly Wrap-up: Week 10 - Trying to Focus

EVERYDAY LIFE
I decided to learn to crochet. I enjoy learning something new, especially a handicraft. I found tutorials to help teach me the basics. (Visit the Crochet Guru here.) Her videos include left-handed instructions. Woot! It's a bit challenging to do things the "left way" with right-hand tutorials. This week I made a dishcloth. Next up? A simple beanie hat...I hope.

I needed to find some way to use up 10 pounds of strawberries from the freezer. I found on Pinterest a recipe for making strawberry jam in a BREAD MACHINE here. (I never did notice the "jam" cycle button before...) The results? Awesome lower-sugar strawberry freezer jam!

We got sticking snow; snow that doesn't melt on contact with the ground. Not a lot, but enough to let me know that we need to finish up our winter prep (i.e. putting the outdoor furniture, lawn mower and grill away). It's on our To Do List today.

MENU
• Baked Chicken Tenders, Teriyaki Rice & Peas • Pepperoni and Cheese Pizza • Vegetable Beef Stew & Rolls • Baked Pork Chops, Mac n Cheese & Apples • Taco Salad • Cereal, Skim Milk & Fruit •

HOMESCHOOL HAPPENINGS
It was hard for us to focus on our schooling this week. Not that it wasn't productive, but it was a struggle for ALL of us to get started and hit most of our subjects every day. Some weeks are like that, right? I think we were thrown off by a super busy (but fun weekend) and Jake being home from public school Monday and Tuesday (due to teacher's workshop and Veteran's Day).

Sam spent a lot of time redesigning his popsicle stick boat filled with expanding foam, even painting it. (I drew the line at HOUSE paint though...) It floats, but it's wobbly so he continues to make modifications, testing buoyancy in the bathtub.

Cati
Infinitives as Subjects, Phrases & Clauses. Wattpad Creative Writing
Rate Word Problems, Equivalent & Addition-Subtraction Rules for Equations, Rectangular Coordinations
Erosion & Deposition: Weathering, Run-off, Moving Water, Glaciers, Waves & Wind
Early Crete, the Minoans, the Mycenaeans, the Dorians, Greek Dark Ages
Walking

Sam
Sara Teasdale Poetry, Wrote  Biography Poem, Grade Spelling Weeks 26-33, Story Settings, Main Topics in Stories, Adverbs, Quotation Marks

"Some Went Away" Word Problems, Fraction Pictures, Repeated Addition for Multiplication & the Multiplication Table
Earthquakes: Measuring Seismic Waves, Damage Caused By, Protecting Against

Early Crete, the Minoans, the Mycenaeans, the Dorians, Greek Dark Ages
Biking

READING and VIEWING
• Lilly's Ghost (Drake Harris) (Me) • The Hobbit (Tolkien) (Cati) • The Story of Davy Crockett, Frontier Hero (Retan) (Sam) • Sea of Ice: The Wreck of the Endurance (Kulling) (Sam) • Stuart Little (White) (Sam) •

PEOPLE and PLACES
 • Pie and Game Night with the S__'s (Me) • Thomas & Kids Visit (All) • Jazz & Concert Band Practice (Cati) • Cub Scouts (Sam) •

A FAVORITE SOMETHING

Happy Homeschooling!

As always, special thanks to these weekly link-ups:

Don't forget to check out my other blog posts this week!
Memory  Monday: Our Pet Family
Tuesday Coffee Chat: Let It Go
Wednesday Hodgepodge: Veteran's Day

And check out these FREE on-line resources for YOUR homeschool!
Around the World Country Stamps for Geography
Circulatory System Notebook Pages

Weekly Wrap-up: It's arrived!

EVERYDAY LIFE

Spring arrived this week! Ah-maz-ing! With warmer days, the snow melted fast creating a new 'pond' right where our driveway used to be...and I found out that Sam's rubber boots no longer fit by the dripping wet, winter boots lined up in the foyer. (What 9-year-old can resist a big ol' puddle to wade in.) But I'll take it! There's nothing quite like opening windows, even briefly, to let fresh air flow through the house after being shut up for months.

Even 'the girls' got to stretch those wings. Olive and Opal, the ducks, went swimming in the frigid brook, and Ony, Speckles, Musty, Sassy, Lil' Rhodie, Rhodie, Ava, Nutmeg, Butterfly, and Amber found the only patch of visible brown grass to scratch up. They rewarded us with finally laying eggs again.

But oh my! the road is a muddy mess. I'm going to need an alignment!

Total Bag Count: 14

MENU
✿ Hamburgers & Pasta and Veggie Salad ✿
✿ Scrambled Eggs, Hickory Smoked Bacon, Fresh Pineapple & Biscuits ✿
✿ Spaghetti with Ground Chicken Meat Sauce & Steamed Green Beans✿
✿ Marinated Beef Strips with Broccoli & Baked Fries ✿
✿ Boston Cream Pie Ice Box Cake ✿

SCHOOL SNIPPETS
Sam does "van school" while Cati is at Jazz and Concert Band and her clarinet lessons. I keep most of his work in a binder, slipping Easy Grammar inside and his current reading book. (I keep pencils and a hand sharpener in the van.) Do you ever do school-on-the-road?

Cati wrote Name Poems and Word Patterns poems this week. She's getting close to finishing up her study of basic 'formula' poetry. (I'd share the unit with you, but it's something I have from my student teaching in 1998 and it was OLD then.) She's also only 12 lessons away from finishing up Saxon 76.

In U.S. History we watched NROC on WWI and Woodrow Wilson, and FDR and The New Deal. We skipped art study this week and spent more time outside...and began to 'spring clean'.

At STEM school, Jake switched his Physics research topic from 4D to antimatter, continued to build a steam-powered power plant, focusing on the turbines, commuted projectiles for Math to get a ball into a basket without practicing, and "learned the things he hasn't" in Astronomy. (I'm not sure what that means!)

BOOKS
Mom- Seeing A Large Cat by Elizabeth Peters
Cati - The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien
Sam - Invisible Stanley by Jeff Brown 

PEOPLE & PLACES
✿ Jazz and Concert Band & Clarinet Lesson (Cati) ✿
✿ Cub Scouts (Sam & Jake) ✿
✿ Wayback Wednesday at Movie Theatre: Back to the Future (All) ✿
✿ Boy Scout Camping (Jake) ✿

FAVORITES

I got a chuckle out of this Lego Pain Scale from Facebook. Those of you with Lego enthusiatists will understand all too well.

ON THE 'NET

How to Have a Perfectly Clean House
50 Best Unschooling/Self-directed Learning Posts in 2013

As always, special thanks to these weekly wrap-ups:

Review: Girls of American History - Literature and Unit Study Guides for American Girl Books

Have you seen The American Girls Collection of historical fiction books for kids? It's been a FAVORITE of my Cati for years. I wouldn't be surprised if she's read through the series 3, 4 or 5 times. So, when Justine Gamble from Girls of American History: A Multi-Sensory Curriculum wanted product reviewers, we signed up for Addy!

"...Read it, Hear it, See it, Write it, and Do it.." - Justine Gamble from Girls of American History

What We Reviewed

Girls of American History Curriculum Unit 5: The Civil War - A Literature Guide and Unit Study for Addy, An American Girl - Time Period 1864

Published by Justine Gamble 2012

Individual Literature Studies $7.95 / Full Set $72.00 (prices subject to change)
Free Samples Available Here

Quick Peek
• Multi-sensory Approach to Learning
• Using Popular Literature
• Suggested Weekly Schedule
• Required and Suggested Reading List
• Field Trip and Craft Lists
• Templates
• On-line Additional Resources

Planning and Preparing

The first thing I did was download the 17 page literature and study guide, print it and slip the pages into a plastic report cover. I recommend these covers as they keep print-outs protected during use and are inexpensive to purchase and reuse.

I used the Overview of Content to gather books (from the library) and arts and crafts supplies. There were also additional resource and reading lists, suggested field trips (none in our area), and a weekly plans and schedule graph. All handy, quick resources to plan your unit study!

A lapbook was suggested to go along with the multi-sensory study, and, as ALWAYS, I downloaded from my favorite lapbook resource on-line. And because Cati doesn't enjoy the cutting-out-and-folding-mini-books part of lapbooks, I did that for her (while watching TV in the evenings). There were also suggestions for craft activities, which we already had 2 kits of.

What We Did

Everything was placed in a handy-dandy plastic basket, and Cati independently worked on the study during her leisure times. As a 6th grader, she was ready to "spread her wings" and take charge of some of her learning...and this literature study was easy enough for her to follow and implement with only a minimum amount of guidance from me. We made a schedule together - one book and one section of the lapbook per week. Definitely doable with her core classes, heavy band schedule, and scouting commitments!

She worked on these studies several times a week, sometimes skipping a few weeks as life happened. It was easy for her to pick-up where she left off and continue on. We borrowed the required reading books from our library, so no purchase was necessary. (Since this is a popular series of books, most libraries should have copies available.)  She's looking forward to completing her study with the Emancipation Party suggested in the study guide. It includes recipe suggestions and time-period games.

What We Didn't Do

Follow the weekly plans and schedule graph. Although a wonderful resource for planning your studies, Cati opted to work at her own pace, reading additional books, watching You Tube videos, doing additional crafts. Definitely a curriculum that can be tweaked to fit whatever your learners' needs and interest take them! 

She hasn't finished the unit study at this time. She's completed a number of weeks, but sometimes studies take longer than planned when following interests. Learning shoudn't be rushed! Fortunately, Girls of American History can be done both as a main history study AND as a supplemental study over different lengths of time.

Our Thoughts

Girls of American History is suggested for grades 2-6. Being in 6th grade, Cati found the unit study suggestions and work too simple. She's read the books before and are below her ability level; each one takes her about about 45 minutes to read. She wanted "more" from Girls of American History, but fortunately it's an easy guide to tweak, adding more detailed, in-dept work from other sources. Our suggested grade levels are advanced 1st - average 4th.

Otherwise, Girls of American History are a go-to for students who love the American Girl series of historical fiction! Super easy to print-out, implement and use, and can be changed up in a variety of ways to meet individual learners. You can focus on a specific girl and period of time, or get the 12 unit set, a complete study of American history that can be finished in two school years.

For more information, click on the following links:

Website

FAQ

Testimonials 

Order

 Disclosure: A Great Balancing Act was given a PDF download of the Girls of American History Unit 5 The Civil War literature study and subscriber access on-line for our honest review. All thoughts are our own.

A Peek at Our Week: Getting Back on Track

In My Life This Week
Again, it seems like I spend most of my weeks doing the same things. Not that that is a bad thing, right? LOL I have started walking regularly now that the temperatures are cooler. The dogs get all giddy when they see me putting my walking sneakers on (since they're my usual walking partners). It's been nice getting out again, traipsing through the woods with the leaves crunching underneath my feet.

Things I Worked On
✾ Scrubbing "green stuff" off the house's vinyl siding ✾

What We're Cooking
New England Pumpkin Pie! Do you have One-Pie canned pumpkin where you live? It's the recipe right on the back of the can! Best ever! (But you can find the recipe here.) I think it's the molasses that makes it New England. 

Now, just because I don't follow recipes exactly most of the time: I used skim milk in this recipe and no butter to make it low in fat, and used 3/4 c sugar instead of 1 c and would probably do 2/3 c next time. And, of course, I used my own roasted and pureed pumpkin that I made last week.

High School Happenings
Jake's summary this week: definition of a community, Nash Equilibrium for Game Theory, types of energy and its effects, histograms vs. box plots (graphing), Chinese writing and speaking, narrative edit, atoms and what they are, and working his video game story with a partner.

Homeschool Happenings

Last Friday I realized that we've hadn't completed U.S. History in almost 2 weeks. Oops! I made a point of getting in our "America: The Story of Us" videos this week. Only we made another oops! and played the wrong disc! The kids didn't want to stop learning about the Depression and Dust Bowl and WWII, so we just continued on, skipping the Civil War. (We'll get back to that.)

Both kids are doing a Poetry unit for writing, but in different ways. Cati is doing formula poetry (or poetry that has specific guidelines such as Haiku) and Sam is doing copywork (currently from A Child's Garden of Verses). It's easier on this Mama to keep their subjects similar, but tweaked for their ability levels.

Here's a sample of Cati's poetry work, which includes putting her final type-written poems into a mini book:

And Sam's copywork: 

We notebook through science using either traditional textbooks or on-line resources. Cati studied bacteria and viruses this week, and Sam studied plants and then the different species of living things. We'll be starting an experiment on testing disinfectants next week! (Such information is good this time of year! :cough: :sneeze:)

We spent Friday morning at H__ Hill nearby, enjoying the mountainous and lake views. This hill was a special spot of the Quakers who settled this town long ago, and there's a special area where people can leave stones with messages for loved ones near a carved wooden statue of Jesus and a child. It is wasn't so cold we could have enjoyed a picnic lunch!

Accomplishments
The Serpent's Shadow (C) & Mummies in the Morning (S)
Easy Grammar - Verb/Verb Phrases (C)
Daily Grams - Days 23-25 (C) & Days 32-37 (S)
Spelling Power - Delayed Recall Test / List 30-31 (C) & List 9 (S)
Poetry Unit - Diamante and Parts of Speech (C) & Copywork (S)
Greek Word Roots - pyro, photo, graph, para, phone
Saxon - Test 9/10/11 (C) & Math-U-See - 11X, Test 11, 12A-B (S)
Life Science - Bacteria and Viruses (C) & Amphibians, Birds, Mammals, and Insects (S)
US History - "Bust", "WWII"
Art Detectives - Botticelli, Vermeer, Watteau

People and Places

✾ Boy Scout Camperee (J) ✾ Hangin' out with the S__ Family (All) ✾ Scouts (J/S) ✾ Jazz and Concert Band (C) ✾

Something to Share

As ALWAYS, linking up to these WONDERFUL blogs: