Co-op has been going well. The boys like cup stacking class and often practice at home.
Here's another of Eddie's drawings from drawing class. They are still working on perspective and scale:
Fencing is great. They have starting learning more rules and having actual bouts now:
The teacher also brought his sword collection in to show the class. This was their favorite day!
We're getting prepared for Achievement Night, when the kids can show their families what they have learned this session in co-op.
Language Arts:
We started working on Caesar's English, and while it is challenging, I think the boys like learning all this vocabulary. They try to use the words in their every day speech so that I will give them a point toward their year-long contest to win a prize.
 |
| I use the words in Caesar's English to make spelling lists. |
 |
| I had them write a paragraph with some of their spelling words. |
 |
| The word searches are their favorite spelling activity each week. |
We've worked on some more sentence analysis, grammar, handwriting, poetry, etc. The boys are currently memorizing The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost. One day, I told them to pick a picture from the internet and write a poem about it. Here are the results.
 |
| This assignment was to look up information online about Julius Caesar and Pompey and write a comparison paragraph. You would have thought I asked them to chop off their own arms. Bad!!!! |
For reading, the boys have been working on Percy Jackson The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan for book club. We are listening to Dumpling Days by Grace Lin in the car. For our evening read aloud, we are reading Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell.
Math:
We finished Lesson 21 in MUS. 9 more lessons to go until we finish the book! We've been plugging away at the measurement book, too.
How awesome is this? I got to meet the kids' math teacher Mr. Demme. He's the founder and developer of our Math U See program, and he's the one the kids watch on the DVD to learn their lessons. Mr. Demme spoke about the MUS program at the homeschool convention, and I talked with him afterward.
History:
We've been cranking through the Chapters of Story of the World, and doing lots of maps. We also read Bully for You, Teddy Roosevelt by Jean Fritz. We're starting to get into recent modern history, and the boys are putting things in terms of when their grandparents and great grandparents were alive.
 |
| Notice how he spelled peninsula. At least he ended up with the correct letter in the circle! lol! |
Science :
We finished reading the RS4K Physics books, as well as the Basher Physics book. We've read more sections of the Usborne Science Encyclopedia, and have completed all but the last experiment in our lab books. Well, except for experiment 8. We didn't have the right materials for that one. Experiments 7 & 9 were really cool, though. We made a light bulb light up, and we watched how light and sound waves moved.
But the best part of science learning this time around was the Homeschool Day at the Great Lakes Science Center. The boys participated in several cool workshops, making slime, visiting the Egyptian exhibit, and doing Lego Robotics. Then we all played around with exhibits. I had the boys look for exhibits that demonstrated physics concepts that we've learned about this year. There were quite a few!
French and Latin:
Nothing really new here. We've been slowly but surely working our way through the books. They both did much better on their Latin tests this time around, and I think some French is finally starting to sink in.
Logic:
We're still working on the Connections book, which is all about deduction, but we've added in a new Analogies book, and the kids like it as much as the last one. Weirdos.
Health:
 |
| We learned how good fresh fruit is for the digestive system, and the boys made a big fruit salad, which we all enjoyed eating. |
 |
| We also learned about the importance of eating fresh foods containing enzymes. Above is Ed's list of things that destroy enzymes in our food. Apparently, his brother is one of those things. |
 |
| To finish up the digestive system, we learned about how important it is to drink enough plain water every day to keep our bodies in optimal health. We used our division skills to figure out how much each of us needs to drink each day, and we made a chart to keep track of our water intake. |
Music: I guess music is going to have to be one of those things we work on in the summer. Just can't seem to get it worked into our days.
Fine Arts:
Andrew is still taking theatre class. The next update will have photos of his next play.
Aunt Nellie took the kids to the art museum and had them draw pictures of what they were seeing and what they remembered. She took them to see the special Pompeii exhibit they had, too. Here are some of their drawings:
