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March 21, 2008
Return to the Weekly Report
My husband requested that I keep doing our weekly reports; if nothing else, they give him a guide to go by should I be ill, or, gods forbid, worse. So on that cheery note ... ;-)
I have finally figured out the best, easiest and smoothest way to get through school tasks with the little boys: First thing in the morning, I gather up ALL our school books, math manipulatives, workbooks, copybooks, everything; I dump it all on the kitchen table, and we just work until we're done. (For the little boys, that's 30-45 minutes of work, altogether.)
This week Lachlan did up through half of lesson 35 in Right Start Math Level B. This is a cool lesson. It has the student build three four-digit numbers with base-10 cards, and add them together. The point of the lesson is to teach the concept of trading, and it works amazingly well. He finished through Lesson 8 in First Language Lessons, and the first half of his handwriting workbook. He also played on Music Ace, and learned to make pysanky eggs.
Griffin worked up through half of lesson 75 in Right Start B. This lesson involves adding 2-digit numbers with sums over 100. This was very hard for Griffin, and we'll probably spend a few days on it. He finished through lesson 50 in First Language Lessons, and the first half of his handwriting workbook. He's into the long "u" sound in Phonics Pathways. He also played Music Ace for hours on end, and listened to me read from Chapter 19 of Story of the World ("A New Kind of King"), a couple of chapters from The Long Winter, and myths 27-32 from Atticus the Storyteller's 100 Greek Myths* ("The Starry Hunter," "The Terrible Feast," "The Dolphin Messenger," "The Bee of Wisdom," "The Robber's Bed," and "The Sharp-Eyed King.") He colored some coloring pages and did some map work for history. He watched a documentary about dinosaurs, and made some pysanky eggs by himself. He worked very, very hard on a tough piano piece, and made amazing progress.
Aidan finished through lesson 82 in Right Start E, which involved finding remainders. This was very easy for him. He also did exercises 7 and 8 in Singapore 4A, dealing with estimation and factoring numbers. Factoring is new to him, but I think he's got it. He did the Singapore exercises because he was in a bad mood, and preferred to go work in his room away from people, than to do a lesson that required human interaction. A wise choice, I think.
He completed through exercise 5.4 of Latin Prep 1, which involved a short reading of the story of Niobe. You would think that a kid whose mother has read him both Atticus and D'Aulaire's Greek Myths would have some idea of who Niobe was, but no. He did well, but he really very much dislikes it when they throw words at him he has not encountered before, even though they also provide a glossary right there, on the same page, right next to the work he's translating.
Aidan also listened to my reading from SOTW and The Long Winter. He read Diane Stanley's Saladin, and some selections from Just So Stories.
Connor worked through Exercise 6.12 in Latin Prep 1, this week covering questions and pronouns in the accusative. He read more of Lord of the Rings, and all of Geraldine McCaughrean's El Cid.
We're taking a break from Classical Writing right now, but both older boys are working on creative, descriptive paragraphs. They also both completed through week 2 of Elementary Greek.
I worked through Cap. 8 of Lingua Latinaand week 4 of EG, and continued reading 1066: The Year of the Conquest.
We made the pysanky eggs as a family, and celebrated our spring holiday on Thursday. We also watched "2001: A Space Odyssey" this week, a family favorite, in honor of Arthur C. Clarke.
Tonight we're going to watch the Kevin Costner version of Robin Hood. (Yes, I know, I know, but I can't ever pass up Alan Rickman as the Sheriff.) I'd like to get a movie about the Crusades, but don't know which are good. How is "Kingdom of Heaven?" How is the Charlton Heston version of "El Cid?" How is the Terry Jones series on the Crusades? Or the History Channel's "The Crescent and the Cross?"
* A million thanks to Poppins for leading me to this book, many moons ago. It is still my favorite way to introduce the Greek myths to children.
Posted by lynx at March 21, 2008 11:32 AM
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Comments
Never seen any of the Crusades movies now that I think about it.
Still, if you get El Cid, it's Charlton Heston! Hard to go wrong there :)
Posted by: Mark L ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.caerdroia.org/116/nav-commenters.gif)
at March 21, 2008 6:25 PM
I liked Kingdom of Heaven. Been a while since we saw it, and I can't remember a thing about it, but I remember liking it. (Yeah, I know; I'm a lot of help.)
I LOVE Alan Rickman as the Sheriff. :) "And cancel Christmas!" I want to get that to watch with the boys sometime, but we'll have to follow it up with Men in Tights.
Posted by: KathyJo at March 21, 2008 6:39 PM
Sounds like you all had a great week! I love that version of Robin Hood - Alan Rickman is great - you are right, who can resist - he has so many great lines!
Posted by: Kat at March 21, 2008 9:42 PM
De-lurking here to say- I thought the Terry Jones Crusades were great. He starts by pointing out that prior to the crusdades the Moslems were pretty darn tolerant of the Christians ( and the Jews), and he ends by commenting that it took almost a decade of savage attacks from the Christians for them to turn the Moslems into the enemy they were looking for. Which to me, pretty much somes up the Crudades.
PBS also has a King Richard/ Saladin show- called Holy Warriors ( I think).
I think the best crusdaes related thing we did was to listen to "Ivanhoe" as an unabridged book on tape and then watch the most recent movie version of it. They totally changed the very last scene in the movie, which if you have read the book ( or listened to the book)lends itself to a great conversation about the different sensibilities of the original audience and the modern audience. The combination of the two versions really gave us a sense of the time period.
Posted by: Carrie at March 29, 2008 8:31 PM