Home School Update

Last week's theme was Food & Nutrition. The kids loved all the books we got from the library. I think a favorite was The Edible Pyramid, which was a fun and easy way to introduce them to the food pyramid. Charis and I started a food journal, in which she wrote down everything she ate for all meals and snacks, and then we tallied how many servings from each part of the pyramid she ate. As I type this, I'm remembering that we probably only did about 2 or 3 days' worth instead of 5, the number of sheets I had printed out. But I guess the days don't have to be consecutive, and she had a great time filling out her chart the times we did it.

Charis began subtraction a couple of weeks ago and is doing very well with it. In fact, I've been surprised at how quickly she has picked up on the concept, and I think I've only found one mistake in all the math pages she has done in two weeks--and that was a story problem for which she switched two numbers. She got the correct answer for the problem she did, though! It makes me feel reassured that we aren't going too fast...she's about 2/3 of the way through the 1st grade math book. As long as she's comfortable with what we're covering, I guess I'll let her keep plowing ahead!

And speaking of which, she is on the last book that I have of the Bobbsey twin series (book 10). She has decided she wants to be a detective and has been on the hunt for mysteries to solve. ;-) She and her friend Hannah "found a mystery" just yesterday, in fact...they discovered the door to the garage on the side of our house. They didn't know it went to the garage, so they had to investigate. Charis proudly announced that they had "solved" a mystery when Sarah and I returned home from a ministry brunch!

Charis decided that she does want to participate in our home school co-op's spelling bee on November 16. I was a little leery about it, knowing how shy she is, but when she seemed eager to do it, I decided that we'd go ahead and sign up for it. The worst that can happen is that she'll chicken out and simply watch other kids participate. In the meantime, we're practicing with the words on her spelling lists, and I think it will be a great experience for her. There are only a small handful of 1st graders participating, so hopefully she'll have the confidence to get up there and do her thing! For me, this is more about the "performance"/public speaking aspect than the spelling...I don't really care how she does with the words themselves! I think she's a pretty good little speller, and I wouldn't be surprised if she does very well. I'm just happy she's willing (at least now) to prepare to spell words in front of other people!

Tobin is nearly finished with his reading lessons from the 100 EZ Lessons book. He continues to improve his fluency and enjoys reading to himself now. He seems to be ready for some more structured handwriting practice, so I plan to order a book for him soon. He's taken some practice sheets and written his own little sentences, such as "I love Momme" and "I love God." When I saw what he had done on his own, of his own free will, I thought, yeah, this kid is ready to learn how to write! I haven't wanted to push it, since he only seemed to want to write his name for a really long time and I could tell that his motor skills weren't where Charis's were at that age--though he's an amazing color-er! :-) I'm excited to have him do the kindergarten handwriting book that Charis did last year. I know he'll love it--it has pictures to color in addition to what I think will be just the right amount of writing practice for each lesson.

I guess those are the highlights of what we've been doing in school lately. The kids are doing very well with the routine, and I'm thankful for that. It has been a very enjoyable year so far, and I look forward to more fun times cuddling on the couch and reading as we get into more read-alouds. (We're over halfway through The Little House in the Big Woods!)