The End of the 2011-2012 School Year

Sorry for the delay in getting these blog posts up!  We have finished school, and I have been taking time to get some other things done, and enjoy the first week of our summer vacation!

On the week of May 7th, I introduced the last of the new material to Grant for our final language arts block.  We covered two more Old Testament stories.  We also continued to practice piano, French, math (with various forms of review), reading and cursive.  For cursive, Grant worked on capitol letters.  He enjoyed using this dry erase board (the other half of the alphabet is on the back).

I also had him write out the names of family members (including pets). 

We also used these bananagrams to change up our spelling practice:

He really liked using those, too.

On Monday, I told him the story of Job.

After I finished reading the story, Grant and I drew a picture for our lesson books.

Mom's Drawing 

Grant's Drawing 

On Tuesday, Grant re-told me the story of Job and then we came up with a summary which he copied into his lesson book.

I also read this book (mostly for Johanna, but everyone listened):

Afterward, we made a dip for apples using peanut butter, cream cheese, and of course, honey.

On Wednesday, I told Grant the story of Judas Maccabeus.

After I finished reading the story, Grant and I drew a picture.

Mom's Drawing 

Grant's Drawing 

We took a day off of school on Thursday for a day trip to Kansas City (more on that in another post).

We were back in the school room on Friday which is when Grant re-told me the story of Judas Maccabeus, and then copied the summary into his main lesson book.

We used the week of May 14th to go back through his lesson books and review everything we had covered through the year.  Grant and I were both looking forward to starting summer vacation, and soon I will begin planning for 4th grade.  In 4th grade we will be using Norse myths stories for our language arts blocks, going into more in depth science by talking about "man and animals", along with learning many other new math skills!  I am looking forward to 4th grade, but plan on enjoying the summer first!

Jeremiah and Daniel

Last week, Grant and I continued with the language arts block using stories from the Old Testament.  We also continued to practice spelling, and review math in different ways.  We reviewed math by rolling math dice, singing the times tables songs, or doing  worksheets.  Here is one worksheets he did:

Grant also continued reading everyday, and we reviewed the French songs and words they had learned so far.  Here is a video of Grant and Johanna singing a song about Spring (they thought it was pretty funny when Julia walked right in front of them):

Here are the words in English:
Spring is here. Hurrah for the nice weather! Here are flowers of all colors.  No more sleeping.  Wake up.  Spring is here coming to visit us again.

Grant and I also had our piano lessons/practices.  He really liked the song you will see him playing in the video below (I think he liked it because it was the first time he got to use the pedal during a song). Right before I got ready to record it, he ran off saying he would be back in a minute.  He came back with his hair nicely combed, and wearing a nice shirt.  I was very impressed!  No sooner had we finished recording the song than he was off changing back into his other clothes.  Enjoy the video!

Grant also finished writing his thank you cards for cursive practice, so we moved onto capitol letters. I dug this nice dry erase board out that I had stashed in the cabinet for him to practice on.

On Monday, I read Grant a story about the prophet, Jeremiah.

Once I was done reading the story, Grant and I drew a picture from it in our lesson books.

 Mom's Drawing

Grant's Drawing 

I also introduced Grant to the form drawing for this week:

On Tuesday, Grant re-told me the story,we came up with a summary, and then he copied it into his lesson book.

I also read the kids the story of Jack and the Beanstalk, and then they made these bean mosaics:

Grant's Mosaic

(He made Snoopy)

Johanna's Mosaic

(Hers started out as a flower, but then she just kept adding more random beans, so she decided it wasn't a flower any more.) 

Julia's Mosaic

On Wednesday, I told Grant a story about Daniel.

Afterwards, Grant and I drew a picture from the story in our lesson books.

Mom's Drawing

Grant's Drawing 

I also read the kids this book:

Once I was done reading the book, the kids modeled these acorns out of beeswax.

We had some other things going on Thursday morning, so Grant and I were back in the school room on Friday to finish up school for the week.

He re-told me the story about Daniel, we came up with a summary together, and then he copied it into his lesson book.

He also drew the form drawing in his book:

Next week will finish up our last week of new material.  The following week we will review everything from the year, and then call it an end to third grade!

King Solomon

This past week, Grant and I began a language arts block using stories from the time of King Solomon.  We also started everyday with piano lessons, math review, cursive practice, reading and spelling practice.  For the past few weeks we have been doing French every other day. Next week, I will have a video of the kids singing the newest song they have learned on the blog.  For cursive practice, he continued to write out thank you cards for his birthday presents.  This was one that he wrote:

On Monday, I read Grant a story about the wise King Solomon.

Once I was done, Grant and I drew a picture from the story.

Mom's Drawing

 Grant's Drawing

On Tuesday, Grant re-told me the story, and then we came up with a summary which he copied into his lesson book.

I also read the kids this book:

Afterward, I sat down with Johanna and we drew pictures from the book.  Johanna wanted to draw baby ducklings in their nest.

Mom's Drawing

Johanna's Drawing 

On Wednesday, I read Grant the story of Solomon building the temple.

He had a lot of fun afterward building a model of it out of Legos.

On Thursday, we took a field trip to the zoo (more on that in another post).

And finally, on Friday, Grant re-told me the story about Solomon's temple, we came up with a summary, and he copied it into his main lesson book.

Saul, David and Seeds

Last week we enjoyed some spring time books and activities, as well as lots of time outside watching everything flower, grow and turn green. For school, I taught the kids new French words and phrases through songs and verses.  We learned a new song about spring and flowers, and played a game using words for different types of fruits and vegetables.  They also learned how to say phrases such as, "that's all", "I would like...", "I don't like....", "I like...."  Grant and I did the usually math review, spelling, reading and piano lesson every day.  For cursive practice, we took the word, "Constantinople", and figured out smaller words we could make out of it which Grant then rewrote in cursive.

We also finished off the language arts block we had been doing with stories about Saul and David.  On Monday, Grant was in an especially grumpy mood, and we made it through French lesson, spelling and piano lesson before I chose to stop working him and end his lessons for the day.  That meant he would have a lot more school work to do on Tuesday, and wouldn't have time for the fun activities. The rest of school time on Monday morning was spent with Johanna.  I read her a story called, "Seeds" out of the following book:

After I read her the story, we sat down and talked about what she would like to plant in the garden box she is going to have this year.  She drew a picture of it in her lesson book.

Grant was back into the swing of things on Tuesday, so after our regular pre-main lesson routine, I read him a story about Samson and Saul.

After the story, he drew a picture from it in his main lesson book.

I also introduced the following form drawing for the week.

Grant also re-told me the story, and then we summarized it together, and he copied the summary into his lesson book.

I read this book to Johanna:

This book talks about all the things seeds need to grow, one of which is lots of sunshine.  So, Johanna and I drew a picture of a sun.  Once again, I wanted her to cover her whole page with color.

Mom's Drawing

Johanna's Drawing 

 

On Wednesday, I told Grant the some stories about David.  One of which was the story of David and Goliath.

Once again, Johanna sat down on her own and drew a picture from my chalkboard drawing.

 

After I was done telling the stories, Grant and I modeled David and Goliath out of beeswax.  Grant modeled David, and I modeled Goliath.  Grant finds it very challenging to work with beeswax (which is why it is so good to have him work with it), so he tends to get frustrated and usually does not attempt to make it very detailed.

 

 (The little yellow guy is Johanna's.)

When we got out the beeswax, the girls wanted some, too.

This is our lineup of beeswax characters.  Julia's is the little blue "guy".

I also read Johanna a story called "The Violet" from this book:

On Thursday, Grant and I made up silly sentences again with the mis-spelled words from spelling practice during the week.  Grant also re-told me the story from Wednesday, and we came up with a summary which he copied into his lesson book.

The girls and I used this fun seed cookie set that I got from www.magiccabin.com.

We mixed up the soil, clay and seeds in the kit, rolled it out and then cut out shapes.

Now our seed cookies are ready to plant.

Next week, Grant and I will move onto another math block, while Johanna and I will be talking about birds and eggs.