On Monday, Grant and I did a new game from the book, Games for Math, called "calculating math". I had Grant skip count, while I used the calculator to skip count and see if Grant had the right answers. I also asked him to tell me, "What would the answer be if we were counting by 3's and pushed the "equal" key four times (basically asking what is 3 times 4.) We did those kind a problems a few times.
Afterward, I introduced the form drawing for the week, and told Grant the story of Eve's creation.
To change things up a bit, I thought it would be fun to do some modeling instead of drawing from the story. Unfortunately, Grant had made up his mind that modeling was not going to be fun. He did Adam, while I did Eve and the tree. As you can see from the picture below, he wasn't really focused on what he was doing and was joking around more with Johanna about it, then he was trying to make a good Adam. Oh, well. Maybe next time he will decide it's fun..
When we finished our modeling, we moved onto a review of nouns by talking about some of the animals Adam was in charge of naming. We talked about nouns being "naming" words, and I wrote out a list, while Grant named off animals. I wasn't even going to ask him to write out the sentences because I knew it would not have gone well. I decided to save the writing for Tuesday.
I also read the next two pages of Lono to Johanna, and we began adding things onto the clay Lono island we made a few weeks ago.
On Tuesday, we continued reviewing math with the star count came. To do this game, Grant rolls a "number" dice once, and draws that number of circles on a piece of paper. He rolls the dice a second time, and he puts that number of stars (or dashes in our case) in each circle. After he does that, he figures out how many stars/dashes he has total using multiplication.
We also got Grant a new desk for school, which has a lot more room, and has a swinging bar for his feet. This is especially good for boys since they can always be in motion, but in a good, non-disruptive way.
After I had Grant re-tell me the story from Monday, we came up with a summary together, and he underlined the verbs and circled the nouns after he copied the summary.
We also talked about proper nouns.
I read Johanna the last two pages of the Lono story, and then we finished decorating the Lono island we made a few weeks ago.
On Wednesday, we played another math game that Grant really likes, called "Lot's of Boxes". For this one he uses graph paper. He rolls the dice once and uses that number to draw a line that number of boxes high. He rolls again, and uses that number to draw a line that many boxes across. After he has those two lines, he completes the box, and then figures out how many little boxes are inside using skip counting, or multiplication. Once he's done with his turn, I have a turn, and he helps me figure out how many boxes I have. We usually do three rounds each to see who takes the title of "winner".
We took advantage of the nice weather and practiced the form drawing outside on the driveway with sidewalk chalk.
Once we came back in, I told Grant the story of "The Fall" from Eden.
Afterward, we drew a picture from the story.
Mom's Picture
Grant's Picture
Once we were done with our pictures, we talked about adjectives using this poem about a snake which Grant copied into his book.
We also went back through our list of animals we made on Monday, and I had Grant describe some of the animals using adjectives.
Johanna also helped me make "Lono" muffins. Imagine, if you will, how muffin tops resemble islands....especially how mini chocolate chips sprinkled on top can look like flowers......
On Friday, everyone had fun on the walk. The weather was beautiful. Grant gave the girl's rides, the girl's picked dandelions, and the dogs had a ball swimming and retrieving sticks.
Grant and Odin enjoyed a game of tug-of-war, and when we continued on our walk.....
Odin wasn't ready to stop playing. He followed us all the way to the school room. He sat outside of the school room whining, waiting for Grant to come back out and play with him. It was pretty funny watching him walk with that giant stick!
In the school room, Grant copied the from drawing into his book. This was another challenging form for him, and it took the week for him to get the hang of it. By Thursday, he had it down really well.
We also reviewed all the parts of speech we had gone over during the week, and when we came up for the summary from Thursday's story, I really tried to encourage Grant to use adjectives. After he was done copying the summary, he underlined the verbs, circled the nouns, and boxed in the adjectives.
On Friday, we took a break from our "formal" school work, and finished putting up our Halloween decorations, including the favorite "Spooky Town" village.
