This was a tough week, bookwise. All of us are tired and worn out from our winter. After we wrap up a few things today, we will be going on Spring Break for the next two weeks. We have about 20 days left to meet attendance requirements for the state, and are on track to finish our history before Mary leaves for her first camp in June.
We did get out this week, a Girl Scout outing to hear the Symphony on Saturday,
visiting the museum on Tuesday and
going to the lake on Wednesday. Those were great outings, but they didn't make hitting the books any easier when we were home.
Mary is reading
The Phantom of the Opera for her free read this week. She is also working her way through
Lewis and Clark and Me: A Dog's Tale by Laurie Myers for her history reading. Once she finishes that she already plans on reading
Who Was Sacagawea? by Judith Bloom Fradin.
Katie read
Mercy Watson to the Rescue by Kate DiCamillo. She likes this series and is ready to go back to the library this weekend and check out a couple more. She is currently reading one of the
Amber Brown books by Paula Danziger, but I can't remember which one and she took it to bed with her last night.
I am excited to see them reading easily and without fighting it so much. They say they are enjoying the phonics/spelling lessons now and it is making it easier for them to figure new words out. Reading still isn't high on Mary's list of what she wants to do, but I'll take it.
For phonics/spelling we are drilling phonic rules, syllables and practicing sounding out two- and three-syllable words. I also added to our lesson reading random passages from classic literature that I write on the white boards. This is for them (Mary and Katie) to read silently to themselves to decode any 'new' words and then read aloud smoothly and fluently. They are doing great and really like us ending the lessons this way.
Because both Mary and Katie had writing assignments (copywork and free writing) in their Grammar books (Primary Language Lessons and Intermediate Language Lessons) we put WWE aside for this week. Instead I used their reading texts to practice narration from. I even got two good paragraphs out of Mary yesterday for her writing assignment on birds. Katie thought it looked like so much fun that she wrote on of her own.
Katie's reading this week was the poem My Shadow by Robert Louis Stevenson. We talked about why he used certain descriptions, how shadows are formed and outlined her her shadow on the wall.
Mary's read about Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt in her reading book. She compared the two in how they both overcame disadvantages in their early lives to become successful men. She really liked the phrase "Pluck and Perseverance" used to describe the two men.
In history we covered China during the late 1700's and the Opium Trade, and then moved on to Napoleon. We spent most of the week talking and reading about Napoleon. On Thursday, Mary completed a short, simple outline of Napoleon's life that we worked on together. Today, she still needs to complete Chapter 4 in The Story of The USA workbook on Pacific Coast Settlements.
Mary began division in her Math this week. She is not having any big problems with understanding it at all, but her weakness is in her multiplication facts. Even though we have reviewed and drilled, she just did not understand why I wanted her to memorize them...now she does ;-).
Katie is continuing her work on subtraction facts above 10. She is doing a great job, though she does not enjoy it at all.
We did not get to any science work on Jupiter and Saturn. I'll just move that forward to when we return from Spring Break. We've spent lots of time on nature and birds for science this week.
As for the little ones, they have had a fun week. Loved the outings, played a lot outside in the nice weather we are having, and playing games with each other.
Emily and I did do a couple more lessons in her MEP math program and she has been "reading" a couple of Dora the Explorer books from the library this week. Her read aloud this week has been
Mr. Popper's Penguins, which all the girls have actually been enjoying listening to. She is continuing to do well with her handwriting and spent most of the week practicing her 'b'.
Today, we'll review our phonics/spelling lessons to this point, finish history and do some more math. We have to go pick up Mary's and my glasses from the optometrist. Katie's came in, but did not pass inspection so they have to be sent back out. Then I need to spend some time on Girl Scout stuff.
Peace,
Amy
At home this week we've been brushing up on our bird identification skills, listening to recordings of bird calls and trying to identify the birds in our backyard. Lots of time spent on the deck, having dinner, putting together puzzles, reading and painting. 
The big girls have been working with their friend in the afternoon to create a book series featuring our cats...
We are finishing off the week with lots of reading. Before she left, my mom took us all the the book store and stocked us up on new reading material. Mary 'found' "The 39 Clues" series and is excited to try out all the clue tracking. 
