Lentil

For some reason Lentil makes me think of Yentl.  Go figure!  It was a fun book to read. We like McCloskey so that always gives a book a leg up. 
We went with the Social Studies lesson today and found Ohio on the map of the USA.  We're also watching the Learn to Read with Phonics dvd that we got from Netflix. 
Hannah still frustrates me to no end in regards to reading.  I guess I'm still not ready for her to learn at her own pace, which means that I should probably hold off a few more months. 

Katy and the Big Snow

On Monday, we had class again.  We started Katy and the Big Snow by Ms. Burton.  Hannah loves the story.  Our first lesson was on maps and we talked about directions, turns out she knows more than I thought she did.  Either that or she's a good guesser :D 

Tuesday we did vocabulary, talking about things like water mains and steamrollers, but she knew quite a bit of those, too.  And then today, we counted by five.  Turns out I LOVE to count by five!!  Maybe it was one of the few times tables I actually got and so it makes me happy to say them, I don't know.  We'll probably have an art lesson tomorrow leaving science for Saturday.  Or vice versa, considering that we are going to Greenfield Village on Saturday and I'm sure there are LOTS of details in the art to notice there. 

Here's a funny thing for me about Five In A Row, when I don't do it for awhile, I think "This is useless, I need a new curriculum" and then when I start up again and I hear Hannah asking for her class books and lessons, I think "It's kindergarten and she is really learning how to learn"  And that's a good thing.

This morning, Hannah spent some time on Starfall.  It's a great site, it just makes me wish reading would click for her.

Map it!

I took it as a very good sign, that Hannah reminded me this evening that we need to do school.  I don't expect that she will do that very often in our time together, so I'll take it when I can get it. 
We're still reading Papa Piccolo and enjoying it.  Tonight, we located Venice on the map and then I turned to our old friend, Netflix, to find a movie.  I was looking to see if The Italian Job was on instant, because I was being lazy and did not want ot find the DVD and put it in the player.  It has some great shots of Venice and the pilings of the buildings, much better than Ocean's Twelve in regards to city highlights.  It was not available, but I did find an A&E special on the Canal's of Venice and we watched bits and pieces of it.  Helped Hannah realize that it's more of an island than a city in the traditional sense. 

Four all together :D

We've been reading Grandfather's Journey this week.  We've done some simple origami for art, looked at our map for social studies, talked about the days of the week for math, and even discussed poetic prose for language arts.  I haven't been on the actual computer much lately, which explains why I haven't been keeping the log up. We did skip the last lesson in The Glorious Flight this past Saturday.  And things have been crazy good here lately, what with Presbytery meetings, monthly Bible study, costume making, trick or trunk decorating and pondering on NaNoWriMo plots. 

Map it!!!

We have been doing Five in a Row for about two months now and I finally got my maps!!!  When we were in SC I took my mom's laminated wall maps of the world and the USA. 
Today, as we did our geography lesson for The Glorious Flight I was able to actually point to a place on a map that wasn't on Joel's Ipod Touch (which with a class of one has been an amazing teaching tool!)

Good Evening, Japan

I believe that Hannah really liked A Pair of Red Clogs, she sat through the entire book without having to be reigned back  in once.  I decided to start with science this week, as we have a wedding coming up and I thought it would be neat to record the predictions of the weather for the big day and see what they actually turned out to be.  We are using two online websites for the predictions, taking down the high and the precipitation predictions.  I'm hoping that later today we can create a colorful chart to go with it.
It also turned out that we did our social studies lesson today.  We placed Japan on a world map, but then to make it even better, a dear friend of mine, currently in Korea visited Japan last weekend.  He was on instant messenger so we were able to quiz him about Japan!  He told us that the people are extremely friendly, they where the same shoes that we do, the weather is like California, people were fishing there, and that the food was amazing!  Now how is that for a lesson!!

Take Great Care

Mike takes such good care of Mary Anne in Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel that she doesn't grow old.  Hannah and I talked about stewardship.  I broke it down to taking care of things.  We also did some work on her writing her name.  She often gets all the letters but not in the correct order.  She had a major attitude when she woke up and it reared its ugly head during class, so she was sent to "rest" for an hour in her room to help take care of it. 
When she got out, we had lunch and since we had talked about stewardship, I figured now is as good a time as any to add some chores to her day.  She chose to take over dusting, and she was given the responsibility of making her bed, tidying her room, and putting away her clean clothes.  And for anyone out there that thinks this is too much for five year old, I must tell you that in all it took less than one hour of her day.  And no, she will not get paid for them, because then it changes from stewardship and into a job. 

Where does my food go?

Vocabulary was on our agenda today.  The words in Madeline are appendix, solemn, and disaster.  We had a little body geographyin order to find Hannah's appendix and talked about the digestive system along the way.  And the other two vocabulary words gave a perfect oppurtunity for context guessing of a meaning.  And given the context and illustrations, Hannah guessed correctly the meaning of the words!
I had a magazine about France out on the table this morning and as we talked about what is for breakfast in France, she started to flip through it.  She noticed the statue of liberty, which was gifted to us from the French.  In the end, we had not only vocabulary lessons, but history and geography and health lessons as well!
After the lesson, Hannah wanted to dance, and Michael W. Smith's A New Hallelujah was in the player.  We got to rock out to some Jesus songs! 

Laboring on Labor day

Joel is off to the office for a half day. I will admit that he rarely takes national holidays, except maybe the Fourth of July and Thanksgiving. And he's always working Easter and Christmas. He hasn't had one off in the eight years we've been married, but that is part of the blessing of being married to pastor.
Hannah and I didn't take off today either. So I can't really complain too much about him going in to work :D
We started Madeline today.  We were still lounging in bed when I told Hannah that we were starting Madeline today, and she rushed to get the library book and asked to have school right then and there.  We had a Social Study lesson today.  Looked at the world map, saw where we live and then where Paris is.  Hannah wanted to go there TODAY!  I told her about how long the plane ride would be and that we can get a direct flight from our local airport.  Then we looked at a map of Paris and talked about where some of the different pictures from Madeline are within the city.  She really wants to go, which is a blessing, because one day Joel and I would love to take her. 
I pray that God blesses your day and gives you the rest that you need and labor that delights you!

Paris photos

I'd like to share my Snapfish photos with you. These are from a quick trip into Paris in 2006. Feel free to use them for your Madeline lessons!

Houseboats

Today, we had a social studies lesson with The Story about Ping . There is a family that lives on a houseboat on the Yangtze river. Luckily, Joel grew up in Seattle and they have lots of houseboats there. He was able to tell Hannah some neat things about the houses that are in Seattle. We also have a friend who grew up on a boat in the Caribbean, so I was able to share with her the stories that I heard about growing up on a boat. Later today, we'll continue the study with a bowl of rice for lunch!

We made it through our first week! One thing that we figured out is that Friday, our Sabbath, is not going to be a school day. Which means that Hannah will have "class" six days a week when including Sunday School.
Next week, we are reading Madeline, so I better start finding my pictures of Paris!