Summer Break Weeks 2-3

Summer Break Weeks 2-3

What I’m Reading: Macbeth by William Shakespeare

The sixth Shakespeare play to read this year.  I was lost.  I knew the general plot, but I definitely did not pick up on any subtleties.  While I did want to quit reading it at one point, I read all the way through.  I know that each time I read it, I will be able to understand it more.  Thus, there always needs to be a first time!

What I’m {nature} Journaling: I am drawing in each of the blooms in my garden.  It’s enough to keep me busy for the summer.  I am also requiring more effort from my son while he’s working in his nature journal.  He gives minimal effort in several subjects, but I have been talking to him more about how giving excellent effort in little things spills over into bigger things. 

Adventure

Week two started off with a great start – a holiday weekend full of family bowling and games, cooking out on the new grill, and having neighbors over to eat and play. The holiday weekend was so full of fun that I set aside a full day of recovery for myself and home.  Just as we were picking up positive momentum at midweek, a stomach bug came running through the house.  That was fun…  (Have you noticed that one of us has been sick just about every month for over a year now?) Once we did recover, I fit in some reading aloud.

Week three was all about cramming in what I already had planned amongst cramming in very last minute international travel preparation for myself (including getting my passport renewed at the very last moment).  After much contemplation the week before, I have decided that June is our very busy month.  I originally thought we were going to have a restful first half of the month and one really crazy week, but the month has proved to be quite the opposite.

Reading

We are thoroughly enjoying Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen right now.  We are reading the hardback illustrated version by Naomi Lewis.  It is a well told version broken down into seven short stories. 

I have started reading Summer of the Monkeys by Wilson Rawls.  This is one of the books my third grade teacher read to us after lunch.  I don’t remember anything about the book.  However, I do remember loving it and imagining that it all took place in my cousin’s side property where they had terraced railroad ties. (I also don’t quite know if this is just tied in because I found out my teacher lived in their neighborhood and this was the age where we were finally old enough to play in that area without supervision.)

Academics/Riches Rotation

On the day I set aside for recovery, we had tea and poetry.  I have made it a point to include it in our summer.  We aren’t doing it weekly, but I am putting it into the rotation since we all love it so much.  I checked out a Tommie da Paola poetry book from our living library.  It’s a good collection of children’s favorites.  This was definitely a sweet highlight of our week that turned out to be so sour.

The only math my son completed for week 2 was an assessment.  He did so well!!!! Since we didn’t get around to doing anymore math for week 2, I decided that it was a good place to break.  We can reasonably pick everything back up again (maybe) when I get back.  (Looking at our calendar, we are really busy in the upcoming weeks, so we will not be doing even half of what I’ve planned.  While I think it’s important for my son to keep practicing math and for us to fit in some good academics and riches into our days, I think it is more important that we are participating in summer fun and reading good stories during our down time. I will continue to plug away at our rotation to give us variety, but I have more reasonable goals now in not getting to everything.)

Term 2, Week 4a

What I’m Reading: Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore
Sometimes you just need a quick read, and this book fits the bill.  I still have a rather large TBR pile that I’m slowly making my way through.  I’ve gone back to my calendar system to help me reach my goals.  I finished my previous Kindle read a couple months in advance.  I wasn’t quite ready to move onto the next on the list, and I always enjoy quick reads over the holidays.  Thus, Oona Out of Order. While I would not recommend this for the language and adult situations, I’m a sucker for time travel books.  (Also, this book has ZERO redemptive value.)  I love time travel books or ones where characters or situations are woven creatively through the book (i.e. Thanksgiving by Ellen Cooney, Kitchens of the Great Midwest by J. Ryan Stradal, The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger). I’m fascinated with mulling over alternate timelines and the effects of time travel and foreknowledge. 

What I’m {nature} Journaling: While on a walk, we stopped to watch a slug cross over the sidewalk.  Its skin looked like a twig, and we lost him a few times once he reached the leaves.  This led to a great discussion on camouflage.  We also had a lengthy discussion about why it was slow (no arms or legs) and other creatures that move in a similar fashion.               

While writing this post, I spied two bluebirds checking out our bluebird house.  I’m a little surprised as it’s not March (even though we are currently experiencing a week of March-like weather).  We did spot bluebirds on our birdwatching outing at the beginning of November, and I know that one of our favorite trails is home to many bluebirds, this isn’t something we see often in our own backyard.  It’s an exciting moment! 

Co-op
We had our last class day at our co-op.  I wrapped up the finger knitting class with an easy wreath.  Everyone was able to finish the project with time left over.  My daughter decorated Christmas cookies and had practice cutting and gluing in her classes.  This was a fun semester for all of us!

Third Grade Highlight

We have two days left of week 4, but we are calling it for the 2022 year.  We are taking the entire month of December off school. I really wanted to call it all off the week before Thanksgiving because our full schedule had already hit, but I was determined to make it all the way through November.  I do think it was good to fit in a few more days of school, but it was mentally hard for me.  I’m overdue for a break.  Pushing through so many illnesses the past couple of months has been trying. I had hoped to be halfway through the entire school year (complete with term 2, week 6) to really get us ahead and leave room for a lot of spring fever.  We didn’t quite make it even with starting school earlier and really staying on track with our schedule.  It’s okay, though.  I have been enjoying this school year immensely. 

We read another installment in our American Tall Tales adventures.  My son and I took turns reading aloud Steven Kellogg’s retelling of Mike Fink. I like his retellings because they are interesting stories full of good language use.  The illustrations are good.  They are great for my son’s reading level.  I’ve never heard of Mike Fink, so this was new for us all.  A fun story!

We have been carving in time to explore more colors in our watercolor pallets.  This week we studied green using Bestowing the Brush color course on YouTube.  We only have a couple videos left, so I’m looking forward to when the rest of the course is released.  I also love that my preschooler is able to get something from the course, as well.  It’s fun to see her impression of what she’s learning.

Preschool Highlight

My daughter is now often asking when she’s going to be in kindergarten.  She wants to do math like her brother. Who am I kidding! She wants to do everything like her brother. She’s asking to write her name more and more. (I do have a laminated practice page of her name she uses with dry erase marker.) I want to give her the challenges she’s asking for but in small increments that keeps all of it fun and builds anticipation for when academics are required. I will just continue down our current path of having some plans made out for her but also including her in as much as I can with my son.

Curriculum Spotlight

Over Thanksgiving and Christmas we have a large pile of crafts to work on.  The kids’ favorite is painting a turkey mask every year.  (We typically do a thankful tree, but I skipped it this year due to all the resting from sickness I was trying to fit in.) This year we also had some crafts I had been saving from the library.

We start our Jesse Tree after Thanksgiving.  Since we aren’t home every day, I have started doubling up on the ornaments when we’re home.  I think we’ve only finished all of the ornaments once.  This year we may even do three a day.  My son still has some potholders he needs to make to put in our Christmas goody bags.  We will also be baking cookies and bread to give to neighbors and friends. We might fit in a few finger knitted wreaths. We have a lot of movies to watch, ornaments to make, and games to play.  We will also do our yearly reading of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.  I’m looking forward to our special moments with popcorn, hot cocoa, and pajamas.

My son told me he wants to write a book.  As he was telling me some of his plans, I told him that I wrote a poetry book in third grade; the moms helped bind them.  He’s been talked about it all week, so I am hoping to carve out some time to work on this.  He asked if we have a typewriter so he can type it.  This will be a good opportunity for me to introduce him to computers as we have held out for many years as we’ve been trying to figure out what the set boundaries will be.

Term 2, Weeks 2-3

What I’m Reading: Strong Poison by Dorothy Sayers This is the book where Peter Wimsey is trying to save Harriett Vane from paying for the murder of her ex-lover. This is my favorite so far of the series I’ve read (I’ve read four completely out of order). This one has been the easiest to get into.  I don’t know if it’s just an easier read or that I’m more familiar with the characters now.

What I’m {nature} Journaling:  My daughter found a leaf for me from the grocery store parking lot.  I pressed it and made a little note in my nature journal.  I know she won’t be bringing me a collection of leaves for much longer, so it will be nice to remember this moment.

Co-op

Last week we met up at a park with our co-op to hear a presentation from our state’s Audubon society.  The speaker presented ten local birds that are seen the most.  It was fun to hear that my son was able to recognize 9 out of 10.  The children also had an opportunity to use binoculars to look for birds around the park.

This week we had our Thanksgiving party.  Each family needed to bring a nature themed snack.  I made apple toffee dip, but I did NOT slice apples.  I ended up pouring pretzels around the tray instead.  I’ve decided to set the bar really low in my super mom capabilities! Since our location had to move indoors due to cold and rainy weather, we only played one game.  The kids also had three nature crafts they could choose to make.  Before everyone left, they could fill a bag of trail mix.  It was a fun afternoon!

Third Grade Highlight

I’m loving third grade.  We finished reading Little Pilgrim’s Progress by Helen Taylor this week.  We’ve been slowly reading it since last school year.  My son would have loved reading it at a faster pace.  (Ambleside Online schedules the original John Bunyan version to be read over a couple years.) I know there’s some arguments against reading children’s versions of certain classics, I don’t have a problem with many of them.  I don’t think it ruins the experience of reading something in the original format for the very first time.  I think it enhances reading because the reader already knows what’s going on and can go straight into understand the story. (I have the same philosophy for my own reading. There are times I will watch a movie or read spark notes first just to get a summary of what I’m going to read. I don’t consider it cheating but enhancing my experience.)

We are reading Margaret Pumphrey’s Stories of the Pilgrims. We read a chapter about storks bringing good luck in Holland.  That very same day we started reading The Wheel on the School by Meindert DeJong.  It’s about the children’s desire for storks to come to Shora. As we continued on in the story with the children being given a problem and dreaming of what they can do to achieve their goal, we moved on to the week’s engineering assignment.  It was about engineers being given a problem and the steps they need to take to solve the problem (or to conceptualize).  It was such a fun week of unplanned connections.

Over the two weeks we had vastly different weather.  The first week I made sure we were getting outside as much as possible in anticipation of the quick turn.  I haven’t set aside lessons in quite awhile to spend time playing outside instead.  It was worth it.  The weather did a full three sixty forcing us to pull out thermals and heavy coats.  We even had our first fire of the season. 

Needs Improvement

Since we did take some time away from our normal routine and had an additional week of so many out of the ordinary plans, we did not quite complete all of our academic work.  We’re carrying over a bit of the plans into Thanksgiving week, but I think that will help keep us in a routine and possibly motivated to finish one more week of the term before we take our complete break over December.

Preschool Highlight

We are loving all the Thanksgiving books and crafts.  I always pull out my stack of Thanksgiving books, but I checked out a few new ones this year from the library that were about baking or families enjoying meals together.  My VERY favorite book to read every year that isn’t about Thanksgiving but turkeys is Too Many Turkeys by Linda White.  We have been laughing along with this book for at least six years now.

We shifted our plans a bit to add in a play date.  We had some new friends come over for a picnic in the tent and then to play while the moms had an opportunity to talk about all the joys of spending all day with family.  We all had an amazing day that went by far too quickly.