Sunday, December 5, 2010

l.i.f.e. Academy

Our latest field trip was to a local children's museum. Andrew received a "family" membership for his birthday! yay! Grandma Michele & Aunt Chanelle came with us to explore our new found fun!


~December goals~

French:
We missed most of our formal lessons last month due to illness, snow, & holidays. We will be practicing what we do know as a review this month.

English:
nothing formal this month, just practice & review.

Fine Arts:
Composer Piotr Ilyich Chaikovsky "The Nutcracker"
Artist Musee D' Orsay "The Dance Class"
Poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day"

History:
Last month we studied the Pilgrim heritage, and are continuing on to Jamestown this month.

Math:
reviews, practice fast facts, and a pop quiz this month.

Literature:
free reading choice

Science:
The water cycle, cloud study, weather analysis, & experiments on salt water.

Note: We intentionally have a light load for our studies in December as to focus our attention more on Christ through this can-be chaotic season. We will focus on peaceful purpose & loving attitudes. We will enjoy some hands-on activities such as crafts, baking, games, and add to our Jesse tree each day. Lesson on finances are a must during this season by earning money & spending wisely towards sibling gifts to each other. This will also include researching different charity causes, and donating to one of them.

Our Classroom Schedule:

Morning:
1/2 hr writing
1/2 hr English (grammar, punctuation, & vocabulary)
1/2 hr Science
1/2 hr Literature
1 hour Math

Afternoon:
1/2 hr French
1/2 hr Fine arts
1 hr history
(reading, map work, & sometimes history related activities)

Fine arts is broken into days:
Monday is our official Bible lesson,
(w/ scripture review the rest of the days)
Tuesday is our composer study.
(we continue to listen to the musical piece all week)
Wednesday is our artist study.
Thursday is our poet study.
Friday is our Nature Study.

Notice that I did not list a time on our schedule =)
Ideally we would do 9 a.m. - noon, and 1 p.m. - 3 p.m.,
but I am into keeping it real, right? so....

We have been staying up late (is 1 a.m. late? ok, ok, it's more like 3 a.m. for me),
and I am getting up around 9 (laughing at myself, because I am a morning person, the day is half over by then!) while the others get up around 10. This would mean our "morning studies" is done closer to afternoon, and our afternoon studies are done more towards evening. I don't really care when it gets done as long as it does.

Anyone else have odd hours? just wondering...

3 comments:

Laurel said...

We are TOTALLY an "odd hours" kind of family. We have 24 hours per day to live our lives, and we don't get too hung up on the "proper time" to do things.

A couple summers ago we had a neighbor that called the police on our kids several times because "it's not normal" that the children are playing outside at 10 pm. They weren't noisy. No one was being disturbed. This neighbor just thought we "weren't normal". Nope. We never claimed to be normal.

Hope your weekend was BLESSED!

:) :) :)

Danielle said...

Hey girl!! We carry odd hours too!! Drives Nick crazy...LOL! But with my medical issues I don't sleep well at night. My best hours of sleep are from 6am-10am. So our school day usually starts between 10:30 and 11:30.

Both kids go to bed whenever they want now (as long as there is nothing major going on the next day). Going to bed before my kids was hard for me to get used to...LOL!!!

Unknown said...

Yup, I have to have odd hours or I never get any time alone to think!

Because the boys have chickens, they're up early and by the time I'm up, they're either reading or doing math!

Seems like every year is different depending on what's going on in our life...having grandparents around always changes things, as well as daddy having weekdays off...whew~

I agree with you about centering our attention on Christ...and I looked up Henry Wadsworth Longfellow...sad story, yet amazing poem/song!!! Thanks.

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