Week 13

This week we started our school with some changes. Jhoshua is getting to the point where Saxon 8/7 is becoming confusing and he started to get frustrated. And this is my advanced child in math that have always enjoyed doing math every morning. But I think he started hitting a wall and was vocal enough to tell me. So I thought I'd give him a break and hand him something new and enjoyable to do that will recover his joy in math again. I got him the Life of Fred Fraction and Decimal books. And he can't put it down. He laughs while reading, though he thinks it is easy for him but willing to do them. I think going back and reviewing his math skills will give him more confidence when he goes back to Saxon again, which he said he will, not just now.

He had also started using Writing with Ease Level 4 combined with Writing Strand. I think we have found something that he can do that I don't get too much complaints and generate good results. His dictation skills are being developed and does help him hold his thoughts longer enough to be put in the paper. I like that he is learning to identify main points of the story and focus on those rather than narrate everything that happened just for the sake of narrating. This greatly helps him in his outlining. Writing strand helps him a lot in organizing his thoughts, writes it down and builds sentences, in a small chunks of work that it does not frustrates him. That is good. I think frustrations in kid's work hinder them greatly to develop their skills. It is not that they do not want to do the work rather it puts them to a negative vibe that stops them from trying.

The rest of their work this week were done. I am amazed how quickly we finished each day this week. I hope it carries on for the coming week.

Alden has been doing well in his reading, more fluent and less difficulty in decoding. Finally, I think he is getting there. We are almost done with Saxon 2 and I bought Math Mammoth 1 for him as a review material when we finish Saxon. We are right on track on his science schedule using Elemental Science. Finally, I found something that we can use that I don't have to tweak a lot. History is fun. Just started reading aloud Squanto, friend of the Pilgrims this week for him.

We were busy today. We went to our biweekly nature walk in a marsh area near our place this morning. It was very cold but we have seen a lot of birds around. We were also able to watch an education movie about marsh land in the visitor's area. We ended our nature walk with a lunch picnic with their friends. Wonderful day.

I know sometimes, starting school again after a long vacation is difficult. But I am grateful for the attitude that my kids have shown me this week. They have been good and cooperative this week and I hope this will continue.
Have a wonderful weekend!