Skip to main content

Weekly Wrap-Up ~ Homelessness and the Bayeux Tapestry

This was one of those weeks where it was busy and ordinary all at the same time.

Dawson ~ 8th Grade

Dawson's week was one of mostly mechanics .. getting through the lessons so that Spring Break could begin. He did well all week, worked hard and did thorough work. But, he didn't really do too much exciting work.

Probably the highlight of his week was an accident. We were studying the Battle of Hastings and read about the Bayeux Tapestry. We decided to look it up, and when we did we stumbled upon a "Bayeux" Tapestry generator. Dawson sat down and started playing with it and generated a few scenes out of the book we are reading, Adam of the Road by Elizabeth Janet Gray.


Additionally in history we learned about the establishment of the middle class in Middle Ages and the Magna Carta. In science we studied biomes and how herbs were used for medicines.

We also received our greenhouse from the CSN giveaway I won so we moved our herb seeds into it and put it in a sunny place upstairs. We have now added some broccoli seeds, as well.


Dawson completed Life of Fred: Decimals and Percents and will move onto Pre-Algebra with Biology after Spring Break.

We also read many Bible verses on stewardship and Dawson wrote an essay on the topic.

He has already left for a weekend at the lake with his best friends and his dog, Crusoe. I am sure he is currently doing "boy" things that I'm better off not knowing about. He opted for staying home this next week while me and the other three kids go to Pensacola to my parents' vacation home. So I hope he has a great week off!

Brynne ~ 1st Grade

Our focus book this week was Fly Away Home by Eve Bunting. It is about a father and his young son who are homeless and live in an airport. As part of that study we had a lot of discussions about the homeless and how we are called by God to take care of them. We discussed ways we could help. We also talked about how we take care of the "homeless" birds in our back yard and how important it is that we provide them with birdhouses and water and food and not disturb the nests they build.


On that topic we also read the book Great Joy by Kate DiCamillo and illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline (love him!). Brynne did two mazes, one helping a bird find the center of his birdhouse and one helping his dog find his way home.

The coolest thing we did on this topic was to brainstorm about what Brynne thinks of when she thinks of "home". She listed several words. Then we used those words to rewrite a poem by Catlin L. Crawford called "When I Think of Home", by filling in the blanks at the end.

And this was Brynne's poem ...

"When I Think of Home" by Catlin L. Crawford and Brynne
(You can go here to see the original poem. Click "handout" under "Materials".)

When I think of "home" I think of burned out lightbulbs.
When I think of "home" I think our house is big.
When I think of "home" I think of toys under the bed.
When I think of "home" I think of times when we dig.

When I think of "home" I think of fun.
When I think of "home" I think of family.
When I think of "home" I think of quiet.
When I think of "home" I think of my neighbor Ellie.

When I think of "home" I think of warm weather.
When I think of "home" I think of homeschool.
When I think of "home" I think of comfy pillows.
When I think of "home" I think of furniture that's cool.

Her letter-of-the-week was "Q" so she read several "Q" books, did her tracer page and her mini-book.

In math we added the concept of money to our study of 10's and 1's (using dimes and pennies). We played store with Brynne paying me for school supplies she purchased. She also played a fun math game focusing on the concepts of grouping 10's and 1's.


On Thursday we went to the Tulsa International Airport for a field trip.


And on Friday she had her Coop P.E. and Music classes.

And school is complete because we are now on Spring Break! We leave at 4 a.m. tomorrow for Florida! So ..... talk to you in a week!

We are linking up with Kris at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.

Comments

  1. Oh, I hope you had a wonderful trip! Sunny Florida! LOVE the greenhouse! Happy planting!

    Jessy

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

We all know that in this crazy world of homeschooling, we need all the (adult) support we can get. Please leave a comment if you so wish!

Popular posts from this blog

ABCya

Eli's reading resource teacher shared a website with me yesterday that I would like to pass along. It's called ABCya . There are separate educational sections with fantastic games for ages kindergarten through 5th grade. I browsed the 2nd grade level, and it includes age-appropriate games about Letters, Numbers, Shapes, Geometry, Patterns, Mouse Manipulation, Art and Holiday games. There are lots and lots of fun and creative games for children to play. They are fun, but oh, so educational. Eli's favorite, in his short time playing it, was Create a Car . A lot of the games also have Apps available for purchase (99 cents for most of them) for the iPad and iPhone. I have been looking for another free website for games similar to Starfall , for some time. I think I have found it. I can feel confident having Eli and Brynne play these games.

A Thomas Jefferson Education "This Week in History" ~ Schoolhouse Review

Talk about a GOLD MINE! A Thomas Jefferson Education's This Week in History by Rachel DeMille is her "labor of love" ... and I absolutely LOVE it! " This Week in History is a daily resource that brings your home school or classroom to life." For just $9.99 per month, you can log onto TJEd.com and click the "This Week in History" link to obtain many, many, many resources tied to specific events that occurred in the upcoming week in history. Or even better, you can receive the summaries and links to ALL resources right in your email Inbox each week! It doesn't get any easier than that! What does this really look like in real life? Each week, I receive an email from Rachel DeMille that sets out each date of the coming week. Under the date, there are listed anywhere from one to several events that occurred in history on that date. THEN there are ALL kinds of things to do related to that event, such as books to read, websites to visit, ac

Cells ~ It's What's for Dinner

Dawson made edible cells on Friday. He made an animal cell pizza ... and a plant cell chocolate chip cookie ... He reviewed what he's learned about cells the past two weeks, and I had dinner made by someone else. Win, win!! I am linking up at Science Sunday at Adventures in Mommydom.