Friday, January 7, 2011

Our Week in Pictures

Where has our week gone?  It is nice to be back on a schedule....but I do miss our lazy unscheduled mornings.  I realized I haven't blogged about school in a while so here's what's happening at THE HOME BUILDERS ACADEMY....

Odyssey of the Mind.....
We are getting closer and closer to competition so things are ramping up.  We had our regular Monday morning meeting but several of the guys on the team met this afternoon to work on the Script.  I was really proud of the guys.  They only had 2 hours to work but got a lot done and stayed on task.

Of course we had regular school which started back on Monday:

The preschoolers have been doing the letter C and studying about Caterpillars.
We had a fun sequencing activity while reading The Very Hungary Caterpillar.

We practiced putting numbers in order.

We made Caterpillars.

AND A BIG MESS



We made patterns with Caterpillar colors

We practiced counting and recognizing numbers.

We read lots of books!

We did a bottle cap letter matching activity.

AND OF COURSE WE USED OUR PRESCHOOL ACTIVITY BAGS

These are bags filled with everything the student needs to complete a learning activity.  These are fun and educational and a great way for me to keep the little ones busy while working on other things.
These bags had a tracing activity, a cutting activity, and a uppercase/lowercase matching activity.

The little ones did a bunch more too....these are pictures from Wednesday but it does give you an idea of what we are doing.

The big kids of course have school too but their pictures are not always as exciting.  However they definitely keep busy.

We all do Bible Study.  We are all memorizing a verse: THE BOY is memorizing verses for his Co-op Class.  I am learning verses for Pondering Passages with Shay, THE TWINKIES AND BABY are memorizing verses for Cubbies and THE GIRL is memorizing verses for Sparks.  So we all review our verses together and then do a short topical Bible Study.  This week it was on arguing.  Whew...and it was timely....my little rascals have been ARGUING!!!
THE BOY has his nose in books for a large portion of the Day.  For History he has been studying World History and is currently reading a book called George Washington's World.


He is also reading a historical fiction set in 1815 on the remote island of Saint Helena, fourteen-year-old Betsy Balcombe develops a friendship with Napoleon Bonaparte who, after his defeat at Waterloo, is brought there as an exile and is housed with her family.  He says it is pretty good.


He is spending a lot of time memorizing in Geography.  He knows all the countries in Africa and Europe so far and was excited to learn that this week he only had to memorize the original 13 colonies.  Which is not only a review....but MUCH easier!

He's studied quite a bit this week he had vocabulary test, geography test, and Spanish.

He is also plugging away at Math.  Which he does primarily on a computer based program called teaching textbooks but when he runs into things he doesn't understand then we do have to supplement.  He is a good Math student and seems to grasp most of the concepts fairly quickly.  WHEW!

He's had lots of other things to...but he doesn't love for me to take pictures so I try to refrain :)

THE GIRL has been super busy too....
LOTS OF MATH....Which she LOVES!

Lots of Stories!  She loves for me to read to her and is really enjoying our current story The Year of Miss Agnes.  It's the story of a teacher from England  who connects with the hearts and minds of students in a one-room Athabascan school in Alaska in 1948.  I'm enjoying it too.  I think even Mindy likes it :)

She continues to work on her penmanship which is another issue with dyslexia...but she is plugging away and it is not too bad.

She also continued with her study of Ancient History.  This week learning about The Exodus.  She is fascinated to learn about these Bible Stories she's grown up hearing and how they fit into real history.  It's cool to see her enthusiasm.  She, like her big brother and dad, is a history buff.  In science she is studying teeth.
Her favorite class by far is Home Ec.  She LOVES to learn how to cook and bake.  She baked biscuits all by herself this week.  We all enjoyed the fruit of her labor!

She made sure her hair was up, hands were washed, and apron on.
She measuring carefully.

She followed the recipe.

She learned about how to use a rolling pin and roll the dough in every direction. North, South, East, and West.

Set the oven!

Then she taught her little students with the leftover dough.

She even cleaned up afterwards!
She did great!
And all this baking inspired THE BABY to open up her own Play-Doh Bake Shoppe!

AND OF COURSE WE HAD THERAPY....But at least I got to carry our stuff in my very cute bag my parents gave me for Christmas!  David Bishop aka Stitch Doctor made it even cuter with his awesome embroidery.
We had Speech (TWINIKIE BOY LOVES his speech folder and all his stickers!)

Twice at the school and everyday homework!

I've also started doing some alternate therapy at home in hopes of increasing TWINKIE BOYS progress.  So far it's been fun.  He especially is enjoying the "rebound therapy" and I have been amazed at how effective it is.

This was his "big" present from us and it had a purpose :) beyond just fun.  Although it has been a lot of fun for the kiddos.  But THE GIRL and TWINKIE BOY are going to reap major benefits it appears.
ANYWAY...
I LOVE MY TWINKIE BOY!  He is a trip!

He works so hard!

We've also had Reading Therapy if full effect....
THE GIRL is plugging right along.  She does not love it...but at least she does not hate it right now.  The pace is S-L-O-W...but we will get there...one day!

She does enjoy the game part of her therapy!


IT WAS NOT ALL WORK NO PLAY....we did have some fun too!
They always enjoy outside time....especially THE BoYS



I love when they play nicely (which was not often this week!)

I did let them eat lunch in front of the TV one day.  Which they of course LOVE!

Here is another fun part of our week.  THE GIRL got a fun card game called Pick-a-Draw, in her stocking for Christmas.  It is a cute way to teach kids how they can make different cartoon characters.  You have a stack of faces, hair, eyes, noses, and mouths.  Without looking you draw a card from each stack and create the face.  She has had so much fun making so many different cartoon faces.  Definitely a great gift.

Enjoying Oranges!

We are trying to eat healthier.
Week one went very well.




It was a busy week.  It was a good week and I am so glad it is the weekend!
Happy Weekend!

3 comments:

  1. I'm kind of worn out - that was a LOT of pictures. How come no pics of the big kid?

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  2. Amazing week! Busy folks that are living purposefully. Love it. You inspire me! Love you Sweetie!

    ReplyDelete