Thursday, August 30, 2012

Rhythm, Building a Dam, Treasured Books, Math Practice, and Zoology

 We've been keeping up with our weekly kayaking.


Rowing is great exercise, but it can also be very soothing.
When we row together, we have to keep a steady rhythm,
communicate clearly, and work as a team.

It's been great for us.
 


We've been enjoying a new nature trail in our town.




Building a dam in the river out back.







Lu finished D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths.
He was actually teary-eyed when he said
"Mama, I just read the last one."


We continue reading Aesop's Fables
for morning read-aloud once a week.

They're short and fun,
and always give us something
to talk about.



With his youth group,
Lu learned how to make these cute little boxes.






We read about the Amazon Rain Forest,
and learned about the Green Anaconda
and the Morpho Butterfly.


Lu gets really excited when learning about new animals.
We'll have to further explore this zoological enthusiasm.


 We also started watching this BBC series on The Life of Birds.

And we worked on graphs and long division.


Today I realized that we really need to slow down with the new math concepts and focus on practicing and mastering everything we've seen so far. Lu is good at math, so it's easy for me to just keep throwing new stuff at him, and getting ahead in leaps and bounds. But then we take a few steps back, and he doesn't remember something we saw a couple of weeks ago, or it starts getting jumbled up.  So it'll be practice, practice, practice for a while. There will be time for percentages and ratios later.

5 comments:

  1. You have a river out back?! How cool!!! I can relate to the practicing thing - have you tried Khan academy? My kids are loving it - even going back over old concepts to earn points.

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    1. We were using Khan, and he really liked it, but then it suddenly got too hard for him. But I think he might be ready to try again. Thanks for reminding me!

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  2. I wanna homeschool with you, Gabriela!!!

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    1. Awww, thanks Karen. You're always welcome to come and visit. There are NO other homeschoolers anywhere around, so we'd be very happy to have homeschooling visitors.

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