Puppies.... and some other stuff

We've been busy, busy with puppies

and projects.

Lu is working on a research project

about the Ancient Maya,

and making great progress despite

the computer room also being a puppy nursery.

A friend recently brought us Momo by Michael Ende

(author of Never Ending Story)

Lu is loving this book! 

It's about an orphan girl who lives in an abandoned park,

something about "the men in gray",

and a weird street where time warps...

I haven't actually read the book, but Lu's been

telling me all about it and it sounds pretty trippy.

 This coming week is our last before a three week break.

Which fits perfectly with the puppies just starting

to become a handful.

The river was running strong,

so we went out to build our annual dam

for a swim hole.

 Lu's been doing "Circuit Training" for P.E.

We come up with a 3-minute circuit

and he goes through it as many times as he can.

(and there's a window from our bedroom

to the dance studio because... 

it seemed like a good idea when we were building?)

The puppies had their first outing

into the yard the other day,

and felt sunshine for the first time!

 

Ancient African Civilizations

We recently completed our studies on Ancient African Civilizations. 

We read about Nubia and the Kingdom of Kush, 

the Axums, the Nok People, the Bantu People, 

and the Kingdoms of Ghana and Mali.

We also watched documentaries from the BBC series

Kingdoms of Africa.

Lu is loving the African folklore.

I even found some in Spanish.

(that's history and bilingual language arts wrapped up in one, score!)

After reading, Lu retells the story to me, 

which is a highlight of my day :)

Here, he is retelling a story from Zambia:

After telling me the story,

 we come up with a synopsis together.

In this story, the synopsis was: 

"A boy saves his sister from being eaten

by her man-lion husband." 

Putting a whole story into one sentence 

is not as easy as it might seem. 

*   *   *   *   *   *

And here's Lu's final timeline for Ancient Africa.

The Writing Flow

There's a lot of writing going on around here lately. 

It seems that Lu is finding his writing flow. 

And writing is becoming second nature.

 

Questions like:

Does it have to be that long? 

How do I start it?

Can you give me some ideas?

have become a thing of the past.

(knocking on wood so that it lasts)

He recently finished the first two books of the Narnia series,

so he wrote a few paragraphs summarizing, comparing,

and critiquing them.

Lu originally wanted to read straight through the whole series, but then decided he needed a bit of a break after Prince Caspian. So he read a very fun book in Spanish about a bowl of story-telling noodles, and wrote a short summary about it. 

I asked him to limit himself to two paragraphs. He said it was impossible to fit it into so few words, and tried to get me to up it. So we talked about how it can be very useful to know how to get your point across in as few words as possible.

Anyway, I'm thrilled that he's asking to write more 

rather than less.

As we are bilingual, I try to make time every week 

for written work in both languages.

Much writing also happens in

history and science.

 Lu does most of the writing, but sometimes I give him a hand

by writing what he dictates.

I try to vary writing assignments as much as possible - reports, reviews, creative writing, dialogues, descriptive paragraphs, summaries, note-taking....

I used to make the mistake of correcting

spelling and grammar in the first read.

Now, instead of handing in his work to me, when Lu is done he reads aloud what he wrote. Then, he edits his own work. 

Reading it to me helps him find his mistakes. 

Then we put it away. I won't check spelling or grammar until a few days have passed, and only comment on content and wording. I give as much praise as I can, to compensate for having been overly critical in the past. And his writer's confidence has definitely improved.

A Productive Morning and a Chicken Bone

It's not something I do everyday, but this morning I laid Lu's work out for him to work through in whatever order he wanted.

He chose history reading first,

 and read about Ancient Mesopotamian

games, music, and sports.

 After math (which we did together)

he did his science reading.

Right now, he's learning about Food Webs with Mr. Q

Lu REALLY digs the way Mr. Q writes like he's talking to him, and makes funny jokes. He laughs while he's reading science! What better recommendation can there be than that?

3 baskets -

The top basket is for daily work,

the middle one is for once or twice a week work,

and the bottom one for finished work.

Finished packets are filed in the blue storage unit on the right.

Next, he moved on to Geography.

He's studying Asia.

We're using Sheppard's Software and  

Head of the Class videos for geography. 

I'm not a big fan of spending time on flags, but he insists.

 

By mid-morning, the daybed-couch is always covered in papers and books. Lately, I'm spending a lot of time on that one meter of floor space doing sit-ups and stretching. Lu is becoming so independent that I need something to do when I'm not needed, and sit-ups are a good thing to do while waiting for the occasional "Mama, I don't get this." And even then, most times, before I can even finish the explanation, he's already got it, and (not always) politely tells me to go back to my whatever I was doing, thank you very much. 

mmmm.... Yeah, just you wait until we hit algebra and essays, and then you'll need me again. Little Mr. Know-It-All. But I'm kidding, kind of. Cha keeps saying that it's a great thing, and that that's exactly what we want - a self-guided learner. But I miss working on stuff together and feeling needed :sniff:

Anyway...

 Back to our day -

 Lu decided to go out to the river with his snorkeling gear.

and found the most amazing...

CHICKEN BONE!

What???

 Okay, it could have been a vulture bone, 

or some other bird... but chicken is funny.

 Then we sat by the river and read a story together.

 A lovely, lovely story.

 Then one more dip, in the natural jacuzzi...

After lunch, there was knitting and cookies.

 Lu started Roald Dahl's The Witches this week.

I love that he loves to read. It is a wonderful thing.