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Saturday, August 4, 2007

Week 2 Report

I am so glad this week is OVER! Whew. Monday was my dh's birthday so we took it off instead of Friday, which also meant that I arranged for Camille's piano lesson to be changed (to Friday) and we spent a wonderful family day together. We needed it so badly with all of the stress lately. So Tuesday was our Monday this week.

We added in history and science this week to our schedule of Bible, Math, Independent Reading, Grammar and read-alouds. We left town Thursday to visit dh's parents, I had forgotten that it was THIS week we were doing this because Tuesday dh had an appendicitis scare- it ended up being a pulled muscle instead but I was distracted from all other things while we awaited the official diagnosis and possible pending surgery. Needless to say, our school week didn't happen as we had hoped. That's okay, we'll just pick up where we left off on Monday and play a little catch with the things we need to.

One change I made this week was the Nobility Record- we laminated one so I don't have to print a new one out each week and then worry about filing it away somewhere. I've also dropped the point system, at the bottom of the new one are questions:

Did you follow the rules? Were you kind? Did you obey the first time? Did you tell the truth? Did you whine or complain? Have you been respectful? Did you nag this week? Did you share your blessings? Did you do your best the first time? Do you need to apologize and ask forgiveness for your behavior this week? Remember each day is a new day and you CAN make wiser choices. God loves you!


I decided this needs to be more about correcting heart issues instead of earning prizes. I will still "reward" Camille for her efforts but just as we are able and I will stand by making the reward just for her.


In Bible this week we talked about God's promises- to Adam and Eve, to Noah, Abraham, Jacob and David.
Our scripture for memorization was:
In Him was life...the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness. John 1:4-5

This is Camille's badly photographed history copywork for the week. She did very well and in one sitting. I thought she would rebel but she didn't.



Math is still review for Camille right now but I'm finding that she has problems with some of the wording of the instructions. One this week was to
Write the number that is five more."
25 ___ 80 ____
I explained to her that it is like counting by 5's and her answers were 25-50, 80-105. I could not figure out how she got those answers until I realized she was counting by 5's 5x from the beginning number. 25- then 30, 35, 40, 45, 50. That was a frustrating moment but completely my fault. I shouldn't have tried to help her.

We flew our magic carpet around the world in SOTW 2's Chapter 1.

We didn't do science this week and we have a day's worth of work to catch up in Bible and Math due to the traveling. Not too bad.

CHRISTMAS THOUGHTS.
This week we also talked about Christmas, dh and I told the kids they can pick 3 items for Christmas this year each and that's it. Everything else will be gravy. We are determined to only get each child 3 things. The kids have chosen a teeter-totter they've seen at Sam's Club for $128 as a shared gift (worth 2 presents), Playmobil's Castle (we're asking the grands for this), architecture wooden blocks (we seen these in Constructive Playthings catalog), Danny wants more Little People playsets and they want a real punching bag. Dh thought the punching bag is perfect since we want the kids to take some form of martial arts, I think it sounded "manly" so he jumped right on board.

I want to get Blockus this year as a family game, a croquet set and badminton set. The croquet and badminton might be before Christmas because I really want them now. : ) Another thing I would like to get is double-dutch ropes so I can teach Camille, we've already decided that we can tie off one end to our fence and I've talked dh into helping use when he can.

HALLOWEEN DECISIONS.
It is right around the corner! Every year we figure out what we're going to do for Halloween in August, Camille said she wants to be a medieval princess and Danny to be a knight. We're going to get an Armor of God dress playset with a shield, sword, belt of righteousness, etc. for Danny and I'm making Camille's dress. If for some reason I can't, I will beg one of the more skilled seamstresses in our church to come to our rescue.

 

2 comments:

Dr. Joanna Branum, MD said...

What do you mean, you will stand behind making the reward just for Camille, though she won't be earning prizes? Will she still be responsible for checking off the daily record, though there are no points attached? I've been following this idea with some interest, and sort of combined your Nobility Record with the chores chart for myself and my husband to keep track of who is carrying the weight of managing our house. I hadn't quite gotten to the point of negotiating prizes with him, though! I thought it was a good idea!

Thanks for sharing your process -- my dd is starting first grade at charter school in a few weeks, but we're still working hard on character development at home and trying to get our household to run like less of a disaster.

Joanna

Jessica said...

Joanna,
Keeping track of points became too cumbersome since Camille is either not mature enough or old enough to handle the responsibility. I'm giving checks or X's and we're discussing her behavior at the end of the day. It is an idea in process, we're just trying to figure out how to make it work for us the best. We may go back to the points once we're into our lesson routine. I just wanted to lighten my load a little bit.

I'm very interested in hearing how you're using it, maybe I can borrow an idea from you!

: ) Jessica