Unit 14: Horse

I've debated the last few weeks whether I should keep the same pace or speed it up. I am wanting to go straight into My Father's Worlds (MFW) 1st grade curriculum. I am not certain starting the 1st grade program after the new year will give us enough time to finish everything before the regular school schedule starts in August 2014. Next year when I legally have to inform the state of my decision to homeschool we will belong to a homeschool group that will maintain all of our records and sessions start at the same time as public school. Additionally, Caleb is an only child and we get through a days work quickly and he has mastered the art of sitting and doing his work with little to no complaining. From now on you will see us completing 2 units in one week. I have found Caleb is more than capable of getting the work done especially since he knows school is not optional. Monday's/Tuesday's and Thursday's/Fridays we will complete MFW lessons. Wednesday's he will go to Learning Planet K-5 program while I go to women's bible study. We should be finished in 5 to 6 weeks and I am excited. Now for the review.

Unit 14 in all about the letter Hh and horses. Caleb learned one of my favorite bible passages for children; Children, obey your parents in everything for this pleases the Lord. Colossians 3:20 NIV. Once trained, a well-behaved horse obeys right away with no hesitations. God wants us to do the same. We learned how Noah obeyed Gods command immediately while Jonah tried to run away and suffered the consequence of his disobedience.

Just beautiful. I am well pleased with his writing.

Finally, he agreed to color the pictures starting with the letter sound. I would get confused between his x marks and check marks.

Cut and paste page. The word hill was challenging for him. So we worked through sounding it out.

  Math page distinguishing between heaviest and lightest and largest to smallest. After a series of questions the smallest horse had to end up in the barn.

Cut and paste page 2. We reviewed the sentences together and then he pasted them in the right spot.

Dictation page. His writing is difficult to see, but it is beautiful near perfect. I couldn't praise him enough for a well job done.

I love all the review and repetition of words. Caleb's ability to recognize and read words grows daily.

We read Fritz and the Beautiful Horses. Such a delightful book. We read a couple of books from the library too selections were poor this time.

 Caleb had to compare a horse and car identifying all the differences. It was neat to see in one of our books fire fighting horses that pulled the equipment unlike our motorized fire trucks of today. Caleb loves fire fighters and believes he will be one in the future. We were also supposed to make a clay model of a horse. That turned out to be a dud and scrapped the project.

Unit 13: Cow

Unit 13 is all about the letter Cc and cows. Caleb learned that in order for him to grow in his salvation he must learn to crave pure spiritual milk (the word of God) like a newborn baby. What a great lesson for me too. I must foster a love for learning in him. The words to remember this week were "God's Word helps me grow."

Caleb tried to memorize The Purple Cow poem by Gelett Burgess. We didn't put enough work into the memorization. I had to trace the cow badge and then let him color it purple which worked out great for the both of us.

Handwriting page. He is still working on placing his letters in the correct location.

Sound discrimination page. He can do this independently now. No help from mom.

The math page is a little challenging this week. He had to circle more than 2 cows and less than 3 cows. I am not sure he got the concept.

Cut and paste page. I review any words he has trouble with and then he pastes onto the page. He is still figuring out how to sound out words. He loves to get in a hurry just to have the activity over with and wants me to just tell him the word. I resist the request and tell him to sound it out.

Dictation page. He is getting better at identifying the middle vowel sound now and has started the good habit of repeating the word to himself so he can hear the sounds.

Cut and paste page 2. I love how Caleb tries to read these one his own before he asks for help.

Caleb's drawing of a cow, cooking, can and a comb. Someday he'll include more color.

We read a ton of books related to cows. Ferdinand came with program and was cute. However, if you want a book both you and your child will love try Click, Clack, Moo Cows That Type. Written by a lawyer it was a favorite by both of us. Cows go on strike then the chickens refuse to lay eggs. The farmer demands milk and eggs, but not without an ultimatum. Oh, and the ducks get in on the action too. This is a keeper and one I plan to add to my personal library.

Unit 12: Goats

Unit 12 is all about the letter Gg and goats. Caleb learned that before Jesus died on the cross for our sins goats, sheep, and other animals were given to God for people's sin. Our words to remember were "Jesus died for my sins." 

I introduced goats; these look much different than the ones we see in farms. We were supposed to compare the taste of goats milk with cows milk, but it's too expensive to buy and goats milk does not come in little tiny cartons. Instead Caleb had a great time singing Old MacDonald Had a Farm using his farms animals on a stick.

 Caleb would have to hold up a farm animal and say it's sound. He loved it! 

Do you see the mistake? Caleb had to match the baby farm animals with the adults. I thought for sure he misplaced two baby farm animals.

It wasn't until Caleb was putting his Baby Farm Animal Book together that I realized lamb and kid did not go together. Sigh! I had to look it up on the computer. Now I know kid goes with goat and lamb goes with sheep. Yep, as simple as it sounds I (Mom) learned something very basic. The best part Caleb was able to read his little book all by himself. I mean he really read the words. I was thrilled and still am. We also practiced finding rhyming words like goat and coat or pig and wig.

 Handwriting practice.

Recognizing the as a sight word and reading the sentence. They are all words he has learned in previous lessons. I love how My Father's World build's on previous lesson to give a strong foundation. 

 Sound discrimination page. Caleb now has a system where the x represents a non Gg sound and the v (aka, check mark) has the Gg sound.

 First we review the words and then he has to match the words with the pictures independently. I check his work and then he gets to clue. 

 Dictation page. He must tell me which vowel sound he hears first before identifying the first and last letters. I have to really emphasize the middle sound otherwise he doesn't seem to hear it. I'm hoping by asking him to repeat the word to himself it will start to click.

Following directions. I will say, "with your purple crayon circle the word gas" and he does. Two through five are covered with blank sheet so he doesn't get confused with all the other words on the page. He likes to anticipate what I am going to say next and get in a hurry sometimes. I remind him that hurrying does not mean better and lots of mistakes can be made. 

Math this week was learning to tell time and how to write it. 

I thought this a was cute picture of him sitting on his foot and using his wooden clock to help him.

We finished our studies by reading "The Year at Maple Hill Farm." A delightful book that walks through the seasons and how all the farm animals change.  

Caleb carefully studying the month of September since that is the month we are currently in. 

Caleb's rendition of the month of September. He still does not like to try and draw what he sees. Most of his drawings are abstract.

In the book it talked about how the horse had to be shod. Caleb wanted to know what it meant. I said, "it's when the horse receives horse shoes." Just to make sure I was right we looked it up in the dictionary. He is pointing to the word "shod" meaning shoe. Caleb will know how to use that dictionary in no time. Every time he asks me what does that word mean we look it up. What a great easy way for a child to learn. To him the dictionary is big story book like the Bible. Too cool!

Unit 11: Insect

Unit 11 was all about the letter Ii and insects. Caleb learned how hard the ant works to find, gather and store food. In fact a lot of insects works hard. They are not lazy. This was a great intro to why working hard has it's rewards. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord and not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Colossians 3:23-24 NIV. What a promise to hold onto and keep.

 Now here is where I have to admit we are so far behind. We seem to do a little work, take a few days off, do a little work, take a few days off, and on and on it goes or life happens. Sigh! But then I have to remind myself this is not like regular school and when we do take a few days off the information he is learning soaks in a bit better and then he is ready to learn something new. Therefore, I've concluded this is perfectly acceptable as he is increasing in his ability to sit still and listen.

Caleb working hard in his Singapore Math book identifying shapes: circles, squares, triangles, rectangles, cylinders, spheres, and cones. This book gives a lot of practice and is setting a good foundation. Of course, I laugh because when he is on the computer playing math games he is accomplishing addition, subtraction and multiplication facts.

Another insect that works hard is the honey bee. Caleb showing off his honeycomb and inside are eggs (rice), larvae (painted pumpkin seeds since I didn't have any beans) and food (brown paper). In doing this activity Caleb learned, The law of the Lord is perfect . . . The rules of the Lord are right . . . They are sweeter than honey that is taken from the honeycomb. Psalm 19:7-10. A wonderful age to learn the Lord's word is sweeter to the soul than honey is to the tongue.

We finished Unit 11 reading The Bee Tree by Patricia Polacco. A wonderful book about a little girl who complained about having to read so much. So her grandpa said oh really, you don't want to read, you want to go run and play? Then I think it's time we find a bee tree. What's that? The little girl asked? Well, grandpa gets a jar and they go outside and he ever so carefully places three bees inside the jar. He let's one bee go and they start to chase it. Along the way the towns people ask what is going on and ask to join the fun. If they loose track of the bee another one is let out until finally the tree with the honey inside is found. After collecting enough honey for everyone to enjoy grandpa pulls the little girl aside and places a bit of honey on top of her book and is told to taste it. Knowledge, wisdom, and understanding are difficult to obtain, but you must seek after it like the words in this book. Beautiful and priceless. 

Unit 10: Water

 

Unit 10 is all about the letter Ww and water. Words to remember are "Jesus gives my spirit living water to drink". We talked about being thirsty after playing hard outside or eating a salty food, which makes us thirsty for water. Our bodies need water to live. Our spirit gets thirsty too and needs living water or we become dead. Jesus is our living water and as long as we ask Jesus to nourish our bodies he will and any forgetfulness on our part and the spirit begins to die.  

 Caleb practicing writing the letter Ww and the number zero and ten. The second page I dictated three words /dad/, /mom/, and /sun/. He must listen hard to hear the middle vowel sound and still guesses. The beginning and ending letters he doesn't seem to have a hard time with.

 Letter sound discrimination page is a breeze. On the second page I cover up all words except those I am asking him to look at and recognize when I say them out loud. He was getting everything confused when I did not do that.

 His first sight word /the/. Since he has seen all of the other words previously he is better able to recognize them and say them out loud. Sam and dad were mixed up, but that was an easy fix. Caleb does not like to make mistakes so I am always telling him "mistakes are OK, you learn from your mistakes" someday he will believe me.

The math page he was supposed to trace pennies, dimes, and nickles. However, since I know tracing is frustrating for him he just drew me circles to represent the money and he still got the concept. It's a bit hard to see the pictures he drew for the letter Ww, but picture number 3 is my favorite water ski's. He did a great job on that one.

In science Caleb learned about liquids, solids, and gases. He favorite was when he got to measure water, put in a pan, place it on the stove to heat watching the steam as the water boiled then after five minutes measuring how much liquid was left. Made for a great conversation.

Here Caleb is putting salt and oil in water to see if it will dissolve. We talked about how oil doesn't dissolve or mix with water it just floats even after several attempts at mixing. Another great conversation not to mention tasting the mixtures was interesting. Caleb wanted to do that on his own.

Although the curriculum comes with a single math page he has a separate book to work from daily. Currently, he is working through recognizing shapes. He is such a math wiz.

 We finished the week reading Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey. A wonderful book that we have read before. We discussed why the ducks needed to live by the water.