October and November school fun

I have had a really hard time this year with getting to start on this school blog. I want to keep track of what the kids are doing, but with 5 kids, it is a challenge! In October, we had fun with lots of Fall festivals and pumpkin fun. 

This was the biggest pumpkin we have ever seen in a pumpkin patch. Jason went to pick it up and a mouse ran out from under it.

We always enjoy a trip to the farm to look at all of the animals.

One of our favorite new math activities is learning to cook. I also want Lily to have some domestic ability, but it is also a great way to teach measurements. She found a cook book at the library that has 3 ingredient recipes! Yay!

We also did a little unit on great explorers. We really enjoyed it and wish we could go exploring more!

Lily enjoys violin with her teacher, Mrs. Emily! One day, we had a funny experience. Mrs. Emily went to our house for the lesson and we drove to her for the lesson. Obviously, this was not going to work! So we did the craziest thing ever and met in the middle. We sat right behind the pizza hut in Nixa and did our first outside lesson. What an adventure! :)

Lily also joined a hip hop group in September. It is a Christian group and is being led by two wonderful teenagers. Lily worked hard at learning the steps for 8 weeks and then got to perform with all her friends. She will probably be joining again in January!

Lily also did a presentation on Francis of Assisi and really enjoyed learning about the Catholic church and about his kindness towards animals.

Lastly, we had a fun field trip to the post office. We learned so much about how they sort and deliver the mail. The kids all had great questions. I was very impressed!

September School Fun

I just love watching the fun that we can have learning and growing together. Boston and Lily had fun learning geometry with Twizzlers. There is even a book that we used to learn. We learned about lines, line segments, rays, and so much more.

We went on a field trip to the Missouri Institute of Natural Science. The kids enjoyed all of the exhibits although they did notice that some of the science was from an evolution stand point. They enjoyed the dig pit as well.

One of our favorite things about Classical Conversations is that we get to do fun presentations. Lily found a joke book with historical jokes and even dressed up as Cleopatra to go with the jokes about the Nile! 

We also learned about biomes this Fall. Lily's favorite one was the desert so she did a report on it and made this little desert scene. 

We also started a new math curriculum this year. It is Saxon math and Lily is doing the 4th grade curriculum. It is much longer of lessons than any other curriculum that we have used. It is teaching her to keep track of her time and be diligent with her time. However, we love the program because every day she learns something new, but she also practices one or two problems in each thing she has already learned. Each lesson has a few word proplems, a few addition, a few multiplication, a few geometry, etc. It is great!

Lily also has gone to a few different science and art classes that have kept her busy. She did another day of the Springfield Little Theater with Boston. I wish I had more pictures. They sang and performed to the Little Mermaid and did "under the sea" crafts!

We went to Bass Pro Shop to learn more about fish and outdoor life. 

We went to an air show to learn about aviation.

Learning is so much fun and we stay busy doing it! 

Summer learning adventures

I didn't get a chance all summer to update this so I am going to do it now! We just had so much fun and so much learning all in one summer! We enjoyed the Insect-O-Rama at the Springfield Nature Center and we learned lots about those six legged creatures! 

 We had a blast at the Creation Xpo Science Camp. The focus this year was on great scientists and great artists. We learned a great deal about Isaac Newton which was a great pre-learning to our classical work this year. 

 We also had so much fun with church camp. It was wild west themed! The kids learned the word of God while doing lots of athletic games and swimming. 

 Lily was one of the muddiest girls there after all the mud game competitions!

We also went to vacation bible school to learn about creation and dinosaurs. It was a great time of learning!

The kids loved doing tennis lessons this summer! They all definitely improved. I really enjoyed taking Lily out one on one to practice. 

Another fun activity was in May when we did the Springfield Little Theaters School's Out workshop. They kids performed a dance routine and did fun skits. They also decorated shirts.

One of our all time favorite summer activities is to do golf lessons. We are blessed with a great golf instructor and a golf course that is made just for children! Lily improved with each lesson. Last year, Lily had received golf clubs and this year we were lent golf clubs for Eli and Valerie to use as well!

Last, but certainly not least, we enjoyed the library reading program. The kids read all summer long which improved their reading so much. It is fun to watch children grow in their love of reading!

Lily is in 4th grade

 My beautiful 8 year old is in 4th grade this year and I am loving it! She has matured so much and it is fun to work with her! The only down side is that her work is a little harder and involves me to grade more and check work through out. 

Lily is doing a great job with writing this year. We have been doing several different things for reading and writing. Lily is using Abeka readers to join history and comprehension as she reads. We are working on rewriting the question in the answer. We are doing spelling. Also we are using First Language Lessons level 3 to work on diagramming sentences and learning grammar rules. Lastly, we are doing cursive, journal writing, free writing, and writing about the medieval times. 

This year Lily is still in Classical Conversations. She is a journeyman this year with the 8-9 year olds. She is in an all girl class. That is a fun twist this year and she loves it. Her class joins with an all boy class for science experiments and for review games. 

One of Lily's favorite things is to draw. Right now she loves the Rainbow Magic Fairy books. They are an easy read...only a 3rd-4th grade level so she can read a chapter book in about 20 minutes, but the point is that she loves to read them. She has lots of other books that she loves to read also, but those are her favorite. 

I really enjoy seeing her pictures. It is such a joy to watch our children grow up and gain skills. 

Here is a picture of the kids on the second day of Classical Conversations. 

We love doing activities with friends. One day, we decided to do a character education lesson. The children all drew pictures of themselves and then passed their pictures around. Each friend wrote words about that friend on their picture. We talked about how important it is to build each other up. 

 Lastly, I wanted to show a picture of Lily with her week 1 presentation for CC. She presented all about herself and made this poster as a prop. During week 2, she presented on her favorite book. 

April

April was an exciting month for us in homeschooling. We took the kids to Medieval dinner and tournament. They all learned so much about that time period. I can't wait to study more with them!

The kids also love spring because we talk a lot about plants and gardening!

We took the children fishing and Valerie caught one fish. We talked a lot about nature. 

Classical Conversations ended the year with a celebration. Lily's class played Mary Had a Little Lamb on the tin whistle and sang us the ten commandments~

Here is Lily with the other girls in her class. She loves Boston and Hope and they even color coordinated!

Lily became a Memory Master this year~ Such a huge accomplishment. She memorized over 400 facts and was able to recite all of them to her tutor without any errors. Then she went on to be randomly quizzed by our director of CC. Lily didn't miss any again! So now she is a Memory Master. It took hard work and lots of study time. I am so proud of her for not being afraid of this challenge, but going at it with full integrity!

Everything is a learning experience when you homeschool. We went downtown and found this amazing old building. We studied the time period it was built and went around looking at all the old features. I even showed her some old black and white movies to show her how everything use to look. It was great! I felt like we were in one of those glamorous old movies!

At New Life, we started a unit on Little House on the Prairie. Rebecca Carter taught the children about wood carving by using bars of soap that they made into creatures. Valerie and Lily made ducks! They also learned about how to tie a knot! 

My favorite thing this month has been learning about the fruit of the Spirit from Galatians 5:22-23. We have been talking about each fruit and the children are noticing each other showing love, joy, kindness, etc. As they notice them, they write down what they noticed from one of their siblings and put the paper in a bowl. When the bowl is full, we will read them all and celebrate with a family party!

On this same note, Christina and Kelly decided to plan a random acts of kindness day. Such a great opportunity to teach the children about serving and loving others. We started at the dollar store and bought toys and snacks to give out at the mall. At the mall, we wrote verses to give out. The children also brought some of their own money. We went around giving toys and snacks to boys and girls with notes telling them that this was just a random act of kindness. The kids loved seeing the smiling faces! The funny thing was how shocked people were. They almost didn't know what to say or do. We also put little bags of money on soda machines and candy machines to bless people. We even took baby wipe packs and set them on changing tables for moms!

After the mall, we headed to the hospital. This was my favorite! The children gave out flowers to people in the different waiting rooms. People were so thankful. It really brightened their day on a very rainy day and when they didn't feel well or were waiting on loved ones. One lady hugged Little Lily and kept smiling and then told us that she didn't know English, but she definitely showed us how thankful she was with her smile! We also gave out crayons and coloring books. One family was so thankful. They had been there for over two hours and needed something to keep the kids occupied. We also taped money on the soda and snack machines and talked to the kids about how long people have to stay at the hospital and how stressful it is. We also gave out more snacks to people! It was a beautiful experience.

The last stop was to the police station and fire station. We had taken a break for lunch at Christina's house and we made fresh cookies. We then took them to both stations. The police and firefighters were very thankful and made sure the children felt special in what they had done!

God is so good! It is great to be able to share that love with people and to bless others!