Week in Review: September 28 - October 2, 2015

We completed Unit 10 in Bigger Hearts for His Glory and Little Hearts for His Glory this week. Here is a quick review of what we did.

Bigger Hearts for His Glory {unit 10}

In history, we continued studying Benjamin Franklin and his experiments and accomplishments. The kids made a kite, defined vocabulary words, listened to and narrated several stories, and made a notebook page with Poor Richard's Sayings. They thought those sayings were funny. I asked them to recite their favorite one, and they both replied, "A lie stands on one leg, truth on two."

In science, we started reading about John Audubon. The kids mapped the migration of a bird and drew a picture of the bird. They looked online for detailed pictures to draw. They also demonstrated the five types of flight using their arms as wings, and they made a notebook page. {They wouldn't let me get a picture of their demonstration!} They also practiced standing on one foot like a stork and realized how difficult it would be. They couldn't believe that storks sometimes sleep like that!

We read a poem titled Philosophy this week that the kids really enjoyed. I am so glad Heart of Dakota has poetry scheduled in each day, or I doubt I would do it, and it's something I have always wanted to do daily.

Our memory verse this week was Proverbs 2:6, "The Lord grants wisdom. From his mouth come knowledge and understanding." We talked about the character trait wisdom.

In math, Mercie had some review on addition and subtraction with carrying and borrowing. She is very good at mental math and solving problems like "398 - ____ = 308." She can do those in a few seconds! Eli learned how to find the area of a triangle.

In grammar, Mercie continued learning about verbs and identifying verbs and nouns in sentences. Eli learned how to identify and diagram direct objects and reviewed past participles.

We also had some art lessons from The Busy Teacher's Guide to Art Lessons. We learned about mixing colors to form secondary and intermediate colors. We also made some fun projects with newsprint, paint, and neutral colored chalk pastels.

Little Hearts for His Glory {unit 10}

Silas had several interesting and action packed Bible stories this week: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; Daniel and the Lion's Den; Brave Queen Esther. He drew the 3 men with an angel and painted fire over them. We played "King, May I?". He memorized Romans 12:21, "Overcome evil by doing good."

He listened to a story about Alexander the Great, and surprised me by answering all the questions!

In science, we talked about tigers, shadows, our hands. He traced his hands and colored them. We looked at our shadows and the shadows of objects. We colored a tiger and his stripes. We found animals in camouflage.

He learned all about patterns in math this week. We made patterns with our vehicle counters, cereal pieces and blocks. He colored patterns in his math book. He told me, "Patterns are fun, that's why I'm good at them." He also worked several pages in his thinking skills book.

 

 

In All About Reading, he learned the letters B, C, D and E. We painted blueberries on the B, dotted chocolate chips on the C, decorated a dress for the D, and made fingerprint peanuts for the elephant on E. He used play-dough to form letters, and he drew the letters in salt. He enjoyed this so much, I let him write his numbers in the salt too.

 

 

We also played rhyming games with Ziggy the Zebra, and Silas still doesn't understand rhyming. Oh well, he will get it one day! He loves putting the sticker on his chart after we complete a lesson.

 

7th grade week in review

Mikaela learned about the liberty bell in history this week {among many other things}! She made a liberty bell mosaic, and gave a short presentation to the family on it. She also mapped several places, completed timeline entries, and is reading Amos Fortune, Free Man.

 

 

 

She did several experiments in science, including one on chemicals and plants, and learned about time.

 

She likes her Spectrum writing book, as it is not too much to frustrate her, but just enough to get her creative juices flowing.

 

 

In Easy Grammar, she is working on verbs, verb tenses, and participles. We love Easy Grammar! It doesn't take long, but is so full of substance.

 

She is also working on a fruit of the Spirit Bible study and reading through the Bible {she is currently in Exodus}.

 

She is almost done with Key to Fractions book, and we aren't sure what to do next. I am looking at Math U See, Pre-Algebra, but we have never used Math U See, so I am nervous to spend that much if we don't like it. If anyone has used it, or has a recommendation for seventh grade math, please let me know!