Learning Log #4

This week for writing the kids and I went over how one's personality seeps through his/her writing, and how it is important to be healthy and strong and alert and joyful when one writes.  All the children worked on writing thank you notes every day to people we visited on our summer trip to Washington.  The kids also enjoyed reading this week.  Elsie read 2 more books from the Wings of Fire book series.  She also finished memorizing The Song of the Blackberry Fairy and recited it for our Poetry and Tea.  Her and I also did our writing club together.  We wrote lists of what matters most to us.  Kimball read the first 2 chapters of Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab (40 pages).  He also wrote in his journal three times, and participated in our Poetry and Tea on Friday.  Anna did 7 more lessons in Hooked on Phonics, as well as reviewed.  She learned blends like ig, id, it, ip, im, and in.  She read some short books and learned some helper/sight words.  Anna and Adam both enjoyed listening to short stories from My Book House (2).  Anna copied a poem down called An American Miner's Song. Adam learned the sounds and names of the letters G-L.  He also learned how to write them.
For Math this last week Adam learned how to read 2 digit numbers and how to build them using the MUS blocks.  It was tricky for him and he practiced lots on this.  Kimball did chapter 8 and 9 last week.  Chapter 8 was learning how to divide by 6s and 9 was learning how to find the area of triangles.  He also reviewed how to multiply 2 double digit numbers and how to add an entire column of numbers.  Elsie started on chapter 8, where she learned how to add 3 different fractions with different denominators.  She learned 2 different methods to do this.  Anna learned what adds to 9 in her math chapter 16.  She also reviewed solving for the unknown and worked on her other math facts. 
 For science the kids learned about the levels of classifying living things (kingdom, phyllum, class, order, family, genus, species).  We went through my wardrobe and tried to classify my clothes like scientists do with animals.  We learned that there are many different ways to classify things, that scientists don't always agree, and that it is harder than it seems!  They also learned about how living things interact, such as commensalism, mutualism, predation, and intraspecific competition.  We went for a walk and tried to notice and identify the different interactions we saw.  We learned about various vocabulary words (niche, keystone species, species evenness, and succession) and really honed in on the term biodiversity and how to recognize it.   We went exploring in their grandparent's backyard looking for Monarch butterflies.  We were a little early, but the kids still all found something to nature journal.
For history we continued to learn about ancient Egypt.  We learned about Queen Hetshepset and King Ramses II and the temples they built.  We learned about the Colossi of Memnon, which are statues people said could sing.
Elsie, Anna, and Kimball continued to practice the piano and their string instruments, and they all went to their piano lessons.  Elsie learned about what a Fake Book is and why it's important to learn about chords and scales.  Anna was braver and able to play her songs better for her teacher, and Kimball learned how important it is to learn to play with a metronome.  They are all working on their music note flash cards.
Adam went to his first week of gymnastics.  He had so much fun and learned how to follow directions.  He jumped on the tramp, kept his balance on a bar, and did somersaults, among other things. 
For Tech, the Elsie and Kimball continued to play on Mindcraft and get to know the software.  They also got onto Code.org and learned some coding in mindcraft.  Kimball made more creations, including a rollercoaster.  Elsie also applied some of the business skills she learned last week and sold some of her handmade products at the Gardener's Market.  Anna practiced some of her computer skills as she worked on code.org and learned about business as she watched her sister sale at the market.