Wrapping Up Week 20 (2014-15)

Posted on December 15, 2014 by Deanna

Whew! We made it to our Christmas break! Ian and I are both ready for a break, and I may just have to play it by ear in deciding when to get back to our school work. Here’s what we finished up with before our break.

Bible/Circle Time

We finished going through Walk With Me to the Nativity: A Journey to Bethlehem by Karen Harper and read from the books the kids opened for Advent each morning.

Math

I am actually amazed that Ian finished up lessons 86-90 in Mathematics Enhancement Programme (Year 2). At one point it looked like this year might just be too hard for him, but he’s really risen to the challenge.

The only bit of school work I plan to do over the next few weeks is continuing to practice his addition facts. I’ve tried so many fun ways to do this, but this week I resorted to good old-fashioned flash cards. Ian actually really likes them, and I’m writing down how many he gets right each day so he’s enjoying trying to beat his score.

Literature

For poetry this week we read Voices of Christmas by Nikki Grimes. I was so moved by these poems, each from the perspective of a different person from the Christmas story. They are beautiful by themselves, but then you add the gorgeous illustrations by Eric Velasquez, and I think I’ve found my new favorite Christmas book.

This year I’ve been trying to include as many of the Ambleside Online, Year 1 books as possible, on top of all the other things I have scheduled. Gradually I’ve been dropping some of the selections that repeating subjects we’re doing separately, and this week I finally came to the decision to only do the literature selections for now, dropping the AO history books. (We’d already cut the science and nature study books.) Perhaps we’ll get back into some of them when they fit into our history cycle.

I decided to hold off on history until after our Christmas break, since we just finished up Alexander the great and are getting ready to move onto the Roman Empire.

Science

In The Human Body (part of God’s Design for Life) we covered lessons 19-23 on the digestive system and nutrition, as well as covering the corresponding pages in The Usborne Human Body Sticker Book. Ian was glad to get back to the My Body unit from Teacher Created Resources, coloring and placing the stomach and intestines on his giant body outline.