Preparing Hearts for His Glory
Unit 3
Reading about History… Emmett is learning how to write a written narration this year. This is a new skill for this guide, and I am oh so thankful for the ‘helps’ Carrie has included to teach this well. After I read “Life in the Great Ice Age” to Emmett for Reading about History, Emmett was directed to reread a smaller portion of the reading himself. This is such a good idea, as it allows him to first hear the entire context of the reading and then reread a smaller portion on his own to focus on writing a ‘bite-sized’ written narration. Then, the leading questions Carrie has included further help him gather his thoughts. I jot his answers on a markerboard, and then he looks at them, putting together his written narration orally first as I write his sentences on the markerboard. He then copies his sentences on notebook paper. I edit them, as he still does make some errors. I like to jot the errors next to the line they occur on the left side of his notebook, as his written narration is on his right. This way, he can learn to edit from my notes independently. I love the progression of this skill, and I know how important the teaching process of it is as we look ahead to future guides that simply direct a student to ‘write a narration’, assuming they’ve had the practice provided here…
Storytime… No pics this week, but reading directly from the Bible and then also reading “Life in the Great Ice Age” – such a wonderful way to show the Bible is a history book too!
History Project… Emmett has been LOVING “Life in the Great Ice Age”, and he is learning so much about this time period! As his dad is a hunter, Emmett is especially interested in the hunting of woolly mammoths described and pictured so well in this beautiful resource. When he found out he was going to get to do his own ‘cave art’ research and painting for his history project, he was very excited! He also is not bothered when his painting isn’t perfect. I think this is partly because of his carefree personality, but also partly because of ME. I am less prone to criticize than I was with my first son way back when he did this guide. I regret that. My sometimes constant correcting combined with my oldest son’s somewhat perfectionist personality did not equal as joyful art escapades. I guess I learned my lesson and have lightened up some!
Rotating History… No pics this week, but one thing Emmett is so excited about is his timeline! He loves watching it ‘grow’ on his bedroom door!
Independent History Study… Emmett followed step-by-step directions to draw a woolly mammoth this week. I helped him gain perspective by first drawing the oval for the head and the body for him. I stayed near to help him as needed with the rest, especially where it might be a good idea to use a black gel pen for outlining. He was so happy with the final product! I was too!!!
Poetry… Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Rain” was our poem this week. Emmett did a writing activity describing snow (not a difficult task for him as we have snow about half of the year sometimes). He did a good job of trying to match the rhyme and meter of the poem…
Language Arts… Emmett is learning to diagram sentences in grammar this year. I see I missed helping him fix some spelling here. Hmmmm. Something I’ll need to watch as that forms bad spelling habits if I don’t have him correct it right away. He did a good job on his review though, this week. I don’t grade grammar, as we work through the bulk of it together…
DITHOR’s 4/5 Student Book is doing a super job of teaching Emmett prediction, as well as the Godly character traits of loyalty and fairness…
Bible Study… Emmett’s Common Place Book is filling up with wonderful Bible verses he is memorizing! Here is the compilation of the first 3 units, and already I can see improvement as he is now doing cursive…
Math Exploration… Yikes! We jumped in headfirst to long division with remainders this week. Lessons took longer, but little trooper chose a cheerful attitude anyway. I was proud of his perseverance and told him so! I wrote the problems for him on a markerboard, as this helps him out with that first step so he can focus on the numerous steps of dividing. Eventually, I’ll drop writing them on the markerboard, or only write half of them. Many textbooks/workbooks write the problems out for students already anyway, so I’m not worried about me doing so on a markerboard with more room to work. I helped him with every step, but the more we talked through it, the better and better he got at the process. This will take much practice (and patience on my part, which I sometimes lack). But, I know it will eventually come! I shudder to think how he’d do if I just taught the lesson and walked away for the workbook. So many bad habits would be learned, and those just have to be undone later. It is worth it to stay by his side and help. With Math being a ‘round table’ subject for all my children with me, this is easy to do while keeping everyone going forward. Though I do admit it can be stressful having one son fire long division questions at me, another son fire ‘solving for x’ questions at me, and yet another son fire division/fractions/multiplication of exponents at me – when it’s all said and done, I like having math be done in a fairly quick way all at once. It works if I can hold onto my wits!
In Christ,
Julie