Week 6, day 4

Bible (Catechism, Bible story, memory verse): We didn't do any of this in the car on the way to or from CBS, so it waited until we got home. We read about the Ten Commandments, and introduced a new catechism question.

Calendar (Update day of week and date of month, record weather and temperature): Today was warmer than usual, in the 90s, but the kids still classified it as "warm" rather than "hot." I suppose we've adjusted to the climate!

Handwriting: P was not interested in doing very much today, so she simply copied the words "honey - bee" and I pointed out that h and b are formed in almost the same way.

Language Arts: This was heaps of fun, as we used letters the kids knew (including ones the LA curriculum hasn't covered yet) to make words ending in "at" and "am". We came up with a list of 20 words, and E was able to read several of them. P was able to read them easily when we were writing them, but had to think a bit harder to read the list after the fact. I wrote all the words they came up with on the chalkboard, and took their picture next to it.

Math (5-a-day, other activities): P did well with today's 5-a-day, though she struggled to come up with the correct answer to 4+6. I had her haul out manipulatives (pattern blocks were closest at hand) and she figured it out.

E's "school": I added 0 and 8 to his list of numbers. It's starting to get hard for him to handle that many numbers, but he easily grasped the concept of 0 (we've discussed it before) and accurately counted out 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, and 9 paper bits. When I reminded him that the number under the 9 paper bits said 8, he removed the extra one. He simply left the 5 blank, but I let it go. (I took this picture yesterday).

Geography and/or science: We read books on Costa Rica, rain forests, and the building of the Panama Canal. The Panama Canal book was fascinating to me, though it mainly contained black-and-white photos and thus didn't hold P's interest as well (E was playing with Legos while we looked at this one), but she was interested in a photo of a man being loaded into a horse-drawn ambulance ("I suppose if their ambulances weren't very good, their hospitals weren't very good, either") and grasped that malaria took its toll during the building of the canal. We reviewed the concept of locks, which she seemed to fully grasp. Perhaps she'll want to make a book on Central America tomorrow - she was interested in doing so today, but I suggested that we wait until after we'd read all our books on the subject.

Other: I discussed with P the wisdom of practicing piano pieces more than once in a day, while in the car on the way home from CBS. She agreed in theory, but when the time came in practice, she was unwilling and claimed to be much too tired to play her piece a second time. I told her she could rest while I played it for her, and we'd take turns until she'd played it 3 times. She was quite happy with this, and by the 3rd time through had really improved (which I pointed out to her). So many times, the kids will protest vociferously, but when they find that I'm firm on an issue, they comply with no further rebellion. I need to keep this in mind for when I'm doubting myself in the face of ardent protest.