Today, Sonic and I started on some Norse myths. I know everybody uses D'Aulaire's, but we're using a version written by Mary Pope Osborne of the Magic Treehouse series.
We're also continuing with A Child's History of the World which DS loves.
In English, just chugging away at Galore Park. For science, same thing...almost done with Galore Park's Junior Science Book 1. Plan is to finish book two of both in the spring.
So, going to veer a bit off-topic and talk about Eid-ul-Adha. I had made my first batch ever of marshmallow cream fondant earlier this week so I could make daisies for my daughter's Girl Scout daisy troop. (On brownies...natch.)
They turned out 1000x better than I thought they would...as I'm not crafty, and my idea of decorating is to add sprinkles.
Thing is, even though I made a small batch using a 7 oz. jar of marshmallow cream, I still had a ton left over.
Enter the Eid-ul-Adha picnic.
I decided to make sheep for a cake. Now, all over the internet it says how difficult it is to make black fondant. Amazon could not get me some in time...so what to do. Well, a year ago, my eldest had wanted a kitty litter cake...and one of the decorations for that involves nuking tootsie rolls until soft. So, I decided to try and nuke some tootsie rolls to serve for the black part of the sheep. It turned out really good. Added bonus is that both the marshmallow fondant and the tootsie rolls are yummy...and gelatin free.
Score!
Here's the recipe I used for marshmallow fondant.
1 7 oz. jar of Marshmallow Fluff
1 lb. box of powdered sugar
1-2 tsp. vanilla extract (optional)
butter or Crisco for your hands
So I buttered a large bowl and my hands and plopped in the marshmallow cream. Then I added the vanilla and about 1/2 the powdered sugar. You knead like crazy (I did it in the bowl) until it resembles play dough and is not sticky. I think I used about 3/4s of a box of powdered sugar. Refrigerate it for a day or two until you need it. I put mine in a buttered bowl with plastic wrap (sprayed with Pam) on top.
I think some Moms really like the general weekly guidelines of Oak Meadow. I'm discovering that I probably would do better with a daily schedule. Why? I am so good in getting daily math done. I know it needs to be done every day. I have a rough idea how much we need to do. So we do it. Not a problem. For other stuff, I'm really sporadic. While I had hoped we'd have certain Science days....certain Social Studies days...it just isn't happening. So, hopefully over the weekend I'll be working on a more detailed schedule.
Math-wise, DS finished up chapter four of Math-in-Focus. I then switched us to Math Mammoth 4A for now...as there are only two more chapters left in 4A.
English-wise, we're continuing with Galore Park Jr. 1. We did our first BraveWriter Friday Freewrite today, and it went really well.
DS is reading "Harriet the Spy" and loving it.
We've continued with Galore Park Jr. Science, but I've been a total slacker on OM science and any sort of hands on.
We finished the Native American creation stories in OM3, and began to work on our report on the Calusa Native Americans. We continued with this series. Most of them, our library had, but we had to buy this one from Amazon. Honestly, I'm learning so much that I don't mind at all. :)
Found this great resource for drawing. It is perfect for Native American studies. We do the copywork in cursive...and in Waldorf-y colored pencils. :) The Oak Meadow drawing lessons haven't really been working for us. I think we came too late...or just haven't spent the time on them. As my goal is for my kids to just have an art-filled environment, this works just fine for now.
So, today we made dragon bread (well, dragon pretzel) in honor of Michaelmas. I had planned to use an old Annie's pretzel mix I had, but the yeast was dead, so I used this recipe instead. It only took about half the dough to make our dragon. We followed the Annie's instructions for baking (and for forming...no flour, just a Pam-sprayed counter). It was easy and tasty. We put the M&Ms on before baking...and some of the dye came off. We then brushed him with melted butter and sprinkled cinnamon sugar all over him. Tasty!
We talked about angels in the Qur'an...and Jibreel (Gabriel) and Mikail (Michael) are the only two whose names are mentioned. We talked about how believing in angels (malaki) is one of the tenants of our faith. We also talked about some of the lore of Michaelmas and how it used to signify the start of Autumn in much of Europe. Happy Michaelmas!
Forgot to post this last week. So, we're looking at creation myths in OM3. Week six involved one from the Cherokee Nation called "The Coming of Crow." DS illustrated it, and did the copywork from it.
In Science, we continued in Galore Park Jr.'s science book--which had to do with anatomy and nutrition. DS really seems to like this. We also watched a bunch of Magic School Bus videos.
In English, I'm not a fan of the slooow OM English in either 3 or 4, so we used the Galore Park Jr. English book. I really like the program. DS read the book, "The Lemonade War" and we did some partnership writing.
We've also been doing stuff from all of the Scholastic Teacher Express printables.
Finally remembered to start again with Egyptian Arabic. It was mainly a "mumkin" week (May I have?).
OK, it's week five? Oops, I thought we were on week four. It was a good week. We did a bunch of different things this week.
In OM3, we continued with the stories and read about a girl of the Kush people (south of Egypt.) DH illustrated a picture from the story and we watched a brief National Geographic clip about the Kush.
In OM4, week four of the lesson guide, we researched animals of south Florida--both those that live here now, and in the past. Found out that 10,000+ years ago, Florida was much larger. DS illustrated some of the animals in his lesson book.
In Galore Park Junior, we read a story about an Indian girl and did the exercises.
DS finished, "The Search for Delicious," so I had him write a "real" book report on it. His answers were as short as possible, so I decided to use the BraveWriter partnership writing technique and basically was his scribe. I asked the questions for the book report, and then wrote his answers. That seemed to work really well--he gave really well thought-out answers. So, I think we're going to do more partnership writing, and then add in some copywork to help him work on writing speed/skill.
Created a copywork sheet for DS to learn the Tashahuud in English/Arabic. While DH can read Arabic, I don't know it well enough to help him with his Arabic script, so we used transliteration. I used this copywork program.
Decided that when possible, we're going to do "fun" math on Fridays--so RightStart games, codes/puzzles, etc. Today, DS did a riddle that involved multiplication tables. You find the answer to the problem which equals a letter. Eventually, you fill out the entire answer. "What shape does a Tyrannosaurus like best?" "A Rex-Tangle." LOL :)
Oh! Finally, I found this neat Steiner verse which I really like. We may use it next week.
So, we've almost made it one month! This week, we used the story in OM3 about the founding of Carthage. DS made a map drawing of the Mediterranean ocean, and put on where Tyre and Carthage should be. We used this for reference: http://www.utexas.edu/courses/greeksahoy!/greece_phoenicia.jpg
We also watched this video about the Phoenician alphabet. Some of the letter sounds as well as reading from right to left reminded DS about Arabic.
We started recorder using the 9-Note recorder method. So far, so good. The first lessons focus on B, A, and G...and then have a bunch of songs with those notes. We'll do that and then possibly at the end of next week, add in E.
Math-in-Focus continues with no issues. Started some logic too.
As for OM4, we've done the Language Arts associated with it and DS started reading, "The Search for Delicious."
I think I'm failing at the OM4 art lessons, though. DS has zero experience with drawing lessons, so he's struggling with the approach. Not sure what to do right now about that.
This was a good week. We seem to be getting our rhythm down which helps. We did the 3rd grade Oak Meadow story about the boy called Micah. We worked on English through Galore Park's Junior English 1 book. The book is designed for a younger grade, but as DS1 did not have very much instruction at school--we're using it. It's still probably on-level for a typical 3rd or 4th grader in a US public school. Our plan is to complete books 1 and 2 this year, and save book 3 for the first half of 5th grade. I'd like to be in the "So You Really Want to Learn..." series by sixth grade.
Sonic is actually doing his work in cursive. I'm so excited. The Calvert program/style seems to really fit him. With printing, his writing was barely visible. Now it actually looks nice! Yippee! I also think he enjoys the Waldorf-y aspects of writing in colored pencils and what not. Form drawing too is a big favorite of his.
For science, we did some of the OM4 observing science in nature with our jewelry loops. I bought this set on Amazon and am very happy with it. It was less than $8.00. I can't speak as to how it compares to the loops in the OM set, as my curriculum was used. We also used them to examine some salt crystals as well as minerals in our Young Scientist Minerals experiment. Sonic loved that. I then had him copy the tables into his science notebook.
We finally got our nine-note recorder method books, so will start recorder next week. I need to practice! We're also exploring classical music through cartoons. Cartoons were my first exposure to classical music--and I love it. I also attended Interlochen's music camp which definitely fueled that--but it was cartoons that started the love. "Kill the wabbit!" So, we watched "Rhapsody Rabbit" which features Franz Litz's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2. I also have a love of operetta so can't wait to show him Sideshow Bob's H.M.S. Pinafore!
So, this week, we read the story of Joseph (Prophet Yusuf) from Oak Meadow as well as Yahiya Emerick's translation of the Qur'an. DS illustrated a picture of it, and then did some copywork in his best cursive about it. I was thinking of seeing if I can find a copy of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat", because it's never to early to foster a love of musicals.
He finished reading, "Trumpet of the Swan," by E.B. White. (Who I didn't know was the same White from the "Elements of Style".) As an activity, I had him narrate back to me a summary of the story. He also wrote a letter to Sam in the book.
We continued with OM4's Language Arts--looking at parts of speech. We also worked on remembering our multiplication tables, and did factoring and prime numbers with Math In Focus.
For Science, we did the week three OM3 thing about clocks. We made the Chinese water clock using a metal bowl and a plastic yogurt container. We also made the Roman/Greek tin can clock using some tomato sauce cans. I think in future, if you freeze water in the cans and then hammer nails in them, you'll have a much less dented can. I asked Sonic ways he could make the clock go slower and he suggested:
1) Use a thicker liquid
2) Use bigger cans
3) Use more cans
4) Use a smaller hole
All which were great ideas. He already has the morning verse memorized and was kind of upset that I almost forgot it this morning.
So, one of my favorite features of my old Oak Meadow 4th Grade is that it gives you a couple of page summary of the weeks going forward right in the beginning. It includes what resources you need, etc. The 3rd grade Oak Meadow does not have that--and it's something I miss when looking at the book. Sure, in theory, I should be looking ahead--but it's nice to have it all laid out for you. As we're holding off the model of our local landscape until the weather is a bit cooler, we're going to be doing the 3rd grade Oak Meadow science on clocks this week. I've already collected three tin cans and will hopefully track down the other stuff today.
Here's a sample of the summary of the 4th grade Oak Meadow book. (Note: I have no idea if this is included in later versions or how much things may change.) If there's any desire, I can actually scan it in, but this gives you the idea.
In the 3rd grade Oak Meadow book, you basically have to read through the entire's week's lesson to figure out what you'll need. There's a materials bit in each section... so Language Arts, need main lesson book, beeswax crayons, and pencil. Then you go a few more pages and find materials for Social Studies--Main Lesson Book, thick pencil, beeswax crayons, and sukkah materials and instruction. Then again in Science--Main Lesson Book, beeswax crayons, pencil or pen, ball, lamp without a shade, table.
So, I pulled out the Oak Meadow 3rd Grade syllabus I had purchased last year on ebay. It's a more recent edition that my 4th grade one... 2006. There are things I like better in it...but thing I like better in the older edition of my 4th grade.
I love the morning verses in the 3rd grade. I love the color. I love the multiplication rhymes/ideas. After saying the morning verse (taken from the 3rd grade book):
I stand erect between Earth and sky
My head rests on my shoulders high
The circling air blows in on me
My feet are firm, my hands are free
My heart will feel what is good and true
My head will plan what my hands will do
We did the 4s times table. My just turned 3 year old loved joining in with us. We swung our hands low from side to side and said softly... 1....2....3....and then at 4 (and every multiple of 4)... we swung our hands around in a circle... and then continued....5....6.....7....and big swing in a circle 8....
Then we closed with the closing verse:
May my hands work with care
My hears work with love
And my mind work with attention.
Today we read the "Tower of Babel" story from Oak Meadow 3rd Grade. Sonic loves the stories written by the Oak Meadow folks, and this was no exception. Insha'Allah (God-willing), we'll read it/think about it a few more days, and then do a drawing/copywork in our main lesson book. We also talked about the Tower of Babel and similar stories in other traditions...including Islam.
A few years ago, when I was an aspirational homeschooler, I discovered Melissa Nielsen's A Little Garden Flower / Waldorf Essentials. I purchased some of her "Coming to Waldorf Late" books, and then ended up buying a First, Second, and Third grade curriculum. Her prices are extremely reasonable, then even purchasing them as a supplement is totally worth it. Last year, I had purchased her "Thinking, Feeling, Willing" mentorship program. I was just going back over it last night, and came across something in planning (I think) recommending that we meditate on each of our children (she suggests starting with the child who may be struggling or a "problem" child if you have more than one). So, I tried that last night. It seems like an obvious thing to do, but I'm so glad I did it.
I was left with thinking that Sonic really needs a lot of the 3rd grade Waldorf stuff. Practical life, Old Testament/Qur'an/Creation stories, and the like. So, as it's wicked hot here (too hot to be outside much), and since we start in August, I may step back and focus on some of that for now.
This morning, Sonic read "Big Mama Makes the World" to his little brother. I love that story. I love that it pictures Divine as feminine--rather than the typical male. (Yes, I know in Islam Divine is neither...but the constant use of male pronouns implies that Allah (swt) is male.) I love that Divine is a big, large woman--because after all, can you really see a super thin waifish Divine making the world and all within it?
The OM 4th grade curriculum comes with a list of spelling words that kids in K-3rd should know. Sonic is a natural speller, and the lists are too easy. We are adding words from his reading, but I also found this free resource online for both spelling and reading comprehension.
Here's the sample reading comprehension for week one. It focuses on the compass rose which is a great tie-in to a lot of Waldorf this year.
We are not using the Italic program that is recommended by Oak Meadow (and I think is included in the 3rd grade curriculum.) Instead, I purchased Calvert's Writing Fun Program, which I bought during their Spring sale. Why? Well, I really like the look of it. Basically it's printed capital letters, and a non-slanted cursive lower case letters approach.
The kit comes with an instruction book, a practice book, a pad of lined "learning-to-write" paper, and a large pad of drawing paper. What we've been doing is starting with form drawing using the drawing paper. Then Sonic will write that day's lesson(s) on the drawing paper. (We've been doing 5 or so lessons per day, as he does know how to write, but just doesn't do it well.) For all language arts assignments, I require him to use cursive.
As he's never done form drawing before, I've started with some easier forms. Sonic likes to add his own touches.
So, finally, I am actually homeschooling my eldest, Sonic. We had homeschooled when he was in Kindy, but it has taken awhile to get back to it. Last year was not a good year at the local public charter school. He was not challenged at all, and began to stop handing in his work, etc. He did great on his FCAT...but I'm not a fan of standardized tests...so a year of misery for a perfect FCAT is not enough.
I've always been drawn to Waldorf methods--especially for the younger years. But I've also been drawn to the more academically rigorous WTM/Classical approach. My compromise is to use Oak Meadow 4th grade this year, with stuff taken from Waldorf Essentials/A Little Garden Flower's 4th Grade Curriculum. We're also using various BraveWriter tools, such as the Arrow for some of the OM books, like "The Trumpet of the Swan" or "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe." (I bought mine at Homeschool Buyer's Co-op cheap. :))
As we're Muslim, we'll be doing some spoken Egyptian Arabic using Michel Thomas (better IMHO than Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone, or Madina).... as well as high frequency Qur'an words using this app.
I purchased my OM curriculum on ebay used. It's from 1998. Comparing the topics with the overview on Oak Meadow's website, I don't see a lot of differences. Sure, we won't be pulling out a tape recorder...but as part of my goal was to get back to a pre-standardized testing type approach, I'm not worried.
