We started school back up this week. It was a light week but the children are getting back into the swing of things well. I have always been skeptical of "to do" lists since too often they are mere speculation on my part. We regularly end up doing even more exciting things than my little planner could have imagined.  I have taken to keeping "done lists" instead and recording our work that way.

   We have a steady school diet of core subjects such as math, language, reading, and religion. To these we add the Charlotte Mason stand-by’s – nature notebooks, artist and composer studies, history timelines, and so on. Toss in a hefty dose of Montessori materials and you have a good picture of the Schoolhouse. That’s the background for you. : )

  This week we spent some time on the plant studies we have been working on this summer. Throughout the past months they have been getting books about plant life cycles and doing experiments, including the aforementioned gardening project. Our favorite resource by far has been Janice Van Cleave’s Plants bk. This book was full of experiments we were able to do and a couple of awesome paper models.  This week they created a pollination model and painted our sunflowers on which they spied several bees. They did a very nice plant parts model earlier this summer. The pics I took of that aren’t responding to any amount of ‘come out, come out wherever you are’ however.  Will try to unearth them this week.

This week’s  nature notebook pages were about frogs for obvious reasons <g>

The girls made more geography term pages.

We are still going strong with the Signing Time videos. Several things fell into place that are developing into a stand alone unit. The story at church last Sunday was about Jesus healing the deaf man. They narrated that. Then Moira had to choose a new chapter bk to begin.  She pulled Helen Keller off the shelf, not realizing she too was deaf and blind. The Magic Schoolbus bk at the bkmobile was about the five senses.  They loved that one and as we worked through the videos and bible story Aidan soberly pointed out that we ‘really needed to read more of that book and figure this out.’  So that is the direction we headed. We discussed the sense organs and the nerves leading back to the brain. We discussed the parts of the brain that registered the senses and how if those areas were damaged you still could not see/hear/etc.

Alannah is finishing one of her first ‘real’ lit works, Alice in Wonderland. Colin had suggested it to her several weeks back and she took his advice. Another wonderful coincidence – each fall the library system chooses a classic to be its all area ‘read’.  They have promotional events through the school year such as plays, presentations, and so on.  Guess what this year’s title is?  Yep!  Alice.

Asher is halfway through Story of a Soul. He is also working through What to Listen for in Classical Music by Aaron Coplandand ‘Tis by Frank McCourt. It is a sequel to McCourt’s Angela’s Ashes and hopefully less graphic but don’t consider this a ringing endorsement.

Our current family read aloud is The Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson.  When Asher got wind of it he said didn’t we just read that?  As it turns out I read it to him and his brothers about 8 years ago when Allen was in Saudi Arabia. Guess it made a favorable impression! Time to treat the younger set to this book.

  Saturday was spent rotating the horses to a new pasture and moving the water troughs etc. Then they tackled the new goat shelters. We helped friends move a few weeks ago and in return they gave us these gigantic dog houses on their new property. Allen and the kids measured and cut new larger openings for the does and moved the shelters into their pastures. Then they had to restring the fence. LOTS of practical life happening there! It does my heart good to see them run and retrieve the correct tool when he calls for a Phillips screwdriver or a drill bit.

That wraps up week one!