Year 1: Week 2

I've titled this post "Week 2," but it should be "Module 2." Instead of a review of what we did over 7 days, this is what we did over 10.

We read 6 poems by Robert Louis Stevenson - At the Seaside, Young Night-thought, Foreign Lands, Pirate Story, A Thought, and The Rain. We also read the fable "The Country Mouse and the City Mouse," and Gemma listened to and followed along with "Beauty and the Beast" on her Kindle.

One of our Bible readings was the story of Jacob and Esau. I started reading the King James Version to Gemma, but then I realized that she really needed a refresher of the story from a children's Bible. I read her the children's version, and explained what a "birthright" is, using the example of a prince in a fairy tale becoming king and inheriting his father's kingdom when his father gets old and dies. After I read aloud the KJV, Gemma narrated; my favorite part of her narration was when she said, "Isaac wanted some 'savory meat.'"

For history, we read On the Shores of the Great Sea - "An Old Trade Route" and "Joseph in Egypt." Something amazing happened while we were reading "An Old Trade Route." Gemma's eyes got wide and she said, "Hey! Abraham was Isaac's father...and Isaac was Jacob's father... and Jacob was Joseph's father!"

We also read a chapter of Hillyer's Art History: Sculpture ch 1 - The First Sculpture - which takes place in Ancient Egypt.
She read (and reread) some Magic Tree House books, as well as a book of Optical Illusions. One of the Magic Tree House books ("Blizzard of the Blue Moon") is about the unicorn tapestries, so I showed her The Hunt of the Unicorn on the Met's website.

For math, we did chapter 3 of Life of Fred: Kidneys.

For copywork, Gemma continued to write thank you notes for birthday gifts. Her printing has improved dramatically in just a couple of weeks. I really do like the Channie's paper, and I like that I don't feel the need to rush her, and that she's deciding for herself that she wants to improve her handwriting.

Gemma got several new games for her birthday a couple of weeks ago. We played Spot It!, Jenga, and my new favorite - "Forbidden Island" - which is incredibly complicated and requires a long explanation of the rules. But once we got the hang of it, it was so fun. It's a cooperative game, which means that you're playing with your child, not against your child. The goal is to beat the game, not each other. The first time we played, we captured all of the treasures and got off the island. The second time we played, we had captured all of the treasures and were waiting on the helipad, but the island sank before the chopper arrived!!!

For drawing, we watched a YouTube video about how to draw a face.

For geography, we read two stories from The World By The Fireside ("Something about the Weather" & "The Red Light in the Sky"). We looked at the Climate map in our atlas, and located the equator, the Tropic of Cancer, the Tropic of Capricorn, the Torrid Zone, the Temperate Zone, the Arctic Circle, the Antarctic Circle, and the Frozen Zones. "The Red Light in the Sky" was about the Aurora Borealis; we watched a video of the phenomenon.

I asked Gemma to choose three people from our history lessons to add to her timeline, and she said, "I choose four. Isaac and Rebekah, and Jacob and Esau."

For natural history, we read a chapter of the Burgess Seashore Book ("Getting Acquainted: Peep the Least Sandpiper"), and the James Herriot story "Only One Woof." We observed our tadpole Rose, who enjoys getting herself sucked against the pump. Gemma painted a leaf from one of our rose bushes.

We sang our French song, our Spanish song, Thine Be the Glory, and Children of the Open Air's 2nd sol-fa lesson.

Gemma practiced piano daily, and did 3 French and 3 Spanish Duolingo lessons.

We listened to a Classics for Kids' episode about Beethoven (Beethoven the Pianist), three Beethoven songs from the Beethoven's Wig CDs (Beethoven's Wig/5th Symphony, Fur Elise, and Moonlight Sonata/Beep Beep Beep).

We revisited Degas' The Dance Class, and Gemma closed her eyes and described the painting from memory. We read a short passage from What Makes a Degas a Degas? about Degas' friend Mr. Perrot, the choreographer, and a picture book about Degas called What Degas Saw by Samantha Friedman.

Gemma worked on her science kit, and made glow-in-the-dark potion with zinc sulfide. Does chemistry count as handicrafts? 

For handicrafts, we started a felt pig project. We didn't get very far, but we did start.