Year 1: Week 3

The Robert Louis Stevenson poems we read this week were Where Go the Boats?, Singing, Travel, and Good and Bad Children. Gemma said Good and Bad Children is her favorite Stevenson poem. She also said that she likes to take A Child's Garden of Verses off the shelf and read that poem to herself because, she said, "I like to learn about good children."

For our fairy tale, Gemma chose "The Elves." As I read, I thought about the shoemaker and his wife, how they were grateful to the elves, how they showed their gratitude by looking for a way to help the elves, how service, gratitude, and reciprocity are portrayed in the story as good, and how this connects to developing moral imagination.

For this week's fable, Gemma chose "The Jackdaw and the Peacocks." We have a leather bound copy of Aesop's Fables, but Gemma prefers a beautifully illustrated version by Doug Hansen - Aesop in California. In Hansen's version, the jackdaw is a jay. I read her both versions, but only made her narrate the Hansen version. I covered up the text and let her look at the illustration. Her narration was quite good, with a beginning, middle, and end.

We finished The Trumpet of the Swan. I love Louis' father, the cob! He's so wonderfully written. The cob loves his son so much that he breaks into a music store to steal a trumpet so his son will have a way to communicate. He can't bear the thought of his son being without a mate, being alone, and so he does the only thing he can think of, even though he knows how wrong it is. Louis knows the crime his father has committed, and knows he must set things right. This book is a must-read!

For math, we did chapter 4 of Life of Fred: Kidneys.

For copywork, Gemma continued her thank you notes, and wrote an apology letter to our neighbor. Gemma found some dead Gerbera daisies on our patio. We don't know where they came from. Gemma thought the woman on the other side of the tall wooden fence that separates our yard from the yard behind us threw the dead flowers onto our patio, so Gemma threw the flowers over the fence into the neighbor's yard. Well, I heard a woman's voice telling Gemma not to throw flowers over the fence, so I called Gemma inside and asked her what happened, asked her why she did what she did, told her there might be another reason for the dead flowers (like, the neighbor we share the patio with might have tossed them out there), and I told her not to do that again. Later, Gemma was weeding the flower pots, and I told her to put the dead daisies in the trash with the weeds, but Gemma hung her head and said she'd thrown the daisies back over the fence. I marched Gemma inside and had her write a letter to the neighbor, saying that she shouldn't have done what she did, she knew it was wrong, and she wasn't going to do it again. Her letter included, "Please forgive me." We taped the letter to the neighbor's side of the fence, and about an hour later, Gemma squealed, "The lady wrote back!" The neighbor had written that, yes, she forgave Gemma, and drew a heart with curly hair and a face.

For history, we read two chapters from On the Shores of the Great Sea. "The Story of the Nile Flood" discussed the annual flooding of the Nile, and "In a Strange Land" told the story of Jacob wanting to be buried not in Egypt, but in Canaan. The chapter about the Nile included a brushstroke about how the ancient Egyptians believed that the flooding of the Nile was caused by the goddess Isis crying, mourning Osiris' death. So, I did what any good Charlotte Mason educator would do 😁 and showed Gemma a Lego animation of the myth of Isis and Osiris. (She narrated the video.) We also reviewed that Egypt is in Africa, and found Lake Victoria, the White Nile, the Blue Nile, and the Mediterranean Sea on a map. We also read chapter 1 of Hillyer's Art History: Architecture - "The Oldest House" - which was about pyramids.

Gemma chose to add Cheops/The Great Pyramid and Joseph (and his 11 brothers) to her timeline...

Our primary Bible reading was "Jacob's Dream."

For geography, Gemma read aloud to me from Elementary Geography - Our World part 1 - which is about the earth being round, and that sailors have circumnavigated the earth. We also read from The World by the Fireside about people in the Frozen Zone using teams of dogs to pull their sledges.

For natural history, we read a chapter of the Burgess Seashore Book (about Tattler the Yellowlegs) and watched a video of a sea star ejecting its stomach to eat. We also read the James Herriot story The Christmas Day Kitten.

Gemma painted her octopus plant (which is in bloom!) her nature journal.

Gemma did three French and three Spanish Duolingo lessons, and sang our Foreign Language songs.

We also sang Thine Be the Glory, and sang along with the sol-fa lesson for One Two Buckle My Shoe from Children of the Open Air.

Gemma practiced a new song on piano: Rockin' Half Steps.

We listened to Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, and looked at Degas' Singer in Green. (Gemma described her skin as "May Gray," which is a Santa Monica term for the overcast skies we have in late spring; we have May Gray and June Gloom.)

For handicrafts, we made a felt rope for our felt pig's legs and snout, and a flat piece of felt from which to cut the pig's ears.

Gemma danced in her 3rd dance recital. Here is the link to her Rockin' Robin tap number.