Tuesday- 11/6/2007

ad·ap·ta·tion (ăd'ăp-tā'shən)
n.
The act or process of adapting. The state of being adapted. Something, such as a device or mechanism, that is changed or changes so as to become suitable to a new or special application or situation.

So, through this journey of homeschooling I have learned a lot about adaptation. And again we are at a time for adapting. I feel the need to change Lyna's schedule/curriculum a bit. I would really like to get her reading soon, as once she has started reading a whole new world of education opens up to her. One that she can access on her own even. So, we are dropping some things that I feel are less important at her age and adding more letter recognition/reading. The new schedule will include daily letter recognition/signing time, art on Wednesday still, Handwriting on Tuesdays, Math on Thursdays, and field trips on Fridays. I am dropping science for now and also nature study. I feel the basis for science is math anyway, so we will continue to develop her math skills until a more formal science is necessary. I am also dropping nature study. This was a hard decision to make as I really love this part of our schooling, but Alyna gets a lot of nature time in her life and right now I do not feel it is crucial for her homeschooling curriculum. I will continue to update the blog with what we are doing. For any of you who are following my old curriculum, please e-mail me kensie.malmfeldt@gmail.com and I can give you the entire year's worth of the curriculum.

So, with this new information in mind, today we worked through all of our letter recognition and signs again. We also worked on handwriting and will be writing a letter to put in our stack of letters that have not been sent because mommy can't ever find the stamps pile when it is done! We also worked on some easy reading with these word: ADD, DAD, BAD, CAB, EGG, FAD, and HAD.

Tuesday- 10/16/2007

Today, we had Circle Time and then for handwriting we did some worksheets and wrote a letter to our pen pal. For science, we learned about why leaves change colors and also recorded the growth on our biodome. We have two plants growing inside.

Tuesday- 10/9/2007

We did get Circle Time done today, it went really well. We sang "Hinges" and did lots of fun rhymes. I am going to incorporate some type of scripture story/study in the next few days during Circle Time, I will update how it goes. For morning lesson, we did handwriting. We wrote a letter to a pen pal and also did some worksheets out of "Handwriting Without Tears". This afternoon, for science, we built a biodome and planted in it. We used this, but modified it a little bit because we didn't have enough of some of the materials. We will see how it grows and record its progress!

Tuesday- 10/2/2007

Circle Time went well today. We have decided to replace the reading of the fairy tales daily with reading a book instead. Lyna seems to respond better to this. She would bore easily with the fairy tale and then not want to continue Circle Time, so this change makes things a lot easier. For the morning lesson we did Handwriting and wrote a letter to a special someone. For afternoon we did this science experiment. It was really fun and interesting.

Tuesday- 9/25/2007

Today was good. We had a good circle time, Lyna was really excited about our story "Why Bat Has No Friends" (Aesop's Fables). She was relating it closely to her own relationship with her aunt Randi Kay because in the fable the mammals and birds are fighting and she and Randi Kay fight! It was very funny, she kept stopping me every time I would say fight and telling me that her and Randi fight over toys and that it's not very nice! I think it is really helping having the dancing/singing time during Circle Time, Lyna is responding so much better to this then she was to the yoga. After Circle Time, we did science. We built a dam with help from Daddy...Our dam didn't really keep the water out very well, but Lyna sure had fun playing in the sand! We also did some handwriting work sheets and wrote a letter. Lyna is so fascinated with mail, this has become a fabulous way to get her to practice handwriting!

Tuesday- 9/4/2007

Today, we had kind of a "run and learn" day! My grandfather was having surgery, so I needed to go to Yukon to watch siblings. So, we did Circle Time, which went MUCH better this time. She seemed to really it enjoy it and participate a lot more. Then, we started our science experiment. We tested whether lemon juice helped apples not to turn brown when left out (we evaluated this when we got home later). We then headed to Yukon with our handwriting lesson in tow. Randi Kay Participated with us doing some worksheets and writing a letter to our pen pal. Lyna really enjoyed this! She is very fascinated with letters and is so excited for this part of our learning (which is good because, at least in my opinion, handwriting is kind of boring!).

Kensie