Week of Oct 2

A shortish week. We had company on Friday and it never fails, it takes us 2 days to get ready. Need to build more housework time and discipline into the day.

Bible: Continued with Psalms and started reading James. I'm using a Life Change Bible study book as a guide but don't really use it that much. Continuing to work on memorizing Psalm 33, though not often enough. Should have it down by now.

I am pretty dissatisfied with our Bible time. Trying to use the time efficiently and read during breakfast just doesn't work. There are too many interruptions. I pulled out The Family Worship Book for some ideas, but I know what has to be done: We need to make the commitment to have a family Bible time every morning before breakfast. I could read history or science during breakfast if I want to be efficient. Really, I feel like our priorities are just messed up in the morning and Bible is stuffed in between cereal and toast.

Catechism is going fine as always.

Math: Ugh. Still struggling with those facts. We have completed lesson 25 in MUS but it almost seems like nothing has changed since we began. We also continue to work in Mathematical Reasoning as a break and for the concepts. As J works in the test prep books, he does fine on the conceptual stuff, but can't do the operations. Oh, we have started doing more timed drills which some might think is nuts, but they are taking so long to do the problems. I am hoping they will compete with their own score and try to get a little faster. I can see that they don't work quickly or efficiently.

Handwriting: They are doing more copywork each day; J finally did a complete catechism q&a in one day - though it was a short one. They are still enjoying cursive. J has to do more writing for Sunday School so he is not fighting it quite so much. Perhaps he is maturing a bit and understanding the need for it.

Spelling: Fine for E, still a disaster for J. Need to find something else. I love AVKO but it's not helping him learn the patterns.

History: Great as always. Pilgrims.

Science: reading Galen and the Gateway to Medicine, which is not in the BF guide but we're just stopping there for a bit. Did some map work on Galen's travels so I have something for the science binder.

Grammar: Still enjoying the Daily Grams exercises.

Latin: Completed Lesson 5 and today learned the Sanctus completely.

Creative writing: Tried doing the first of the Imitation in Writing: Aesop's Fables but it didn't work too well. We worked on it quite a bit before E informed me that she had no idea what we were doing. So I did the first one as an example for them. But I will let that sit a bit longer. I think that was a waste of money. But I may try again. I really should just pull out Writing the Natural Way and use that with them. Much more... natural.

J continues with PE and E continues with Gymnastics Dance.

They are reading Nature Readers and J is reading Daugherty's Landing of the Pilgrims. But today's reading included the Mayflower Compact and he thought it was a sermon. Oh my.

Oh, they love the test prep exercises and do fine on them. The reading comprehension blows me away - doing well on that. Surprising, a bit, since J stumbles so much and doesn't seem to get it when he reads aloud. Different skills, though...

Went to the Rice Northwest Rock Museum on Saturday. Enjoyable as always. J demonstrated he remembered some things learned at the last trip - things I'd forgotten. Lots of fun in the gift shop too!

My reading: Hm. Not much. Keeping up with Bible and reading a bit in Marriage to a Difficult Man every day.