What We Studied

Between my retreat and a lot of field trips, we ended up having two weeks of part-time homeschool. Thank goodness I built in a break week for mid-October. We aren’t going to take that break, but use it to catch up on some parts of schedule.

Literature and Poetry

We covered a variety of Arthurian Tales for week 8 and then moved on to American Trickster Tales for week 9. I really enjoyed reading multiple different versions of the same style of stories.

• Young Arthur by Robert D. San Souci

• Excalibur by Hudson Talbott

• The Kitchen Knight: A Tale of King Arthur by Margaret Hodges

• Favorite Medieval Tales by Mary Pope Osborne

• Trickster Tales by Josepha Sherman

• A Ring of Tricksters by Virginia Hamilton

• 10 Minutes a Day Spelling

Math

We’re deep into Unit 3 focused on multiplication and division. I imagine that we are going to stay on this unit for awhile. I would really like Arthur to attain some mastery of multiplication and division before we move on.

• Singapore Math Common Core Edition 3A

• Primarily Logic

Social Studies

For history we covered the British Isles during the early medieval period. This was a great connection to our Arthurian tales.

• DK Timelines of Everyone

• DK History

• The Duke and the Peasant: Life in the Middle Ages by Sister Wendy Beckett

• DK Eyewitness: Knight

• DK Castles and Knights

• The Hawk of the Castle: A Story of Medieval Falconry by Danna Smith

• Magic the Margins: A Medieval Tale of Bookmaking by W. Nikola-Lisa

Arthur Independent Time

To allow for one-on-one time with Quentin, I have added an hour of independent work time for Arthur. Each week, he will have a mix of packet work (mostly grammar and math review), independent reading time, and special projects. Many of his projects will be aligned with our literature selections (some taken from B&R Language Arts curriculum) and history. This week, he focused on some story writing prompts and packet work.

Science and STEAM Coop

Our theme for these two weeks was camping. We ended up canceling our first week due to a medical emergency and unpredictable weather. Our second week happened, but was a bit abbreviated. The park that we chose was infested with bees. Our lesson was cut a bit short, but we still talked about camping and made a craft project before going and playing at the playground.

Art/Music

None this week

Quentin

I have scheduled at least four 1-hour time blocks for one-on-one time with Quentin. I bought Blossom and Root’s Early Years Volume 2 curriculum to use as our base. I love the variety of activities and some of the bigger projects included. For ELA, we continued our big overview of the alphabet with the letters K, L, M, and N. We read multiple nursery rhymes and did some math activities.

ELA

• Once Upon an Alphabet by Oliver Jeffers

• My “k” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncure

• Kylie Kangaroo’s Karate Kickers by Barbara deRubertis

• My “l” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncure

• Lana Llama’s Little Lamb by Barbara deRubertis

• My “m” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncure

• Maxwell Moose’s Mountain Monster by Barbara deRubertis

• My “n” Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncure

• Nina Nandu’s Nervous Noggin by Barbara deRubertis

• If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff

• If You Take a Mouse to School by Laura Numeroff

• If You Give a Pig a Pancake by Laura Numeroff

Math

Other

• High Five magazine volume

• Smart Start STEM PreK

Field Trip

Multiple field trips these two weeks! We visited Vala’s twice! I love getting as much fall festival visits in that I can. We took advantage of their homeschool days to pick some apples and enjoy all the activities. We also visited Platte River State Park to walk the waterfall trail and play at the playground.

Documentary Selection

I have carved out a one hour time block each week to watch a documentary related to our studies. We didn’t end up watching anything this week.

Misc. - Random picture books read

• Nick and Nack Put on a Puppet Show by Brandon Budzi

• The Legend of King Arthur-a-tops by Mo O’Hara

• Duck and Goose: A Gift for Goose by Tad Hills

• King Arthur’s Very Great Grandson by Kenneth Kraegel

• 100 Cats by Michael Whaite

• The Little Blue Bridge by Brenda Maier

• Never Follow a Dinosaur by Alex Latimer

• How to Potty Train a Dinosaur by Alycia Pace

• Crunch, the Shy Dinosaur by Cirocco Dunlap

• Here Comes the Tooth Fairy Cat by Deborah Underwood

• The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss

• Firefighter Duckies by Frank W. Dormer

• My Leaf Book by Monica Wellington

Highs

• While it isn’t really to do with homeschooling, I did really enjoy a personal break from everything for the bookish retreat.

Lows

• Our days got a bit out of whack. I’m not loving how off schedule we are right now.

Next Week

• Starting a new chapter book

• Covering the Crusades and the Magna Carta

• Learning about transportation for preschool and coop

• Embarking on a big dinosaur unit

• Continuing multiplication and division

Next up on the TBR pile: