SPRING SEMESTER WEEK 8

It's official! Twenty-three weeks of Challenge A down and only seven to go. I can hardly believe that it will be time to start thinking about final exams in just a few short weeks!

BIBLE

Our biblical virtue for today was WISDOM. What a treasure! We explored the 22nd and 23rd chapters of Proverbs, looking at what the Bible has to say about seeking and acquiring wisdom. We learned that wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord and that we should desire wisdom more than silver or gold.

I found two excellent articles which I will be using during the week to discuss wisdom in our home:

GET WISDOM

10 Characteristics of Wisdom

BONUS POINT: While reading your Bible this week, find one verse that talks about the importance of wisdom and bring it to share with the class next week.


GRAMMAR/LATIN

We are moving right along in our Latin curriculum. Henle Latin doesn't waste any time, does it? This week I introduced 2nd conjugation verbs. Here's the good news: the 2nd conjugation is NOT THAT DIFFICULT...mainly because it follows the exact same pattern that we use for verbs in the 1st conjugation. Here's the slightly less good news: the 2nd conjugation comes with 4 new principal parts and a new identifying letter, all of which must be memorized. First off, we learned how to identify 2nd conjugation verbs by memorizing and following this rule:

ALL VERBS WHOSE PRESENT INFINITIVE ACTIVE (better known as the 2nd principal part) ENDS IN "-ERE" BELONG TO THE SECOND CONJUGATION.

Then, we discussed the two major differences between the first conjugation and the second conjugation. The first difference is recognizing the 4 principal parts. As a refresher, the 1st conjugation principal parts are:

1st: PRESENT (uses the ending "-o")
2nd: INFINITIVE (uses the ending "-are")
3rd: PAST (uses the ending "-avi")
4th: PARTICIPLE (uses the ending "-atus")

In the 2nd conjugation, the principal parts are:

1st: PRESENT (uses the ending "-o")
2nd: INFINITIVE (uses the ending "-ere")
3rd: PAST (uses the ending "-ui")*
4th: PARTICIPLE (uses the ending "-us")*

*Truth in advertising: The 3rd and 4th principal parts are a bit unpredictable in the 2nd conjugation. They do not always follow this pattern, but for the purposes of our study this week, please help your children memorize these endings. 

As you can see, the difference is minimal...but significant. The second difference to note is that the identifying letter  of the 2nd conjugation is "-E."  So, when conjugating verbs in the 2nd conjugation, we will use the exact same "formula" that we have been using in the 1st conjugation, but we will use an "-E" as our identifier, instead of an "-A."

STEM + IDENTIFIER + TENSE + ENDING = CONJUGATED VERB  

The best news of all is that the tense endings we have already learned DO NOT CHANGE. That will certainly make it easier for your student to conjugate their new vocabulary words this week!

If you need more clarification, here are two videos that help further explain 2nd conjugation verbs:

If your child needs interactive practice at home, feel free to utilize this Quizlet set:

2nd Conjugation Verbs on Quizlet

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Make sure you and your student preview the next week's lesson as stated in the guide so that they are prepared to discuss it in class. Drill student on vocabulary & grammar rules.  Check daily assignments (or have students check).  Continue to have students focus on memorizing endings for the declensions and conjugations - sing the songs & work those charts! It's a good idea to write the endings out - like copying mastery charts in Essentials.

BONUS POINT: Find one English word or product that is derived from a Latin root.

LOGIC/MATH
Just a few new math terms today: permutation and combination. 

Permutations represent a particular arrangement of numbers or items. The important thing to remember is that with permutations ORDER MATTERS. For example, if I were to ask you for directions to your house and you told me that you address was 257 Main Street, and yet I mistakenly drove to 527 Main Street, I would not arrive at your house. Obviously, even though the numbers in both addresses are the same, the OUTCOME is different because the order of the numbers is critical to a correct understanding of the issue.

Combinations are slightly different because they represent a selection of items where ORDER DOES NOT MATTER. For example, if we were to meet at a restaurant for lunch and I ordered a cheeseburger, french fries, and a soda, but you ordered french fries, a soda, and a cheeseburger, we would still receive the SAME food, just in different combinations.

I did not teach the formulas that accompany these two math concepts, as we will most definitely tackle them in the higher levels of algebra. No need to rush. :)

Each week we will continue to review previous week's concepts through dialectic discussion with the problems that the students bring in.  In each problem we work, we will ask the same questions  based on the common topics. 

BONUS POINT: Bring in one problem from this week's math work to share with your classmates. 

LTW/COMPOSITION

This week, we discussed the canon of Arrangement. There is no new material this week...they have already learned all the arrangement elements necessary to organize the information from their ANI charts into an outline. Using the student ANI charts, we reviewed sorting & discussed how to make those "labels" that will serve as the main proofs.  We reviewed amplification & talked about how to make our amplification more eloquent by not using the words "it matters to", and instead replacing it with something like "this affects.." or "this is important to...".

At home the students should sort their ANI and use all the Arrangement tools that we have learned during our previous 7 essays. I stressed to the students to ask "why" and/or  "so what" after creating their outline to be sure they've answered those questions.  Please have your students bring their outlines & all worksheets to class next week.

Suggestions for parents @ home:   Assist/review sorted ANI charts.  Review all worksheets as well as the outline.  Be sure to help them assess whether they have a "main proof" with 3 separate sub-proofs.

GEOGRAPHY

To start geography this week, the students assembled a 4' x 4' blank map of Africa. It was a bit like a puzzle for them, but everyone worked together as a team to finish. Now, we have a HUGE map of Africa to help us study and review. If you would like to print your own giant maps at home,  I would encourage you to visit the MEGA MAPS website. You can print world maps, country maps, or continent maps in an enormous variety of sizes FOR FREE!

 I introduced the next section of Africa (green on the color coded map) and helped the students add the newest section of Africa to our previously learned areas.  We will continue to add new countries, capitals, and features according to the "breakdown" each week.

We also continued our laser pointer review game to reinforce all the previous countries, capitals & even features that we have learned.

MEGA MAPS

Students should bring in maps that they've drawn.  They'll show the class their best map.

In addition to drawing their maps and drilling their memory work, your child should define and illustrate the new geography vocabulary words this week:


SLOPE

SNOWLINE

SOIL

SOUND

SPIT

DRAW FOR POINTS!!!  Students will earn 1 point for each map drawn each week, up to 8 points.

****Remember that at the end of the year we will be drawing the world - states, countries features - everything from memory.  Students need to continue to draw areas they've been tested on.   (They can draw on the large laminated maps I gave them at the beginning of the year).  The more they draw the better they'll get - the more they will be able to remember.

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Drill student on provinces & capitals as well as geography terms.  Check daily drawings for accuracy & labeling.  Be sure students continue to draw previous geographic areas - adding them to new areas.  Continue to drill previous states & capitals and/or countries & capitals (it is suggested that they make flashcards for review)

RESEARCH/SCIENCE

Today, everyone presented their presentations on the skin. I learned a lot! Please continue to proof your child's presentation and ensure that they are at least 1-3 minutes long. Over the past two weeks, some of the presentations seem to be shrinking, and I don't want it to become a lower standard in our class. :) 

I introduced the skeletal system, which is the most involved system this year. We went over the definitions and labeled our drawing together in class. I modeled & gave suggestions on how to draw the skeletal system. I told them that a stick figure skeleton is not what they should be drawing, but rather a detailed drawing that shows the shape of the bones. As a reminder,   THEY NEED TO DRAW THE SYSTEM  LARGE ENOUGH TO SEE ALL THE DETAIL.  We referred back to our Foundations art - OILS in breaking down the drawing into circles, straight lines, dotes, angles & curved lines.

 For a refresher, click on the link below for a step-by-step tutorial on how to draw a skeleton.

HOW TO DRAW A SKELETON

NOT OKAY

PERFECT

For my musical students, check out this song to help you remember the names of all our bones:

NAME THOSE BONES

At home, students will need to define the new terms, and DRAW, DRAW, DRAW!!  They need to be drawing the system every day - at least twice per day -  and labeling it.  The skeleton is our most difficult body system to draw so far this year, so it will require quite a bit of practice this week.  After the first few days of drawing, they need to "test" themselves by drawing & labeling it from memory.   In addition to drawing the skeleton, students will need to continue to draw the skin in preparation for the quiz next week.  Try drawing from memory only as if testing to see what's missing.  The quiz on the skin will be next week.

STUDENTS SHOULD BRING IN THEIR DRAWINGS TO CLASS.


Suggestions for parents @ home:  Check students drawings daily.  "Test" by having them draw from memory several times, ensuring they have all elements & it is correctly labeled. Also, have them practice their presentations by reading their reports to you this week.

BONUS POINT: Find out how many bones are in the human body.


RHETORIC

The kids continue to really enjoy our discussion of The Fallacy Detective. I am thrilled that they seem to be grasping the material so quickly and so well. This week, we discussed Genetic Fallacies and Tu Quoque Fallacies. If you are unfamiliar with them (as I was), please encourage your child to explain them to you. 

Next week, we will be discussing Chapters 10 and 11. If you would like to provide more structured study in rhetoric for your child this week, follow the link below to download and print a chapter-by-chapter study guide.

FALLACY DETECTIVE STUDY GUIDE


Suggestions for parents @ home:  Discuss chapters 10 and 11 in The Fallacy Detective. Watch a presidential debate and try to identify the fallacies that any candidate uses while attempting to make their point. Drill all catechism questions (remember they must be able to state word for word).

BONUS POINT: Find one example of either a red herring, special pleading, ad hominem attack, tu quoque, or genetic fallacy and bring your example to class to share during our rhetoric discussion.

CONFESSION TIME:

 Please raise your hand if you, too, have been completely sucked into this black hole. In an effort to make myself feel better about the number of hours I waste  spend on Pinterest, I want to share the board that I created specifically for Challenge A. Check it out here: Challenge A Board  In it, you will find helpful links to many of the projects and documents that I have used throughout the year. I pray that it is an encouragement to you all. 

Have a blessed time learning together this week!

News Flash!

Classical Conversations is in the news! Check out this excellent article:

Choosing to Homeschool in Tulsa, OK

See you in class tomorrow!

SPRING SEMESTER WEEK 7

 Can you believe we only have EIGHT more weeks of Challenge A? Let's make the most of them!

BIBLE

We opened with prayer and spent some time searching Proverbs 22 for biblical wisdom that applied to our character quality of the week: VISION. 

BONUS POINT: I asked everyone to bring in their vision for themselves in 10 years. Where do they see themselves? What are they doing? Where are they living?


GRAMMAR/LATIN

Today, we continued our study of verbs, and we added a new tense - the future Indicative Active Tense. For simplicity's sake, we just called it the "Future Tense." This tense expresses action going on in the future. For example: I will study Latin vocabulary tonight. We reviewed grammar rule #164 which models the endings for our new tense.  In a nutshell, we use the same exact "formula" that we used last week: stem + 1st conjugation "a" + our future tense sign "bi" + our personal ending = future tense verb (i.e. laudabit - 3rd person singular future indicative tense).  Here are the new endings:

I forgot to share our "cue" for remembering the endings: In the FUTURE, you may have to wear a BOW tie. So, when they hear "future tense" they automatically know that it begins with "bo."

I also gave them a worksheet that was modeled after a baseball diamond. It's purpose is to help them memorize the four principal parts of a Latin verb, as these are CRITICAL for learning how to conjugate verbs quickly. Just as a noun or adjective belongs to a family called a 'declension', a verb also has a family that is called a 'conjugation.' In the first conjugation, the four principal parts of a verb are:

1st: PRESENT (uses the ending "-o")
2nd: INFINITIVE (uses the ending "-are")
3rd: PAST (uses the ending "-avi")
4th: PARTICIPLE (uses the ending "-atus")

Here's what that looks like using the Latin verb "amo", which means "to love."

There will be a quiz on this material next week, and to be proficient, your child should be able to identify the principal parts of the verb (1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th), the name of each principal part (present, infinitive, past, participle) and the endings (-o, -are, -avi, -atus.) 

I  modeled how to complete our homework exercises (124-126, 129, 131, and 132)) & we reviewed all  the new vocabulary words. There are quite a few of them this week!

As a review game, we translated Latin verbs and identified their meaning. For each correct verb, they received one chance to fling a stick chicken onto our whiteboard target. They did GREAT!

For additional at-home practice this week, you can download the future tense worksheets from Family Style Schooling:
http://familystyleschooling.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/1st-Conjugation-Future-Tense.pdf

Also, here is an EXCELLENT resource that explains Latin verbs and ways you can "play" with them at home:

http://familystyleschooling.com/2015/06/06/playing-with-latin-verbs/


BONUS POINT: Find one English word derived from a Latin stem and bring it next week to share with the class.

****It is important that the students parse/label each sentence so that they can clearly identify the parts of speech in order to translate it properly.  

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Make sure you and your student preview the next week's lesson as stated in the guide so that they are prepared to discuss it in class. Drill student on vocabulary & grammar rules.  Check daily assignments (or have students check).  Continue to have students focus on memorizing endings for the declensions - sing the songs & work those charts, as well as memorize vocab & rules.  It's a good idea to write the endings out - like copying mastery charts in Essentials.
  
LOGIC/MATH

We had no new math vocabulary today. However, each week we will continue to review all of our previously studied concepts through dialectic discussion using the problems the students bring in.  In each problem we work, we will ask the same questions based on the 5 common topics: definition, comparison, relationship, testimony, and circumstance. For example, if a  student writes 5 + x = 24 on the board, I might ask:

What do you see? (circumstance)
What does 24 mean?  or What is a variable? (definition)
What do we need to know to solve this problem? (relationship)
What law or laws will we use to solve this problem? (testimony)
 How are 5 and 24 similar? How are they different? (comparison)

Their answers drive the conversation, and they are getting more and more adept at leading the discussions themselves. :) If this is something you would like to try at home, you can use these questions to start a conversation:

BONUS POINT:  Bring in a math problem from their homework to explain to the class.

EXPO/COMP

Today, instead of presenting our papers aloud, I reviewed each paper individually.  They did a great job adding alliteration to their essays, however I did notice that a few elements (refutation, division, antithesis) were missing in some papers. I reminded everyone that there are NINE very specific checklists (one tailored to each essay) located at the back of their student workbook. During the week in which your student is focused on writing his/her essay, please make sure that they are referring to appropriate checklist to ensure that they have all the required elements. During Challenge B, we will be re-using our LTW Level I text, so your children will have many more opportunities to master the skills they are learning now. However, the more practice they get now, the more prepared they will be for the workload next year in Challenge B. 

For our EIGHTH essay, we are back to the cannon of Invention.  I introduced the topic of TESTIMONY and we defined two types of witnesses who can testify to an event: eyewitnesses and character witnesses. Throughout this week your student should draft their own issue based on A Gathering of Days  and create an ANI chart with 30 items in each column. They should use the Testimony pages from their student workbook to generate new information for their ANI chart, in addition to using the seven other Invention tools that they have already learned this year:

1. ANI Chart
2. Five Common Topics
3. Comparison Chart: Similarities
4. Comparison Chart: Differences
5. Definition 
6. Circumstance
7. Relationship (cause-and-effect)

Please be sure that your child brings their completed ANI chart and all associated worksheets with them to class next week. Also, if they have not finished reading A Gathering of Days, please have them finish it this week.

Suggestions for parents @ home:   Assist/review all student worksheets & ANI charts.

DEBATE/GEOGRAPHY

We began with a laser pointer and world map review. They are all doing very well, though I noticed that some of their earliest memory work (Canada and Central America) is beginning to slip. Encourage them to continue reviewing ALL their previous map work in addition to what we are currently studying.

During class I introduced the section of Africa that we dubbed "The Western Blob." This is the yellow section of the map that I handed out last week, and it includes all of the tiniest countries in Africa. There are eleven new countries and capitals to focus on this week. Please be sure to continue drawing the Northwestern section of Africa that we learned last week and ADD this week's work to it. DRAW, DRAW, and then DRAW some more!!!

If your child would like some interactive practice memorizing Africa's capital cities, visit THIS site. It's a matching game where the computer provides the name of a capital, and you click on the correct black dot. If your first answer is wrong, you'll get two more tries before the game gives you the correct answer. Here's a sneak preview:

Students should bring in maps that they've drawn.  They'll show the class their best map.  

In addition to studying African geography, be sure to define and illustrate this week's new geography terms (located on page 63 of your Challenge Guide):

SEA LEVEL

SEAPORT

SHOAL

SHORE

SHORELINE

BONUS POINTS  Students will earn 1 point for each map drawn this week (up to 8 points.)

****Remember that at the end of the year we will be drawing the world - states, countries features - everything from memory.  Students need to continue to draw areas they've been tested on. The more they draw the better they'll get -  and the more they will be able to remember.***

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Drill student on provinces & capitals as well as geography terms.  Check daily drawings for accuracy & labeling.  Be sure students continue to draw previous geographic areas - adding them to new areas.  Continue to drill previous states & capitals and/or countries & capitals. Flashcards make this easier!

RESEARCH

Today was our quiz on the digestive system.  I had the students trade papers with one another and evaluate their work based solely on the accurate labeling of all 12 parts. They did so well! 

I then introduced the skin with a few interesting facts before we and labeled our drawing together in class.  I modeled & gave suggestions on how to draw the skin. It's surprisingly simple! I reminded them that they need to DRAW IT LARGE ENOUGH TO SEE ALL THE DETAIL!! I encouraged them to use the ENTIRE sheet of paper when they are practicing their drawings and I referred them back to our Foundations art skills - OILS (breaking down the drawing into circles, straight lines, dotes, angles & curved lines.)

Here's an example that is almost identical to what I sent home today:

At home, students will need to define the new terms, and draw, draw, draw.  They need to be drawing the system every day (more than once a day) and labeling it.  After the first few days of drawing, they need to "test" by drawing & labeling it from memory.    In addition to drawing the skin , students will need to continue to draw the heart in preparation for the quiz next week.  Try drawing from memory ONLY (as if you were taking a test) to see what's missing. There will be a quiz on heart will be next week.

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Check students drawings daily.  "Test" by having them draw from memory several times, ensuring they have all elements & it is correctly labeled. 

RHETORIC

Though I thought everyone might be sad this week about discussing The Fallacy Detective instead of It Couldn't Just Happen, I was WRONG! Everyone was so excited to discuss the two fallacies we studied this week and to share real world examples that they discovered. I love the depth and breadth of our discussions! This week, we learned about Red Herring fallacies, namely Special Pleading and Ad Hominem attacks.

For this week, we will be reading Lessons 8 and 9. Please be prepared to discuss these new fallacies in class.

BONUS POINT: Bring an example of a fallacy to class and be ready to explain why the argument is faulty.

Suggestions for parents at home: Continue to drill your child on the catechism questions. These will continue to remain relevant throughout this year and next. Remember that the answers must be stated WORD-FOR-WORD!

FINALLY...

NEXT WEEK IS WILD HAT DAY AND 

PIZZA DAY!!

Wear your wildest hat and be sure to email Mrs. Spake if you are interested in ordering pizza for lunch. 

See you then and have a blessed week of study!

SPRING SEMESTER WEEK 6

What a great day! Thank you for all your hard work and for continuing to persevere even when it's hard!

Our character trait for the week is THANKFULNESS and I opened by asking the kids to ponder this question:

After we read and discussed several of the (many) scripture verses about being thankful, we chose
 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 as our focus verse for this week.

LATIN:

We are continuing our study of present tense Latin verbs. This week we covered 1st conjugation Imperfect Tense endings.

It's easy to see how memorizing those endings during Cycle 2 is finally starting to pay off! As a reminder, conjugating verbs in the imperfect tense uses a "formula" almost identical to what we learned last week.

STEM + IDENTIFIER + TENSE + ENDING = CONJUGATED VERB                                                           

STEP 1: IDENTIFY YOUR VERB STEM. EVERY VERB HAS 4 PRINCIPLE PARTS - The Imperfect Tense is built off of the present stem which can be found in the 2nd principle part. The 1st Conjugation always has “-āre” at the end of the 2nd principle part. Drop that ending to find the present stem. You can ignore the 1st, 3rd and 4th principle parts in the imperfect tense.

STEP 2: EVERY CONJUGATION HAS A CONJUGATION IDENTIFIER - The 1st conjugation is the “a” conjugation. You use the letter “a” as a connector between the stem and the ending when building your verbs.

STEP 3: ADD THE TENSE SIGN - The imperfect tense is identified with “ba”. If you see those letters in a verb, you know it is in the imperfect tense.

STEP 4: ADD THE ENDING - The person/number identifiers are the same for every verb: “m” - 1st singular, “s”-2nd singular, “t” - 3rd singular, “mus” - 1st plural, “tis” - 2nd plural, “nt” - 3rd plural. Add them to the stem, the conjugation sign, and the tense sign, and you’ve built your verb! 

The amazing family behind Family Style Schooling has created a series of free worksheets to help practice conjugating these imperfect tense verbs. Follow the link below to download and print your free copy!

http://familystyleschooling.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/1st-Conjugation-Imperfect-Tense.pdf

BONUS POINTS: Find one word this week that is derived from a Latin root and bring it to class next week to share.

Just for giggles, check out this "Let It Go" video. It's been translated into LATIN.

LOGIC/MATH:

Today's new math vocabulary word:

TERM: (1) A number that serves as a numerator or denominator of  a fraction. 

            (2) One of the numbers in a sequence Ex: 1,2,3,4... 

            (3) A constant or variable expression composed of one or more factors in an algebraic expression.

As a reminder, these terms do not need to be memorized verbatim, they simply need to be understood by your child in such a manner that they can use the term(s) correctly during our math discussions.

Each week we will continue to review previous week's concepts through dialectic discussion with the problems the students bring in.  In each problem we work, we will ask the same questions (based on the Five Common Topics)  to expand our understanding of how math works and how it always points us back to our Creator. Again this week, we focused on "showing our work" - talking about "math sentences" and each individual step in solving/evaluating a problem.  

For a fun review, we played the National Number Knockout Game (N2K)  individually & in teams. We'll continue playing this on a weekly basis to help hone our mental math skills.

LITERATURE/COMPOSITION:

This week, we wrapped up our discussion and study of The Door in the Wall. I reviewed each student's outline, as well as last week's Arrangement element: NARRATIO. Great work!

Our newest Elocution element for this week is: ALLITERATION. Simply put, alliteration is a single consonant sound that is repeated (usually at the beginning) of adjacent words in a single sentence. It's the basis of every tongue twister that has ever been written. I shared a few with the class today, and we had a lot of fun trying to say them as fast as humanly possible. Give it a shot. You know you want to.

Alliteration can occur anywhere in the finished essay, but should only be used ONCE, much like a decoration in IEW. If your child needs a reminder for how to implement this into their work this week, you may consider sharing the Essay Seven: Elocution video with them: https://vimeo.com/album/3199449.  

BONUS POINTS: Bring in an alliteration-filled tongue twister to share with the class next week.

As a reminder, next week we will begin our discussion of A Gathering of Days. It is a short book and an enjoyable read, so you should have no trouble finishing it before Wednesday.

Finally, if YOU as the teacher need some encouragement, sign up for the free LTW Support Newsletter. You'll be notified of any upcoming LTW Training/Equipping Events, provided with helpful hints and tips, sent updates and answers to parent-submitted questions.

GEOGRAPHY:

Today, we finally waved goodbye to Asia. After 5 weeks of intense study and numerous silly sentences, your children drew and labeled by hand and from memory a complete map of Asia. I am so pleased with their work!

Having completed our study of Asia, we moved on to Africa. It was obvious today that several of our students have a deep affection for the continent and the people of Africa. It is so sweet to hear them share about the things that God has laid on their hearts. 

For the next five weeks, we will be drawing sections of Africa and memorizing the countries, capitals, and features. I gave each student a packet of maps to help with their studies. The full-color map is broken down into 5 colors. This week, we are studying the BLUE section (Northwest Africa.) Please help your child remember to BRING THE MAPS BACK EACH WEEK, as we will be adding information to them on a weekly basis. Don't forget to utilize the free Quizlet website and app to drill new countries and capitals:

https://quizlet.com/4494809/all-africa-countries-and-capitals-flash-cards/

For a change of pace, our review game this week involved laser pointers and a giant wall map of the world. Ask your kids about it...we had a blast!

In addition to their map work, your children should also be defining and illustrating in their geography dictionary their new geography terms for the week: 

RIVER MOUTH

RIVER SOURCE

SANDBAR

SAVANNA

SEA

BONUS POINTS:  Students will earn 1 point for each map drawn this week. If you are following the Ch A Guide plan of drawing 2 maps daily, a total of 8 points can be earned per student.

****Remember that at the end of the year we will be drawing the world - states, countries features - everything from memory.  Students need to continue to draw areas they've been tested on.  The more they draw the better they'll get - the more they will be able to remember.****

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Drill student on provinces & capitals as well as geography terms.  Check daily drawings for accuracy & labeling.  Be sure students continue to draw previous geographic areas - adding them to new areas.  Continue to drill previous states & capitals and/or countries & capitals. Flashcards are very helpful for this!

RESEARCH/SCIENCE:

Each student presented their research on the digestive system. I reminded them that their presentations should still be accompanied by a detailed drawing. They can choose to simply use their best drawing from their homework, or they can create a more detailed drawing (or model) to share with the class. We quickly reviewed the digestive system from memory and I reminded them that they will be tested on the digestive next week.  I introduced the heart with a diagram and a list of vocabulary terms. We went over the first few definitions and labeled our drawing together in class.  I found a tutorial that was extremely helpful to me this week as I was learning to draw the heart. However, when I attempted to log into that website today and share it with the class, the site was no longer public. The reason why? The gentleman who authored that blog and originally offered his content for free, has since complied that information into a Kindle e-book available for purchase on Amazon. Go figure.

As your children are drawing the heart this week, THEY NEED TO DRAW IT LARGE ENOUGH TO SEE ALL THE DETAIL.  We referred back to the skills we learned in our Foundations art class - OILS: breaking down the drawing into circles, straight lines, dotes, angles & curved lines.

At home, students will need to define the new terms on the vocabulary sheets that I provided for them and choose one term to research more in-depth for their presentation. Your child should also draw, draw, draw! They need to be drawing the system at least twice daily and correctly labeling it.  After the first few days of drawing, they need to "test" themselves by drawing & labeling it from memory.   In addition to drawing the heart, the students will need to continue to draw the digestive system in preparation for the quiz next week.  Try drawing from memory only and then checking to see what's missing.  

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Check students drawings daily.  "Test" your child by having them draw from memory several times, ensuring that all elements are included and correctly labeled. Encourage your child to research the heart in depth this week. Get started with these links:

http://sciencewithme.com/learn-about-the-heart/

http://www.texasheart.org/ProjectHeart/Kids/Learn/Learn.cfm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H04d3rJCLCE

https://www.fi.edu/heart-engine-life



RHETORIC:

This week was slightly bittersweet for all of us. During class, we discussed the final chapter from our much-beloved book, It Couldn't Just Happen. This book has sparked so many interesting discussions during the past 20 weeks, and it has helped your children solidify their Christ-centered worldview. They have become such effective apologists, and I am beyond thrilled with the growth that I have seen in them so far this year. They continue to ask thoughtful and abstract questions, some of which are difficult to answer. While I will always answer their questions with truth straight from Scripture, I do encourage them to investigate the answers for themselves through reading what the Bible has to say and by consistently reminding them to ASK THEIR PARENTS. The discussions that we have during our rhetoric seminar can naturally overflow into your home. Some of today's questions were: Will there be animals in heaven? What happens to babies who die before they can become saved? What is the Rapture? Will Jesus return before or after the Tribulation? What is the Mark of the Beast? 

Next week, we will be transitioning to our new book, The Fallacy Detective. You may notice that the Challenge Guide directs your child to read Lessons 6 and 7 in preparation for next week. While those are the lessons that we will be discussing in class, I can't help but emphasize that you AND your child's understanding and enjoyment of this book will be greatly increased if you take the time to read the introduction and Lessons 1-5 before we meet next week. There is some foundational  knowledge in the beginning of the book, and I am surprised that we have been directed to skip over it. 

Finally, even thought we are no longer learning any NEW catechism questions, please make sure your child is still studying them at home. They are crucial to our rhetoric discussions. 

Suggestions for parents @ home:  Drill all catechism questions. Remember they must be able to state every answer word for word.

Have a blessed week of study at home!