Franconia Challenge A Class: SPRING SEMESTER WEEK 10

Thank you for your diligence in class yesterday! Everyone worked so hard. :)

BIBLE

Our character quality for this week is YIELDEDNESS. We spent some time looking through Scripture for verses about yielding ourselves to God. We discovered that Joshua commanded the people of Israel to "yield your hearts to the Lord." (Joshua 24:23), we learned that the yield (fruit) of wisdom is better than fine gold or choice silver (Proverbs 8:19), that God will not yield His glory to anyone else (Isaiah 48:11), and that God does yield to pleas of His people (Ezekiel 36:37). We discussed what yieldedness looks like in our own lives and I encouraged everyone to think about one area in their lives where they could practice yielding this week. Perhaps they need to yield to the Lord's direction in their lives. Or maybe they need to yield to a parent's instruction.

LATIN

Today, after reviewing all of the 1st and 2nd person pronouns in Latin, we learned about 3rd person pronouns. These are quite a bit more complex than those we learned last week. Since the 3rd person represents "he, she, and it", it requires that we have a different set of singular and plural pronouns to represent the masculine, feminine, and neuter forms. So, for this week, we have 3x the amount of information to memorize. Use this chart to help:

To help everyone remember our personal pronouns, we practiced singing them to the tune of "Yankee Doodle." It's so much EASIER this way!! To jog your memory, click on the link below to watch a short clip that demonstrates how to sing the song.

SHOW ME PERSONAL PRONOUNS

Here are two more videos to refresh your memory.

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

LOGIC/MATH

We had several new math terms this week. Apparently, we are making up for the last several weeks when we had none. :)

· Scale: a ratio that shows the relationship between a scale model and the actual object. If a model airplane is 1/24 the size of the actual airplane, the scale of the model is 1 to 24.

· Scale factor: the number that relates corresponding sides of similar geometric figures.

· Hypotenuse: The longest side of a right triangle (always opposite the right angle).

· Legs: The two shorter sides of a right triangle which form a 90° angle at their intersection.

· Pythagorean Theorem: The area of a square constructed on the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to the sum of the areas of squares constructed on the legs of the right triangle.

· Irrational number: Numbers that cannot be expressed as a ratio of two integers. Their decimal expansions are non-ending and non-repeating.

· Real numbers: all the numbers that can be represented by points on a number line.

15/16 and 37 are rational numbers.

Ã and p are not.

I introduced each of the new terms very briefly and showed an example of each term using a math problem.

Each week we will continue to review the previous weeks' concepts through dialectic discussion with the problems brought in by each student. In each problem we work through, we will ask the same questions (based on the 5 common topics.) The students are beginning to lead the discussions.
Again, we focused on showing our work - talking about "math sentences" and each individual step in solving/evaluating a problem.

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

**Students should bring in a problem from their math lesson to share (can be one they struggled with; one they think will stump the class or anything they found interesting & would like to share & explain) This will help them be rhetorical!!

Suggestions for parents at home: If you feel as though your child could use some additional math instruction or just some extra practice, I would encourage you to visit these sites that I recently found. They offer everything from tutorials to extra problems to practice tests.

Analyze Math: Free Math Tutorials

The Math League: Sample Math League Contests

Math Counts: Math Test Prep

Virtual Math Club

LTW

This week marks the beginning of our ninth essay in LTW. At this point in our year, we have precious little new information to cover, so the bulk of our seminar time will be spent reviewing and solidifying the skills that we have already learned. In class, everyone shared their essays based on A Gathering of Days. They did a very nice job and we enjoyed listening carefully for the metaphors inside each essay. We discussed Crispin: The Cross of Lead and used the story to generate a class issue and ANI chart.

Throughout this week your student should draft their own issue based on Crispin: The Cross of Lead and create an ANI chart with 30 items in each column. There are no new worksheets to utilize in their student workbooks, so they will need to use the eight Invention tools that they have already learned this year:

ANI Chart
Five Common Topics
Comparison Chart: Similarities
Comparison Chart: Differences
Definition
Circumstance
Relationship (cause-and-effect)
Testimony (eye witnesses and character witnesses)

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 Crispin: Cross of Lead, please have them finish it this week.

GEOGRAPHY

This week was our fifth and final week in Africa. We added the 13 countries that are marked in RED on the take-home map. We also introduced the last section of African features, which included the following deserts and mountains: Atlas Mts, Cape of Good Hope, Equator, Kalahari Desert, Libyan Desert, Mt. Kilimanjaro, Prime Meridian, Sahara Desert, Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. We identified each of these features on our large wall map and then created a silly sentence mnemonic to help us remember them!

ASA

CAN

EAT
KALE
LAST.

MOST

PEOPLE
SELDOM
TELL (the)

TRUTH

These are the red countries on your map and you will need to practice, practice, practice this week at home. Students should bring in the maps that they've drawn. They'll show their best map to the class.

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

TABLELAND

TERRACE

TIDE

TIMBER

TIMBERLINE

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 at 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

This week, we started with a quiz on the skeleton. I will review them and return them next week in class. We had some interesting research topics for presentations this week: The Cerebrum, Facts about the Brain, Imagination, and the Ganzfeld Effect.

Our new topic of study this week is: Neurons and the Neuromuscular Junction. 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 neuron is one of the more simple body systems to draw this year, so I think that there may be some temptation to not work as diligently on the drawings this week. Please use the extra time that you have to practice drawing and labeling the brain. After the first few days of drawing, they need to "test" themselves by drawing & labeling it from memory. In addition to drawing the neuron, students will need to continue to draw the brain in preparation for the quiz next week. Try drawing from memory only as if testing to see what's missing. The quiz on the brain will be next week.

STUDENTS SHOULD BRING IN THEIR DRAWINGS TO CLASS.

In an effort to help our students use the 5 Common Topics to generate questions on their own (as opposed to simply answering questions based on the 5 CT), each student will be assigned one of the 5 Common Topics per week. Their task is to create one question based on their assigned Common Topic that pertains to the subject we are researching in science for the given week. This week they will need to create a question that pertains to either neurons or the neuromuscular junction. Here are a few examples: What is a neuron? (definiton), How is a neuron similar to the brain? (comparison), What happens when neurons are damaged? (circumstance), How are the neurons and muscles related? (relationship), What does God say about nerves? (testimony). As a reminder, here are the assigned topics:

DEFINITION :: MYKAELA

COMPARISON :: EMILY

CIRCUMSTANCE :: JACKSON

RELATIONSHIP :: BEANA

TESTIMONY :: FAITH

RHETORIC