Wednesday 10^th May 2006

I wonder when people get their housework done?  I have been trying to work towards a routine where the kids have some table time early in the morning while I get some extra housework done.  This doesn’t seem to work.  Don’t know why… table time works in the afternoon without my supervision.  I think I have to recognise that the things I want Nomi and Daniel to work on, first up in the morning, do need my supervision.  I am going to have to get myself “home-blessing” and cooking in the afternoons for a little while longer!

I sat with Daniel as he did his Lentil Math (TOPScience) – he didn’t get it so we will be doing that exercise again.  I wanted to get to Daniel’s RME but we had an appointment with the Speech Therapist instead.

Math U See – Josh and Jess are working through their lessons fairly independently with touching base with me to confirm their understanding and to set the worksheets they need to work on (which is based on their understanding).  I tried Nomi and Daniel together today and that didn’t really work, in a sense it worked for today, as Nomi needed to go way back to get her brain into gear, but by the end of the lesson it was obviously she had kicked in and needed to be working on a higher level.  I may try and have Daniel working beside me with an activity while I teach Nomi and then have Nomi work on her worksheets while I teach Daniel.  We need to find a routine that works here.  My goal for Nomi’s math this week was for her to skip count by fives and she is doing that well.   Daniel was exposed to the “teen” numbers and we will be working on his counting to 20. 

We tried to have a full component of Discipline studies today.

Josh – copywork, Math (didn’t get to Latin)

Jess – piano, copy work, Math

Nomi – typing, copywork, Math

Daniel – TOPScience, Math, Phonics (which we didn’t get to)

We spent a lot of time reading the story of Daniel in the light of him being Dependable.   Josh tried to trace back who the king would have been when Daniel grew up and how this affected Daniel and the faith and character that he had by 16yo.  We checked out a few pictures of archaeological finds that gives a little glimpse of life in Babylon.  We did no writing after this lesson though the lesson gave Josh and Jess an opportunity to use some of their study tools.

We spent a short time with our Oral Communication course looking at what is communication, how has it changed over the years.  Then we looked at some key points for verbal communication:

• Use words that your audience understand – keep jargon to a minimum
• Use descriptive words, exciting words not just everyday words – keep this in balance with your audience age/understanding
• Know your stuff – you have to know your facts, information, proof etc not just waffle off the top of your head – your audience wants to have confidence in what they are hearing.

This is timely as the children have another Oral Presentation at the Co-op on Friday.

Read Aloud for today:  William Jennings Bryan – Golden Tongued Orator.  

The children are still listening to Narnia on tape.