Wednesday 31^st was a bit of a non-academic day – we spent a bit of time with Peter.  It is one of the blessings of home schooling is the flexibility to fit in with the family.  If Pete has time, then we have time too!  There was a quick vet check over for Domino, we talked about Deism (Joshua was very clear on how he saw God actually involved in our lives), we ran out to see the Jet pass over again.  There was rough and tumble play, there was Mummy and Daddy talk time.  Nothing much to write about but it was everything when we look at being a family and imparting to our children the things that are important to us.

The children did have table time before Pete got home.  They completed their notebook pages from yesterday.  Josh wrote an essay, as well as a short report.  Daniel continues to build his mast for his pirate ship.

Thursday 1^st June 2006

I think for the first time this week we have started at 8.30am.  This week has been a good case study for a flexible routine as we have got through the lessons just not according to the clock!

I have been reading “For the Children’s Sake” and have been very convicted that our Bible times for Nomi and Daniel have become very much like a Sunday School class and worse than that, twaddle!!  I spent a long time chatting this through with my mother last night and this morning was ready to face our Discipleship time from a different angle.

We started off with a more devotional time reading Proverbs 2.  The children had a colouring in sheet (where the older ones could take notes on the back should they desire).  We discussed both the Proverbs that jumped out at them as well as the Proverb on the colouring sheet.  I think we may use the Proverb from our Monday reading as a memory verse for the week.

Then came our Bible Study.  I let the children continue to colour in their Proverbs sheet though Josh and Jess had to have their notepads ready should they wish to take notes.  We read of the Tower of Babel and the dispersion of the nations.  Daniel gave me an oral narration on the Tower and Nomi gave one on the dispersion.  Daniels narrations are a bit sketchy – one sentence at a time, often having to be prompted by questions to keep him going.  I kept to who when where what and why questions.  Trying to keep in my mind that I wasn’t to have an agenda and that I would let the children’s minds sort and process the truth in the story.  I did ask him why was building the tower the wrong thing to do.  His response was “because they didn’t ask Jesus first”.  I have never considered that they should have had a relationship with God, and therefore should have been asking for direction in their life!  But there you go… in Daniels child like understanding he has brought a new thought to me – and a new thought that isn’t so off track either.  This is exactly what Susan Schaeffer McCauley was talking about and it is exactly the type of comment that I would have missed should I had my own agenda about our reading of the Word.

After our narrations and discussions I tabled some Bible Study books and asked the kids to find out something about Babel/Babylon/etc…  I had Daniel on my lap and Nomi by my side as we flipped through some children resources.  Jess and Josh had their own “adult” resources that they use.  After 15 minutes we all shared what we had found and what we thought.  Then Daniel was excused and the older 3 worked on recording their findings and thoughts. 

Josh recorded the various places around the world where they build ziggurats.  Jess did some map work on the space between where the art landed and the tower built.  Josh and Jess have always been fascinated with how Noah could have let this happen, even though he was an old man by this stage.  In today’s reading they got a bit of an understanding that maybe Noah wasn’t exactly at Babel – no-one knows but it stretched their thinking.  Nomi looked at the whole world map to locate Israel (as a base point in the map for her), the Ark, and the Tower.  The three of them also traced a map that indicated where the families of Ham, Shem and Japheth travelled to (The Table of Nations)

Josh, Jess, Nomi all did Math.  Their handwriting was kept to their labelling etc on the maps.  Nomi typed a little on the computer with a creative story.  Jess is spending time sorting and reorganising her files on the computer.  Josh is spending time sorting and filing his paperwork.  I am not taking over this time as he is slowly developing a system for his filing and that is my ultimate goal (even if and when it takes a long time to get there!)  Systems have never been a strong point for Josh so this is a good activity for him to take time over.

Daniel had great progress with his reading today.  We did revision, blending 3 letter words.  He started to close his eyes after he had sounded it out and then he would say the word.  He was getting very confident by the end.  It was a delight to hear him blend the words, to hear him understand that he has to say the third sound.  Yesterday at the Speech Pathologist he was very taken with the printed word and how they were the same yet different (top and stop etc).  This was the first time he has ever paid any interest to the printed word.  So he is definitely making progress and is very keen to read.

Daniel’ math is all wrapped up with his building a pirate ship.  Today he nailed on a bar to attach the bottom of the sail too and he did it too low so the sail didn’t fit any more.  So we had to measure a new sail.  We talked about the need for true measurements and that estimates don’t always cut it!

Jess and Nomi finished their Science Read aloud.  I have given them both a chapter book connected to the topic of cells to read over the next week, as we continue to look at some reference material on cells.  We will start to record our research on cells next week.

Joshua continued on a few notebook pages from his reading list/history.  This included editing and improving his writing from earlier in the week.