Fall has finally arrived in the South. It has only taken most of the month of October, but relief from the 90 plus temperatures is here for us. We are still in South Carolina, but our days are quickly coming to an end, and we foresee ourselves heading back to Wisconsin by Thanksgiving.
October kept us very busy with the girls actively finishing out their soccer season with the local YMCA. We had games 1-2 nights a week, and luckily for this Momma Bear there was only two of those nights where they played on the same night at the same time. Mouse was recommended to play as a midfielder as she gets older. This position seems to her defensive personality well. Thumper (the only girls on her team) didn’t let her brute strength show until the end of the season and most of the time was content t follow the pack screaming like a banshee.
We also spent a warm Sunday at a local corn maze, and later that week the girls got to carve their pumpkins they picked.
School kept us going this month as well and we are making strives to be on target to finish up our major spine curriculum by the end of the year.”.
In history we continued with he Roman Empire which tied in with our read aloud “Detectives in Togas”.
We seemed to have started a mouse theme and read “The Mouse and the Motorcycle” and started “The Tale of Despereaux”, which we will finish in the next few days. We continued in plants in science and studied Roots, Stems and Leaves and Flowers this month. We have attempted to start a leaf research project but keep getting sidetrack with the rain. New to us this month is our adventure with cursive handwriting for both girls. The program started out with practicing numbers, and Thumper surprised us by being able to keep pace right along side her big sister. We are taking the rest of the program slow and have just begun introducing letters this week. Our new bible study time with using Focus on the family seems to still be going well. We talked about obedience this month and that we need to obey God, even when it is difficult remained in our minds as we approached each lesson.
Mouse this month has continued to grow in her independent reading and with the help of participating in the BookIt program with Pizza Hut has earned her first certificate. She was able to cash in on her pizza after her game earlier this week. She had a goal of reading 5-chapter books and surpassed it by reading 10. She is enjoying writing them down and rating them, she is also trying to take over my read aloud library for herself. In the future, I may begin to post a recap of what she reads each month, and what her ratings for each book were, so be on the lookout for those posts if she keeps up this appetite for reading.
Once she passed her little stall in Math she is moving right along with subtraction and telling time. We just started subtracting with regrouping, a new concept, that may take some time too.
We finished Writing with Ease Level one, and I decided to up her challenges in language arts, where I haven’t before, and we began using Sonlight LA 1. It is going well, and I think she is finally ready to write more on her own, as this program is having her do on some days. We are taking it gently, but she on her own has written a few “books” this month so I think it was time for such a transition into more work for her in this area. She is also continuing to progress through All About Reading Level 3 doing 1-2 lessons a week and we are pacing ourselves through All About Spelling Level 2 doing a bout 1 lesson per week.
Thumper has still been enjoying her changes and additions to her day. We have covered letters R,S, T and started U this week. She has enjoyed getting to sing Halloween songs this month. She particularly enjoys getting to add extra things t her All About Reading Activity Sheets with each letter.
Our year is winding down as we get to reaching our goals for the end of the year, our work load will get less and less for the next 2 months as we transition into the holiday season as well. I have been in the background prepping for next year and revamping my approach to planning. I’m starting to find a healthy balance for things in relating to school and life.