2011-12

J: 6th grade, O: 3rd grade, M: 2nd grade, SweetP: pre-preschool

Addendum 7/12: I made an error in our history dates, and this year we covered 1500-1612.  Much of what I initially listed for this year will be moved to next year, so if this page has changed since you last looked at it, that’s why.

Bible: Proverbs 1-8, Daniel, Colossians, James, and verse memorization

Math: J: Singapore New Elementary Math, Year 3A, O: Singapore Primary  Math 4A, 4B and 5A, M: Singapore Primary Math 3A and 3B

Latin: Henle Year 1 (for J).  I found Harrius Potterus et Philosophi Lapis and a Latin Fairy Tales book for him to read.  (“Huffabo et Puffabo tuum domum inflabo.”)

Spanish: Rosetta Stone Level 1 (O & M), and phrases for all of us

Language Arts: ETC 6 & 7 for M, Thrice-weekly copywork (mostly from MLK’s I Have a Dream speech, the Gettysburg Address, and JFK’s 1961 Inaugural Address) and Dictation once a week; Plus narrations.

Geography: We worked for the autumn/winter on Africa, and then in the spring, we worked on the USA.

Music: We’ll continue with piano using Faber, and Composer Study, Copland and Holst.

Art: Picture Study with Cezanne, Vermeer and Peter Brueghel the Elder.

Science: This is the area that changed the most in form.  We designed and carried out several small experiments over the year.  M & O read a lot of science books, and J regularly read articles from Scientific American and Odyssey. He did some narrations of these.

Nature Study: Slow and steady wins the race.  We took nature walks and continued working on our skills of observation, including watching Mourning Doves nest.

Literature: J read Oliver Twist, and we read parts of Twelfth Night as well as several summaries of it.  We watched the 1996 movie version and saw it live with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival.  For read-alouds, we read: A Bear Called Paddington and More About Paddington (Bond), The Long Winter (Wilder), Secret Water (Ransome), a selection of Milne Winnie the Pooh books, Heidi (Spyri), D’Aulaire’s George Washington,The Horse and His Boy (Lewis),Masterpiece (Broach), Cleary’s Ramona series, Little Britches, the City of Ember books (duPrau), Harry Potter 3-7 (Rowling), The Westing Game (Raskin), Because of Winn Dixie (di Camillo), Hatchet (Paulsen), and Peter and the Starcatchers (Barry).  We also listened to some of Flanagan’s Ranger’s Apprentice series, and The Austere Academy and The Carnivorous Carnival (Snicket).  I didn’t keep track of all the picture books, but a standout was Diane Stanley’s The Bard of Avon.

Individually, each of them read a mix of novels of their choice and mine.  I was happy with their book lists for the year, as well as the improvement they made on comprehension and fluency.

As our History “spines”: we read Genevieve Foster’s The World of Columbus and Sons (started in spring of 2011) and The World of Captain John Smith.

J’s history novels were: A Murder for Her Majesty (Hilgartner), Leonard daVinci (Stanley), Stowaway (Hesse), The Witch of Blackbird Pond (Speare), Om-Kas-Toe (Thomasma), The Sign of the Beaver (Speare), The Watsons Go to Birmingham (Curtis), The Wednesday Wars and Okay for Now (Schmidt), Oliver Twist (Dickens), and I, Juan de Pareja (de Trevino), and The Arrow Over the Door (Bruchax & Watling).

O’s historical reading included Bulla’s Pedro’s Journal and Squanto, and  Sunken Treasure.