To Linda From Shelby

Dear Linda,

I wanted to tell you about school.  My favorite subject is math and why I love it so much
is because you can take away and add  and it's so fun. We do art every day it is sooo fun.  I LOVE YOU TOO.  I have been writing in a spelling book and it doesn't say to write it in cursive and I did it any way ha ha.
In my Primary Language Lessons I'm memorizing poems, one is called 'A Secret'.  It goes like this:
We have secret just we three
The Robin and I and the sweet cherry tree
The bird told the tree and the tree told me
And nobody knows it but just us three
But of coarse the Roben knows it best
Because she built the... I shant tell the rest
And laid laid the four little... somethings in it
But I'm afraid i shall tell it any minute.
 I have also been singing songs and I am getting better at it, and it is so fun and we go up to see my grandma and we sing with her and play the organ which Lydia does the most and it is so nice to listen to.  Grace does so good in her school books and so does Lydia.

I have learned about China, Egypt, and more. I love China.  It's my fave.  Listning to the way they create clay shapes and pots, pans, and bowls makes me want to make some out of my clay too.
 I have learned about dinosaurs and have been waching video's of them.  I
didint relize how BIG they were!!       

I want to learn more abuot sience but that's ok.  And how life started and how
 the first person was born but I think it was a monky huuuuuuuuuuuuuuh.

I LOVE organizing ssssoooooooooooo  mmmuuuccchhh.  Painting, sketching, using my imagination is one of the best ways to create art.  When I do art outside, sometimes I make fairy houses for the fairies out of bark, twigs, moss flowers, mushrooms and leaves.  I also take nature walks and find interesting nature to put in our nature bowl.

I love reading the Lizzy McGuire books that Lydia read and gave to me to read.  I am having a lot of fun with them.  I also like to read books about frogs wich I have a frog and toad book which is interesting.  I love a book called Celebrations that shows pictures of children all around the world celebrating holidays where they live.

I can't wait to come and see you again because I want to tell you stories about out here where I live, read to you some and recite some poems I have learned.

See you in April!
Love, Shelby Hyde



                                                                  .I LOVE YOU.

Daily Schedule

Lost Photos

So, I just discovered that the folder I had on the computer with 165 pictures of completed work and art as well as form drawing and piles of boks read has been deleted during a computer clean up...SO, I'm just going to gather those things up and let you thumb through them on eval day.  Sigh...hours and hours wasted,  I will NOT dwell on it, but I'm afraid I cannot recreate it either.  Sorry about that.

Also, don't forget to check http://www.spiralpathways.blogspot.com/ for family educational events and festivities.

Happy New Year!...so now what?

Ok so now my New Years resolution is documenting our school life a little better and the second half of the year IS the most important part anyway right?

Our science unit studies were beautiful and exciting but I'm afraid we don't have much to show for them so, as a review, I aim to do some of the activities suggested in the back of the books.  Lydia is also going to pursue her study of the physical sciences as well.

Math has become a hobby, especially for Shelby who is currently working in a 5-6 grade workbook for fun and put a printing calculator at the top of her Christmas list!
We will continue to do math drills and find fun games on line.

For Social Studies we will continue with The Story of the World and I will be adding some additional studies of Italy as we are having and Italy party on the 23rd, the first of what will hopefully be a monthly event featuring a different culture each time and complete with music, cuisine, language, dress and whatever else we can throw in.

Language will continue on with Intermediate, Primary and Language Lessons for the Very Young and continued reading practice with Grace.

November 2-13 Main Lesson

"This remarkable evolution series, narrated by the universe itself, concludes with Book 3, the amazing story of mammals.  It picks up with the extinction of dinosaurs, and tells how tiny mammals survived and morphed into lots of new earthlings....horses, whales and a kind of mammal with a powerful imagination- you! It's a story of chaos, creativity and heroes0 the greatest adventure on Earth! And it's a personal story...about our bodies, our minds, our spirits.  It's our story."

Vocab for this ML

apes

Cenozoic era

culture

DNA

Homo Erectus

marsupials

monkeys

paleontology

primates

religion

science

spiritual

taxonomy

October 19-30 Main Lesson

" Settle in with your favorite pillow while the Universe tells the thrilling story of Earth. It's a story about the beginning of life, and hoe Earth triumphs over crisis to become bacteria...jellyfish...dinosaurs!  It's a science story that is your story too, the story of your living Earth and the unbroken chain that connects you to the very first life that began to twitch in the sea four billion years ago.

Vocab ofr this ML:

animals

amphibians

bacteria

birds

dinosaurs

evolution

fungi

genes

mammals

photosynthesis

reptiles

vertebrates

October 1-16 Main Lesson

"Time after time the Universe nearly perishes, then bravely triumphs and turns itself into new and even more spectacular forms- like the Sun and Earth. It eaven turns itself into earthling scientists who help the Universe discover more about itself.  This is a science story from the inside.   And it's a story about you, from the time you were really born- about 13 billion years ago.

 

Vocab for this ML:

 

atom

black hole                                       

carbon

element

galaxy

hydrogen

mass

matter

nucleus

oxegyn

supernova

http://www.neok12.com/  videos watched:

• Atoms and Molecules pts 1,2, and 3
• Physical Science- The structure of an atom 
• Electricity and Matter: Atoms and Elements
• The Discovery of the Atomic Nucleus