Homeschool Update: Weeks of 11/15/21 and 11/22/21

I fell a bit behind on taking homeschool notes, so for this one I've combined two weeks. 

Morning Time

Music: We watched performances and visual interpretations of several Bach pieces: 

• Prelude and Fugue in B Minor 
• Ricercar a 6 from Musikalisches Opfer BWV 1079
• Bach, Musical Offering, Ricercar a 6
• Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B Minor 
• Canon Perpetuus from Musikalisches Opfer
• Canon a 2 Cancrizans from Musikalisches Opfer 
• J.S. Bach - Crab Canon on a Möbius Strip

M. and I also read Crab Canon aloud.

Singing: We learned to sing "All the Pretty Little Horses" and "Over the River and Through the Woods."

Poems: From Favorite Poems Old and New, edited by Helen Ferris (Doubleday Books, 1957), I read aloud: "A Song of Sherwood" by Alfred Noyes, "Come, Little Leaves" by George Cooper, "The Fairies" by Rose Fyleman, "The Modern Hiawatha" by George A. Strong,  "First Thanksgiving of All" by Nancy Byrd Turner,  "The Embarrassing Episode of Little Miss Muffet" by Guy Wetmore Carryl, and "When Young Melissa Sweeps" by Nancy Byrd Turner.

Art Appreciation: In 100 Masterpieces in Color (Hamlyn, 1972), we studied The Annunciation by Simone Martini, Les Tres Riches Heures: April by Pol, Hennequin, and Herman de Limbourg, and The Merode Altarpiece by Robert Campin. We watched Smarthistory videos about the Martini and Campin works. 

History

First Grade: C. and I read some of Life Long Ago: Ancient Egypt, but it was way more detailed than what we need at this stage. We switched to Life in the Ancient World by Bart Winer, (Random House, 1961) and read about daily life in Ancient Egypt instead. C. completed this worksheet about the Nile and she watched a BBC video entitled Egypt from 2006. 

Third Grade: M. finished The World of Captain John Smith by Genevieve Foster after reading these sections: 

• Enter Cardinal Richelieu
• Broken Promises
• La Rochelle and the Huguenots
• New France Again
• On the Way to China
• Inside the Great Wall
• Japan's Closing Door 
• In and Out for Christian IV
• John Winthrop of Groton Manor
• Neighbors, New Amsterdam and Plymouth
• Velazquez
• Velazquez Sees Rome
• Galileo's Final Visit to Rome
• Gustav Adolf 
• Plans for Massachusetts
• John Smith Is Not Invited
• Governor Winthrop
• Pilgrims and Puritans
• The Bell Tolls 

Then she started The Puritan Revolution by Walter Hodges (Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1972). She is also reading Puritan Adventure by Lois Lenski. 

Science

First and Third Grade: We worked on BFSU Lesson A-9: Matter IV - Dissolving, Solutions, and Crystallization. We added various substances to water to see if they were or were not soluble. We also left some salt water out so the water could evaporate, but it took several days for it to evaporate and leave salt crystals behind. We also watched some YouTube videos: 

• The Great Picnic Mix-up from Crash Course Kids
• Mixtures vs. Solutions from 2 Minute Classroom
• What Dissolves in Water? from Science Universe
• Pop Up Science: Oil and Water from McGraw Hill Pre-K-12 
• Oil Water Detergent Experiment 

Preschool: E. and I read a few pages from the National Geographic Little Kids' First Big Book of Animals. Afterwards, she asked to see some real animals, so she watched Cheetahs 101  and Zebras Risk Their Lives to Reach This Place Every Year from Nat Geo Wild. 

English 

C. read The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum. To Gran she read Three Boys and a Lighthouse by Nan Agle and Ellen Wilson. 

E. read Pop Fox, The Fog, Pom Pom, The Big Log, and Tub Fun. She started working on reading words with a silent E in The Ordinary Parents' Guide to Teaching Reading. 

M. read This New Land by G. Clifton Wisler. 

We started reading aloud the final play in Three Children and Shakespeare, which is The Taming of the Shrew. We finished A Light in the Forest on audio and I started reading aloud The Genie of Sutton Place by George Selden. At dinner, Daddy finished reading Polly and the Wolf. 

M. and C. worked in their Mad Libs grammar workbooks. 

Typing and Handwriting 

C. did typing daily. M. has completed all of the typing exercises she can do with a Chromebook keyboard. C. practiced cursive daily. M. needs to get back to cursive.

Languages 

C. continued to practice Over the River and Through the Wood in ASL and started learning Jingle Bells. She also watched the We Play Along ASL letter videos for I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, and S. 

Math 

M. continued working on Challenging Word Problems 3. C. finished the another review section in Singapore 2A. C. also worked on addition and subtraction with renaming on the soroban. Both girls did chapters from Life of Fred. 

Physical Education 

All the girls rode bikes on several of the warmer days. They also did some dancing. 

Instrumental Music

M. and C. practiced piano and recorder daily. 

Art

All three girls made homemade birthday cards for me. They also glued felt turkeys, made Thanksgiving sticker collages, and colored some Thanksgiving coloring sheets.