Um...where did October go? It is just a blur in my memory, so I am glad that I took some pictures! Hopefully my kids remember more of what they learned than I do!
Our October science unit was a continued theme of plants with a focus on pumpkins. We learned their life cycle, parts, little known facts, went on a field trip to a pumpkin patch, made pumpkin goodies from the pulp and seeds, did math problems using seeds as manipulatives, and of course, carved some up for decorating!
Ella also learned about the amazing world of fungi and we grew some mold...on purpose for once!
Our author of the month was Robert McCloskey and we enjoyed reading his well known books as well as his lesser known ones. This book was extremely helpful as it compiled all his books as well as gave a biography of McCloskey:
It was a puzzle month around here. The kids did a lot of puzzles. Puzzles I had bought at the beginning of the school year that sat untouched until for some reason this month they decided they would become puzzle monsters.
Our composer of the month was Felix Mendelsohnn and we all can recognize his famous wedding march now, ha!
Our artist of the month was Jackson Pollock. My kids reaction to his work was really funny, Ezra especially...the perfectionist in him was really in conflict over the seeming "mess" of Pollock's art.
That is, until he tried to replicate it himself. It is a lot harder to get defined swirls and squiggles and not just a big glob of paint than it seems.
One must wear goggles for Pollock painting. And go outside, of course...
Their finished masterpieces. I believe there are moments of greatness in them =)
Ella is doing great working through all her curriculum and books. I am using a lot more formal curriculum than in previous years with her, somewhat as a necessity to allow me time to work with the others while she is able to work independently in her books. However, when she failed a chapter review in her English I decided to take a break from the book for a week and instead came up with some creative non-formal ways of teaching the subject she was struggling in. If you had visited our house that week you would have seen quite the chalk lesson on plural, singular, common, and proper nouns on our driveway, ha! It worked though and she now has a solid grasp on the subject and we went back to the book lessons again. (Until the next struggle...)
It was a good reminder to me that the books are not the teacher...I am. The books are a good tool that I can use, but I need to not be afraid to hang them up and get creative!
The boys are doing great as well. We did a lot of repeating with Eli as repetition seems to be so important for him to grasp new concepts. Ezra is continuing to read well and beg for a craft to do every day, ha! Abc order, number recognition for 1-20, cutting skills, and sequencing were some of the main areas we worked on.
I'd say "bring on November"...but we are already quite into the new month.
My new motto is "keep up with November" as it seems that this is going to be another crazy one!
