Friday, January 13, 2012

Weekly Wrap-Up: Illuminations

I can't believe I'm organized enough to actually link up in my first ever Weekly-Wrap Up hosted by WUHS. We've been working hard at getting back into the school grove after the holidays. We added some new curriculum this semester and will be adding WriteShop Junior book D to the line-up as soon as the mailman delivers it.


We finished up our second week of using Illuminations and Mystery of History Vol.1. Illuminations is is an all-inclusive *curriculum, covering Bible, Language Arts, Literature, Science, Humanities, Geography, History, Life Skills, and Projects. We've been reading through our first book, Adam and His Kin by Ruth Beechick. I decided to read this aloud to the kids and I have been surprised at how interested they are in this book about Adam's family. It has brought up some good questions and discussions.


Each week I print out the Illuminations schedule and put it in my binder (I print out a month's worth of schedule/materials at a time). I file each behind the appropriate tab. Then I print custom schedule sheets for my 3 older kids to place in their binders. Illuminations always you to edit and change the text on the schedule. So for instance, my children are using a different spelling program than what is scheduled in Illuminations. I can replace the text with my children's specific spelling assignments. I love that!


My kids place their weekly schedule in their Mystery of History binder. It is set up with tabs for all the continents plus a misc. tab. All their history, geography, and reading assignments will be filed here.


Here's an earlier assignment that was filed in the notebook. Assignments vary from reports, graphic organizers, maps, to notebooking pages and art projects. By the end of the year each child will have a complete portfolio of work.


I like that all my kids are covering the same time-period but have different levels of assignments. This week we read about Noah and the flood and dinosaurs. My younger kids played a dino matching game while my middle schoolers worked on a mini-report on an ice-age animal. 

Since our local co-op is not meeting yet, we have been using this opportunity to work through some fun science experiments from Christian Kids Explore Science: Earth & Space. We've studied astronomy in-depth a couple of years ago, but I thought it would be a nice way to review and it tied in well with our Days of Creation lessons in history. Can you guess what this experiment was? It looks like a galaxy with all the star confetti. It was actually a tornado-in-a-bottle.


My younger girls are continuing with All About Reading Pre-Level 1 and Level 1. This activity was for my 5yr. old, but the 3yr. old wanted to "feed the monster" too. Each slip of paper had a word that my 5 year old had to read before feeding the monster.

The girls have also been using the ipad for school, making crafts, coloring, and of course playing. :) Well that's it for this week! Swing on over to WUHS to see what everyone else is up to.



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8 Comments:

Blogger wdworkman said...

The prettiest tornado I've ever seen!
Janet
http://homeschoolblogger.com/wdworkman/784867/

January 13, 2012 at 6:42 PM  
Blogger The girl who painted trees said...

That's a nice tornado. Is it just water with "confetti" added in?

January 14, 2012 at 8:34 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

You're totally organized! Maybe not for a regular link-up with WUHS (in the past), but DEFINITELY for school! Wow! Great binders!

January 14, 2012 at 10:11 AM  
Blogger Ticia said...

That would be a difference between girls and boys. My boys wouldn't even think of coloring that picture.

January 14, 2012 at 10:18 AM  
Blogger Mozer said...

yes, it basically is just confetti and water w/ 2 pop bottles.

Our Side of the Mt: I always start off organized but have a hard time keeping up :)

Ticia-- so funny! My girls love to color. My boy likes to doodle and cartoon.

January 14, 2012 at 10:45 AM  
Blogger MomLaur said...

Good times! Love seeing how you are using mystery of history as we want to start it next term!

January 15, 2012 at 11:47 AM  
Blogger Autismland Penny said...

Sounds like a great week! You do look nice and organized too!

January 15, 2012 at 2:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sounds like a fun week. I love all the binders and tabs -- organization excites me. ;-) The "feed the monster" game looks cute. It reminds me how much fun that age is.

January 15, 2012 at 10:10 PM  

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