Thursday-Friday Learning Notes — Week 3 (Days 5-6)

We had several days of unseasonably warm weather — brilliantly sunny and and close to 90 degrees — and today we plunged into late fall. It was gray and chilly. This prompted Marie to give us the Quote of the Day:

“Yesterday was sunny, and today is a Tim Burton film.”

Thursday we spent most of the morning cleaning house. In the afternoon, GamerGirl and YoshiGirl came over. GamerGirl watched movies with Marie while Martin and YoshiGirl chatted and looked at YuGiOh! cards. It seems that a good time was had by all.

While GG and YG were here, I pulled out my neglected scrapbooking stuff and started working on the kids’ portfolios. I’m making a very slow start.

Today, Marty complained he was feeling sick again and stayed in his room most of the day. I will confess that at first I suspected he was malingering, but then he told me HE DOESN’T FEEL LIKE PLAYING VIDEO GAMES. He sorted some of his YuGiOh! cards and listened to more of Harry Potter. (Language Arts: Reading & Literature)

Marie and I worked in Spelling Power and Math-U-See Pre-Algebra. (Math: Algebra, Language Arts: Spelling) We continued reading and discussing Are You Liberal, Conservative or Confused? (Civics) She finds it terribly dull.  I told her I don’t like force-feeding things that don’t interest her, but I feel a basic understanding of politics is extremely important. Ideally, kids should get this basic understanding from dinner table conversation, I guess. But this doesn’t seem to be happening in my house. Most of our dinnertime conversation is about zombie movies and similarly edifying topics.

Marie also continued to work on her research on banned books. (Language Arts: Writing) I helped her sketch a visual outline of how her paper will be organized. She didn’t need much guidance from me; I just helped her get her thoughts out of her head and onto paper. She has already done a lot of the research. Traditionally, one creates an outline before beginning the research, but I think plunging in and starting to learn about your topic can help give the paper a clear shape in your mind.

As I mentioned, she wrote some questions and has been interviewing librarians at schools and libraries. She has been making all the phone calls and conducting all the interviews herself. I’ve just given her a little prompting and served as her chauffeur. In addition to using telephone and interviewing skills, she’s started keeping track of her occasional appointments on a planner. (Life Skills)

After we created her outline, I dropped her off at the library. She did a bit more research. After talking with her about what she’d done at the library, I feel she needs more scaffolding. She was just browsing, really, not gathering the specific information she needs for the paper she has planned. So Monday, I will help her write a list of specific questions to take with her when she goes to the library or does online research.

Marie has horseback riding today. (P.E.) During her lesson, Marie and I walked around the barn and visited the horses. (Science/Nature)

Marie also started listening to several new books: Devil in the Details, a memoir about obsessive-compulsive disorder, and Boy Proof. (Language Arts: Reading & Literature; Psychology)