Boo-tiful fall

The coming holiday is approaching with such excitement for some that it is hard for them to concentrate, but somehow we have managed to focus a bit.  We had our usual Thursday of drama class (they are starting to memorize their lines), followed by an active game of floor hockey in sports class.  After that we tried to do some math work at a local coffeeshop before aikido.  Friends were also there doing schoolwork, and it became full, so soon we were just too distracted.  The library quiet room saved us, and we whipped through a series of 2 and 3 digit multiplication problems with incredible ease.  Homeschool is rarely just at home, and on these days that we have classes on the far north end of town, we learn where most comfortable.  Aikido was also a huge hit, an hour and a half of athletic fun, I think we made it to 3 classes last week, my boy being quite focused on a goal of a green belt soon.

This week we finally started French lessons with an outside teacher over at a friend's house with 2 young friends.  Conor just loved the songs, games and new words.  Not only is he excited to go back, he is actually worried about being able to remember the words until next week.  We also kicked off a new learning module for 4 weeks around the first peoples, starting with the peoples of the rain and mist, aka our own neck of the woods.  We drew some lovely longhouses, Conor being far more attentive to detail than I.

And now for your literary pleasure, a holiday tale from Conor:

The Phantom of Darkness  

It was dark and our house was next to a deep dark wood. Many had entered and none had ever returned.  Last night we heard a long, low moan that surrounded our house like a fog.  When I went to bed I heard it again. I thought to seek it to slaughter it.  I got dressed and got my sword and brought my faithful dog, Pasco, with me.  Suddenly a thing jumped out of the trees and Pasco did a super bark.  The monster fell back stunned.  One of the shapes of darkness was coming out of the trees.  Then Pasco took the leash and did zoom-zoom!  The monsters fell down cut in half.  Hooray for Pasco!  "Oy! Be careful with that thing, it's sharp!", said a voice near the ground.  I looked down in surprise and saw an old gnome near the ground, Pasco's paws near him.  "Stop!", I said.  Pasco halted immediately and waited my next command.  "Stop swinging that sword around, you'll cut someone's head off!  We were just coming to meet our new neighbors", said the gnome.  It was a crazy night!  Pasco waited obediently for his treat that would come at any moment.  I gave him a wild salmon treat, his favorite, and walked the gnomes to the house.  I showed the gnomes around, we had tea, and we all were friends from that moment on.  All thanks to Pasco!

Boy and his dog from "Dogoween" costume contest.

Fall continues...

First an intro from our star, typed himself:

This is Conor here to tell you about my week! The first thing I'll tell you is about my recorder. I learned how to play a few days ago, the song I learned to play was called Hot cross buns, the second thing I will tell you is roman numerals I learned them a day ago and now I am doing multiplication with them! Then there's northwest trek, they told me that only the carnivores are in cages. 

Back to mom, fall was a great time to visit Northwest Trek-all the animals of the Northwest right up close.   Even the grizzly was pretty active, and the bison were close enough to touch, except that our group was very good about keeping their hands inside the tram that lets you be the watcher in the animals habitat.  We had a lovely fall drive down, walk in the woods, and learned many new things about these gorgeous creatures.   

Conor really loved a solid 2 weeks of math focus on measurement and multiplication, and actually complained a bit Monday when we started a weeks's focus on weather.  Of course, that quieted down when we started in on hurricanes, typhoons, and twisters, which he reported on in his journal.  He is still very jazzed about math and my planned short lesson on Roman Numerals I-10 turned into an evening of fun where he and his dad pretty much had them all down up into the thousands.  And funny how much more fun addition and subtraction is with roman numerals. 

I didn't realize how much he would get into the recorder either, we whizzed through the basics and he has a repertoire of 3 songs.   He already has musical theory down pat from piano, in fact, is game to try out any new sheet music first on the piano.  Pasco, our mutt, was not a fan of our new instrument and lay moaning in pain for part of the lesson until he was kicked outside-it really was not that bad, just a few squawks!   

Along the way I worked the weekend while the boys did aikido, went to a harvest party, went to the zoo, and today we finally got more of the garden cleaned up for fall, with only part of the harvest of tomatillos and carrots brought in.  Which reminds me, my boy has grated his carrots (from his garden bed, no less), so I am off to make muffins!

Math, math, math

We focused on math this week, and it was surprisingly fun! First we continued our measurement theme.  Once we reviewed and tested the liquid measures in the house, we found this adorable story of magic and measurement quickly converted the recipe like it was a secret code.  Sadly, we never did get around to making the brownies since this was one of our outside classes days.  Conor has continued playing Timez Attacks and gaining speed and accuracy with his times tables.  And he has conquered multiplication of 2 and more digit numbers, which he is rather proud of.  Tonight out at dinner alone, he was getting rather good at doing them in his head.  I don't recall getting math this easily and quickly.

Monday we joined in with some of our neighbors and planted our traffic circle.  If only we had this much enthusiasm about our own yard work!  Either Comcast or google or all of the above is making things miserably slow or I would post a pic, next week!

Conor says:  "I learned a new way how to solve multiplication of 3 and 4 digit problems this week.  It is fun and easy!  I like practicing it, especially at getting faster at solving in my head.  I love my new sports class I started last week, we even went outside and played kickball and kickball.  The wind would catch the ball and put it opposite of where you sent it.  In aikido I am working on my next belt, aikido, which I hope to do next week."

Back to our rhythm

We are back after a week away in Michigan, sadly to say goodbye to my dearest maternal grandma. She was one of my best teachers, both in life and in knowledge. It was a long, difficult week but important and memorable to us both.  While it was a week off from formal work, Conor spent a great deal of time working on an idea for an instant transporter that would take us from Seattle to Michigan in minutes.  He says "it may take me until I am 40 to work out all the problems.  I just need to solve how to break the people into their atoms and put them back together on the other side. "  That lead to a trip for urgently needed study materials from the bookstore, a science dictionary and a book about technology, both of which Conor has been studying quite intently all that evening and our travel day back.  


We have kicked off a measurement theme, yesterday using our bodies as rulers, measuring various parts of our bodies and diagramming them.  We noted that horses are still measured by hands and that a yard was the length of a stride.  Conor then measured the width of our property with large strides.  We multiplied his strides by 3 and then noted that number.  Then we measured by tape measure and found that he was off by less than 2 feet!  Today we brought out the liquid measurements first guessing and then testing our approximations.     

The rest of the afternoon was taken up by an exciting chemistry lesson about the properties of atoms.  We took water of varying temperatures and observed the rate of diffusion of each, creating first an hypothesis which was quickly confirmed.  While we were waiting for the final time interval measurements we also discussed the parts of an atom.  Which turned out to be total review for my studious boy.  


Writing is coming more and more willingly and easily.  Our daily weather journal fell by the wayside on our trip, but  back into it today.  In other math review, Conor is getting faster and quicker at his times tables with Timez Attacks.  Overall, it has been a bit sluggish trying to get back to a rhythm, but looking forward to seeing our friends again in drama and sports class tomorrow to be truly back in the swing.