Wow! This April was gone in a blink. What we have been learning since Easter may take too long to list so I will hit the highlights. I have been pushing math concepts beyond Z2's grade level because he understands it so well. I mean if you took about 35 minutes and explained to your seven year old how to borrow in subtraction and he understood it wouldn't you be excited to put together a worksheet that let him excercise his new found comprehension? Well, I was and now he can subtract tens and hundreds and I am not surprised after all he is a genius, however, it never ceases to amaze me how incredible my Zs' minds are! We have been reading stories from Z1 and Z2's readers and answering main idea questions as well as paying attention to details. We started a very big Spelling list of homophones and I have been encouraging their use of context clues as a result of those homophones because they have to use them to figure out which "there" to use based on the clues and definitions we looked up. We played a game with our homophone list called Word Design in which the kids had to write the spelling words and then decorate the letters in the word to help describe the word. I think it has done wonders for their spelling as far as giving the words a shape to remember because they have both got the list memorized now and it was so much fun letting them be as creative as possible. Z1 is moving into division and so she needs to finish memorizing her multiplication tables which we are working on. For Earth Day we made paper flowers and planted seeds in the seed starter; Z1 did flower seeds from her birthday and Z2 did pumpkin seeds from the seeds I saved from last year's decorations. They are growing and we are so excited to see them getting bigger. The kids also learned about litter and (for the strict reason of learning) they went outside and picked up all the litter in the yard. We also did stories in art and the kids had to look at a painting and tell me their own stories about it. Next, I had them each paint their own picture and then write in their Wonder Journals the story about their paintings. Z1 learned about different kinds of poems especially haiku after reading Grass Sandals: The Travels of Basho and started counting out her syllables and wrote one. For National Storytelling Day Z1 and Z2 wrote stories and created a shape book about it. Z1 and I had the spring dance performance at the Cumberland County Playhouse called The Sun and the Four Winds and Z1 and Z2 after having seen it for themselves wrote in their Wonder Journals about it. And finally we started learning about Tall Tales and read about Paul Bunyan and Babe and then we played a game about tall tale statements called Bragging and you start by saying something outrageous and then the next person tries to outdo your statement and so on. We have been so busy and I haven't even decided if I want to keep going through the summer or not.
As far as Z3 and Z4 goes, well, that's just it all those two do is GO! I swear they can take a clean house to chaos in a matter of seconds. I have been trying to correct Z3's speech a little bit and help her with complete sentences and Z4 with simple sentences and naming objects. Next, I want to teach Z3, who has aced letter recognition, what each letter in the alphabet says so I can start the process of teaching her to read. For Z4 we have started recognition of people in her life in pictures so then we can move on to the alphabet so she can recognize her letters, too.
Now I'm off Learning My xyZ's!
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