Jamestown, the Mayflower and Colonial life. Football and other ramblings, too.

The younger boys have been working on a few writing assignments in the past several weeks. They have written reports on Jamestown and the Mayflower already. They are now preparing a three paragraph report on colonial life in America which will also be given as an oral report. Joseph often throws fits because he has to prepare an outline before he begins his writing. Aye yi yi. He has decided to write on travel in colonial America, while Sean has decided to write on food in colonial America.

We use a simple formula: pick your subject, then pick three topics within that subject. Each of the three topics will be a paragraph. Paragraphs are written: Topic sentence, middle sentences that explain the topic sentence and a conclusion that reiterates the topic sentence and may add a personal note or an extra tidbit of information. Outlines are easy! Use your topics and add keywords for A and B (or C, D, etc)

Subject

I Topic
A
B

II Topic
A
B

So far, high school seems to be going well for Matthew. Several challenges, but going well. Football season is in full swing and I hope to go out and get some pictures of him with his new team this year. It is his first year on the homeschool football league. He is a Panther! They are asking him to move up from JV to varsity because when they scrimmage the varsity team, it takes two varsity players to block Matthew. He can also sack the QB.

Sean and Joseph will start playing for High Point Little League soon. We are supposed to get a call this week. They are looking forward to fall baseball.

Our garden is still going. The other day, we picked carrots, bell peppers and a few other things and made a delicious Emeril's creamy chicken recipe with our wonderful garden fare. We've also been making apple recipes with the apples we picked at our friend's orchard on the way back from Cincy last week.

The boys had their bone marrow biopsies and we are still waiting on the results. I got their CBC results before leaving. Sometimes I just want to crawl under a rock and pretend that Shwachman-Diamond isn't real. I dream of the day they will have completely normal counts! ~smile~

The First Day is................

Always exhausting! We woke up early enough....the kids seemed to have some memory lapse as to what we've done the previous ten years of school. Luckily, they caught on quickly and got to work. Joseph started his new math and only had one fit over writing. He got over it quickly! This year, we are using one of the Institute for Excellence in Writing's U.S. History-Based Writing Lessons in Structure, Style, Vocabulary and Grammar. I had used this for Matthew and Sean had never completed more than one or two lessons while we were using other English books. So, we pulled it out again forthis year. At the end of the lessons, they can bind their work to make a history book of their own. Very neat!

We reveiwed a few lessons of Friendly chemistry and are back on track for a great year! We've always tried to supplement our science with Friendly Chemistry and not used it exclusively. Have not made it through the entire curriculum because it was always a supplement....this year we're going all the way. It is an excellent program and we can't wait to do it all!

While Matthew is using Seton's curriculum, they do not have a Catholic Physical Science textbook, so he is using A Beka's Science of the Physical Creation textbook through Seton. Seton does not require the labs to be done, but we are adding them using the Science of the Physical Creation Lab Manual

Sean and Joseph will be participating with Matthew when we go over his religion for this year and we are also using Scott Hahn's Understanding the Scriptures to supplement Sean and Joseph's religion.

This afternoon, Matthew is working on his homework while dad teaches an Aeronautical Science class. Sean and Joseph are taking the class along with the other students and seem to be enjoying it quite a bit.

I've got a lot of work to do to keep ahead of them in their lessons! ~smile~ I'll be doing lots of homework every night to keep on top of things! and grading.... ewwww...I don't like to grade!

The boys have drama auditions on Wednesday. Matthew and Joseph are excited about the homeschooling drama classes for the next year. They will be performing the original Cheaper by the Dozen play. Sean may try to play piano music between scenes, etc. We'll see. Auditions are Wednesday morning and practice/classes begin the first week of September.

We're also getting really excited about the Homeschool Science Fair, too! It is the first year that we have ever hosted a science fair and we're hoping it is a great success. We'll also be participting in Around the World Night and Student Night at the Opera again this school year. This is our 11th year of homeschooling and they keep me on my toes!

As we begin our new school year, I will tell you more about our curriculum. We've got quite a bit! All and all a good first day.