Weekly Report: Week Twelve (days 056-060)

We had an abbreviated schoolweek for this week, for several reasons. On Sunday and Monday, the kids spent time with their grandmother, and we also took them to get Christmas pictures taken. The pictures turned out fairly well, though the photographer wouldn't honor the coupon we had as it was written. Minor aggravation, since we've already decided we need to find a different way to get the kids' pictures taken. And today is my birthday, so we're not officially doing school. EG is finishing her literature book (it was abandoned on Wednesday in favor of The Lost Hero), and FB decided he wanted to do a page or two of Miquon today. We did make up the lost schoolwork as far as EG was concerned, at least, so I could continue being even with my days and weeks matching up. Yep, I'm obsessive complusive (though not, officially, disordered, so that's something I suppose).

EG's aforementioned literature book this week was Green's Tales of the Greek Heroes, and she read all about Athens in history. She outlined from The Ancient City, but her writing assignment was modified from Essay Voyage, so I didn't require a separate summary.

EG worked in Practice Voyage & Caesar's English II, and worked on a writing assignment for Chapter 3. I merged two of the options (the structure of one, something of the topic from the other), and then modified it to apply to Athens. The result was a essay – "Athens: The Place of Learning." Her micro-language was "learning," as you may have guessed. Her statement of the thesis could use a little clarity, and it has gems of phrases like "where there was stuff to study," but overall I was very pleased with her effort.

In mathematics, EG worked through four lessons in Advanced Algebra, and continued to work on drill. She didn't conquer any drill levels this week, but with the shortened week, that's less surprising.

She also didn't do as much Latin work (only scheduled for two days), and continues to go through chapter five in Latin Prep. I'm trying to decide if I'll have her move on to the second half of the book immediately when she finishes, or if I'll instead let her take a week or two for more extensive review before going on.

Since this was a shortened week, and we're between PLATO's Life Science and Earth & Space Science, EG read Silent Spring, as well as reading chapter nine in Science Matters. She also watched two lectures from The Joy of Science Teaching Company course.

Music appreciation this week was listening to Traditional Arabic Music and making a one point outline of chapter fourteen in The Complete Idiot's Guide to Music History. Art appreciation this week covered Ancient Rome, with Art supplemented by Art in Ancient Rome.

EG's logic class moved on to chapter three in Critical Thinking 1 this week. The next to last week of soccer was held in near-perfect weather (perfect, with an extra side of wind). Master's Academy was off this week, as was EG's History of Science class.


FB had a good week as well. I added Spelling Workout A to his language arts line up, at his request. He also seems to be enjoying Miquon; we'll do one more week of just Miquon, and then add Right Start back into the mix.

FB's history this week was about Moses & the Israelites leaving Egypt. I intended to get Wildsmith's Exodus from the library, but we never made it over there (despite the fact that it's just up the road a ways).

FB's books this week included Equal Schmequal, Mister Seahorse, Owl Babies, Africa, Make Way for Ducklings, Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See?, Bad News for Outlaws, The Very Busy Spider, and two Bob books.


Purple Child has been constructing obstacle course for herself all week long. I just looked to my left and realized one of the Billy bookcases has a shelf that is going to fall without intervention in the next twenty-four hours. Guess I know what I'll be having Spousal Unit do tonight.