Week 2

Another wonderful day at Westside Chapel for Challenge :)  With the rain clouds rolling in and Challenge A having the MOST comfortable room with couches, fighting off the after lunch food coma was warfae at times.  I do believe we made it through with flying colors.

Our weekly recap.......

Algebra 1:  We welcomed a potential new student and enjoyed seeing our class grow a bit.  All the children were very patient with me this morning, as apparently the function that allows my brain and mouth to coordinate......malfunctioned.  If this left anyone slightly confused, please, please, please feel free to contact me and I will be more then happy to help.  This weeks assignments lessons 5-8 (Mostly more review).  I did promise a small quiz next week, I could tell that's what they really wanted. I also let them know on Fridays, I will be available at the Kernersville location from 2pm to 3pm to help with any questions.

Rhetoric: My ability to form sentences came back to me (Praise the Lord!) and rhetoric went quite well.  We discussed Chapter 1 of both Don't Check Your Brains and It Just Couldn't Happen.  We reviewed our Catechism questions and let them know at about 10-15 questions we will start playing Jeopardy!  I emphasized that this hour will be discussion time and encouraged them to start engaging more.  I also encouraged them to not get behind in Catechism questions.
Homework: Read It Just Couldn't Happen chapter 2 and fill out study guide; read chapter 2 Don't Check Your Brains, be prepared to discuss both. Add Catechism Questions 4-6.

Science: Today we shared our reports on protista! Some students had two reports, which was awesome, but not needed.  Sorry is there was any confusion.  Hopefully, in the future, this blog will be a great forum to ask such questions and bring some clarity.  They did a fantastic job on these!
Homework: Report on Fungi.  At least two sources, with bibliography and picture.  There is much freedom here on whether they would like to be general about fungi or more specific.  (This may have been what caused the confusion last week)

IEW/BB Writing: In class we practiced more outlining and telling a story from our outline.  We listened to everyone's stories and tried to find who/which clauses and "ly" words.  We tackled about a few more dress-ups; the dreaded "because" clause and a quality adjective.  If because falls at the beginning of a sentence, there must be a comma and the rest of the sentence.  We also banned 5 words from our writing (good, bad, big, little and cool).
Homework: Lesson 5.  Pick one source.  Use the 2 paragraph outline and write two paragraphs.  Attach the checklist to your final copy to turn in.  (Two of them were left behind :)

Geography:  I think this is the subject that overwhelms most of them.  Here is where it is at.  First, I always defer to you the parent.  If you have told them it needs to be "this much", then so be it.  Here is what we will be doing in class.  Today I tested them on states and capitals.  I gave them a blank USA and had them fill in what they knew.  (This went home with them)  We then introduced the features and got to know our atlases.  Next week, I will test them on the states and capitals.  (It will probably be the outline of the US with/without states depending on how they did today)  If they do not know their capitals and states, the class will still move on, but this will be something they need to keep at until mastered, for the end of the year.  As far as features goes....I told them each time they need to find all of the features.  I encouraged them to get to know about 5 of them really well while we are studying that section of the world.  They will not be tested on them at the end of the year.  This is something that is done daily.  Set a timer for 15-20 minutes at a time; maybe once in the morning, then again in the afternoon. Daily practice is what will help the most. 
Homework: Add the terms bay, bayou, beach, bluff, bog, and branch to our "dictionary".  Add features to the maps we started today.  Study daily US states and capitals.

Latin: We reviewed first declension noun endings and introduced 2nd declension.  I encouraged them to memorize those noun endings quickly.  It would definitely make life easier.  We discussed the 5 cases of nouns, in the hopes of gaining some understanding of where the endings come from.  Memory words were breezed through pretty fast.  We will have a "matching" type quiz on them next week.
Homework: Complete pages 16 - 26 in your books, Decline the 2nd declension nouns I assigned, memorize 2nd declension noun endings, memorize vocabulary words

It is always my pleasure and joy to tutoring your children!  I hope this finds everyone off and ready to go for week #2.  Please, let me know how I can be of most support to you :)