This Week...

This week Georgia worked on some math, phonics, her cursive, and re-read a lot of her favorite chapter books. She received her Ranger Rick magazine and has read that cover to cover. She also had her gymnastics class on Tuesday, and went swimming on Thursday. Wednesday she came up with an idea for art. She thought of finding a picture of a horse and covering it with ripped pieces of paper. Here's what the girls came up with....(they both wanted to make a horse like Spirit)

Georgia added a bald eagle and some trees. She told me she made some trees smaller so they would look farther away.

Olivia had gymnastics on Saturday. She went swimming on Thursday, too, and I was really impressed with how much she has improved. She is a lot less timid about playing around in the water. The shallow end is 3 feet, which is still too deep for her to stand in. The water would go to the middle of her face. But she used a noodle (long foam that she puts accross her chest and under each arm) and she even put her head under water a couple times! She does need to remember to keep her mouth closed, though! She smiles so big when she is having fun, but then a wave will go up her chin!

Olivia is also improving her reading! She is picking up more and more words everytime we read together! She also likes to just take a book and look through it, studying the words. She's used some of Georgia's chapter books that do not have pictures. Today she layed down on the couch with the rather large American Heritage Student Thesaurus and quietly looked it over, studying the words. She was so engrossed in her word searching that a good thirty minutes passed! She still likes to do her copy work where she'll take a notebook and copy down words she sees different places. Her writing is improving, too. The copy work and perusing books is something that she came up with on her own, I don't tell her to do it. If I do try to help her sound something out or ask her what sound a letter makes she gets irritated and does not want to hear it. She is truly an independent learner! When I read to her I usually point to the word I say with my finger so she can follow along if she wants to. Sometimes she tells me to stop, but sometimes when I don't do it she asks me to do it. That is how Georgia learned to read.

Tomorrow we plan on attending Prairie Days. Should be lots of fun! We were just talking about life without electricity, and Olivia picked out a Little House on the Prairie book that I was reading to her. Should be neat to see it all reenacted for us. Mark is excited to see the cider making, and the girls are looking forward to the horse & wagon rides. I'm interested in seeing the honey extraction, blacksmith, spinning, quilting, pottery....okay....all of it!