Monthly Review - Jan 2008

Language Art - Satisfactory
J continues to excel in Language Arts; during this review period we covered the Lion, Witch and a Wardrobe on Beyond Books. This included doing writing on what Plutoians and humans look like to each other. J did a very good job with this assignment but did not really enjoy it. We started Bridge to Tarabithia (next book for Beyond Books), J quickly became bored with the story and we decided against continuing the book (we have put Beyond Books on hold for now). In his Calvert studies J has done comprehension questions, plurals with ies, es, s, using pronouns, four compositions and six spelling tests on which he missed a total of 6 words out of 60 words (because, school, flew, should, orange and morning). J can now spell these words correctly most of the time (he still has issues with should). He started to show boredom and distraction again by making silly mistakes on things like forgetting to do questions, leaving name and date off papers, indenting, etc. so we changed our days around a bit. Everyday we start the day the same, then subjects are done differently daily (instead of always starting with math each day is different), after lunch is active activities. J's overall grade in this subject is currently an average of 96%.

Technology - Satisfactory
J continues to use his computer on a regular basis. He is still slow and hesitant to type much of anything but last week he started typing his Weekly Contacts himself. J started typing some of his school work and posting them on his blog. We are still looking into typing programs to help him in this area. J is currently averaging a 96% in this subject.

Fine Art - Satisfactory
We are still working on the picture Pinkie by Lawrence; during this period we have done two drawings to go with it called (a colorful bird and wrapping paper). The poems we covered were "Hiawatha's Brothers", "The Purple Cow", "A Centipede Was Happy Quite", "Block City", Things I Like to Do, "The Land of Story-Books", "City Rain", "The Rain", and "Who Likes the Rain?” J enjoyed the poems about the rain the most since we get so much rain here. We received our Discoveries in Music this period and have started working on it also. We have cover two lessons so far (strings and percussion); we love this part of our school day. We highly encourage music and recently got a full drum set and mic to help encourage J in his music; he has been having a blast and learning so much. We have not used the Music Appreciation through ClassTool yet and will be waiting a bit longer; don’t want to overload him. J's overall average in this subject is 99%.

Math - Satisfactory
J has been learning adding and subtracting using regrouping. He finds this very easy and has a hard time understanding why it is important to show your work (he looks at the problem and just knows the answer). We have been working on taking the time to show how you got your answer; he is starting to understand this is for the future and is just a good habit to have. J has also continued to do his Perplexors, CodeBreakers, and Deducibles; along with playing online math/logic games. J really enjoys math. His overall average in this subject is 96%.

Science - Satisfactory
J has continued to take nature science every other week and is still really enjoying while learning a lot. He has become reenergized with the Calvert Science since we are covering the night sky and sound with hands on activities. J loves to look and learn about the night sky; he also loves to have reason to play with the musical instruments (not that he needs one). After we finished the Chemistry on Beyond Books J informed me he was not ready or quite interested in covering science on that level yet. He is more interested with having hands on experiments. Most of the Calvert material is things we have covered before, given this we will continue with it and adding many hands on experiments to reinforce the concepts instead of using Beyond Books. J is currently averaging 95% in this subject.

Social Studies - Satisfactory
J really enjoys his social studies lessons; we have been learning about Indians and the War of 1812, Custer's Last Stand, how to making tepees, slavery and abolition, the red cross, Biology, Medicine, and Mathematics. He loves learning about our country’s past and how it became what it is today. J has also learned about elections and what is currently happening. He is very interested in the presidential election and asks questions often about different topics. It is wonderful to see his enthusiasm for politics. J is currently averaging 94% in this area.

PE/Health - Satisfactory
J did a wonderful job in his YMCA classes last session. This session starts Feb 19th and he will be taking PE, Gymnastics, Basketball and Swimming. He is looking forward to starting the new session since last session was so much fun. J is currently averaging 96% in this subject.