greenfield academy

School Pictures

The photo theme of this past year has been snap fast and snap many. For me with my extreme amateur photography ability it is the best bet on getting a half way decent picture. Trying to get a good “school picture” proved to be another one of the occasions where snapping fast and snapping many landed me a few good ones. Enjoy!

Jr. Age 7

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Steadfast, Inquisitive, Compassionate and Confident

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The best big brother. A budding musician. My first beautiful boy.

Little Bro (Lil’B) Age 5

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Imaginative, Empathetic, Spirited and Joyful.

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The best little brother. A budding artist. My second beautiful boy.

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Where it all goes down….

Welcome to our school room tour!

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I’d like to say we spiffed up for you but you’ll have to pardon our life – it seems to have spilled all over these photos! We’re starting at our school table which doubles as my crafting table as you can tell by the sewing machine peeking in the picture. What you may also make out is the brim of a brown hat near the bottom. In the center is a stack of a few of the weeks things that didn’t get put away. A notebook, a schedule book and peeking out from in between is an art project. I swear there is really learning that goes on in all this chaos!

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For a brief moment let me tell you how much I love my table:

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At just the right moment in time, a friend of mine mentioned painting her dining room table with chalkboard paint. I was intrigued and decided to take the plunge on our school room table. It is by far my most used resource. Words are written. Math problems are figured and so much more. When it has a few too many paint splotches, nicks and glue bumps it is time for a brush up. I smooth it out, wash it off and PAINT IT AGAIN!

Remember that brim of the brown hat left on the table? That’s an integral part of where school happens: OUTSIDE. We don’t often actually carry our books outside mostly because it is often irritatingly windy. Wind and pages just don’t mix well. But a lot…A LOT of our science happens outside in full, vibrant living color. And that hat is on the top of a small head while in the great outdoors!

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School won’t stay put. That was one of my first realizations when we started homeschooling. Here you can see school ran away to have a day away from the table. Taking advantage of the floor space for a drawing project inspired by an action figure battle.

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School can be messy. Here is my second favorite “big” resource. Our white board which isn’t really white at the moment because as you might be able to see a space battle happened. It seems the red ships blew up all over the board. Then we needed to find where Turkey was so the map got stuck up over the battle! The planets are only visiting temporarily as their spot (on my ironing board) was actually being used to iron something.

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School is full of noise and some of it is music. I can’t forget our piano. We spend a fair portion of time here each week practicing at our various levels. I am proud to say that I’m not the most learned here. That belongs to my oldest. And what’s neat is my youngest isn’t far behind him. They are leaving me in the musical dust!!

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And finally there really isn’t any better place to curl up with good books than on the pillow filled bed. I snapped this quick photo of my 5 yr old hanging out waiting for me, to find the books I’d just sat down somewhere, and for his older brother to finish up his telephone call with his Grandpa. He likes to be first to be ready to read because then he gets the choice pillow. Stinker!

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Hope you enjoyed your visit to our electic mix of school room resources!

Greenfield Academy July Notes

DSCF2456Jr. Related Notes:

We’re settling into our new routine with a few bumps and adjustments. I had been thinking after reviewing what I had scheduled in a typical day for Jr. that we may need a mid-lesson break. Turns out I was right and we are now having a bit of a recess before lunch. Then returning to studies after lunch or in the evening. I’m actually amazed at how much Jr. is able to work on independent of me this year. The ability to read his own directions is freeing to us both.  In the photo he is working on his Grammar. I am enjoying that he has a series of work that he can work on independently like his handwriting, grammar, copywork and phonics review. That is allowing me to easily work with his little brother for a focused time period.

Jr. has read two chapter books from the A to Z Mysteries series by Ron Roy. I’m allowing him to make his own selection for his chapter books. I’m hoping to move to giving him a selection of a few choices but I’m not finding a lot of series that suit him at the moment. We’re always on the look out for fun, adventure series for the young reader if you have any suggestions I’ll gladly take them.

Cursive has been a really good fit! I am amazed at his interest and the quality of his cursive writing. History is again a hit and the audiobook version of Story of the World is still tops for Jr. I got a huge kick out of the question he thought up to write to his international pen pal about history. He followed it up with a sentence about his favorite story from last year’s history: Ottoman Turks conquering Constantinople. Science (Chemistry) is going slowly unfortunately because it’s been a little more difficult to separate the boys for science that I’d hoped. Turns out that Lil’B is not happy being left out of the mix at the same time he’s not quite old enough to fully participate. Some rethinking on how to approach science with them both wanting to be little chemists.

Lil’B Related Notes:

DSCF2459This little boy knows how to add numbers! What a surprise it has been to work with math with him. He’s quickly shown me that we either need to speed up or add to what I’ve got planned. Even with the hands-on math related things he’s a little bored. So next week I’m hoping to add a bit more spice to his math related activities.

Handwriting is going well. I’m always pleased to note this since he’s my lefty. I can’t take credit for any of his skill though because I’m positive that his fine motor skill development is in direct porportion to the amount of drawing he’s done since he was little. I am grateful that my lefty is also artistic leaning.

Reading is consistenting mostly of phonics review and lots of book reading with Mommy. He’s easily frustrated here so I’m treading lightly. It has been a difficult summer with regards to reading. His brother is now able to read much faster in his head than aloud and thus prefers to read silently. That has left Lil’B out of the story and it is increasing his awareness that he can’t read which in turn increases his angst. With his phonics review he’s proving to have a lot of the hard consonant sounds and short vowel sounds already learned. I think once again we’re all just waiting for that moment when the pieces click into place for him.

Science for Lil’B is consisting of units of animals at the moment. We covered Ants last week and this week (along with the next few) we’re covering butterflies. Unfortunately we’re struggling to keep our caterpillars alive again. Last year we had some trouble too. I’m wondering if our house isn’t a bit to cold. We’ve got five eggs in the garden that we’re watching. And I checked today three have hatched so we’ll bring them in tomorrow but try a new location and housing for them. In the caterpillar-butterfly weeks ahead we’ll cover elephants and eagles. I’m going to see if I can find a place to order tadpoles from too. We didn’t have any luck locating any in the wild. And I think both boys would like that project.

Well that’s all I’ve got this time!

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