Unschooling Summer Week #5

Once again we had a very nice week around here.  We didn't have much to do and enjoyed a bit of downtime.  We went to the beach, went to check out their father's latest project at work, and spent quite a bit of time at the library.  We had a few rainy days and happily spent them at home watching YouTube videos, movies and TV.  We were a bit busy gearing up for the holiday weekend and checking out new recipes to try at our huge family reunion/ cookout.  I couldn't find as much evidence of traditional school- type learning as usual but that's OK. Even if we learned a little less this week it's OK to take a bit of break now and then.  I noticed the boys sleeping more and lying around in their pajamas so we all obviously needed a bit of break and, to me, that's what summer is all about.  It's the perfect time to relax and recharge.



Reading-- Alec started reading the graphic novel series of Warriors and finished book 1& 2 as well as reading a regular Warriors book and finishing up the first Tombquest book.  Ian started reading Mockingjay and has just about finished Mr. Cooper is Super!  Evan read some more Dick and Jane stories aloud to both Alec and myself and even read a few stories quietly in his head to himself.  He informed me that's he really improving and reading a lot more.  We finished up reading The Phantom Tollbooth and started listening to Inkspell whenever we're in the car.  The boys spent part of the day Monday signing up for our library's summer reading program and seeing how it will run this year.

Math-- They all went back to their timed math sheets trying to work on quick & accurate computations.  Evan moved onto subtraction this week while Ian and Alec have worked on subtraction, addition, multiplication and division.  They have all played many games of pitch, memory and the card game golf.  I found a worksheet about Egyptian numbers and Alec wanted to try it out- for fun.  The boys also made up their own game this week.  I can not for the life of me figure out what it was; something to do with slamming matchbox cars into one another on our air hockey table.  Points were awarded for various things and they wrote up a score sheet and kept track of who was in the lead as some added self- guided math.



Science-- We played with Oobleck at the library as part of their STEM Mondays.  We learned it's called a non-Newtonian Fluid since it has properties of both a liquid and a solid.  The boys have been watching a lot of shows about forges and making weapons.  They watched several Man at Arms YouTube videos and they watched Forged in Steel. Alec and Evan also spent some time at the actual forge with their father.  The boys and I spent a day at the ocean side looking for crabs, shells, fish, and sea glass.  We observed the cormorant fishing for food, watched the gulls flying overhead and following the sounds we heard we even saw a mockingbird.  We found a plant growing inside the drain to the bathroom sink!  It was a weird and usual find for sure and we talked about how that could have happened.  With Alec's bird feeder across the hall we assumed a seed made it into the sink and with the help of water and nutrients found in the seed itself was able to grow.  It was all yellow though because it was lacking in sunlight.  And speaking of Alec's bird feeder we've seen an increase in finches, red-winged blackbirds and nuthatches over the past few weeks.  We're going to try hanging orange slices from his feeder next week to see if we can entice the orioles to come around.  Ian spent a night "fishing" with his net around the dock and shoreline and caught quite a few baby catfish, some eggs (that we believe are frog's eggs), and a few mini fish too.


Geography/History/Government-- We spent a little time looking through 29 places in America to visit.  I stumbled upon the blog post while on Pinterest and thought the boys would be interested in looking at all the beautiful photographs.  We talked about where they were located and which ones we'd like to see the most.  We also had another vote in our town this week, which once again led to discussions of what we're voting on & why it's important to vote. We also had a talk about some of the presidential candidates and their view on various topics of interest.

Art-- The boys decided to bring coloring books and colored pencils in the car to keep themselves occupied on the way to and from the beach.

Socialization-- We had some family visiting from out west over the past weekend and we got to meet them and spend time with them.  It was a wonderful visit and the boys were so sweet with their much younger cousins.  Ian even sat down to read with the little two year old.  It was so adorable!  Alec made friends with a family he met at the beach and must have spent an hour walking around with the mom and daughter talking up a storm.  He wanted to exchange phone numbers and addresses with her when the day was done so he could invite her to his birthday party. I thought that was so sweet & cute and pretty typical of kids.  Ian spent a day at a friend's house enjoying time away from his brother's catching up with an old school friend and the younger boys spent the day swimming with their cousins.

Physical education-- They swam, climbed rocks, rode bikes, played baseball, and climbed all over our swing set.  They set up a slip and slide and ran across the lawn trying out different moves.  They tied the hose up to their regular slide and turned it into a water slide climbing up and down and all around. They ran from one end of their father's work building to the other and enjoyed climbing up into the plant he was working on to see how all the parts fitted together and worked.  Ian was jumping on a trampoline, kayaking and shoveling dirt this week too.

 


Comments

  1. It sounds like a wonderful week to me.
    Blessings, Dawn

    ReplyDelete
  2. It really was! I'm enjoying all this "down" time and watching them learn on their own. It's wonderful.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sounds like a super busy week! I love how you break down all of your activities.

    ReplyDelete

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