A good day

We did our devotion and then moved onto the social studies lesson. We reviewed the basics about South America and went onto learn more about it. We read about the geological history and the physiographic regions (terrain.) We Googled many pictures of the Andes, the Amazon, and the Highlands and added them to our map. We learned the Andes are the second highest mountain range in the world and the Amazon is the second longest river in the world. (However, there has been discussion in the recent past that argues that the Amazon is currently longer than the Nile. I’ll let the experts decide.)

We did math next. I had JD show his classmate (Grammy) how to solve an “Order of Operations” (string “formula”) problem. I don’t know how to type “division” sign so I’ll use the “/” key and I don’t know how to type the exponent number other than the # followed by “s”. Here’s an example of the type of problem JD solved for Grammy. 32x(2+4)4s-38x4. Of course she was lost and wondered under what math category that fell under; like: algebra or geometry. I said, “It falls under…who knows…I’ve never needed to use it. Maybe it’s for scientists.” Then, we looked over the lesson JD watched on Wednesday. It taught him math word problem solving strategies. It also taught him to look for the info that was important, how to organize the info, what strategy to use to solve the problem, and asked him to check to see if he answered the question correctly. (Sometimes those word problems can be tricky and full of unimportant information.) We worked together on a unit quiz and got a 70%. I’m not upset. It was asking which type of strategy to use out of the nine possible choices. So the possible answers were really based on preferences.

We stopped and had lunch. Lyndell asked earlier if she was going to be the “lunch lady.” I told her she didn’t have to be. During our lunch time we watched a new video series I ordered from the History Channel. It’s called “America: The story of US.” It was on the History Channel from April to June this year, but we didn’t watch any of it. I figured if I got a video of American History JD would remember it better. He LOVES the DVD! (Grammy and JD started watching it yesterday.) I had JD start over again so I could take notes on what we watched. The DVD is so PACKED with facts, names, place, etc…that my fingers cramped up just before the Boston Massacre. We learned about the Jamestown Settlement, the Plymouth Settlement, and started on the British nosing their way into the new life. I called for a pause because my fingers were tired.

We did science next. I reviewed with JD about traits and genes and ALL those new vocabulary words that we learned about last Friday. Then, we did seven short worksheets of reading and answering questions together. I ordered a 5th/6th grade science book from Amazon. It gives me many ideas about what to teach JD. It doesn’t really teach him, it’s more of a workbook. Today we learned about Gregor Mendel and his pea pod experiment where he crossed a green pea with a yellow pea. He was looking at seven specific traits on the experiment to see if the pea pods give the genes to make different peas. JD and I did a small experiment where I took two flat rocks and wrote an “X” and “Y” on either side of one rock and an “X” on both sides of the other rock. JD shook the and “rolled” them ten times. He did this to see what the chances were of having a boy or a girl. Turns out seven out of ten rolls produces a girl child. We talked about traits you can and cannot change. The last thing we did as a class was to find dominant and recessive traits in our classroom of three (thanks to Grammy.)

Today for Language Arts we worked on memorizing the “Parts of Speech.” If I can teach JD anything in a song or a rhyme he learns it quickly. So I found this cute little rhyme to remember the parts of speech.
Three little words you often see Are ARTICLES: a, an, and the.
A NOUN's the name of anything, as: school or garden, toy, or swing.
ADJECTIVES tell the kind of noun, as: great, small, pretty, white, or brown.
VERBS tell of something being done: To read, write, count, sing, jump, or run.
How things are done the ADVERBS tell, As: slowly, quickly, badly, well.

CONJUNCTIONS join the words together, as: men and women, wind or weather.
The PREPOSITION stands before a noun as: in or through a door.
The INTERJECTION shows surprise as: Oh, how pretty! Ah! how wise!
The whole are called the PARTS of SPEECH, Which reading, writing, speaking teach.

I took this poem and cut it up in pieces. After we repeated it three times I had him line up all the articles of speech and then the applicable words for each lined up under the correct category. He did pretty good.

Grammy sat on the couch most of the day. JD was more talkative today than most days. I think that’s because he had an audience. The word of the day today was “FOCUS.” I think Grammy did well in school today. She didn’t get in trouble once for talking.