Thursday, February 15, 2007

Medusa on Thursday

Today was a pretty busy day. 9 am came and Catherine wondered if sometimes she couldn't have some input into what work she did in a day. I said of course. We're trying to find a balance of our old unschooling values and newer approach and I welcome her contributions. She decided that she wanted to play on Starfall, a website with some fantastic phonics games and activities. Simple stuff but she's been slipping lately when it comes to sounding out short vowel sounds so it was the perfect idea. That was a good hour.

Next she went to her computer to play Imaginext: Battle Castle. It's a great game that seems to be, sadly, marketed only to boys. Bah. Girls can like building things and killing their enemies too!

After she was off the computer she pulled out a wildlife puzzle book and worked away at that for over an hour and a half as she watched cartoons.

After the puzzle we sat down with a piece of paper and talked about what her goals where for learning. She wants certain skills but has been reluctant when it came to sitting down to do some work. After talking we came up with being a fluent reader and writer and she decided that doing 'big math' was important as well. Her goals are now written on a piece of bristol board hanging in plain site. I plan to revisit them occasionally so we can talk about how much progress she's making. Hopefully it will help her focus on her work a bit more.

In the late afternoon a friend of Catherine's stopped by. This friend, I was earlier shocked to learn, had never heard of the greek gods! So today we sat down with the pattern for this mask craft and got to work. I cut out the pieces for them (I used bristol board instead of paper for the face part) and then read the story of Perseus to them as they coloured and glued. I also made a mask for Harry but I'm finding with him that right now, even holding a crayon or pencil is frustrating for him so he just played with the mask and had a ball. Here's a picture of Catherine's finished (with her revisions to the original pattern) mask.



After that, my sister came over so it was pretty much all about kids screaming as she chased and tickled them.

I read to Harry a bit today and have an appointment with him after this post is finished. The cute little guy also made me a present as I was typing the post with paper, glue and stickers. :)

It's now quiet time and Catherine's in listening to the second disk of the Odessey play.

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