Our Week in Review

This is what we learned about in school this week:

We continued learning about westward expansion, focusing on the gold rush. I did not realize that so many men traveled to California by the sea route, sailing all around Cape Horn at the tip of South America and back up the western side! It was actually safer to travel that way than to go overland, though it took longer. Amazing what men were willing to endure for the "promise" of riches. Some things don't really change over time, do they?

We also learned more about the presidency of Zachary Taylor. Though he grew up on a plantation and his family owned slaves, as president he was first and foremost concerned with keeping the union together. The tension between slave and free states continued to escalate during this period, every time a new state was added to the union and the question arose, would it enter as a slave state or as free? President Taylor worked tirelessly on the Compromise of 1850, but then tragically died after only 16 months in office, from eating tainted buttermilk and cherries on the 4th of July.

The Compromise of 1850 was a series of 5 measures that were passed after his death, and managed to delay the civil war for another 10 years. But as with all compromises, everyone had to give up something and no-one was really happy. As part of the compromise, California entered the union as a free state but also the Fugitive Act was passed which gave authority to federal officers in any state to return runaway slaves to their owners. As a result the underground railroad became very busy during this period. We will cover that in more depth during the next couple of weeks.

Our daughter G also read about the "mini" revolutions occurring in Europe during this same time period. Though all the uprisings were eventually put down, european monarchs were forced to be more sensitive to the demands of their citizens. The flames of freedom and representation were being fanned ever brighter!

Our read-aloud this week was (and is) Moccasin Trail by Eloise Jarvis McGraw. It's the story of a young man who lived with the Crow Indians for several years and then is reunited with his siblings (parents both died, mom died on the trail) on their journey west to Oregon. They must each learn to overcome their differences, accept each other, and truly reunite in order to survive the journey. It is good. Hard to put down!! We will probably finish this by the end of next week. The children have been playing quietly with their covered wagons while I read - it's time we all look forward to!

Since this is our first year with a child at the dialectic level, and that requires a significantly higher workload than before, we decided to delay the literature portion of Tapestry of Grace until we felt the history portion was going smoothly. Each week G reads from 5 or 6 different history books and answers about 10-12 questions in writing. She and I also have a mini discussion prior to her virtual co-op class on Thursday mornings. At first it was all she could do to finish all the reading before Thursday. Now, however, she is finishing her history reading and answering the questions more quickly, and we decided it was time to add literature to her workload. Most of the literature books are FUN. It is true pleasure reading, and the scripted literature discussions in my TOG teacher's book are just excellent. We started last week with the book The Princess and the Goblin by George MacDonald. I forgot how much I like George MacDonald! He is such a good writer, and we are both thoroughly enjoying this book. For my fellow TOGgers, this literature selection is a multi-week book that is scheduled to end during week 18. We started it in week 18, so we are going to be "behind" schedule, but I think it will be the perfect schedule for us.

Since instituting our new schedule this month, we have been able to have our latin lessons each week and we are slugging away with that! (I am struggling, personally)

Son C is on lesson 45 in Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons, and he is amazed at how he is able to read "long" stories now! (long = half a page of large print) I have not let him look ahead to where he is reading stories that are two pages long (small print) because I don't want him to be discouraged. He is doing great right where he is and it is thrilling to teach another of our children to read. I am so privileged to be the one that gets to do this! Next to life and Jesus and unconditional love, the gift of reading ranks way up there. Four down, one to go. :-)

In science we learned about bats. It is fascinating to learn what gentle and helpful creatures they really are! I think the movie industry has done a good job of making bats seem scary, aggressive, and enemies of humans. Practically the opposite is true! We learned that bats are a keystone species, meaning that other species depend on them for survival. Did you know that a bat colony can eat 6 million mosquitos in a single night!!!????? Yes, I said 6 MILLION! Can you imagine how inundated we would be with insects were it not for bats? The fruit eating bats also help pollinate and disseminate seeds. So they are a very helpful species of animal!

Sons L and G are working on subject/verb agreement in grammar. For Bible we read all of Matthew 7 and 8. We worked on memorizing Awana verses and poetry. I read lots of books to Little Man. He is on a Curious George kick. AND......(exciting news)......he SIGNED HIS OWN NAME in Grandma's get well card! Virtually without help. Big sister helped only a tiny bit. I didn't even know he knew any of the letters in his name beyond the first one!

We finished week 18 which means we are halfway through the school year. Amazing!

In other news, I did not walk once last week. Remember my goal is to walk 1 mile each day? Oops. It was an unusually full week. My mother in law spent the week in the hospital with cellulitis in her leg and it was a pretty severe case. I am so thankful my hubby is not working right now so he was able to spend lots of time with her. She is home now, and is on the mend. Thank you Lord! So, I'm not wasting energy lamenting last week. I will try to walk again this coming week. Somebody ask me if I did, okay?

I'm doing well with the 1 vegetarian meal a week/eliminating white sugar goals, but by the end of the week I am really tired of cooking. Please pray that I will choose joy in serving my family in this way, even on days 6 and 7!

And in truly happy news, my husband has acquired a short term freelance project which will pay one month's living expenses! Thank you for Your provision, Lord!