Reflections on today & Assignments due 9/12/08

WHEW!!! We had a whirlwind of a day. I fell even more in love with your children today. At this rate, I'll have to move them all in with me after the first of the year! :)

The Board of Trinity is still working some kinks out of our room assignments. I arrived to a room that needed some prep so we got off to a chaotic start. We stopped and prayed and God came along side us, settled us (mostly me) down and we ended up with a very productive and busy day.

Many thanks to Terry Beach who helped us and was worked hard as our assistant. Last week, we had Beth Langehans helping, yet, I forgot to thank her. Thank you!

Here's the plan I'm trying for turning in your home assignments. All the work I assign, once it is finished, needs to be put into your student's assignment folder. When they enter our classroom the next class day, they will remove everything and turn all the completed assignments into the basket provided. They will then leave their empty folder beside the basket. As we proceed through the day, any work we do in class will be put into their folder along with homework pages to complete and graded homework that I am returning. When they arrive home, you can go through their folder with them and place any class work and returned homework into the appropriate section of their big binder and take note of the homework pages to be completed. Hope that makes sense. We'll give it a try and adjust as needed. NOTE: please be sure a name is on EVERY page turned in. Also, unless otherwise noted, science assignments will not be turned in. Just complete them in the book and leave them there.

Your children will soon know that History is my favorite subject to teach. I love the idea of you teaching and reading with them at home and then us coming together to bring the lessons alive in class. We were busy about this today! After discussing the Spanish explorations and quests for gold in South America, we went outside and tried to "taste" what being a native Indian slave was like. We panned for gold in a flowing river, we dug for gold in sand with sticks, and we crushed quartz in hopes of finding veins of gold dust. It was exciting! Ask your kids to tell you about it and hopefully some gold nuggets made it home for you to see.

As I'm learning more about the Classical model and putting it into practice with your students, I will be reading to them alot. I love to expose them to the literature that is suggested in Story of the World. I plan to keep you informed of the books your children listened to while they were with me. Here are the ones for 9/9/08:Rain Player (SOTW recommended), Montezma and the Fall of the Aztecs, and for science: Hurricanes, On the Same Day in March.

Assignments due 9/12/08:

Grammar:
Third Grade:
--review Lesson 4
--finish Exercise A that we started in class (some may have finished)
--complete Exercise B using Exercise A
--complete Review and Practice on page 25
Second Grade:
--review lesson 1 on pg. 10 with parent
--complete "Finding Sentences" on pg. 11
--review lesson 2 on pg. 12
--complete "For You To Do" at the bottom of pg. 12
--complete "More Practice and Review" on pg. 13

Literature:
--continue working on memorizing Psalm 23
--read ch. 3 and 4 (Pgs. 39--64)
--answer review questions

History:
--produce a narration on "The Riches of Spain" and illustrate it
--read the part of ch. 2 called "The Dutch Revolt"

Science: (I hope the rain guages made it home safely!:)
--review the sheets about predicting rain with your student and put them in their science notebook near the page explaining making the rain guages
--Use the sheet (top half of a page) that explains keeping a record of rainfall using their rain guages to help your child measure rainfall this week. Finish filling out their lab sheet #2 with them.
--bring one kindergarten-size, fat, new pencil in next week.

Latin:
--finish page 9

Bible:
--read ch. 101 on page 235--237 (this is taken from Daniel 3)
--draw a picture of the events in this chapter or write a short paragraph (3 sentences or so) telling what happened

I encourage you to enjoy the above science assignment with your child. If you're laying on your back examining clouds with your son or daughter, let it evolve into a time to just listen to them and notice how their thoughts meander. My preacher reminded us again this week of how much Christ loved children. Slow down and enjoy them!

love,
Mrs. Tkach
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