Memory Monday!

Do you do "memory work"?  If so, what sorts of things do you work at memorizing?  Do you think memory work is good for the mind (as in, a useful exercise)?

We are continuing memory work this year involving the first 16 Presidents of the United States.  My son has been writing out their names and dates in office as Italic cursive copywork for the first couple of weeks of school, too.

He is memorizing the Gettysburg Address and Oh, Captain! My Captain! (Can you tell we're studying the Civil War time period?)

He just memorized a one minute monologue called "Forbidden Fruit" last week for his audition for Junior Company, which is a theatrical group for middle schoolers meeting through our local children's theatre.  He will find out how he did on Wednesday!

He is memorizing terms related to our physical science studies.  The current list has to do with simple machines and concepts concerning those.  (I have these listed in my physical science post....)

He just started work on his next to last list of Latin words in Latin Primer III.  He'll be finished with that book soon and into the grammer books that go along with the series.... 

He continues practice of certain grammar lists memorized last year....  I believe that might be all right now - at least that's all my own poor memory can bring up out of the depths....

Regena

Week 4 Highlights - 2011....

~We went to see the Da Vinci exhibit at Frazier this week and it was terrific!  I loved being able to examine closely replicas of so many of his creations (as well as handling some of them).  We are doing physical science this year and just started working on simple machines.  It was cool to look at all the different types of applications Leonardo found for the screw and the gear....

http://www.davincithegenius.com/

~The new P.E. class is a testosterone filled rush!  I think it is going to be a great success....

~Trepidation over the try-out for Junior Company (a theater group) gave way to a great performance!  We won't know whether or not he got in until next Wednesday....

~ New books this week:

Across Five Aprils, Hunt; Sing Down the Moon, O'Dell; listened to Jim Weiss tape Mystery! Mystery! with stories by Poe, Doyle, and Chesterton

         









He just finished reading various Sherlock Holmes stories and I've got a book of Chesterton stories on hold (if the book ever gets returned - argh)....  We'll be studying Poe and attending several events related to his works during October....  Did you know he invented the mystery story?

~  First soccer game of the season is tomorrow!  (If the rain holds....)

Regena

The Week (3) in Pictures - 2011:

Walkin' on Sunshine!

What?  Don't you have kitty-cat breaks at your house?

Written work continues apace with all the aforementioned texts.  We covered Islam this week with the United Learning video series.  There's no lit/writing class next week, due to the Labor Day holiday, so he's stretching out his work in that class.  He has another set of study questions, a friendly letter, and another writing prompt for a paragraph (3 choices) due to finish up his study of Call of the Wild.

Almost finished with Volume 6 of History of US (and WHERE did those long, skinny legs come from, anyway?)

Reviewing Spanish with Live Mocha on Mom's laptop (on Mom's bed - but then making that bed just seems an invitation for someone to jump on it - happens EVERY day....)

Last Bubble-ology Lab!  We chose the garage this time in hopes of avoiding breezes that would pop our bubbles prematurely....

Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble!  Aren't the colors beautiful?  And the formula for the color sequence leading up to a pop really does work perfectly, too!

Taking a little quiz at the kitchen table over terms used in the course of this study, as well as working a practice problem on calculating the volume of a bubble sphere....

Enjoying lovely weather for the beginning of fall soccer practice....

I laid out a luncheon tea for him on Wednesday this week....

He has been reminding me (vigorously) that I hadn't done a tea for him since he was very little.  He is forgetting that I was involved in three large, group teas for a theatre group in which he and his brother were involved for several years when his brother was in middle school through ninth grade.  I think he was a little jealous that I did a tea for our ladies' group at church last week.  SO, I needed to use up the leftovers, anyway, and we didn't have to leave the house for any reason on Wednesday - tea time seemed like a win/win....

A good time was enjoyed by all.  Tea in your pj's is always fun, isn't it?

On Thursday we ate out before co-op classes began.  He got into the PE class he wanted to add, so we won't have time for this anymore for a while!  He's such a social butterfly now that he has to talk on the phone during lunch.  See that woven bracelet on his arm?  A GIRL made it for him at theatre camp.  She's going to audition for JR. Company (a year-long theatre group) along with him, too, so there will be MUCH more time for socializing....  OY....

We both are getting our hair cut on Saturday.  Just couldn't get over there before then....  I hope we don't have any accidental trips or falls before then; I'm as shaggy as he is....

Co-op Home Ec. and Physical Science seem to be going well.  I was instructed that we had to find a funny instance of junk science reporting for today's class in order to make a girl laugh (did I say OY?)  I was also instructed that I am not to tell anyone that he made a rice filled pin cushion last week (and quite well, by the way, for a first project).  "But what's wrong, aren't there any other boys in the class?"  Yes, as a matter of fact, it's all boys save for one poor, lone girl (LOL)....  His first sewing kit is a tackle box....

What are we reading this week?

He finished Call of the Wild and read "The Musgrave Ritual" from the Illustrated Junior Library edition of of The Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes, Doyle.  He's also reading The Hound of the Baskervilles (another Sherlock Holme's adventure by Doyle).

                        

I read from Haywood's Atlas of Past Times regarding America at the time of the Civil War and on into the opening of the 20th century.  We continued with the Marrin book.  I read a simple (but good) book entitled From Slave to Civil War Hero, about the life of Robert Smalls.  I had not read about him before.   I also began reading The Long Road to Gettysburg, Murphy, because I was getting complaints about not reading enough about the battles.... 

         

He continued with Roll of Thunder....

I read some from a volume of Emily Dickinson's poetry that we own....

He has been reading on his own time from many of my husband's civil war volumes.  Books I've found around the house include:

Fighting Men of the Civil War, William Davis

The Civil War: A Complete Military History, Douglas Welsh

The Civil War: Gettysburg, The Confederate High Tide, Champ Clark (Time-Life series)

I know he was taping the History channel programming "Gettysburg" last night, also, so that he can watch it this weekend.  He's gearing up for Perryville the second weekend of October.  It's a national

re-enactment this year and he's excited....

For science next week, we'll be starting an exploration of simple machines, moving into making Archimede's screws and Rube Goldberg devices.  I started him with some reading on the topic and he finished:

Castle Under Siege!  Simple Machines, Andrew Solway

Inclined Planes, Anne Weisbacher

Sensational Science Projects with Simple Machines, Robert Gardner

His fall chemistry lab began on Friday and they did chromatography work from the Illustrated Guide:

So that's our week - fall semester is almost in full swing!  I'm still working on field trips, but those are falling into place, too....  Hope all is going well at your house,

Regena