Thank you all for your kind words and emails as I was sick - I was so glad to be able to come back on Wednesday! Here are a few highlights...
Over the last two weeks we have done so much! We of course have also learned through our explore time. Here, LE (who we are very happy to have back!) and HA are playing with playdough, but also enhancing fine motor skills, and their counting as they practiced how many they made! Addition came in when they counted the total.
Addition and subtraction has been a big focus of our math the last few weeks. We have started our math journal - every day we have a new question or prompt to get us thinking, and then we draw or write how we figured it out. Math journals emphasize the process as much as the product, which is especially important so that students can apply their skills to different situations.
We also got to explore a moth brought in by Mrs. B. from Grade 1/2. We loved seeing how it moved and hearing how it needed to dry its wings before it could fly!
We are getting good at knowing and using our decoding strategies - Stretchy Snake, Eagle Eye, Lips the Fish and all of their friends. We are expanding that now by adding comprehension critters, things to help them understand what they read. Questioning Owl (who is fortunate to live in a lovely garden now) tells us to ask questions about what we've read. We are practicing this and writing our own silly stories with characters, settings, and action to help with this and build our writing skills at the same time.
On Friday, we enjoyed the Grade 7/8 Hall of Faith, where students could throw stones (beanbags) at Goliath, knock over a heathen temple in Sampson's last act of strength, walk through the Red Sea, and more interactive activities. They also got to go up and talk to each character about God's work in their lives!
Next week we look forward to our class trip - these boys are all ready to go - and the Grade 8 graduation! We are getting lots of singing practice in for all of the events in the next few weeks!
