Six Week Report

Well, Gabriel's been home for six weeks now - it's been going very well and he's pleased and feeling on top of things. Our schedule has been a bit hectic - me working part time at the high school plus all the Christopherus stuff.... but he's done quite a lot. Here is a summary of all the things he's done in the past weeks (something I often advise homeschooling parents to do - to make a list of all the things their child has done over a period of ... a day? .... a week?... a month?.... just so they can see, as the unschoolers say, that "children learn all the time".):

 

* he's read Genevieve Foster's Augustus Caesar's World and is taking notes in preparation for writing a biography of Augustus.

 

* listened to me read Famous Men of Rome most mornings - we're almost finished with the book and we've had many good discussions of what we've read.

 

*memorised a couple of passages from Virgil's Aeneid in Latin and English.

 

*has been working on a beautiful Main Lesson book which contains passages from Virgil and Livy, his own composition and things I've written which he's copied or been dictated. He also has made a map of the Roman Empire, a drawing from a bust of Julius Caesar, other illustrations and a mosaic.

 

*He's about to start reading The Bronze Bow.

 

* He's worked faithfully through some Latin exercises every day - and in order to help him understand the Latin grammar, we've done a lot of grammar exercises and review in English. Now that he's motivated to learn this stuff - because he wants to learn Latin as well as German - he is finally taking it in.

 

* When he was at school his class had been having a Geology main lesson - he has continued with some studies of rock formations and continued to fill his main lesson book with beautiful illustrations, diagrams and descriptions of rocks and minerals.

 

* Each week I've given him a list of spelling words which he has worked on - each Friday he's had a spelling quiz.

 

* Most days he's played the piano for about 15 minutes - I am trying to carefully walk that line between requiring him to play - and letting his own interest inspire him to play. It's a bit hit and miss at the moment.

 

* The last week I asked him to switch from free choice math exercises to working on measurement (which somehow got missed earlier on) in the Key To... workbooks  we have. He has finished workbook 1 and has started on the second one on English units of measurement.

 

* He spends about 15 minutes three times a week working on a typing/keyboarding program on the computer.

 

* He spends about 15 minutes 4 times a week on the Rosetta Stone German language program - also on the computer.

 

* He has started to knit again - he finished a scarf and is now working on a hat.

 

* He read Rosemary Sutcliffe's The Lantern Bearers for enjoyment.

 

* And he did laundry, walked the dog, played monopoly and Battleship with a friend, vacuumed, prepared several meals, looked after the rabbit and helped keep the house cleaning moving along!

 

I guess he accomplished quite a lot!