What Have We Learned?

So....we are two weeks in~still in a happy honeymoon phase! What have we learned so far?
We start each morning out with a cup of tea and the morning readings from:

 It's not intense learning time, but  those 5-10 minutes of picking out tea and finishing the readings ease us nicely into the school day.

MATH:

We spent these first two weeks working through the 26 Lessons of Hands on Equations. It was definitely easier than she needed but it was fun and a painless way to start thinking algebraically while holding a place in our schedule for math.  But I'm excited to begin our much more in-depth Algebra next week:

 from Art of Problem Solving.

GRAMMAR:
 This supposed 5th grade text was a little bit of an eye opener about grammar concepts we both usually use correctly but can't necessarily put into words!   In the first two chapters we have covered: Compound and Simple Subjects and Predicates, Helping Verbs, Verb Phrases, Subject Pronouns, Sentence Types, Diagramming Simple and Compound Sentences, Writing Paragraphs, Comma Splices and Diagramming Sentences Beginning with "There Is/Are".

VOCABULARY:
 Uses Latin and Greek roots to teach English vocabulary.  The first two lessons dealt with numbers and the key roots included:  monos, unus, duo, duplex, bi, tri, tres, quartus, quatour, decem and centum.  Roots that combined with those included: logos, arkos, gramma, polein, lithos, animus, latus, plicare, secare, athlon and gradus.  Words that were new to Kayla (or that she couldn't define clearly) included:  monologue, monolith, monogram, unilateral, bipartisan, triumvirate, quatrain, centenary and decimate.  She was also excited to understand why unanimous, monopoly and centrigrade mean what they do!

PHYSICS:

An area I haven't thought about in probably 17 years! We are both learning as we go (there may be calls to the scientific Auntie in our futures!)  We did a handful of simple experiments to experience the ideas of the first two chapters: speed, acceleration, the acceleration of gravity, vectors/scalars, Newton's Laws, mass vs. weight, terminal speed and some basic equations.

LATIN:

We are alternating Spanish and Latin so we only did Lesson 1: Vocab: amo, porto, laudo, oro, laboro.  First Conjugation: amo, amas, amat, amamus, amatis, amant.   But what she was really excited about was learning the Lord's Prayer in Latin. 

SPANISH:  Before our first trip to Mexico, we purchased a language program called Synergy Spanish. Kayla really picked up a lot from it in the months before traveled and is excited to learn more. We had done quite a few of the oral lessons, but not the written. So we went back to Lesson 1 and 2 and worked through the written exercises.  We also grabbed a bunch of children's books while we were in Mexico that have a simple 10 page story followed by activities~so we started in on Peter Pan.  We were excited to find out that between the words that she already knows and knowing the context of the Peter Pan story there were only a few words on each page that she needed to ask about.

HISTORY: The addition of the timeline to our kitchen and hallway walls was by far the most exciting part of history!  But we also read/talked about sections about European Imperialism (1750-1900) and India Under British Rule.  The topics that rose to the top in terms of interest were Queen Victoria and the Victorian Era and Rudyard Kipling....

LOGIC: 
  Basic definitions and introductions to the concepts of logic, simple apprehension, judgement, deductive inference, proposition, syllogism and  mental image. 

READING:  The daily report on this book is basically a barometer of whether it is more or less boring than the day before, with the occasional admission that she enjoyed a passage.  Definitely not her usual pick :)

ART/MUSIC: Daily piano practice,  read about James Whistler and added a couple of Kayla's favorite works to the time line.

OTHER ACTIVITIES:  Nature Walk with Dad and the dog, signed up for Post Crossings~looking forward to receiving some fun mail (and sneaking in some geography!)

WHAT'S NEXT?  She'll spend the first three days of next week at a "Homeschool Outdoor School" at a local(ish) 4-H camp.   I'm excited both because I loved outdoor school and she has never had a chance to go and because it will give me a chance to evalute and regroup.