Classical Conversations (CC), week 3-9

  I think we are finally getting in the CC groove at our home, so I thought I'd share the fun we have had the last few weeks.

This went with week 3's history sentence about the Boston Tea Party. This has been our favorite craft so far! My four year old even took his to his CC class for presentation and recited the entire sentence on his own.

Our favorite book from the library:

fun ways we have learned skip counting:

  

Our favorite review game that works at home AND at CC:

I wrote #1- #7 on the sticks for the appropriate weeks, and then I picked ONE category (History was first). At home I let my boys pick one stick each at a time, we did the history sentence that went with the week # they picked, and then I let  them put a piece of Mr. Potato head on his body.

 At CC, I have 7 kids, so they each picked a stick with #1-#7. The first round, they answered history sentence questions and put a piece on when they answered. The second round, they answered science questions and put a piece on when they answered. I took a picture of "History Mr. Potato Head" and we compared it to our "Science Mr. Potato Head" and they decided which one they liked the best.

 For week 8 game at CC, I prepared the snowball fight game for my kids at CC. I wrote questions on half pages of white paper. I had two teams (Team Olaf and Team Frosty) behind two different tables that were facing each other. When they answered the question as a team, they took turns rolling the paper into a paper snowball. At the end of the game, they had a snowball fight.As you can guess, my 6 year old thought the game was the best thing ever! He even wrote/drew about it the next day in his weekly journal:

So if you didn't already realize, I am a tutor at CC.

 Here are  3 examples of my weekly memory board for class time:

Two things make me giddy/happy: when CC and MFW (My Father's World) lessons correlate really well, and when my kids sing the CC songs because they want to.

He was SOOOOO excited that his words to learn from MFW was "to do" since we had just learned how to conjugate "to do" at CC!

My family could be a commercial for Mary Bryant songs:)

Singing Mary Bryant's circulatory system song to his baby cousin:

We also enjoyed going on our own Lewis and Clark Expedition (tying in the MFW Friday nature walk), finding new to us things, naming them, and drawing them in our nature books

-  like a weird looking fungus and a yellow spider.

Thank you , Lord, for this beautiful world you gave us to explore. May we never take it for granted.

Our Second Week of Classical Conversations ( CC, cycle 3, week 2) and a Minecraft Art Lesson

Week #2 was SO much fun with our CC group and at home. 

Most of our review time is spent saying and singing, but we also like to do worksheets. I find if we use different methods (verbal, written, visual,etc.) it sticks in our memories better.The printables you will see all come from the wonderful ladies of CC Connected.

My 6 year old's journal entry about the CC review game time:

History:

 This is a homemade Mayflower my kids decided to make just for fun:

Math and Latin:

Science (yes, they gave the skeleton clothes):

The take home from our community for art (mirror image) 

and science experiment (water drop magnify glass):

And then we decided to have fun with Minecraft and mirror image art at home:

I drew one side:

 and then my kids drew the other side, 

teaching them how to draw shapes with symmetry:

 They didn't want to stop!

And that was our week 2!

How I Organize Classical Conversations, My Father's World 1st Grade , and Pre-K

Ready to go to our first day of CC (Classical Conversations)

The boys were so excited to get to go to school! My first grader even made a comment that it was so cool that he had two schools- homeschool and CC! 

Here is our take home art and science from week 1:

We started My Father's World first grade (and Jonah's Pre-k) curriculum a month earlier just so I could figure out how to manage everything at the same time. How on earth do mother's of more than two kids keep things straight? I decided my method for mischief managed would be the workbox system. Here is my organization set-up:

When we are ready to start school (usually 9am), I say "Get me box #1 and #2!" The boys race to get the boxes out and bring them to the kitchen table.

Box 1: MFW  Bible assignments (including Proverbs memory work) and my teacher's manual

Box 2:  MFW 1st grade workbook and phonics worksheet for the day. Sometimes I will add an easy reader in there for him to read. 

Box 3: Classical Conversations flip book (memory work put on 4x6 cards in a $1 photo album from Melody Stroud on CC Connected) and any project/library book to add for the day. We also review/listen to the songs and work on all memory work for the week. This week somehow became an obsession with ships (because we are learning about the ships the Nina, the Pinta , and the Santa Maria).

 This was actually part of our MFW curriculum to learn the blend "Sh"- we cut out a ship and wrote other words that began or ended in "sh".

 Little brother wanted a fold out ship too, so I wrote the names of Columbus's ships on it for him, and we reviewed the history sentence together.

Box 4: Has the number of the day laminated/reusable page with beans, coins, and other items needed

YELLOW Box 4 is for my yellow loving 4 year old. He can get this box whenever he is ready (usually when big brother is working through box 2). It has his coloring worksheet for the day along, with the teacher's manual for his Sing,Spell, Read and Write Pre-k curriculum. 

Box 5: Math workbook pages and manipulatives for the day. (Usually I place a few of the pattern blocks in there to remind me to get the box out)

Even pattern blocks were used to make the Nina, Pinta, and the Santa Maria. This was all my four year old's idea:

We worked more on the skip 2's (from CC AND MFW)

My Father's World had the great idea of matching up socks, then looking at the matches as you skip count by two. This is a great visual for kids!(and a great way to get the socks organized). I actually used this when I tutored at CC and the 5 and 6 year olds liked counting the socks.

  Here they are putting two stickers in each box before they skip count by two:

Here they are singing the CC skip count by 2's song:

YELLOW Box 5: Pre-k extras for four year old (aka: what he gets when he wants more school). Other worksheet and library books

Box 6: Science and science related library books OR Art Project

our Science seed/ sprouts project

Art fun from Ed Emberley Book

Box 7: Read -Aloud book (right now we are reading a book about Squanto to get a head start on CC week 2)

BOX 8: Future worksheets (they do not pull this box out)

As I am a very visual when it comes to organizing things, I am hoping all my pics/visuals will help a fellow home-school mom who just needs to SEE how to put it all together.