We are deep into fall here in the mountains.  The kids enjoyed the first snowfall of the season (although it was gone by the next day) and temperatures at night are in the low 20's.  The boys have began attending homeschool-enrichment classes on Wednesdays at Riverwood Community School, in Colville.  Smiley joins the mixed Preschool / Kindergarten class for a morning of crafts, stories, circle time games and songs, and outdoor play.  Caleb joins the mixed 1st / 2nd graders for Spanish class and knitting lessons, and participates in their outdoor play and story time.  The kids were very excited to join a few old friends and make some new ones.  I was happy that the enrichment classes will help round-out the academics we do at home.


Here's a bit of the fun and learning we've been up to:

Smiley has been working on letters M and N.  In addition to writing the letters and talking about the sounds they make, Smiley uses fun things like clay or Popsicle sticks to make letters.

Caleb worked on word lists, and paragraphs and illustrations about the stories and fables we are reading together.  He also started writing in a journal.  He loves that it is his choice what he writes about in the journal; even video game and movie characters are OK!  Caleb practices handwriting and reading daily.

Smiley listens to seasonal nature stories.  After one such story, he drew a picture of a tree that loses it's leaves in the fall, next to an evergreen that stays green all year.

Caleb also enjoys seasonal stories and we have been closely observe the weather changes.  He made a wind detector to see wind is made when air temperature changes.  He drew a picture of one experiment that uses hot, colored water that rises above cooler water.

We are practicing using maps.  Caleb copied symbols from a Washington State map after locating the different legend symbols on the map.  We have been watching a great BBC documentary called Wild China that has helped bring our Chinese stories and maps to life.

Smiley practices writing and counting numbers.  The picture shows him drawing a spider with 8 legs while practicing the number 8.

Caleb practices math every day.  He has been working on adding money and began reviewing subtraction facts.

The kids helped sew bean bags which we used for a variety of games.  Caleb actually sewed one completely on his own and it turned out great.

The kids also listened to the audio books of The Spiderwick Chronicles (we went through the whole series in one week), helped put our garden beds "to sleep" for winter, picked out library books to enjoy, danced to live music at a local Open Mic and played on their own recorders at home (they even put together a "show" of musical entertainment for Mom and Dad), helped cook dinner, took walks and exercised outside with friends, did puzzles, colored pictures, and lots more!