Essentials Week 21 (2017-2018)

In Class...

EEL

• Reviewed through an Easter egg hunt
• Placed the sentences found in the eggs on charts on the board that were like charts B, G, and M
• One board was for declarative sentences.  One board was for interrogative sentences.
• We categorized the sentences by structure and pattern.
• New (and last structure)--Compound-Complex
• last piece of our grammar/Chart A puzzle!
• reviewed what it takes to make a compound sentence and what it takes to make a complex sentence
• discussed how we already know the parts to a compound-complex sentence; we just need to put them together
• reviewed visual reminders of sentence structure (houses and a family)
• Verbals
• Only touched on this briefly, because of time
• Infinitives 
• Reviewed Foundations definition
• one of the 5 verb principle parts, so it still maintains it's verb-ness
• acts as an adjective, an adverb, or a noun--so can do any of their jobs in a sentence (i.e. SPIDO PONA noun usages)
• Used myself as an example--I am a woman.  I can be a mom, a teacher, a friend, a tutor, a wife, etc., but I am still a woman.  Verbals are that way.  They may be acting like a noun in a sentence, which means they can take on the noun usages and adjectives, but they are still verbs.  So, they can also take direct objects and adverbs like a verb.
• Diagrammed a compound-complex sentence with infinitives (similar to practice sentence 1 in this week's lesson in the EEL). 

Math

• Played Multiplication Fact Relay Races
• Played Number Neighborhood

IEW

• Students shared 1 paragraph from their FOH papers
• Reviewed what is expected for Faces of History
• 3-5 paragraph paper, written in 3rd person, following Unit 8 guidelines, due next Tuesday, April 3
• Presentation for Faces of History night (April 12) can be as simple the original paper read aloud or as elaborate as a presentation written on notecards or paper and given in the 1st person
• Presentations should be 2-5 minutes 
• Reviewed Introductions and Conclusions
• Introductions have 3 parts
1. attention grabber (handout from a few weeks ago is a good resource)
2. background information (introduce your subject)
3. state your topics/thesis statement
• Conclusions have 3 parts
1. restate topics (repeat/reflect thesis)
2. tell which topic is the most significant and why (Why is this person still remembered?  What can we learn from his/her legacy?)
3. final clincher (It may repeat/reflect the attention grabber, but it does not have to.  It needs to sum up entire paper.  The title of the paper will come from this.)

At Home...

**Remember--There is no way I can cover everything in our lessons in class.  You will need to read the lessons to see what I didn't cover, so you can cover the entire lesson at home during the week.  😊

**Also, don't forget about the separate blog post I made about what our day at home looks like.

EEL

• Review all charts as needed.
• P and Q are the new charts for this week.
• Practice charts B, G, M, and Q with a fun game like we did in class, using the sample sentences and trying to place them in the right places.
• Complete at least 1 ATS per day.  
• This week's practice sentences are set up wrong, in my opinion.  The easiest ones to do are 2, 3, and 5.  1 and 4 include verbals that might be above the heads of 1st year students.
• Optional--Editing exercises and Spelling List in EEL

This website is a great place to get your grammar and diagramming questions answered!

Math

• Practice and work on speed and accuracy of math facts through games and whatever method works for you and your student.

IEW

• Complete your Faces of History paper
• Should be 3-5 paragraphs long, including an introduction and conclusion
• Should be written in 3rd person
• Turn in a marked copy with a checklist on Tuesday for feedback and a clean final copy for the end of year published book.
• This project is not meant to be stressful, but fun!  
• It is part of the Unit 8 curriculum, but as with any other unit--modify to fit your and your student's needs!
• Try to get your presentation ready
• This can be as simple as reading the paper directly, or you can cut parts out of the paper or even rework it into a 1st person presentation.  This is entirely up to you!  Just be sure it fits into the 2-5 minute time frame!
• Practice--your child should be comfortable reading/presenting.  Have them practice several times.  They can do this in front of the family, in front of their toys, the dog, whoever will be a captive audience!
• If you are choosing to do a visual, be sure it is ready as well.

Reminders...

• Be sure to read your lessons for next week--Week 22 in EEL Guide and Unit 9 in the TWSS 

• We will begin covering Unit 9 in class this next week.  This is a fun unit on critiques and literary analysis

•  Faces of History--Thursday, April 12, 6:30pm
• I will be sending out a potluck sign up in the next couple of days.
• Be sure to be inviting friends and family!

• We will begin this week with having our students who are "graduating" to Challenge teach us a sentence during our EEL time.  Remember these can be any sentence of your choosing.
• Week 22 (April 3)--Ceci
• Week 23 (April 10)--Lauren
• Week 24 (April 17)--Elora

My Prayer for you this week...

I hope you are starting to see some "harvest" from your hard work during this school year!  Teachers, you have do a superb job with your Essentials students this year!  When we look back at how far they have come, it is nothing short of remarkable!  God has been our help and our strength, and He has seen us through!  The end is in sight!  Keep up the great work through these last few weeks!

Essentials Week 19 (2017-2018)

In Class...

EEL

• A HUGE "Thank you" to Lindsey for leading EEL on Tuesday!  She did an amazing job!  It was so fun to be in her class!  The EEL portion of this post comes directly from her.😄

• We reviewed Complex Structure, Interrogative Purpose, S-Vt-DO-OCN Pattern, Verbs, and Charts O, D, N (with O being a new chart [To Play])-Lastly, we compared Charts D & N to Chart O. Charts D & N are significantly more challenging since they are irregular verbs. Chart O (To Play) follows all of the regular conjugations for a regular verb (-ed ending for past tense, -ing ending for a present participle, and so on). Students worked to put a disassembled Chart O back together.
• A complex sentence consists of one independent clause and at least one subordinate (dependent clause).
• This structure first came to us in Week 13 and can be referenced there & on Chart M.
• The most common clauses in a complex sentence are adjectival and adverbial.
• Adjectival being who/which, and usually beginning with a relative pronoun (which becomes the subject pronoun of that clause) Relative pronouns are on Chart F.
• Adverbial being www.asia.wub beginning with a subordinating conjunction Remember that www.asia.wub are not the only ones – there are more listed on Chart H.
• We reviewed complex structure with the little sheet of sentences at the beginning of class. This could be a handy tool to review the other structures that were also mixed in.
• Interrogative Purpose asks a question. To change the purpose of a sentence to interrogative, remember the acronym CIA:
1. Change the end mark
2. Interrogative pronoun – change the subject to an interrogative pronoun
3. Add a helping verb to begin the sentence
• My sister called the skydiver a lunatic, though he considered himself a normal guy.
• My sister called the skydiver a lunatic, though he considered himself a normal guy?
• Who called the skydiver a lunatic, though he considered himself a normal guy?
• Did my sister call the skydiver a lunatic, though he considered himself a normal guy?* *see note in 'At Home' section
• Tasks 1-6 were completed with the above sample sentence. Thank you for your participation, students!
• S-Vt-DO-OCN Pattern – first introduced to us in Week 16. An object complement is a noun, it follows a DO, and it renames the DO (it will neither be in a prep. phrase, nor in a sentence with an IO). The OCN will rename what the DO has become as a result of the action of the verb.
• The sheet of sentences can also be used to compare the S-Vt-IO-DO pattern to the S- Vt-DO-OCN pattern because students will sometimes want to classify an S-Vt-IO-DO as an S-Vt-DO-OCN (see pg. 297 in EEL). The question confirmation for each word is crucial to distinguish the jobs of each word in a sentence, and it will serve to help students accurately identify the roles or job of each word.
• Verbs – we briefly reviewed verbs by using Chart C to verbally fill out the Quid et Quo for the verbs in our practice sentence: My sister called the skydiver a lunatic, though he considered himself a normal guy.
• Lastly, we compared Charts D & N to Chart O. Charts D & N are significantly more challenging since they are irregular verbs. Chart O (To Play) follows all of the regular conjugations for a regular verb (-ed ending for past tense, -ing ending for a present participle, and so on). Students worked to put a disassembled Chart O back together.

Math

• Played "Multiple Madness" 
• Use the number cards (and ace) from a deck of cards.  Deal out the cards to all players until they are gone.  Decide what multiples the group will work on (i.e. multiples of 2--2, 4,6,8,10,12, etc.).  These can be written down on a piece of paper or whiteboard.  Players lay one card down at a time and add to any previous cards laid down until the total reaches one of the multiples chosen.  The person who lays down the card to reach the multiple will keep all cards laid down (similar to the game of war).  Play ends when only one person is left with cards in their hand or when players choose to call the game.  (again similar to a game of war)

IEW

• Students read their "US Flag" papers in small groups.
• I really enjoyed reading their papers this week!  They were all so creative and descriptive!
• Began Faces of History 
• Practiced making a KWO from one of my source texts.
• Took that KWO and some from other source texts that I had already done to create a fused outline together.
• Assignment for this week:
• Find (if haven't done so already) the resources you will use--these really need to be simple for students to be able to understand them and get the information they need from them.  
• Try to have at least one book and not all source texts from internet articles.
• Should have at least 4 sources (not every source may have information about your child's chosen topic).
• Choose the topics that your child will write about in the body paragraphs.
• Read through the source texts and do the KWOs/Fused Outlines for each topic chosen on your child's Faces of History handout.

At Home...

**Remember--There is no way I can cover everything in our lessons in class.  You will need to read the lessons to see what I didn't cover, so you can cover the entire lesson at home during the week.  😊

**Also, don't forget about the separate blog post I made about what our day at home looks like.

EEL

• Practice Chart O using whatever method you/your student desire
• 2^nd and 3^rd year students could further disassemble Chart O for an even greater challenge.Practice Chart O using whatever method you/your student desire. 
• Review other verb charts from past weeks, including the verb anatomies
• Parse and diagram at least one practice sentence daily. 
• First-tour students can try to complete tasks 1-4, while experienced students should go on to tasks 5 and 6. 
• Sentences 1-4 are pretty normal this week. 
• Do remember that verb phrases will be identified together in the question confirmation, and they will also be diagrammed together. This can come into play often with the interrogative purpose. Changing the purpose to declarative can often help you put the verbs back together if they are separated in the original interrogative sentence. 
• This can be seen when we added a helping verb to the first clause of our practice sentence: Did my sister call the skydiver a lunatic... your verb phrase is did call, and it will be diagrammed together.
• Scale for your student as you see necessary! This includes chart practice, what kinds of sentences you use in your daily practice, and how far you go with the tasks.
• Use he sheet of sentences handed out and the picture of the color-coded chart I mentioned in class. There really are so many ways this work can be reviewed! Try noticing patterns on the verb anatomy charts. How many patterns can your student find?
• Optional--Editing exercises and Spelling List in EEL

Math

• Practice and work on speed and accuracy of math facts through games and whatever method works for you and your student.

IEW

• Work through as much as you can of Phase 1 of the Faces of History handout.
• Remember, we will have Spring Break after next week's class, so that will give you some extra time to work through these tougher weeks (research, KWO/Fused Outline, and rough drafts).
• Scale as you see fit.
• You can just do 1 or 2 source texts. 
• You can just do 1 or 2 topics (body paragraphs). 
• This project is not meant to be stressful, but fun!  
• It is part of the Unit 8 curriculum, but as with any other unit--modify to fit your and your student's needs!
• Be sure to bring your resources and any KWO/Fused Outlines with you to class this week.

Reminders...

• Be sure to read your lessons for next week--Week 20 in EEL Guide and Unit 8 in the TWSS and the Faces of History handout.

• Our final Pudewa night is next Thursday, March 29.  Location is TBA

•  Faces of History--Thursday, April 12, 6:30pm
• This does give you an extra week to prepare for the presentation, but we will be doing most of our last unit in IEW (unit 9) before this, so don't procrastinate and not be able to do/enjoy the last unit, which is a fun one!

My Prayer for you this week...

May you find strength through Him! 

Essentials Week 18 (2017-2018)

In Class...

EEL

• Reviewed (board work) with a fun game of "Find Someone Who..."  
• I think the kids had a great time, and I heard many repetitions of the memory work from the EEL charts!
• Played a fun game of Living Sentences.
• This is a challenge of a game, but I always enjoy it and think it really stretches our minds!
• Reviewed finding the sentence patterns in different sentences, particularly those with reflexive pronouns in the direct object and indirect object spots.
• Went through all 6 tasks on the Analytical Task Sheet for the sentence: "Consider her a good friend because she prays for you."
• Always remember to ask questions!  I don't know if you aren't understanding something if you don't speak up!  😊

Math

• Allowed students to vote for our math game today.  They chose SNAKE.  It is always a fun one!
• I'd love to hear any ideas you have for fun math games or ones that you or your student would like to play again!

This is a fun one we haven't played yet this year, but it is easy to do at home!

IEW

• Students read their "hopes and dreams" papers in small groups.
• I thoroughly enjoyed reading their papers this week!
• Great job students & teachers!
• Introduced new sentence opener and decoration
• #6 sentence opener is a short sentence
• Must be only 2-5 words.
• "an occasional short sentence can pack a punch in paragraphs that otherwise have intricate and lengthy sentences."--A. Pudewa
• 3 Short Staccato Sentences Decoration
• similar to #6 opener in that it is short sentence of 2-5 words
• must be 3 together, in a row
• can double count as a #6 opener as well
• best to be all same length or of descending length
• Continued with Unit 7
• Lesson 23--Nationalism--The American Flag
• Brainstormed places where the American flag might be found
• Looked at pictures of some places where a flag is found
• discussed a few things a flag might see, think, etc. in those places
• talked briefly about personification and pretending to be the flag
• Briefly Introduced Faces of History and handed out resource packets

This is a funny video by the late Robin Williams on the American flag.  He actually personifies the flag like what our students are to do on this assignment.

At Home...

**Remember--There is no way I can cover everything in our lessons in class.  You will need to read the lessons to see what I didn't cover, so you can cover the entire lesson at home during the week.  😊

**Also, don't forget about the separate blog post I made about what our day at home looks like.

EEL

• page 284-285 (286-7) in EEL--"At Home" section
• Review all charts and work towards mastery of all 
• Analytical Task Sheet
• Try to complete 1 practice sentence each day 
• Sentences 1, 2, 3, and even 4 this week are basic and easy enough for anyone 
• Sentence 5 is definitely more advanced!
• Don't forget the answers to each of the sentences are in the lesson and laid out step by step.
• 2nd and 3rd year students should be doing tasks 5 and 6 (quid et quo)
• 1st years students who are moving on to challenge should try to do tasks 5 and 6, at least some parts of each sentence.  Remember you can modify Quid et Quo to keep it simple.  (i.e. just do adjectives this week)
• Other 1st year students can just be focusing on tasks 1-4 and mastering those
• Remember the section in Lesson 3 that gives all of the details for the ATS, and remember the steps are laid out for you on each sentence's page.
• Also, you can create your own sentences by simply changing part of speech for part of speech.
• Week 18 (and with our break) is a great time to assess your student!  Suggestions for this are found on page 284 (286) in the EEL Guide
• Optional--Editing exercises and Spelling List in EEL

Math

• Practice and work on speed and accuracy of math facts through games and whatever method works for you and your student.

IEW

• Lesson 23
• This is only one paragraph, but what a fun one to do!
• Don't forget about vocabulary words!
• There are flashcards for these in the back of the student US history book
• Reminders:
• EZ+1---only require of your student what dress-ups, decorations, and sentence openers he/she can do on their own easily, plus one more as a challenge
• You cannot help too much! 
• Model KWO, the writing structure, etc.
• Many times the KWO is the hardest part for our students.  Help them get through that, and they can possibly write the paragraph on their own.
• Hands ON structure and style.  Hands OFF content.
• Process over Product!
• With the break, feel free to just take a break!
• However, if you want to work on something, you can cover lesson 22 or 24 with your student, as these are both unit 7 lessons
• Or, you can begin the research part of Faces of History
• See the packet for information.  
• Feel free to ask me any questions!

Reminders...

• Enjoy your break next week!

• Be sure to read your lessons for the week we return (March 6)--Week 19 in EEL Guide and Unit 8 in the TWSS (we will begin this unit, which is the Faces of History project on March 6)  We will not be working out of the US History books for this unit.

• Our next Pudewa night is next Thursday, March 1, at Holly Collins home, at 6:30pm  

•  Faces of History :  Be thinking about (and even discuss with your child) about the visual component of this project.  We will vote whether to keep it as a part of it or not when we return from break.

My Prayer for you this week...

May you experience some stillness and our Lord's presence this week!

Essentials Week 17 (2017-2018)

In Class...

EEL

• Reviewed (board work) by identifying all of the adjectives in the sentence "Old farmer John painted some parts of his barn bright purple, although he was colorblind and thought it was red."
• Some good dialectic discussion came about through this!  
• Remember grammar is not a science.  It is an art! There is not always one correct answer to every single situation.
• This is the sample sentence on page 268/270 in the EEL Guide.
• Review/Fun Activity--Adjectives about our Friends
• I hope the kids enjoyed getting to come up with adjectives to describe their friends as well as reading the adjectives that were written about them!
• Final Sentence Pattern!!---S | Vt | DO \ OCA
• exactly like OCN, except it is an object complement adjective, which means it describes the direct object
• uses the same verbs as for a direct object
• and, as seen in this week's practice sentences, synonyms of those verbs can also be used.
• Remember:  OCN and OCA complete the thought begun with the verb and direct object
• not "God calls us" or "God calls beautiful"
• but "God calls us beautiful."
• Remember sentences with an OCA or OCN will not have an indirect object 
• Always remember to ask questions!  I don't know if you aren't understanding something if you don't speak up!  😊

Math

• Valentine Candy Math
• BoardSlam/Number Knockout with the official competition board
• We did very well!  We only left 9 numbers after working on the board for less than 10 minutes!

IEW

• A few students read one of their topic/clincher combinations.
• Teacher Valentine Activity to Review Dress-ups, Decorations, and Sentence Openers
• I hope you each enjoyed the notes you received.  The ones I read as I walked around were precious!
• Thank you all for being flexible and completing this activity for each other!
• Continued with Unit 7
• Lesson 21--adding an introduction and conclusion to our papers we began last week
• Conclusion should be written first
• Take time to write a KWO before writing paragraph
• KWO should include:  
1. Restate topics
2. Tell which topic was most significant/important and why
3. Final Clincher--repeats/reflects from introduction paragraph
• Page 164 in USHBW book and page 109 in TWSS
• Introduction has the main jobs of capturing the reader's attention and introducing the paper
• Different kinds of attention grabbers (handout) and page 137-138 in SRP
• Write KWO before writing paragraph
• KWO should include:
1. Attention grabber
2. introduce subject (no "this paper is about...")
3. Give background information (if needed)
4. mention the topics (but don't give everything away!)

At Home...

**Remember--There is no way I can cover everything in our lessons in class.  You will need to read the lessons to see what I didn't cover, so you can cover the entire lesson at home during the week.  😊

**Also, don't forget about the separate blog post I made about what our day at home looks like.

EEL

• page 272 (274) in EEL--"At Home" section
• Review Charts L, M, and N, especially, but work towards mastery of all 
• Analytical Task Sheet
• Try to complete 1 practice sentence each day 
• Sentences 1, 2, and 3 are basic and easy enough for anyone this week
• Sentences 4 and 5 are definitely more advanced!
• Don't forget the answers to each of the sentences are in the lesson and laid out step by step.
• 2nd and 3rd year students should be doing tasks 5 and 6 (quid et quo)
• 1st years students who are moving on to challenge should try to do tasks 5 and 6, at least some parts of each sentence.  Remember you can modify Quid et Quo to keep it simple.  (i.e. just do adjectives this week)
• Other 1st year students can just be focusing on tasks 1-4 and mastering those
• Remember the section in Lesson 3 that gives all of the details for the ATS, and remember the steps are laid out for you on each sentence's page.
• Also, you can create your own sentences by simply changing part of speech for part of speech.
• Optional--Editing exercises and Spelling List in EEL

Myra saw this picture the other day and thought that we needed to try to "undiagram" this one in class.   I'm not sure the students are up for it, but I think you all can probably figure it out!  😉

Math

• Practice and work on speed and accuracy of math facts through games and whatever method works for you and your student.

IEW

• Lesson 21
• You will add an introduction and conclusion to the 1-3 topic paragraphs you wrote last week on "hopes and dreams"
• Don't forget about vocabulary words!
• There are flashcards for these in the back of the student US history book
• Reminders:
• EZ+1---only require of your student what dress-ups, decorations, and sentence openers he/she can do on their own easily, plus one more as a challenge
• You cannot help too much! 
• Model KWO, the writing structure, etc.
• Many times the KWO is the hardest part for our students.  Help them get through that, and they can possibly write the paragraph on their own.
• Hands ON structure and style.  Hands OFF content.
• Process over Product!

Reminders...

• Be sure to read your lessons for next week--Week 18 in EEL Guide and Lesson 23 or 24  in USHBW book. **We will be drawing for teacher prizes next week!

• Our next Pudewa night is scheduled for March 1.  We still don't have a location, if someone would like to volunteer to host.  Our theme is Pizza and Pudewa.

•  Faces of History :  Go ahead and be looking for and even reading resources.  That will prepare you for when we actually begin writing.  We will only have around 1 week for research (KWOs and Fused Outlines), so having resources already in place that you know will work will save a lot of time!

• I plan to hand out Faces of History instructions next week.  I won't go over it much, as we won't officially begin on it until week 19.  However, since we will have a week off in between week 18 & 19, I thought some of you might want to get a head start.  I can't believe its already that time!

My Prayer for you this week...

We are finishing up the 3rd quarter of this CC school year!  It is so hard to believe that we have already come so far!  If you are fretting over what you may be behind on or may have skipped over hoping to come back to, stop!  We must not worry or fret, but simply keep our eyes on the goal (what God has called us to--disciple, raise, and homeschool our children).  If we keep our eyes on the goal and the One who set that God for us, the Author and Finisher of our faith, we will never have anything to worry or fret over!  He has it all under control!

God's got this!

Essentials Week 14 (2017-18)

In Class...

EEL

• Reviewed (board work) by studying a variety of review questions.
• Then played "Puffballs" with those questions, but without looking at our charts.
• Remember, this is an easy review game to replicate at home for anything!  (We use it mostly for Foundations review).  Simply gather some craft puffball/pompoms in different colors (or you could use colored cards, popsicle sticks, etc).  Assign points (some positive, some negative, some 0) to each color.  As students answer questions, they draw out a color and receive the points assigned to that color.  The game is never the same twice!
• Reviewed some of last week's lesson on Complex Sentences.  We mostly discussed adjectival clauses last week (begin with relative pronouns, IEW's who/which clauses, act like adjectives--modifies nouns/pronouns).  Today, we discussed adverbial clauses more.
• Adverb clauses begin with a subordinating conjunction.  They are IEW's www.asia.wub clauses.  They act like adverbs, modifying verbs usually.
• Discussed briefly active and passive verbs.
• Active verbs are when the subject is doing the action of the verb.
• "Cooper feeds his dogs."
• Passive verbs are when the subject is receiving the action of the verb.
• "The dogs were fed by Cooper."
• Only Transitive verbs can have a voice (be active or passive).
• When changing from active voice to passive voice, the Direct Object will become the subject.  The subject will become the direct object.  If there is an indirect object, it will need to find its pronoun again ("to" or "for").
• "Myra made Lily pancakes." becomes "The pancake were made by Myra for Lily."
• In an active voice sentence, an Indirect Object is just a prepositional phrase that ran away from its preposition to hang out with the Direct Object and now has to answer to that preposition in the question confirmation (to whom/what? or for whom/what?)
• In a passive voice, the Direct Object decides he is in charge and does not want to be Direct Object any more.  He wants to be the star--the subject.  Since Indirect Objects can't hang out without Direct Objects,  IO has to go find its preposition again.  
• Active and Passive voice may be above the heads of 1st year students.  No worries!  Just skip it.  Touch on it briefly with 2nd year students to begin their understanding.  3rd year students should try to completely understand it and even be able to write sentences that switch back and forth.  As they move on to Challenge,  active and passive voice become important in Latin.
• Always remember to ask questions!  I don't know if you aren't understanding something if you don't speak up!  😊

Math

• Four in a Row with partners
• There are several versions of this game.  I've searched, but I cannot find the link to the printable I used.  If you do a quick Google search, though, you should get several to pop up.
• Card Slam
• This is another easy one to replicate at home.  All you need is a deck of cards.  Say the operation and number before you turn the card over (i.e. "add 3").  First person to say answer with the turned over card keeps the card.

IEW

• Read entire papers in small groups.
• Used cards to identify dress-ups we heard.
• Reminded of what is expected for papers turned in.
• 1st--It is NOT required to turn a paper in every week!  You are the teacher, and you decide what your student does each week.  However, I do encourage you to have your student complete at least one paper per unit, at minimum.  
• My personal recommendation is to try to do a paper each time one is assigned, but adapt it to fit your student (i.e. maybe only do a KWO one week or only take a paper through the rough draft another week or have your student only do one paragraph when 2-3 were assigned)
• REMEMBER--It is process over product.  Skipping doing the work is not allowing your child to learn from the process.  The final product is not important!
• If your child does turn in a paper and they/you want feedback, please follow these guidelines:
• 1 copy marked with dress-ups, etc.
• checklist signed by teacher (feel free to write me any notes here!)
• 1 "clean" copy for their end of the year books (Even if you don't want feedback, please turn in any papers to be placed in your child's book.  It really is a wonderful keepsake at the end of the year!)
• Answered questions regarding Unit 6 and this week's assignment.
• Remember to put "source name" at top of each KWO
• Remember Roman Numeral "I" is for the topic.  Should write something such as: "I. Topic--Alexander Graham Bell"  This will turn into the topic sentence, which each paragraph will need.
• Paragraphs come from the Fused Outline.
• Don't forget to write the clincher!
• Sentence Openers
• Reviewed why these are needed with a paragraph that had all subject openers
• Reviewed prepositional (#2) openers.
• Discussed -ly (#3) openers, since I failed to cover them in class last week
• Learned about -ing (#4) openers
• Remember: the thing after the comma (the subject) must be the thing doing the inging!
• Easy way to create these--decide what two actions your subject will be doing and move one to the front with an -ing ending.

At Home...

**Remember--There is no way I can cover everything in our lessons in class.  You will need to read the lessons to see what I didn't cover, so you can cover the entire lesson at home during the week.  😊

**Also, don't forget about the separate blog post I made about what our day at home looks like.

EEL

• page 222-223 (224-225) in EEL--"At Home" section
• Review Charts A, E, H, I, L, and M 
• 2nd and 3rd year students can be studying Advanced Chart DD
• Work on the vocabulary words and definitions at the beginning of each lesson covered so far.
• The names and definitions of the parts of speech are especially important!
• Analytical Task Sheet
• Try to complete 1 practice sentence each day 
• Sentences 1, 2, and 3 are basic and easy enough for anyone this week
• Sentences 4 and 5 are a bit more advanced, but don't have anything we haven't covered.  They just include adjectival phrases modifying the object of a preposition.  Since prepositional phrases are hard enough in and of themselves, these 2 practice sentences are definitely harder.
• Also, all of this week's sentences are still adjectival subordinate clauses.
• Don't forget the answers to each of the sentences are in the lesson and laid out step by step.
• 2nd and 3rd year students can be doing task 5 and even 6 (quid et quo), but 1st years should just be focusing on tasks 1-4
• Remember the section in Lesson 3 that gives all of the details for the ATS, and remember the steps are laid out for you on each sentence's page.
• Also, you can create your own sentences by simply changing part of speech for part of speech.
• Optional--Editing exercises and Spelling List in EEL

Math

• Practice and work on speed and accuracy of math facts through games and whatever method works for you and your student.
• Arcademics is a website we enjoy this time of year.  It is normally a paid site for many of the games.  However, for the next couple of weeks, you can get a free trial to participate in their "Arcademics Cup" which is a competition of earning points through playing their multiplication games.  I believe the competition is the 1st and 2nd of February.

IEW

• Lesson 17 & 18 from the US History Based Writing book
• Over the next 2 weeks, we will combine our writing into one 2-3 paragraph essay about inventors.  This week you are to choose either Thomas Edison from lesson 17 or Alexander Graham Bell from lesson 18.  Then, do KWOs from each source text about the chosen inventor, create a fused outline, and write a paragraph about that inventor.
• 1st year students are encouraged to choose 1 this week and another next week.
• 2nd and 3rd year students should try to do all 3 inventors.
• Papers can be brought to class for sharing this week, but wait to turn in your clean copy for memory books until the entire essay is completed.
• Don't forget the brainstorming in each lesson. 
• Don't forget about vocabulary words!
• There are flashcards for these in the back of the student US history book
• Reminders:
• EZ+1---only require of your student what dress-ups, decorations, and sentence openers he/she can do on their own easily, plus one more as a challenge
• You cannot help too much! 
• Model KWO, the writing structure, etc.
• Many times the KWO is the hardest part for our students.  Help them get through that, and they can possibly write the paragraph on their own.
• Hands ON structure and style.  Hands OFF content.
• Process over Product!

Reminders...

• Be sure to read your lessons for next week--Week 15 in EEL Guide and Lesson 19  in USHBW book. 

• Our next Pudewa night is scheduled for February 1 at Jennifer Clinehen's home. Please see email sent out concerning this

•  Faces of History :  Go ahead and be looking for and even reading resources.  That will prepare you for when we actually begin writing.  We will only have around 1 week for research (KWOs and Fused Outlines), so having resources already in place that you know will work will save a lot of time!

My Prayer for you this week...

I pray that you find yourself trusting in our Lord and keeping your mind focused on Him this week, so that He may keep you in perfect peace!

Essentials Week 10 (2017-18)

In Class...

EEL

• Reviewed (board work) by parsing and diagramming a simple, S | Vl \ PN sentence.
• Reviewed sentence structures and parts of speech through "Living Sentences."
• New Part of Speech--Adjectives
• Definition and Questions can be sung to "The Ants Go Marching."
• Chart L
• Learned through a sample paragraph that highlighted each type of adjective 
• explanations for each can be found on pages 161-162 (163-164) in the EEL Guide
• I intended to compare Adjectives and Adverbs and the different questions they answer in a sentence in class; however, we ran out of time for it.
• This is something that would be good to go over at home!
• New Sentence Pattern--S | Vl \ PA
• Subject--LinkingVerb--Predicate Adjective
• Very similar to S | Vl \ PN.  Diagrammed in same way
• Question Confirmation changes to "Can ____ rename or describe the subject?"
• A good help for this is helping your student look at what part of speech the "verb what?" is.
• If it is a noun then it will either be a direct object or a predicate nominative--if it can rename/replace the subject.
• If it is an adjective, it will describe and cannot be a noun.  
• See page 164/6 in the EEL
• Some of the linking verbs can also be used as transitive verbs (not the "to be" verbs).
• look for what the subject is/can do.
• page 163/5 in the EEL

• We also practiced for EIE next week.  
• We are doing all of chart A with the other class.
• Be sure your child knows all of chart A (including the sample sentences, if possible. (If not, the 2nd and 3rd year students that know those can probably carry the rest of us!) 😀

Cute Visual to use for practicing this week's and last week's sentence patterns.

You could do this on laminated sentence strips to where you could replace the words on either side of the verb.  (I'm not artistic enough to make the hands.  I'd probably just cut holes out of my rectangular sentence strips!) 😉

Math

• Whole class board slam, trying to knock off the numbers for each other's birthdays. 
• Did anyone ever get the numbers we missed?
• www.nationalnumberknockout.com

IEW

• Read entire papers in small groups.
• Used cards to identify dress-ups we heard.
• Shared some of the dress-ups we heard with the entire class.
• New Advanced Style--Dual Dress-ups
• Two adjectives, adverbs, or verbs used as a dress-up
• A dual verb can replace a strong verb dress-up
• TWSS page187
• USHBW, blackline masters page 14
• SRP, page 143
• New Unit--Writing from Pictures, unit 5
• This unit is so fun and gives quite a bit of freedom for our students to be creative.

• Remember:  Hands off content.  Hands on structure and style!
• We want to teach them how to write well.  What to write will come as they mature and learn in other areas.
• This is NOT story sequence (like unit 3), but rather an "event description."
• Each picture should be done separately, not as a whole group.
• However, they can (and should put all three together at the end to create a story)
• We just want to do a separate KWO and paragraph for each picture.
• To get ideas, we ask questions (5W's +1, and others)
• These are listed on the outlines in the SRP,  USHBW, portable walls, and in the TWSS
• 1st line of KWO is the central fact
• This is what we see in the picture--the facts--what everyone can see.
• The other lines are where they can come up with ideas of what happened before the "picture was taken" or why things are happening.
• Each paragraph needs a clincher sentence.
• This should still repeat or reflect the topic sentence (which is the central fact in this unit)
• Final Clincher, the clincher in the last paragraph, is what will be used to create the title.
• Past Perfect Tense
• When writing an event description, you will write in past tense.
• When wanting to give what happened before the event in the picture that you are describing, you will want to use the past perfect tense (uses the word "had").
• It is the "past of the past"
• TWSS page 70, USHBW page 107, SRP page 38
• Chart BB (in the excursions section of the EEL) is also a great explanation of this

At Home...

**Remember--There is no way I can cover everything in our lessons in class.  You will need to read the lessons to see what I didn't cover, so you can cover the entire lesson at home during the week.  😊

**Also, don't forget about the separate blog post I made last week about what our day at home looks like.

EEL

• page 166 (168) in EEL--"At Home" section
• Study Chart L (adjectives)
• Continue practicing all charts learned so far (A through K)
• Work on the vocabulary words and definitions at the beginning of each lesson covered so far.
• The names and definitions of the parts of speech are especially important!
• Analytical Task Sheet
• Try to complete 1 practice sentence each day 
• Sentences 1, 2, and 3 are basic and easy enough for anyone this week
• Sentences 4 and 5 are a bit more advanced, but don't have anything we haven't covered.  They just include adverbs modifying adjectives, which may be a bit advanced for our first year students.
• Don't forget the answers to each of the sentences are in the lesson and laid out step by step.
• 2nd and 3rd year students can be doing task 5 and even 6 (quid et quo), but 1st years should just be focusing on tasks 1-4
• Remember the section in Lesson 3 that gives all of the details for the ATS, and remember the steps are laid out for you on each sentence's page.
• Also, you can create your own sentences by simply changing part of speech for part of speech.
• Optional--Editing exercises and Spelling List in EEL

Math

• Practice Number Knockout at home
• Practice and work on speed and accuracy of math facts

IEW

• Lesson 13 from the US History Based Writing book
• Don't forget the brainstorming in each lesson. 
• If you need to modify the writing for your student, feel free to just have them do one or even two pictures.  
• Or, if they need more of a challenge, have them write extra paragraphs about pictures that might have happened in between the ones in the book or before/after the ones shown.
• Don't forget about vocabulary words!
• There are flashcards for these in the back of the student US history book
• Reminders:
• EZ+1---only require of your student what dress-ups and decorations he/she can do on their own easily, plus one more as a challenge
• You cannot help too much! 
• Model KWO, the writing structure, etc.
• Many times the KWO is the hardest part for our students.  Help them get through that, and they can possibly write the paragraph on their own.
• Hands ON structure and style.  Hands OFF content.
• Optional--Bring a completed paper to turn in and share on Tuesday
• This should be a marked copy with checklist (signed by the teacher), if you want feedback.
• Inspect what you expect!
• You, as the parent, are the teacher!
• Should also have a clean (and even illustrated) copy for the published student book

Reminders...

• Be sure to read your lessons for next week--Week 11 in EEL Guide (it is review weeks for the next two weeks!) and Lesson 14  in USHBW book. 

• We will not have another Pudewa night until after break.  Thanks for all of your hard work this semester.

• Our ice cream party will be during the last part of class during week 12.  Not everyone had a chance to sign up this week.  I will send out the completed list for your reference/reminder once everyone has had a chance to sign up.

•  Faces of History is already on many kids' (and some parents) thoughts.  For character choices, anyone who has made a historical impact on US history is acceptable.  If you'd like a list, the website below is a good one, or I can bring some ideas to class, if anyone wants.  Please let me know once you have decided (no rush to do so at this time...just some already want to!).  It will be nice to not have any duplicates to make the evening more interesting!

100 Most Significant Americans in History--great website from the Smithsonian

My Prayer for you this week...

4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.                      ---Deuteronomy 6:4-9

Whenever someone asks me why we homeschool, the above passage is almost always my answer (along with it is what God has called our family to do).  When Lara was just starting school, Larry and I attended a conference where God truly convicted both of us on how we were going to raise our children and how we conducted our ministry at church.  We as parents are to be the primary teacher and discipler of our children.  What an honor God has bestowed upon us!  And, what an amazing privilege we have as homeschool parents to bring God's teaching into every aspect of our children's lives, including their "academic education!"  

I'm praying for you always as you train your students "to know God and to make Him known!"   

Our Week at Home (for a first year student)

EEL

Day 1 (after community day)

1.  Practice Sentence #1 from EEL Guide

• First, I dictate the sentence to my student, who will usually write it on a laminated copy of the ATS (with dry or wet erase marker)
• Sometimes she also will write on a paper copy of the ATS chart.
• We like to use the chart, because of the handwriting lines that also give her some penmanship practice.
• As the sentences get longer, we will begin using regular penmanship paper, wide ruled paper, or even just blank copy paper.  
• Second, I work with my student to follow the question confirmation flow and label each word in the sentence.
• Several versions of this are available:
1. Directly on the sentence page in the week's EEL lesson
2. On the back of the Quid et Quo trivium table
3. Different options from CC Connected
• Username LauraBettis has one similar to the one pictured below
• My personal favorites are below
• I usually use both of these in conjunction with each other.
• Both of these came from fellow tutors and are not on CC Connected, but I'm happy to provide a copy, if desired.

 Front Page of my favorite one.  The only things I change are we underline the propositional phrase and we put brackets around each clause as we identify it.

 Backside of my favorite one.

 Front page of my second choice.

Back page of my second choice.

• The third thing we do after labeling the words in the sentence, is we go back and check Task #2 on the ATS.
• I choose to do this third, because it seems easier for my student to follow.
• Fourth, we determine structure of the sentence.
• Then, we determine the pattern and purpose of each of the clauses.
• Finally, we diagram the sentence.
• I use the entire time of when we are working on this practice sentence to go over parts of speech and things that are covered in the EEL charts and lesson(s).
• This is my teaching time for English grammar with my student.
• I ask her questions to help her better understand why she is labeling words a certain way, and I reteach any areas that I see a need.

2.  The only other thing we do on Monday for Grammar/EEL is we work on at least one chart.  

• Some weeks, we may work on more than one chart a day, but most days it is just one.
• I choose what chart my student works on based on the chart scope and sequence (page 445 in EEL Guide)
• I also choose what chart she works on based on what she is struggling with in the practice sentences.
• Many times, she simply copies or tries to write from memory onto the blank charts provided in the EEL Guide.
• I laminated and spiral bound all of the charts for her for easy access.
• We also do the charts orally quite often.  
• We use songs, chants, and hand motions to help remember each part.
• Sometimes she just tells the chart to me.
• Occasionally, we play games to practice charts.
• I copied the charts onto colored paper and cut them up to make chart puzzles.
• We play race the teacher to see if she can complete a chart before me.

Days 2, 3, and 4

• These days look very similar to Day 1.  
• We do other sentences in the same way I described for Day 1.
• Many times those sentences will come from CC Connected files
• Some of our favorites are the Star Wars ones under username lindsey.crews@gmail.com.
• Sometimes I simply take the sentence from the guide and change the words.  
• I try to be very careful in changing part of speech for part of speech in order to keep the same kind of sentence and not go over our heads.
• It is perfectly o.k. to simply use the same sentence(s) more than one day during the week.  Repetition is classical!
• We also continue to work on charts in the same way I described above. 
• We do try to mix it up and do different charts each day; however, sometimes it is good to work on the same chart all week to get it thoroughly memorized before moving on to another one.

That's It!  EEL/ Grammar practice is that simple each day!  It really should only take 20 to 30 minutes each day, and many times it takes less than that!

** We don't do the spelling or editing practice in the EEL guide.  We cover that in other areas (see my explanation on Day 3 of IEW below)

IEW

Day 1--KWO, Vocabulary, and Brainstorming

1. Reread the source text and write KWO.
• This can be done independently by the student or together with the parent.
• Parent/teacher can not help too much!
• KWO is usually the highest thinking activity of the week, and it is important to get it done correctly.  This may mean the parent/teacher helps the most with this.
2. We try to go over the vocabulary words together on day 1 also.  This can be simply reading the words and their definitions or doing something fun with them like illustrating them or creating funny sentences.  It really depends on the amount of time we have to devote to this.
3. If we have time, we will do the brainstorming activity from the lesson in the history-based writing book.  If not, we do it on day 2 before writing the rough draft.  Sometimes we will split it between the two days.
• The brainstorming activity is the time to go over new style (dress-ups, decorations, and sentence openers) and review old style.  
• When keeping Pudewa's "EZ+1" mantra in mind, we may skip parts of the brainstorming in order to focus on the style technique that is in my student's current "EZ+1" set.  
• Those that we skip, we will come back to at later dates when we add that technique into our "EZ+1."  

Day 2--Rough Draft

1. Finish any brainstorming pages we didn't complete the day before.  This could include ones in the current lesson or ones from previous lessons that we need to cover, keeping within the "EZ+1."  (see notes on IEW day 1 above)
2. Write the rough draft.
• Pudewa suggests to have the student orally give their rough draft before writing it down.  We actually have never done that.  Usually, my student writes the rough draft on her own and only asks me questions when needed.
• She always writes in pen (no erasing allowed), and she skips lines on her paper to allow for editing later.
• She puts her style techniques in as she goes, not necessarily trying to check things off of a list, but just doing what comes naturally.  (That's "EZ+1"!!)

Day 3--Revising and Editing

1. My student takes her own paper and follows her checklists to revise and edit her own paper, many times before I ever look at it.
• She uses 2 checklists. 
• The first one is the IEW checklist with the style techniques and structure requirements.  We use the master checklist that I created and sent out to all of my Essentials teachers.  I simply draw an asterisk beside the items that are required for her to have.  She knows not to worry about anything else on the list.
• The second checklist is one I created with grammar, spelling, and punctuation rules that I feel she needs to work on or should already know well.  
• This is the only editing we usually do for Essentials work.  We do a different spelling curriculum than what is in the EEL guide, and it has some editing built in.  So, we do that editing practice as well.  
2. After she is finished revising and editing, she types her paper and prints out a copy for me to look at.  
• She highlights this printed copy for her style techniques, according to the IEW checklist.

Day 4--Final Copy

1. I read her paper and "grade" it.  
• I look to see if she has completed what was required per her checklists.
• I also revise and edit anything else that she might have missed.  
• I will talk to her about the things that she missed, and we work together to correct it.  
• I never actually assign a grade.  I just make notes for myself to know what she needs to work on and what I need to be sure and cover next week before she begins a certain day's assignments.
• At the beginning of each day, I will remind her of things she needs to work on, if necessary.
2. I sign her checklists to show that I have "graded" and inspected the work that I expected from her.
3. She adds in the corrections I made (or sometimes I do) to her paper on the computer and prints it.

Our Week in a Nutshell 

• Day 1--one practice sentence and one or two charts for EEL;  read source text, KWO, vocabulary, and some brainstorming for IEW.

• Day 2--one practice sentence and one or two charts for EEL;  write rough draft and finish brainstorming for IEW.

• Day 3--one practice sentence and one or two charts for EEL;  student revises and edits paper per checklists and types paper for IEW.

• Day 4--one practice sentence and one or two charts for EEL;  teacher "grades" paper and signs off on checklists, working with student to correct anything missed.

So, that's it.  Our week is pretty simple.  We usually only spend about a hour a day on all of our Essentials work.  Some days it is more.  Some days it is less.  My first year student is a very independent worker, so I know that our day is different from many first year students.  Your student may need much more help from you, especially in IEW, and that is just fine.  This is simply what works for us.