I really, truly cannot believe that we are beginning our 7th week of school.  It is nutty how quickly time is passing.

The students are all settling nicely to our daily routines, and most of the time are using their time wisely.  We still have some fine tuning to do before I can say they are completely normalized, but overall I am pleased.

The last two weeks we have spent a lot of time discussing what it means to write a complete sentence.  As such, we insist that all answers (written or spoken) are done so using complete sentences.  Last week we discussed the parts of speech we use when writing complete sentences, and the students all did follow up work honing their skills. This week we are getting down to the actual writing of “good” sentences which contain an adjective, subject, and vivid verb.  The goal is to write “best” sentences.  Though this simple sentence writing has been time consuming, I am confident the time we take now will pay off 10 fold in the long run.

Level 4 students are studying Utah History and began studying the five Native American Tribes of Utah.  This preliminary study before the field trip next week will give them a great background to the activities they will be participating in at the American West Heritage Center.

Ute Dwelling

Level 5 students are studying Mesopotamia and the people of Ancient Babylonia.  Today we talked about King Hammurabi and the students interpreted the early code.  They acted as judges to pass down a sentence they thought was appropriate before comparing their sentences to Hammurabi’s Code.  Whew!  I would not want to go before some of your children in court.  They were harsh!

Hammurabi’s Code

Level 6 students have been studying Ancient Rome.  Today we discussed the three types of government in Ancient Rome and then they began researching and interpreting the Twelve Tables.  We will continue this discussion throughout the week.

This year our cultural routine is working out marvelously.  We are working in units of individual subjects rather than a different subject daily.  This is allowing the students to really immerse themselves in one subject rather than continually switching gears.  My observations during their individual work time have convinced me that this is a good change.

If you have volunteered to help with reading groups, I will be sending out an email by mid-week.  Watch your inbox please.

One more thing, book reports and science fair questions are due tomorrow.  So far the cereal boxes and questions have been fantastic.

~Cheers