Look Left, Look Right, Look Left Again from Greene Bark Press: Review

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My girls are always so interested in the why of everything, especially safety rules. We have been very strict to teach our girls they must obey, even if they don’t understand why at the time for their safety, but explaining why has also been a very important part of our teaching. They need to obey, sometimes blindly, but teaching safety should occur other times as well. 
 photo lookleftlookrightlookleftagain_zps08f68e39.jpgThis sweet little book by Ginger Pate is a wonderful tool for gentle instruction of safety rules and the reason why we have those rules. Look Left, Look Right, Look Left Again ($8.50) from Greene Bark Press Inc. is beautifully written and engaging for my girls who are in just the right age range, 3-8. I think the format is best suited for preschoolers simply because it is a board book. Most grade-school kids will balk at board books, although my girls are an exception to this! I’m not sure if it is because they don’t experience the peer pressure to fit-in, but so far I have yet to hear one of them complain a book is too little for them.

My oldest, who is eight, grabbed it right out of the box and settled down to check it out. She is obviously past the board-book stage, but my girl will read anything she can get her hands on. I think she secretly wanted to check it out before her little sister got to it! It wasn’t long though before Grace found her new book and immediately fell in love with the little duck, Wally. What an adorable protagonist!
One of my favorite aspects is howWally is instructed by his mother about safety rules when crossing the street. In a society where a good portion of the media portrays parents as irrelevant and often idiotic I am pleasantly surprised when books or other media put parents in a positive light. Mama Waddlewater is protective and wise. She instructs her son and gives reason and makes sure he is safe. 
I also liked how Mama Waddlewater teaches Wally to practice. He insists he was going to cross the street the right way and tells her indignantly he knew better. Mama says it is still her job to make sure he is safe. What wonderful words from a storybook which have echoed my own so many times!
Beth enjoyed reading this to her little sister. It was fun to hear them discussing the pictures and enjoy the book together. They both said this book was fun and I found them reading it several times. 
This is really just such a pleasant story and so sweetly written! To see what my Crewmates had to say click below!  
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Weekly Review: August 19-23

This is what I do to prepare each week. Let me be clear, Heart of Dakota is a completely open and go curriculum with no additions or planning needed. I find it helpful for me personally to have a checklist. The biggest reason for this is I am using three guides. The first four guides are scheduled for a five day week and every guide after that as a four day week. I love having an extra day to have for field trips and catching up if we missed something. I also feel like I have more freedom to skip something and come back to it if needed. So at some point towards the end of the week…or on Sunday night…I sit at our kitchen table and write on my weekly grid all the activities for the week. I really loves this part of the week because I get a chance to look ahead, anticipating all the fun in store!

Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 21

This week we studied the letter Q and read through Jesus’ birth. It was quite fun having Christmas in August! For our storytime I pulled out several books from my box of Christmas stories and we read through several of those. Our favorite was The Puppy Who Wanted a Boy. It is about a puppy who asks his mother for a boy for Christmas and his mother says is fine as long as he can find one! It is super sweet and ends with the puppy finding more than he had hoped for!

Little Grace isn’t so little anymore! This will be the third time I complete Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons with one of my children. Somehow I feel it may be bitter sweet at the end. She is doing fabulously already! She was so excited to read the words at and me this week. One of the most amazing treasures I have received from homeschooling is being there for all of these sweet moments of learning.

I also started back with Touch Math again this week. Grace begs for more, more, and more learning so I try to do what I can to encourage her desire to know more. Touch Matht has been a great hands-on learning tool to introduce the ideas of more and less, equals, and other early math concepts. I use clear mats I purchased from Target to slip the pages I print into each day.


Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 3

The first time I went through Beyond it was our first year homeschooling. I am appreciating it so much more this second time through. Beth is fully engaged during the history readings which is partly due to the wonderful history selections, but also having completed Little Hearts for His Glory. She has matured a lot through schooling and we have had some wonderful discussions.

Beth definitely enjoyed our history activity this week. She was slightly disappointed not to include a new entry on her timeline, but this made up for it! We played a game which helped her think more about the persecution of the Pilgrims. The bottom of the steps was the jail because this was where the Pilgrims who refused to worship God the way King James was requiring went. Depending on the roll of the dice she either obeyed the king or chose to worship the way the way she felt the Bible said she should. She ended up in jail…and was quite happy about it! We talked about how jail is not usually a place you want to be, but if you are there because you are following God, then it is okay. 

She is illustrating the poem Uphill here. Using both the upper and lower guides at the same time has given me such an appreciation for the full Heart of Dakota curriculum. Everything is intentional and there is no such things as busy work with this guide. I love how the poems and Scripture study always relate to our history readings. The connections between disciplines are seamless. This year is truly starting out wonderfully for Beth!

Preparing Hearts for His Glory: Unit 2 (1st half)

Rose was thrilled we started Life in the Great Ice Age this week. We firmly believe the Bible’s account of creation, completely rejecting the idea of evolution because it does not fall in line with the Genesis account. Resources like these were not available to me when I was in grade school. It is blessing my socks off to learn alongside my daughter. Rose devours all things historical and scientific. I really have to hold her back and limit how much she reads! I don’t think we’ll be going half-speed much longer.

While Rose does enjoy learning new words, she’s had to adjust to completing her history vocabulary each week. She completed it more quickly this week, but we’re still only doing 3 of the 5 words. I plan to work up to the 5 words by the end of the year.

Ahhh, grammar…need I say more? The English teacher in me can’t help but love it! Rose says she really liked diagramming. Yeah, she pretty much melted my heart when she told me that!

We took some time to study a little bit about microscopes using a unit from In the Hands of a Child. You can click on the picture to see a full review!

Math has been a bit bumpy this year. There is a big jump from the last grade-level to the next in Rod and Staff. I’ve restructured a bit and pulled my husband in for advice since he is very mathematically minded. I think we’ve got things figured out for the most part. I’m not a fan of switching curricula when we hit a bump. I am, however, considering supplementing with something which will engage her a bit more.

We had some really fun moments this week and this was one of my favorites. Beth was working on a vocabulary page when she said, “Hey guys! Come quick! You have to see this!” I love seeing my girls excited about learning, discovering together, and sharing with one another. 
How was your week?

Under the Microscope Lapbook from Hands of a Child: Review

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My oldest daughter loves to learn and is completely fascinated by science. We do not have a regular science curriculum I follow at home because from September through May my girls attend a learning center which covers a wide variety of science topics. At the same time science has always fascinated me and I encourage my girls to engage in what interested them scientifically. I even have a science corner built into our homeschool room to encourage investigation. 

Additions to our schoolroom this year included instruments for investigation. Although I was extremely excited about getting a microscope and telescope into our room, but I have to be honest…it has been a while since I’ve used a microscope and I don’t know if I’ve ever used a telescope!Reviewing the Under a Microscope Curriculum (K-3rd grade) from In the Hands of a Child seemed like a great opportunity to refresh my skills. 

We don’t typically use lapbooks, but In the Hands of a Child is a company I am very familiar with. They are at the top of the list when searching for quality lapbooking materials. For those unfamiliar with how lapbooks work I like to think of it as scrapbook learning. As students read, learn, and investigate they construct a miniature scrapbook of the information usually kept in a manilla folder. Instructions are included at the beginning for how to construct this lapbook although I was a little confused about where exactly to place the information. This is probably because lapbooking is still more out of my comfort zone than most learning activities. This particular company offers lapbooks in a variety of formats including e-book ($10.00), CD ($15.00), Printed ($18.00), Print+CD combo ($16.00), and a Lapbook It Pack ($12.00 – Does not include the teaching materials). This and other titles are currently on sale right now!
One of the reasons lapbooking isn’t typically our learning format is the time it takes to construct the lapbook. It is difficult to do this with multiple ages of children, but In the Hands of a Child helps by gearing their units to a wider age-range with multiple book options and activity choices. My oldest daughter mostly worked on this, but my other girls were excited to check out the microscope as well.
Matching up the scientific vocabulary used when talking about microscopes to their kid-friendly definitions was one of the first activities we did. This was a great way to start out the study so as we went through our learning she would have a good understanding as well as a reference dictionary along the way. 
Although many lapbooks I see use lots of multicolored paper I like having the option to print on what I want to. This way my girls can decorate and color the pictures as they want. I particularly liked this how to focus the microscope step-by-step clipboard. It turned out really cute an looked “scientific” to Rose. It also gave very clear instructions for even a newbie scientist. 
In addition to information on how to use a microscope and the various types which exist, there was quite a bit of historical information as well. It was fun learning about who created the first microscope. 
Rose was so excited to be able to follow the directions and focus the microscope on her own! We have a set of 15 slides I purchased at the same time as the instrument and she has been waiting to learn how to use it on her own. Her favorite slides to look at were the pine stem and human blood. “Ewwww! Blood!” That was my almost-four-year-old Grace’s response. She still enjoyed looking at it though!
While working on this unit we had a friend who was over for the afternoon. Rose was very happy to teach her how to use the microscope and share all she had learned. 
If you enjoy lapbooking, this is a high-quality lapbook at an affordable price. They also frequently run specials and offers with steep discounts. I personally do not care for this learning medium, but I know many families who do. If you like the idea of project-based learning and hands-on instruction I encourage you to take a look at In the Hands of a Child and their many resources which cover all subject areas.

You can see some other products from this company reviewed by my Crewmates below!

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Considering Homeschool?

You may have already seen this elsewhere, but I wanted to share it for those who may not have. I do not try to tell people homeschooling is the only option for education because I don’t believe it is. However, when those of us who homeschool get questioned on our ability to teach our own children and wonder if we will ever be able to provide all that traditional schooling can, information like this can be very helpful to share. Besides that, statistics really fascinate me! 
  Homeschooled: How American Homeschoolers Measure Up

Week in Review: August 12-16

This week was a little smoother than last week, but we’re still trying to find our groove! We’ll get there eventually. Last year I stagger started as was suggested by other experienced Heart of Dakota moms. I should have done that again and plan to next year. Ah, the wisdom of experience. I would encourage you to connect with moms using the same curriculum, no matter what that curriculum is. There are message boards and facebook pages for just about everything you can imagine. Utilizing these as well as personal friends who use the same materials as you helps you have good collaboration. I also like bouncing ideas off of other moms who may have more experience and know if what I am thinking is wise.

Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 20

We did a handful of activities we missed in Unit 20 of Little Hands from last week. She was also very excited to finish Bigger Steps, the “B” book from Rod and Staff’s About 3 series. Last year I limited her to one page a day, much to her chagrin. She really needed to move slowly to give her motor skills time to develop. I’m so glad I forced her to stick to this as her fine-motor abilities have very much improved since last fall. Now I allow her to do 2-4 pages a day.

The “C” book, Coloring and Cutting, uses shapes to help teach the colors. Every color has an assigned shape so they can begin to do more on their own. It has mostly been coloring, but there is some handwriting and I’m assuming there will eventually be cutting!

Grace is not yet reading, but she is very observant! This activity wants the kids to coloring the pain cans the colors written on them. Down the side are the various shapes with the color words in them. I helped her remember which shape was which color and then told her to look for the matching words to color the paint cans. She completed this perfectly and was so very proud of herself!

Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 2

Beth loves this guide so far. She is thoroughly enjoying the history readings and math. The only part she is reluctant to do is the emerging readers set. I have a strong suspicion this is because the first book is a Bible we have read over and over. I’m seriously considering skipping to the next book in the schedule because of this. Most of the emerging readers are on a 1st or 2nd grade level. She is actually reading on a higher level than this, but because I want to work more on comprehension I want her to finish them.

This is the “I” book of Rod and Staff’s ABC series called Inside and Outside. We are sad to be at the end of this series as she loves it so much, but after checking out the “J” book online I really think she has surpassed the levels intended. I may end up getting it for her because she just loves them so much.

In math Beth completed the speed drill in one minute for the first time! She was so excited about this! She is farther in the workbook than the speed drill indicate because when the speed drills were initially scheduled her handwriting speed was holding her back, causing a great amount of frustration. I decided to wait a bit and now she is doing quite well. It is exciting for me to see her feeling so accomplished with her math.

For spelling Beth is still using All About Spelling, but I use the Heart of Dakota spelling as well. On Friday or Monday morning she takes a “pretest” of 20 words found for each unit in the back of the guide. The words she misses or has to think about a while become her spelling list. This week’s list included next and when which she originally spelled neckst and wen. On Monday Beth writes each word 5 times. On Wednesday she writes a sentence with each word. For now she is dictating a sentence to me and then copies it in her spelling composition book. We’re also working on word spacing which is why she’s using her pinky as she writes. She takes the test on Friday and got both words correct!

Working on a timeline has been great fun for Beth. She’s watched her older sister do this for two years now so she feels very grown up. I typically write down the entry for her to copy and give her some guidance on how to draw the symbol.



Preparing Hearts for His Glory: Unit 1 (week 2)

After a rough start last week we’re now going half speed through preparing until the point at which I feel Rose is ready to handle full-speed. I’m so thankful for the great HOD moms who helped me work through this decision. I’m prepared for this guide to last 2 years if it needs to, but also happy to move up to full-speed if she is ready at some point this year. I originally intended Bigger Hearts for His Glory to stretch out over two years. After 4 units at half-speed, however, she was only taking about 1 1/2 hours for school. That was the point we moved into full-speed mode!

I do not add a lot to our HOD guides, but vocabulary is one area we supplement with. It isn’t so much that I feel HOD is lacking in this area as I want her to be fully ready for the SAT when the time comes. I use Wordly Wise because I feel it solidly prepares kids from the first books to think the way the SAT test encourages thinking. Right now Rose is doing a lesson a week with a test on Fridays which she is completing quite well. I plan to finish these books faster than in a year as they are written.


Diagramming!!!!!!!! I love diagramming sentences, and no it isn’t because my background is in English! To be honest, I was only taught diagramming by my father, never once in school that I recall. Rose is only in 3rd grade, but she is already starting to learn the basics which I just love about Rod and Staff grammar. I know this is one of those things many grumble about from school-days, but honestly, understanding how words fit together properly really does help you build a correct and understandable sentence. Not to mention in the future Rose will understand direct and indirect objects more easily because of their placement in the sentence. So yahoo for diagramming!

And then there is math…this is Rose’s least favorite subject. It isn’t that she struggles, she just gets bored with it. Singapore was a struggle in 1st grade and Rod and Staff was an excellent switch for us in 2nd. I think the problem is she much prefers words over numbers. For example, word problems are a much more enjoyable portion of the work for her than just rote practice. I still strongly believe in Rod and Staff and I am really not one to switch up curriculum unless there are major issues. Still I’m starting to consider some different options.

Rose’s first timeline entry of the year! I’m not sure why, but it doesn’t really feel like the year has started until we begin our timeline. I just love this concept for learning history and I love how Heart of Dakota is so consistent with their timelines.

This year’s timeline is written on index cards and will be a lot of fun for her to complete!

Rose and Beth are too old for naps, but they still do best when they have quiet time either reading or working on a craft. Quite often they hang out on their bean-bag chairs with me and we all read. On this day they sat on the couch and read while I read in one of their chairs. I realized my girls rarely actually see me read and I thought this was something I should remedy. While Grace naps in the afternoons we now all ready for 30-60 minutes. This has been a lot of fun! Our kitty-cat Zoe quite often joins us as well.

Well that was our week! I’ve also been posting some really great reviews from the TOS Review Crew, Mom of Masterbooks, and a handful of other companies. You can see some of my recent postings below.

Understanding Child Brain Development from Family Hope Center: Review

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The brain is an amazing thing. It still holds so many mysteries for doctors, researchers, and therapists, yet amazing understanding of our central processing organ has developed over the last few decades. So much understanding of new ways to manage and treat abnormalities are being understood so families can succeed. Not too many years ago we would in our history a push to lock away those who did not function “normally” in society. We still refer to many issues as illnesses, indicating medication alone is needed to treat the individual. Family Hope Center has a different approach, a unique approach…a successful approach

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The DVD Understanding Child Brain Development will take you on a journey to understand the workings of the brain. Because Family Hope Center looks at different developmental issues as an injury rather than an illness their therapy is much different, yet you cannot begin to understand the treatment programs until you understand the how and why of brain function. This DVD gives hope to families who may have felt hopeless otherwise. 

Although my daughters are not affected by any developmental delays, this has been a profoundly interesting seminar giving me great insight into how the brain actually functions. Matt and Carol Newell have taken complex research and science and presented it in a format which is understandable and manageable for those of us not familiar with the inner-workings of the mind. Terms like mid-brain and pons are now words I understand and can talk intelligently about. As I watched this DVD many families with kids who struggle came to mind and I would love for them to view this. I have had so many conversations with parents who feel hopeless as their child is evaluated and medicated each year with little to no progress academically. This DVD shows another way, a way without medication and away towards healing. 

There were two particular parts of the DVD which intrigued me in particular. The first was the effect of crawling. Our society pushes children to move very quickly through the crawling phase through the use of walkers, exer-saucers, and doorway jumpers. While my kids used those, they were often on the floor crawling around, yet some children get very little time doing this. One of the interesting treatments used to help heal the injured area of the brain is to practice crawling. I was completely fascinated by this news. 

The second thing which intrigued me was the reference to research by Dr. Masaru Emoto about how water molecules are affected by different outside forces. Seeing highspeed photographs of frozen water crystals after water had been exposed to television radiation and microwaved has given me pause. If you haven’t heard of this yet, take some time to research. I’m not in any way advocating all of his theories, but it is a very fascinating topic and makes me wonder how much harm we may be doing our bodies because of technology.



Take a moment to watch an introduction from Andrew Pudewa from the Institute for Excellence in Writing.

I would encourage all parents, no matter the state of your child’s abilities, to view this DVD. It will definitely open your eyes to what is going on within your child. It costs $19.00 and can be ordered by calling 610-397-1737 or online Understanding Child Brain Development from IEW. 


Check out more reviews from my Crewmates by clicking below!
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I Am Ruth: Review

Ruth…a poignant love story…a hopeful legacy…an unwavering loyalty…and it’s all true.

Our world wants to denounce the truth of Scripture and portray it as irrelevant myth. Doing so takes away the accountability laid out for us by our Creator. Rather than living life in a way which serves God and puts the good of others above our own our society pushes us to live selfishly, being more concerned about our own benefits than even those we are closest to. We know better, but sometimes we need a reminder.

Ruth has always been one of my favorite books in the Bible. As a girl I was drawn to the love-story between Ruth and Boaz. As a woman I am drawn to the parallel love-story of our Savior, our personal kinsman-redeemer.


I am Ruth from Master Books (a division of New Leaf Publishing) is stunning, simply stunning. I vividly remember the Bible storybook my parents read to me with a real-life person photographed as Ruth. Perhaps this is what initially drew me in. The rest of the book’s pictures were mostly paintings, merely an artists renderings. Just like then I was drawn to the realism. I once again have the visual images of real people and it was like reading the biblical account for the first time.

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The beautiful images taken on location in Israel capture the imagination. They are so beautiful and full of emotion you can imagine the individuals speaking the words of Scripture as you read. I felt the despair as famine and heat forced Elimelech to feel desperate enough to leave the land God had given his ancestors.  

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Weep with Naomi and her daughters-in-law as they journey back to Israel and eventually part with Orpah. 
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Listen in to the conversations Ruth and Naomi have as they discuss the wheat Boaz has allow Ruth to glean.

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Celebrate the marriage of Ruth and Boaz followed by the birth of Obed as you see the joy-filled faces of the couple and Naomi. 
I think what struck me most about this book was while the photography by Kenneth Berg drew me in, the excellent exposition of the book kept me reading. Each chapter of Ruth is written in full form, but before you get to that Brenda Duff fills in the historical details and significance of various aspects of the Jewish culture. Never has Ruth held so much meaning for me personally. 
Take an exclusive peek here…

I’m not the only one who loves this book! Check out what others have to say by clicking on the link below!
Disclaimer: I received I am Ruth as part of the Moms of Master Books Team. I was not required to give a positive review. I was not compensated in any other way. 

Field Trip: Museum of Life and Science Engineering Day

We had a fabulous time at our local children’s museum. There was a special day all about engineering and the girls had a blast! I love providing them with opportunities I can’t really give them at home. Building, constructing, problem solving…2 hours of pure educational fun!

Gumdrop Towers!
Rose gets a Tallest Tower height
Building boats and testing their weight capacity
Creating circuits
Lego machines!!!!!! Need I say more?

Constructing a remote control car
Driving her construction! And Grace is driving someone else’s!
Beth made it through the maze!


Week in Review: August 5-9


In retrospect, this was not the ideal week to begin school. I had these wonderful visions of what our first day back at it would look like with eager faces shining up at me begging to be enlightened…yeah…and I’m not even a newbie anymore either! My girls were coming off a 2-week vacation with their grandparents, I was only 2 1/2 weeks out from having thyroid surgery, and I started one of my two part-time jobs teaching piano for 2 1/2 hours every afternoon. I obviously didn’t think this through! Yet, when my mind is made up to begin something, I have a very difficult deviating from that thought.

Our first week was not what I had planned, yet it was still pretty good. I learned some things, tweaked some things, and regrouped more than once! We ended the week with a fun field trip giving us some much needed family-time as well.

We’re using three guides from Heart of Dakota once again…

Grace – K4
Beth – 1st Grade
Rose – 3rd Grade

Little Hands to Heaven: Unit 20


Grace did a little over half the guide of Little Hands to Heaven last year for K-3. I had originally intended to do this guide twice in a row, but plans changed, life happened, and here we are. This unit was a review so it was a perfect starting point for Grace. All of the letters have special motions and a rhyme to help out with remembering their sounds. I was so pleased that even though she didn’t remember all of them she did recall them quickly when I reminded her of the motions. 

We are moving fairly quickly now through the About 3 series. Rod and Staff is an excellent company and very solid, although not flashy. Much of their curriculum focuses on rural life and has given us some great discussions we may not have had otherwise. My grandfather was a farmer so it has been fun to explore things like farming tools as well as less modern conveniences such as oil lamps. 

We are also reading through Master Book’s N is for Noah. I am loving being a Mom of Master Books! (Click on the picture for my full review!)

Grace is also starting to learn to read! We’re using Reading Kingdom (A TOS Review product) and Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons…but more will come next week!




Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory: Unit 1

Beth has grown up so much in the last couple of months. She has decided to grow her bangs out and is typically the first one starting her lessons, most often without my even saying anything to her. She loves to learn and never, ever balks at her schoolwork. I have no idea if this will last, but believe me, I’m going to enjoy it while I can!

She is finishing up the last few pages of the Inside Outside Rod and Staff workbook, which she is sad to see end. J, the next book in the series has just been published and I may just have to get it for her! 

She was a bit hesitant about history last year, but by the end of Little Hands to Heaven she really enjoyed our readings. She couldn’t wait to get started with history this year. Living history is one of the beautiful aspects of the Heart of Dakota curriculum modeled after Charlotte Mason’s style of learning. 
Beth did her first timeline entry today! Timelines are a big part of Heart of Dakota. Beth was very certain she could never do a timeline entry…then was so proud of herself when she did! Everything is her own writing and drawing. I did give her an example of what she could draw to get her started though. 
We are also continuing with All About Spelling (close to finishing level 1!) as well as cursive instruction. She has started the year off quite well! 
Preparing Hearts for His Glory: Unit 1
Rose was not quite as eager to get started this summer as I expected and I think it may have been my fault. I over ambitiously assumed since she completed Bigger Hearts for His Glory on such a high note we could dive right into Preparing Hearts for His Glory at full speed…and after two days I saw this had been a big error! I believe from now on I’m going to need to start every guide at half speed and then see how it will go. Since Rose is at the younger end of the age-range for the guide I had to be reminded by other Heart of Dakota moms that I need to give her a bit of time to grow into the higher expectations of this guide.
Rose’s least favorite subject is math. I’ve been having her continue with Math Rider which is really helping with this. Rod and Staff is our math curriculum which has a lot of practice. Since I feel it is more at this level than she needs I have been having her do just the even or odd numbers on the page. If she has any trouble we go back and do the opposite the following day. So far this has been a great plan and has eased her anxiety over this subject. 
Draw and Write Through History: Creation to Jonah is definitely her favorite part so far! These creation based history lessons excite my little artist! 
Dictation is alternated with All About Spelling, level 3. She does well with both, so I combine the two with an alternating schedule. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays are for dictation while Tuesdays and Thursdays are All About Spelling. I have been so pleased with her progress in this area. She still has some letter switching issues, but this seems to be most prevalent when she is less focused or tired. I just try to make sure she is fresh when we cover these subjects from now on. 
Over all the week was good. I did have to change up my plans and back off a bit on Rose’s work, but otherwise it was a good week.