We started our homeschooling in July, earlier than the official date prescribed by our provider. We do this so we can have longer rest in December. One major change in our homeschooling journey is that Nereus, my eldest, wanted to go to a regular school for Junior High School so we enrolled him in a school. For this year, I will only be homeschooling Ian. There are changes in my professional life too but that is something that I will probably announce in another blog. Written below are the highlights for Ian’s homeschooling activities for the month of July and August. As explained before, I choose to document his homeschooling journey here as backup for his portfolio. This post might also give ideas to fellow homeschooling families as well as parents who are curious about homeschooling. Whatever are your reasons for reading my blogs, I hope that my blogs help or inspire you!
I learned how to write in cursive when I turned nine, tutored by my mom and aunts. I also learned to write in cursive when I was a 4th grade at our local elementary school. I also remember we had a contest then for best cursive writing. Since Ian showed interest in writing in cursive after seeing my (failed) attempt at calligraphy, I decided to include it in our curriculum for this year. We used Jenna Rainey’s free calligraphy e-book and videos as well as books I bought from Shopee on cursive writing practice.
For Filipino, we are using Wikahon-B and Nereus’ old textbook so we got to study this subject early as well. We also hoarded so many books from local publishers such as Adarna and Lampara during Shopee and Lazada sales. We always loved supporting local authors.
Ian learned about “diptonggo” (dipthongs), “magkasingkahulugan” (synonyms), “magkasalungat” (antonyms), “simuno” (subject), and “panaguri” (predicate).
For Math, Ian used his textbook as lesson guide but we also did Math games and live worksheets. He has so far reviewed addition, subtraction, ordinal numbers, multiplication, ranking, and number patterns. We also combined Computer lesson with Math by using Microsoft Excel for creating a table of population data in all cities in NCR and create histograms.
For Science, we have started using the websites I recommended for this subject for activities, simulations, as well as, games. One of the experiments we did was the measurement of mass, volume, and density of various objects that would fit on our small weighing scale and graduated cyclinder. Ian learned about the phases and properties of matter in this experiment and through the games and simulations we found on Study Jams and PhET Interactive Simulations.
Do visit this article for list of online resources for science:
Since Taal volcano showed up to Level 3 of unrest and we had about two typhoons in the country for these months, we decided to revisit our previous lesson on geologic hazard and weather monitoring. For geologic hazard, we use the apps VolcanoPH App and GeoRiskPH, both developed by PHIVOLCS. For monitoring weather, we follow PAGASA’s weather forecasts as well as visit the website below to see real time satellite monitoring of temperature and wind patterns:
For social studies, Ian learned about different types of maps as well as NCR cities’ population. We did a lot of discussion regarding Corona Climate Map in relation to weather pattern monitoring.
When I saw a recent scientific article about the potential linkage of our Philippine Aetas to Denisovan, we deviated a bit from our planned topics and watched a documentary about Denisovan. Before the pandemic, we visited the remnants of Homo Luzonensis in Department of Archaeology in UP Diliman.
Homo Luzonensis, a 67,000 years old human remains, currently the oldest found in the country, came from Callao Cave, Cagayan, and is currently on display at the Department of Archaeology, UP Diliman.
Art and Music
This year will be busy for me because of the changes in my professional life (announcing soon) so I decided to enroll Ian with Watercolor Afficionados for watercolor art lessons. The three teachers in the group teach about basic watercolor and sketching to kids and adults so if you would also like to learn, feel free to join the group.
I have also encouraged him to use our current array of art books for reading and inspiration in order to keep his interest in sketching and painting. These are just some of the art works he did since July. I’m really proud of this little boy for showing interest in art and music. Speaking of which, we three also have ukulele class every Saturday with our teacher. If you would like to join us in our ukulele class, do send me a message. Our teacher Eric lost his gigs due to pandemic so it would really help him financially if you would enroll with him. Let me know if you want to have lessons with him.
Life Skills
Aside from academics, one of the reasons I homeschool is to teach my kids basic life skills and street smarts. For the two month, I taught Ian how to cook adobo – our favorite viand that I can prepare even blindfolded. Ian also occasionally come with me to buy fresh vegetables, fish, and fruits in our community market.
So those are just some of the activities my son Ian and I did for July and August. If you have questions, feel free to message me. Have fun, homeschooling!
xoxo
The Fabulous Scientist 