Week 33 Overview

Beautiful weather this week! As each of our extracurricular activities comes to a close, we find we have more time to enjoy our learning and begin our math reviews. We review math skills to double check for any missing learning, so that we can reteach it in this final month of school. Last month? Yes, I know. April flew by and we have a lot to do in the next 4 weeks, but we are right on schedule!

Here is our learning from week 33:

Bible ~ Romans, Ephesians, Philemon, Philippians, Colossians: Paul's letters to strengthen churches

How can we be truly good? Jesus. How can we have joy? Jesus. Jesus is the one who makes every good thing possible for people who trust in him. Through His Holy Spirit, we are able to live holy lives.

History ~ The Renaissance (means "new birth") was a time of questioning tradition and making new discoveries.

Johannes Gutenberg, of Germany, made a great invention...the printing press. Gutenberg and 20 helpers printed 450 Bibles in one year. It would have taken 20 monks NINETY years to accomplish this same production written by hand. This changed life forever.

Remember Martin Luther from last week? With his 95 Theses? Basically, saying the Catholic church was wrong in selling indulgences? His followers were called Reformers because they wanted reform in the church. The pope condemned many reformers as heretics. A document called the Augsburg Confession by Philip Melanchthon includes the teachings of the Reformers. The Reformers became known as the Protestants because they protested against the practices of the Catholic church.

Protestants argued that men and women could read the Bible for themselves and Catholics argued that the Bible could only be interpreted properly with the help of the church. Unfortunately, not all those claiming to be Reformers did so because they wanted to obey God. Instead, they used the Reformation as a reason to do as they pleased, like Henry VIII with his many wives. The disagreement between Catholics and Protestants also had to do with politics, since some English, German, and French Christians didn't like the idea of an Italian Pope telling them what to do. Sometimes disagreements turned into wars between countries and sometimes it caused civil wars.

28 years after Martin Luther developed his 95 Theses, the pope called for a council. All of the Catholic leaders met in the year 1545 in Trent, an Italian city. This council went on for 18 years discussing the beliefs of the Catholic church and how they differed. Once they completed their statements, these statements became the official doctrine of the Catholic church. They insisted that the church's beliefs were correct, but they did agree that some of its leaders had been acting wrongly. To correct this, no one could pay to become a bishop any longer, but instead had to go to seminary. This reformation of the Catholic church that happened at the Council of Trent is called the Counter Reformation.

This did not keep Protestants and Catholics from arguing and fighting. Both groups would order the other to be put in jail and sometimes put to death.

Math 3rd grade
So, the girls have been laughing at me because every day now, we have our regular math, extra math, and extra-extra math. I know, that's a lot of math. For regular math, we are stretching their minds and working on some harder area problems. Extra math is comparing and ordering fractions. Extra-extra math is review of place value skills (ordering numbers, standard form, expanded form, and written form). We have had several quizzes/checks this week.

Math 6th grade
Graphs, quizzes, and beginning algebraic equations & inequalities

Science 3rd grade
Frequency and amplitude, how airplanes fly, light years, and review of: sound, sound travel, hearing sound, musical sound, seeing with sound, molecules, atoms, electrons, fission & fusion, and states of matter.

Science 6th grade
how plants and animals survive in grasslands, deserts, monsoon regions and Mediterranean area, and how the seasons and climate differs in each of these.

Read Aloud ~ Master Cornhill: Oh, Michael isn't alone any more! A ballad seller/ street performer has taken him in, Michael has been given back his purse (wallet) that was stolen, and we can't wait to find out if Michael ever sees Susanna again.

Independent Reading
After reading some biographies, the girls are enjoying some fun chapter books, such as Pippi Longstocking. I absolutely love that book! It was a favorite of mine as a child.

Writing ~ Shape poems (see this one about twisters, above?) Pretty neat!

We also spent time on: Geography (maps), memorizing Scripture, piano, vocabulary, poetry, recess, math fact fluency, math games, and we went to church on Thursday to pray, as it was the national day of prayer. Of course, we can and do pray at our home, but it was a special time on Thursday to kneel at the alter knowing so many others were doing the same thing that day.

Happy learning!