The school year kicks off with the addition of a new Mac Air 13" laptop for Niah. Only the finest technology for my little one (wink ;)! Sparring no expense, mainly due to the fact we are 'MAC People' and they've got us! Oh well. But MAC computers are truly the finest learning tools available especially if you are into the Arts. Niah absolutely loves the device and takes very good care of it. It also acts as a leveraging pawn, in that she must comply with our expectations in order to keep it.
That being said...
DAY 1: kicks off with
Computer Technology work. Organized desktop for quick navigation to important websites and online resources. Dashboard includes Khan Academy, our Blog, Curriculum links to other Math and ELA, etc. Also created folders for her work and practiced saving files to folders. Internet safety discussed. Expectations covered.
Day 1 also included getting started with Saxon Math Placement testing.
DAY2: Easy Peasy (EP) Day 2,
reading (Hope has Wings) poem, respond to questions and writing.
Expanded Apple poem.
Saxon Math (SM) placement testing,
World History for us ALL (WHA)- discussion on how to study history. Blind men and the Elephant analogy. Studying history from 3 perspecitves: Panoramic, Landscape, Up CLose. She illustrated an elephant (Landscape) with a micro-bubble window showing skin and hair follicles (Close Up), and African continent (Panoramic).
DAY3: Finished SM Placement, ready for 8/7.
Maleficent came in mail as Niah wanted to read the book.
We discussed the 'Sleeping Beauty' theme and learned about it's origins dating back to the 1300's, then again in the 1600's with Perrault (French) and Brothers Grimm (Germans). There have been many adaptations of this story throughout the years with some of the most disturbing versions found in its earliest emergence by Perrault. Walt Disney, a man with a darkside, of course, made this story popular in the 1959 Sleeping Beauty animated movie. Today's Maleficent maintains much of it's 'Walt Disney' elements but expands and spins off on its own with new elements.
In studying the story from a myth-perspective, we discovered it contains nature symbolism which I will let Niah explain in the next blog entry titled, 'Myth Analogy of Sleeping Beauty'.
Finished Lesson 1 of WHA- mapping
Khan- Human Body part 1
DAY 4:
ELA -EP, Read poem, The Second Day Before Christmas, discussed and responded to questions. Keyboarded in the Apple Poem importing edits from written draft while using correct posture. Learned the history of proper notations, as found in the APA, and how the technological advancement of word processing allows us to italics vs underline and using quotation marks. This a part of technological evolution. However, not everyone has crossed over and instructors will have students use underlines and quotations. Streamlining grammar rules, making writing easier.
Khan-Math @ 5% of 7th grade mastery
Khan Science - Cells
DAY 5:
Khan-Math GCF LCM; WHA Lesson 2; ELA Shakespeare Sonnets- discussed how the English language evolved, how poetry is used to express deep love (in contrast to the degradation of love expression in todays world as seen on Instagram, 'Hey! You are awesome! Follow me!" or 'You are hot', etc.
ORIGINAL TEXT | MODERN TEXT:My eyes work best when I’m asleep, because all day they look at things I don’t care about. When I sleep, my dreaming eyes alight on you and glitter brightly in the dark, having found your bright image there. Given that your shadowy dream-image brightens even the dark, how bright might you appear in daylight, when your own light is so much clearer? How bright, when your shadow shines so brightly to my eyes blinded by darkness? What good would it do my eyes to see you in the daytime when they already look at your beautiful image in the dead of night, as I sleep? Every day is as dark as night until I get to see you again, and every night is as bright as day when I see you in my dreams. |
When most I wink, then do mine eyes best see,
For all the day they view things unrespected;
But when I sleep, in dreams they look on thee,
And, darkly bright, are bright in dark directed.
Then thou, whose shadow shadows doth make bright—
How would thy shadow’s form form happy show
To the clear day with thy much clearer light,
When to unseeing eyes thy shade shines so?
How would, I say, mine eyes be blessèd made
By looking on thee in the living day,
When in dead night thy fair imperfect shade
Through heavy sleep on sightless eyes doth stay?
All days are nights to see till I see thee,
And nights bright days when dreams do show thee me.
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