Tuesday, September 4, 2012

En Route to Heaven or Days 11-12

Last Thursday was an exciting day -- The MacTavish School spent the day planning and then buying and delivering the food for 45 people for a youth group beach retreat. We did a nutrition unit for science, a pictorial list, and I hid a whole lot of math, grouping and multiplication, into the shopping itself. Now, let me be frank: I am not a fan of calling everyday errands "academic", but I am learning that with proper planning, errands can become quite good field trips.

That said, today we were back in our little blue classroom, and I realized one of the downsides of homeschooling; there is no distance, no separation, when a household pet is dying. George's mouse, Dot, is decently old in mouse years and is suddenly and quite clearly nearing the end of her lifespan. We are a household in pre-mourning.

As George noted, "It's hard to concentrate when you're sad."

nonfiction read & react: Quiet hero of the Titanic disaster
math unit: Lesson 1, Chapter 2, Houghton Mifflin Math North Carolina, Grade 4
daily poem: "Mr. Nobody" by Walter de la Mare (inference)
science unit: A Mysterious Mammal, the platypus (characteristics)

2 comments:

wstachour said...

Not to minimize his grief, but this is one of life's profound lessons as well. Alas, I hope all is well.

Lucy said...

Sweet Dot is sleeping now. I did the sugar water in dropper routine, and I suspect she'll either go tonight or wake up a bit and then plummet.

Gah, some lessons stink.