Last week was kind of crazy, due to a two-day week of school for Moose (two scheduled days off and one snow day), and a lot of furniture moving, so I decided to just wait until today to do a two-week wrap-up!

We started Mr. Pipes Comes to America last week. So far, we’ve enjoyed this book, especially as it has tied in nicely to our history studies, which have focused on the American Revolution. It has, so far, been the book with the fewest familiar (to us) hymn writers, however!

In math, Turkey and Bunny have been working on permutations and combinations. Ladybug had been revisiting Roman numerals and working with different forms of measurement. They’ve come to the halfway point in their workbooks, which feels like quite an accomplishment!

We finished Farmer Boy this week…Ladybug is looking forward to beginning Charlotte’s Web next. Turkey and Bunny are still working through Tom Sawyer, and we’re all looking forward to finding out what is going to happen next in that story.

Turkey and Bunny are continuing to learn about geology in science. We’ve been focusing on fossils so far this week. Ladybug is learning about eggs, after having finished the chapter on nests.

Our history lessons have focused on the early wars fought in North American thanks to the European colonization of the continent. I always enjoy a visit to the time of the Revolutionary War, so I’ve really enjoyed our studies. We’ll be learning about the early days of the new country of the United States of America next week.

As I mentioned at the beginning, we have rearranged our school room yet again. The bookshelves from our library/guest room have been moved into the school room, so now all of our school stuff is in one place. It’s kind of cozy this way, and even though it was a lot of work moving all of those books, I really like it!

I’ve been thinking about a major schoolroom rearrangement for a while now, but I was afraid to do it because it involved moving a lot of stuff up and down the stairs (not to mention figuring out how to remove and then reinstall the gate at the top of the stairs!). Last night, I decided it just needed to be done, so Ryan and I moved a bookshelf and a couch downstairs, and another two bookshelves and an almost couch upstairs. It was a lot of work, and involved a lot of cleaning once I discovered how much stuff had gotten trapped under the couch in the schoolroom. Several hours of hard work later, though, I’m very pleased with the end result:

I think this is the most efficient use of the available space. Before, the corner bookshelf was almost impossible to get to, even for the children, and Turkey’s desk space was very cramped. Now the whole room is much more walkable, and the storage is much, much better. I hope I don’t think of any other ways to rearrange it for quite some time…I’m not sure my back could handle it!

I’ve shared a lot of pictures of our school room in the past, especially since I keep rearranging it! This year is no different, although the rearranging has been fairly minor compared to some of the other times I’ve moved things around!

We added a computer desk to our layout. No school computer yet…hoping to have the money to add it sometime this school year!

And since we put the desk where one of the bookshelves was, the shelf had to be moved, as well. I kind of like it over there by the window. Some poster and banner rearranging was also necessitated by these changes.

Since so much of our guest bedroom is also used for school purposes, I guess it’s fair to say we have school rooms. Our library is in this room, as is a new storage area. I’m loving this little shelf/basket system I picked up on sale at Target…there’s enough room for each child (plus the teacher), to store stuff!

There’s not much else I can do to move things around, unless we replace the couch with a chair for the teacher. We just don’t have any more space for new furniture, and I think I’ve finally come up with the optimal arrangement for the furniture we do have!

OK, I’m not going to say that this is how the school room is going to stay. I’m just not. Because every other time I’ve said it, it’s turned out to be untrue. So, this is how the school room is going to stay for now.

I took the five main bookshelves out of the school room (again), and moved them into the room that used to be Chickadee’s room/the guest room (again). Now it’s back to being the library/the guest room, just like it was before Chickadee moved in (she’s in the room with her big sisters now)!

I don’t mind having a separate library. It was nice having the bookshelves in the school room, but because Turkey and Bunny’s desks were in front of them, they were a little inaccessible (mostly to me…the children didn’t seem to mind), and Chickadee wanted to pull all of the books off the shelves every day. So, I removed the bulk of that temptation, even though there are still some books she can make a mess of if she’s so inclined. I did have to steal a bookshelf from another room in the house to complete this set-up, which I’m not thrilled about. The bookshelf was not absolutely necessary where it was, but it did serve a purpose. As it’s necessary for the school room, however, the school room wins!

So, this is the current state of our school room. I still have a long-term plan that involves getting rid of the couch, and putting in a computer desk, and a comfy chair for the teacher. When that happens (since that’s probably two years down the road, at least, Chickadee should be a little less mischievous), I may bring the bookshelves back in, but I’m not going to make any specific plans about that now. For today, I’m just happy to be done rearranging all of the books and the furniture yet again!

The school room hasn’t changed too much for this year…I did add another bookshelf for my teacher’s guides and our references books in the last remaining space, and this year, we will have three banners up year-round, but the general layout is the same:

I do have a long-term plan for this room, that may or may not ever be implemented. If we ever get around to replacing the couch and chairs in our living room, I plan to bring one of those recliners upstairs, and get rid of the school room couch. This would be a little bittersweet, because I do love when we snuggle on the couch and read, but on the other hand, if I just had a cozy chair instead (because the teacher needs a comfortable seat!), it would free up room for a small desk with a school computer, and maybe even one more bookshelf. If I can make all of that happen someday, it will be the homeschool room of my dreams (although, it’s already pretty darn close!).

Technically, I don’t think this really counts as rearranging the school room (which I said I was done doing). But I really wanted to find a way for our folding table to stay up permanently, because we use it for so very many things…puzzles, games, building projects, science experiments, and crafts, to name a few. The only way to really make room for the table, though, was to take the sectional sofa in the room apart, and slide everything toward the window.

In the end, I think it worked out well. The end of the couch is against the wall, so you don’t really notice the missing arm on one side. We have full access to the window now, which is nice, and the heating vent is no longer blocked. I don’t know that the room suffered at all for that (it wasn’t totally blocked, and there is a second vent), but it’s nice to have it back out in the open.

I’m done now. Other than adding a second cabinet, which I’d love to do at some point, but isn’t really in the budget, I can’t really think of a way to improve our school room set-up. I’m excited to get back to work on Monday, in our new-and-improved (again!) school room!

This was a bad week. The children were mouthy and unmotivated, and had some difficulties with varying concepts. I was rather unmotivated myself, which didn’t help things any. But we soldiered on, and managed to end things on a positive note.

We did start reading Bully for You, Teddy Roosevelt!, which was a bright spot in the week. It has been popular with the children, and fascinating to me. I didn’t really know anything about his personal life before, and it’s quite inspiring the way he overcame so many obstacles and trials in his life to become the Rough Rider everyone knows. This book fit in well with our history lessons on the Gilded Age, as well. We had an interesting discussion, trying to determine whether John D. Rockefeller was a good guy or a bad guy. Turkey decided that he was an anti-hero, which I guess fits.

In science, we learned about the circulatory system. We had the chance to do a few fun experiments, including building “blood” using corn syrup (plasma), candy red hots (red blood cells), sprinkles (platelets), and a jelly bean (a white blood cell). We also used a strong magnet to discover just what it means to have an iron-fortified box of cereal. Even though I knew what it meant, I have to admit, I found it a little disturbing to see the iron filings collect beneath the magnet!

To combat our week of doldrums, I spent last night and this morning rearranging our school room a bit. I thought a fresh perspective might give us a new outlook. It went from looking like this:

To this:

Now all of the bookshelves are in the school room, which is nice. There really isn’t room for our “project table” anymore, though. I’m probably going to leave it up through our Christmas School activities, because it will get a lot of use, but then it’s going to have to be put away…it’s just taking up too much space!

Next week, Christmas School starts…hopefully, we’ll have a better go of it!