Gracyn was absent today.

I used our session time to plan for future lessons.

Granny was absent today. We would have continued working on the lesson on animals.

Gracyn's lesson covered using place value to add two-digit numbers. The ones and the tens were counted separately to determine how many in all. If the sum of the ones column totaled more than 9 Gracyn carried the one to make another ten in the tens column. The white board was used to draw quick pictures and add the tens and ones. We also began to review the concepts and skills learned throughout the chapter for the upcoming unit test.

Gracyn and I worked on verb tense in sentences, she grasped the concept readily. She read aloud the Fly Guy book she's been reading to herself all week, very nice reading. She classified the story as fiction and identified the characters, setting and problem. She also recognized the author's purpose as writing for entertainment. Her word study was the spellings of long a: a-e, ai and ay.

This was our first session together, so I wanted to see where she was in math. We did some addition and subtraction games online, then went and worked on addition of two digits numbers on the white board. She was interested in more advanced problems, so we did a couple addition problems with numbers in the millions.
We also practiced mental math (working to the tens) and will practice more next time we meet.

We began Name That Tune. Gracyn loves to listen to, identify and sing along with piano music. Next we reviewed several pieces in the Bastien method primer. We started a new piece, At the Zoo, which introduced the dotted half note.

Gracyn continued the unit on living things today. We reviewed the characteristics of mammals and discussed the characteristics of birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians. She did an animal classification sort and cut out pictures of different animals. She sorted them onto mats which contained characteristics of each animal group. She had to decide which group the animal fit into based on its characteristics.

Today we filled out a goal/planning sheet for Gracyn. We're planning yoga/dance classes (yoga to music); yoga art projects; and focus on arm and upper body strengthening. Gracyn practiced assisted hand stands today, in addition to push-ups and planks. Gracyn's participation and attitude were very good today. During the last part of class, we went outside to enjoy the beautiful weather in the zen garden behind the school.

Today's lesson, focused on the strategy of making a ten to help add a two-digit number and a one-digit number. Using base ten blocks, Gracyn grouped together ones to make a ten in order to solve problems more easily. Problems were solved on the white board by making a quick picture, grouping the ones to make 10, and adding the tens and ones together. Gracyn also read and solved word problems that correlated to the lesson.