Assessment 2024-25: Mister Man

 

Mister Man is my long, gangly boy-man right now.  He reads and draws.  He loves to be "my favorite kid" when I call, "Who wants to be my favorite kid?" as I'm asking for a favor.   He's gentle and smart.

Mister Man grew academically and socially this past school year.

Math

He completed Teaching Textbooks Pre-Algebra with a 96% average.  When he asked for help, it was specific, and he understood the answer with minimal coaching.  He's a good student.

Morning Meeting

Mister Man was an active participant in all of our Morning Meetings.  He read, sang, answered questions, learned to lead music in 3/4, 4/4, and 2/4 time, memorized scriptures, and contributed spiritual insights to our daily lessons.

It looks to me like leading music might actually be one of his gifts.  He picks up on the nuances of conducting simply by watching, and sometimes he even instinctively gets movements right.  He is graceful, and as his voice deepens, he's developing into a lovely baritone.

Evening Reading

Mister Man loves books the way his mama loves books--binge reading to the max!  Half the time, he's already read the books I read aloud to the family, but he's an enthusiastic listener.  His comprehension is spot-on, he contributes logically to discussion, I can always count on him for a vocabulary word question, and he frequently leads the others into deeper understanding of what we're reading.

American Rhythm

Mister Man was in Nature Angel's Sparkler class this year.  He's grown so fast that his height/length outstripped his coordination, so a final year in this group did him a lot of good.  He is growing in physical grace, though, and he's not the same dancer he was at the start of the year.  It was our director who noticed it and pointed it out to me--his long limbs don't get away from him the way they used to, and he's mastering the footwork that he used to "fake."  Mister Man is sweetly charming with our elderly audiences.

Swahili

In a moment of maternal inspiration, I offered Mister Man the chance to start studying a language on Duolingo.  He chose Swahili.

And he has dutifully studied almost every single day since!  

I actually opened an account for him on Mango, too, because our library offers that service for free to its patrons.  He likes having both because they teach in different ways, and he gets a chance to understand nuances in the language that might be otherwise missed.

Everything Else

I based our Kid School time on The Peaceful Press Playful Pioneers 2.  

And we followed it beautifully for a month, then we simplified in the second month, then we simplified further for the rest of the year.  Ultimately, we followed the history reading with pretty good faith. 

We did quite a few written narrations to add some power to our daily oral narrations.

Then we added Shakespeare Stories for a little bit of fun.

     *King Lear

     *Twelfth Night

     *The Taming of the Shrew

I needed history to be less literature-based and more straight-forward for my crew so we made our way all the way through The Story of Science: Newton in the Middle.  In the spring semester, we added brief lessons from The Golden Book of Natural History. 

As with history, we did daily oral narrations and occasional written narrations.

As part of the Playful Pioneers 2 plan, we memorized all 50 states and capitals over the course of the school year.  Mister Man mastered them in rapid order.  We also did a few mapping activities.

A few times we did Rod and Staff grammar lessons from the Level 2 book.

When we got adventurous, we turned to  Under the Home for enrichment. We explored 

     *Art Appreciation

     *Studio Art  (we did one or two Art for Kids Hub lessons, too)

     *Geography

     *Music Appreciation

For a couple of months, we did a great job heading out for weekly hikes. Then we shifted to working on Couch to5K training.  Mister Man found his own rhythm over time, figuring out that his long strides don't match anyone else's strides in the family.  Because he likes to visit as we run and walk, he found that he could walk a certain length of the track then break away on his own to run a sub-loop of the track before rejoining those who were walking.  He could definitely use some coaching for his posture and form, but he lopes along happily. 

Back in the late summer, he participated in our 5 week homeschool soccer "league."  Mister Man loves to play soccer with friends, and while he's not a star, he's a teammate who can be counted on.

On His Own

Mister Man loves to read, play chess, draw, and write.  He shies away from athletics because he has brothers who are so much more athletic than he is (and they rub it in).  He did get a chance to go rock wall climbing (without any brothers) for his birthday this past year, and he loved it!  His big hands and long arms and legs made him a natural.  He's good at strategizing during chess, and a highlight of the year was playing with his grandma's friend's husband--who runs a national chess training camp for kids.  

He has a great sense of humor, readily understanding irony, puns, plays on words, etc..

He revels in his height in this not-very-tall family. :)

He's a good teacher.  For the past few months, he's been able to serve as president of his church class.  He attends meetings, plans activities, and has frequent opportunities to teach his peers.  He is industrious about preparing his lessons, and I hear from his leaders that he is a good teacher.

He also loves good conversation.  Of all of my boys, he's the most likely to seek out my company just to chat about books, recent events, and thoughts that are going through his mind at any moment.

Looking Forward

Mister Man starts high school this fall! 

Early morning seminary

Study for credits

More personal accountability

Heavier work load

Like Ladybug, he's nervous, but happy about what's coming next!