Day 2

Today was another hectic day but I still feel like we accomplished a lot of quality work. Viv's bus was late AGAIN and Ian had his meet and greet and we had to go to the grocery store, so needless to say we had a lot of interruptions. Still we were able to get through 2 chapters of the Book of Mormon, we started reading Stuart Little, Will completed 2 math lessons and some typing lessons, we read about and researched the Revolutionary War, baked cookies and worked out of the closet. Not to mention his free reading time and that I made him add up all the prices of our grocery items as we shopped! Will still needs to do his chores for the day (clean the downstairs bathroom and get stuff out for packing for our trip tomorrow) and write in his journal but I will call that "homework".
I was really pleased with his work on the Revolutionary War. I did a "Mom Share" on how to look up topics (i.e. table of contents, indexes, etc.) and then asked Will what did he want to know about the war. I was surprised at what he expressed. He wanted to know why it all started, where battles were, more about Minutemen and the Boston Tea Party. Today we read in books and looked on the Internet and took notes on the stuff we found. We also discussed how the war effected families and how Dennis is in the military and how he might have to protect our country some day. This made Will sad, but we talked about how the families of the time felt the same way and that if Dennis had to go we would have to pray a lot and it would be sad. I think it is good to have that connection and build an emotional tie as we learn about it rather than just think about facts and figures. I think it is important to learn the affects of war, the reasons for war and other options so that our future generations can find other ways to solve problems. I felt good about our work today.
I am so excited for our trip. We might run into Hurricane Earl, but I guess if that happens we'll use it as an opportunity to learn about hurricanes!!! Wish us luck, I will post as I can!

A Few Bumps but a Good Ride

Viv's bus was an hour late, we also had a few tantrums and I almost flooded our pool, but other than that the day went well. I considered what most kids do on the first day from my memories as a kid as well as when I taught. The first day is generally a day of get to know you, rules, procedures, a few fluff activities and not a whole lot is covered. Home schooling you don't have to do that really. Will already knows our rules and what is expected. We have been talking to him all summer about school starting and that it would be work and not just all play. Plus we have had bits of our routine in the mix so that today would not be a big shock and I would say it worked out.
Today, Will read 2 chapters of the Book of Mormon and discussed them with me. He completed a lesson and partial 2ND lesson of math, he worked on cursive, finished reading How to Eat Fried Worms and blogged about it, read his Sonic book for 30 minutes, completed 3 science experiments, planted seeds for our family garden, cleaned his room, developed a deeper relationship with his brother by helping him build a train set, made lunch for not just himself but his brother and sister as well, wrote in his journal and chose topics for his Boston report and picked what he wanted to learn about the Revolutionary War. I think it was a productive day, beat that Public School! So despite being a bit exhausted, I feel pretty happy about our day!

Boy scientist! During Study time, Will chose to work on a science book I picked up filled with different experiments. He loves this type of activity and had fun doing them. He learned about Surface tension, Optical illusions and "Bending" or Refracting light.

Below is his Surface Tension Experiment. Super fun!

The First Day of School

Yikes, I am scared. Dennis said, have a great day today, "teacher"! I can't believe I am really doing this. Good luck Will, I hope you learn a lot, I will be doing my very best!!
So here is the schedule for today:

Breakfast
Get ready for the day
Scriptures
Chores
Free Reading
Mom Share (report topics)
Math
Cursive/Typing
snack
Study time (I have a basket of items from Will's learning wish list that he can choose from to study)
Closet time (see Thomas Jefferson Education and future posts for more details, basically I have a closet full of different things Will and the other kids can pull from and play with, learn with, etc.)
Lunch
Free Time
snack
Family Project (planting seeds/gardening)

Hopefully all will go well, wish us luck and lots of learning!!!

Day 1 on a schedule

I just finished my first scripture/Faith in God/Cub block of time with Will. It went OK. We sat down and looked through the first part of Faith in God and he picked his first activity of creating a pedigree chart and doing some family history. He made his chart and we still have to work on a family group sheet (still need to figure that one out) and pick a family story to share and discuss how temple work blesses families. He also picked a scout project to create a healthy habit chart.
The great thing is these are things I would have picked for him and he picked them on his own!!!
The bad thing is the amount of distraction we had. I let the little kids watch PBS but Will kept wanting to watch and the kids still kept coming in for different things and getting into his work. Next time I think I might try giving the little kids a project of their own, my worry is that they will still be very distracting and interrupting a lot and these are projects that require Will and I discussing things. The only thing about doing it without TV is that Will will be more focused, I hope anyway.

I also had a big Trio set of blocks and pulled that out for "school" time. The kids loved it and all stayed pretty focused on it. When the little kids got bored with the blocks I told them they could just choose another toy from their toys to play with. Ian followed Will, Cadey and Viv played with the dolls. I felt that time was a great success. I hope I can pull enough items to keep them excited and happy for this school time.

Will and I read more of How to Eat Fried Worms. The main theme is betting, lying, cheating and friendship. Will picked up on the characters telling a lie but he didn't come up with why they would lie, (to win a bet). I guess it is good he wouldn't think of that. I asked if he thought it was fair that they would lie so that Billy wouldn't eat all the worms and thus lose the bet, which made him realize why they were lying. I don't want to feed him too much. Not sure how to go about discussing. Do I give more time, what do I say if he says, "I don't know?"