First Day of Homeschool....Again

It's been a couple years since I have home schooled. My older two attend school. Eden is a Junior at a Charter High School and Joey is in seventh grade and getting ready to attend the school Eden is in.

My youngest two, Jade 5 and Jager 3 will be home with me learning all the basics of life and having fun doing it! I am excited to start on this journey again!

On the agenda today:

Take a walk and get some fresh air

Wash the dishes together

Read a book

Make bread and cookies

Lunch

Rest time

Painting

Music time

Clean up

Dinner

Story

Bed

Nice full day of learning and fun!

Butterflies are among us!

So school went great this week! The preschoolers have really learned their seasons and are very quickly grasping the concept of letters being separate from each other and not just a song. They can count separate groups of shapes and realize that when you run our of shapes you stop counting. But the most exciting thing this week was the arrival of our butterfly larvae. The School Fairy delivered them on Thursday, so we could all watch them grow, turn into a cocoon and emerge as a butterfly. This is my favorite project of the year. It fascinates the kids so much (and me).

This week we heard the story of the Three Little Pigs. It's funny because I grew up hearing a different version than the one we use for school. In this version the wolf eats the pigs who make their homes of straw and sticks. In the version I heard (probably cleaned up by a parent or grandparent) each of the pigs who made weak homes ran to the next strongest home until they all ended up in the house of bricks. I sort of like the version we read because it seems to me that if the wolf can actually get to the pigs it would be able to eat them and not have them run away. Then again it is only a tale.

Joey and I are slowly working our way through Beowulf. The story is amazing and the lanuguage is so fun to read. I'm so suprised by my son's ability to understand what it's saying. He's so smart! This week he asked me if I could teach him about fractions and amazingly that's what our math block focuses on. So soon we'll be learning about that. There are so many fun projects to do that bring fractions home.

Eden is still struggling a bit with all the extra homework she has and the lack of a social life it lends. I feel bad that she has so much work to do, but I know she can handle it. She's smart enough. We went to the West High game on Friday night and had a blast! Our team won, which made it even better and against the other hometown high school to boot!

It's been a good school week! Yay!

School+Life=Busy

Well it's been a little while since I've posted, but only because life has been hectic. School with Jade and Jaeger is going so well. They both really seem to love it and they have learned so much. Since my last post we have done a painting reflecting the four different seasons and since then we all know the seasons based on their description. I didn't get a snap of Jaeger's or Jade's paintings before he left that day, but they were great. Here is a shot of my winter painting. Their paintings looked very similar. Pretty good for little hands.

We have learned letters A-C and are working on the letter D this week. Although they don't have them perfectly memorized they get the concept and will be ready to go further with their letters next year before they begin kindergarten. They both know that "A" makes the long "A", short "A" and "ahhhh" sounds. "B" makes the "Buh" sound. "C" makes "ssss" and "Ka" sounds. This week "D" makes the "Duh" sound. They like that one. We also know that "B" is the beginning of such lovely words as booger, butt and bellybutton. They recognize all of the basic shapes and can even draw some of them freehand, usually by accident. We know all the colors and are learning how two colors who meet in the middle magically make a new exciting color. We practice this only once a week now because they have it down already and it can get boring to do it everyday. Their favorite story to be told is Three Billy Goats Gruff. I do the voices for the goats and the GREAT MEAN TROLL and they love it. We take a walk every morning before we begin to get some fresh air and our energy out. Sometimes they'll pick up nice things to put on the nature table. It's been a much easier endeavor than I imagined it would be when I first started. I have two very rambunctious three year olds with strong wills and I thought they would be difficult to wrangle, but they have both been great. Obviously we have our moments, but all in all it's been a fantastic experience.

Joey is doing great as well. We got off to a slow start because I was so busy all the time. So we did a lot of math worksheets, handwriting practice and free writing. Now we are studying Beowulf. We have been for the last two weeks. It's an amazing poem and I'll tell anyone who has seen the movie that the book is nowhere near what the movie portrays and the language in the book adds to it's brilliance. Amazingly Joey understands what it's saying. Every once in a while if I feel the language was hard to interpret or if it looks like I've lost his interest I'll explain the passage in more simple terms, but mostly I read it to him as it is. He's excited to hear how it all comes out. He asks wonderfully engaging questions about the story wondering if Beowulf wins, what happened to Grendel. We both grossed out at the description of one warriors death at Grendel's hands. Brutal. Each day Joey writes passages from the book. While his handwriting isn't the most beautiful it is so much better than it was last year and the year before. It's especially better than when he was in school. You couldn't even read any of his writing out of second grade. We've really enjoyed this book and are about half way through. We are going to do some drawings to go with our passages a little later as an after school activity. Joey is also working on a great paint by number painting. He really likes working on it and asks if he can paint. Our neighbor gave it to me after finding it in a closet. I was going to do it for fun and Joey saw it and asked if we could work on it together. He's done most of it.

Eden is still very much enjoying high school. It's a lot of hard work, but she's doing well. We received her progress report in the mail and she had all B's and one C. The C was in drama class of all things. Go figure. The drama queen makes a C in drama. I guess she doesn't actually know it all. She is trying hard to pull all of her grades to an A, but I'm happy with a B average. That's fantastic for just getting back into public school and taking advanced classes. I'm very proud of her. She has joined three clubs: Christian Club, Drama Club and The Pink Ladies Club. No, not Pink Ladies like in Grease. This club will be fundraising for breast cancer research and awareness. She chose to join all on her own because her Grandma had breast cancer. It made my mom very proud. She likes all but one of her teachers. That's pretty good considering she has 6 classes a day. Right now we are just trucking along. I can't wait to see her report card and find out if she's done well. So far I'd say she's worked really hard.

On a more personal family note we decided the other night to just take a drive and on the way home Jerod decided ice cream cones were in order. So here are pictures of the kids eating their ice cream. This was Jager's first ice cream cone. Think he liked it?

Also, Joey has been playing soccer. He doesn't like it a lot, but he plays anyway. Here are some shots from his soccer games.

Progress Report

Eden's progress report showed up in the mail on Saturday. As I opened it I realized what it was and I was instantly nervous. Here it was...the proof that homeschooling her was a good idea or not. Actually that's not totally true. Even if her grades weren't great I still feel that Eden found her confidence while being home schooled. She would never have been able to discover that if she had been harassed at school for the last three years. But, I still wondered, "Did I teach her enough to tackle these Pre AP courses?" Right now she has all B's and one C. The C is in Drama. Duh! Why??? That should be the one she has the best grade in. We talked about it last night and I encouraged her to realize that drama isn't just an easy course. It too needs serious consideration. Just because you like it doesn't mean you're good at it. It takes paying attention, taking notes, studying lines and being prepared the same as any other class. It too shows up on your transcripts for college. She agreed. I also made a vow to myself that I'm simply going to run through each course in the afternoon to prompt her memory of what she did that day and what needs to be done that night. I'm trying not to help too much, but help enough. I want her to learn to be responsible for her own things. It's really important to learn before college.

All of this being said here I have to be proud that she's getting all B's in the hard courses. It proves to me that not only did homeschooling bring her more confidence in herself, she did grasp what I taught her and I was successful in my endeavor to get her ready for high school. I almost didn't graduate high school myself. Not because I wasn't smart enough I was lazy and had no motivation. I wanted to do other things. But having never gone to college I felt judged sometimes by others about homeschooling. I would lose my confidence, especially when I got to a problem I couldn't solve alone. But I look back now and realize that I didn't let my lack of knowledge stop me. I found the right resources and used them to help me along. We muddled through it together figuring things out side by side. I think it helped Eden to realize that I don't know everything and that I have to work to get the answers the same as she does. It also helped her to see that I wouldn't simply give up. I was going to do all I could to find the right answer and how I came to that answer. When I would finally get it right I'd be overjoyed. It was a celebration. I really loved figuring it all out with her. I miss that.

I really do miss having her home with me. It's different not seeing her all the time. Because her homework can be so time consuming and with having club meetings after school some days and youth on Thursday nights our time is limited. I think we appreciate each other a little more. I know I appreciate all the help she used to lend with the little ones. I have the good life before. I never took advantage of Eden being here, but I would leave her in charge from time to time so I could run an errand. But it's time to start loosening that grip. Let Eden become who Eden will become. Because she's so smart, talented, personable, beautiful inside and out her possibilities are endless.

School Days, Gardening, Canning and fun!

We are well into our school days now and all seems to be going great! We are having such a great time learning all about the seasons, shapes, number and even our letters. We've learned the magic two colors do when they meet each other. Our school fairy loves to visit, play tricks and leave gifts on our nature table during the week. Last Friday Jade and Jaeger received little bean bags to play with.





Joey has been reviewing some math and writing skills, just getting warmed up for all the neat things we will learn this year. Yesterday we made jalapeno pepper jelly. It's so delicious. Joey put on his gloves and helped cut and clean the peppers. He measured the sugar and vinegar and did all the stirring. I handled the canning, but he watched carefully to see how it was done. We learned a lot about keeping thing sanitary and the difference between sanitization and sterilization. It was a fun lesson. The nicest part is the peppers came from the garden we planted together last spring.

Basket of items from our garden

Jalapeno pepper jelly to share

We've taken video of the little one saying their abc's. It's so cute to watch them try to say the lmno part. They also count really well. See the videos below.

Our garden

It occurred to me that we planted our garden last spring and I don't think we have any pictures of it on my blog. If we do it's from when it first began. Here's some pictures of our garden from beginning to now.

Our garden before we began planting

While we were waiting for the right time to plant we decided to do some paintings in the garden on the fence to entice our plants to grow.

Here is my painting of corn

Eden's carrot

Jade's painting....abstract artist

Here's a pic of three of our paintings...the tomato in the middle is Joey's

Our starts...almost time to plant

Sugar snap peas

Our tomato plant...so tiny then.

Our first planting of corn...we're on our third now

Picture of the whole garden as it began to get full

Our tomato getting bigger

Another view of our garden

One of our four sunflowers...very short here

This sunflower ended up being our biggest. It towered several feet above that fence.

Butter lettuce...these were yummy

Jalopenos....they're great to eat like this, but when they get red they are spicy

Our cuccumbers. These get huge and are so delicious

I have never liked tomatoes before. I love them now that I can eat them out of my own garden. We have made the best salsa out of these too.

Basil....if only you could smell this stuff.

Watermelon...you should see how big this is now. I can't take a picture of the entire thing. It spans the entire garden. We have about 3 or 4 melons on it now.

One of our melons....little bitty

Look at the hair on that corn. That has to be one of the most beautiful colors.

Our corn wasn't plentiful, but what we had of it was delicious

Getting taller

A bugs eye view

Sunflower

A pretty good idea of what our garden looks like today

First Week of Preschool

We started preschool for my 3 year old, Jade and my friend's son Jaeger this Tuesday. I really wasn't ready, but had made myself a promise to start on that date and wanted to stick to it. With the school room organized enough to teach in and no real plan I dove in head first and did what came naturally to me.



While I use a Waldorf style curriculum to follow I have to modify it slightly. While my daughter Jade will be homeschooled for some time to come, my friend's little one would be entering into a public school come kindergarten. I want to make sure he's ready to succeed when that happens. So I take the beauty, the stories, the playfulness of Waldorf preschool and add in some basics. We talk about shapes, letters, numbers, colors. We begin each day with a prayer. We play different rhythm instruments everyday and practice counting while we beat out a rhythm. We take a break for snack and some fresh air and head back in to do something fun and artful.



We have a school fairy that watches over us each day we have school. She likes to play mischeif with out nature table by taking things off to see if we notice or she'll leave little presents for the kids if they've done exceptionally well for the week. Today she left a note and some Jelly Bellies.



We visited the Jelly Belly factory yesterday and took a tour to see how they make this yummy candy. We had a blast. My friend Tiffany, her two little ones, my two littlest ones and I drove to Fairfield for the day and had the best time. The kids were pretty well behaved considering the amount of time they had to spend in the car. We only had trouble on the way home with a little arguing. Otherwise it was a fun and interesting day. We learned how they make them, shape them, color them, flavor them, coat them, polish them and stamp them. We even got to see what happens when they don't quite meet the high standards that Jelly Bellies must face. They become a Belly Flop! How funny!!



Today we did some painting. It was fun and the kids listened pretty well considering they are only 3 years old. I'm attaching pictures to go with our activities this week.



I'd say for the first week it went well. As we begin to adjust to the rules of our school and to each other and our new schedules it'll get better and better. They are both so eager to learn new things. I love watching them learn something new and really grasp what they are learning. When I get to see that light come on inside it just makes my day.



Jade and I spent some time this afternoon just free painting. It was a nice time relaxing together. I asked Joey if he wanted to paint and he didn't. Today is his last free day at home before he starts school, so I think he wanted to take advantage of his time to himself. I can respect that. Attached are pictures of our afternoon paintings also. Three of them are mine and one is Jade's. She's very talented. :-)

Jade and her squares

Jaeger and his squares

Kids being silly kids

Board work

Jaeger not posing like a monster or something....He's just being Jaeger

Jade's painting today

Jaeger's painting today

My painting today

Of course we need a picture of Jager

One of my paintings from our afternoon painting session

Jade's painting from our afternoon painting session

My second painting from this afternoon