Week 2, Session 2

It has been neverending sickness at our house. I took my baby in for a well check after she got over her other sicknesses and she had an ear infection. She was put on a stronger antibiotic since she'd just finished one round of antibiotics and she has an allergy to it. In her short life she has experienced some trials that I won't forget even though she will.

So now that everyone else is mostly well we've got spring allergies to deal with. Not a major trial so far; just more of the usual.

We're chugging away at school but I want to be doing so much MORE!!!!! I feel like we are doing a lot but I want to pack it all in.

I mostly just wanted to check in on this blog since I haven't gotten here in weeks! I'll try to do more daily check-ins in the future.

Week 4

Look people, I just don't have time for this!

Especially if my kids keep getting sick! And they are keeping me up at night Sick! and with Nightmares! about Snakes and Ponies!

*deep sigh*

I must say that this week was super successful and I was abundantly happy with progress made. My #1 child is happy with her work and plodded along through it with minimal complaint. It helped her to write a list on the board and tell her what exactly she was going to get immediate rewards for. She is a sucker for instant rewards. Breaktime? Is it time for a snack?

I managed somehow beyond my understanding to teach all three kids all of their material 4 out of the 5 days we did school. The fifth day I took baby to the doctor and ran related errands and gave up on school in order to care for self and baby who are/were sick.

#3 child is doing not so hot on his workbook work (i.e. coloring) and I have discovered that he hasn't figured out patterns yet. Going to work on that. We play with a Leap Frog Word Whammer all of the time and he's getting the hang of that. I notice that in order for the kids to get the most out certain activities I have to be close and available for coaching (e.g. painting) and this is so especially true with him.

#2 child is coming along swimmingly with her reading. I'm not doing any math activities with her really. WE have enough games and stuff for fun that I'm going to start her on Saxon grade 1 next year without the K program just like I did for #1. She is mostly good about practicing her handwriting pages but has given me some trouble at times when she doesn't like how the page looks. I find she is much more particular about things than #1 ever was. (I like that about her.)

#1 is highly motivated with piano and most all of her work. I discovered that the review section of Saxon 2 is quite lengthy possibly to recover from summer breaks in classroom situations and I was able to test her and skip a large number of lessons. I could have started her at Lesson 50 but I'll relax and let her begin next week at Lesson 40. She is fully into the routine and i'm going to add an extra reading time next week. She is also doing more work on French than previously and she seems to love it!

Week 3

Monday we went to the World Aquarium in Dallas which was, for me, a big disappointment. It was overpriced for what they had to offer and it wasn't well equipped to handle more than 50 people at a time. It was far too crowded with walkways too narrow and birds kept out of view in cages behind foliage. There were many tamarins but few monkeys and I thought very few fish.

I haven't been to many great aquariums in the US but the ones I have been to surpassed this one in quality, information, comfort, and price. Albuquerque, Omaha, and Los Angeles stand out in my mind as enjoyable aquariums.

I don't think the kids really got anything educational out of the experience, unfortunately.

Tuesday and Wednesday they did school just fine with all of the regular requirements and Thursday they got hit with sickness. My baby was the first to get sick on Wednesday and by Thursday it was crazy with all four sick. I wanted to read to the kids at least and I did have #1 do some school anyway, but most of the time everyone was sleeping.

We got more school books today so we'll start Saxon 2 and some other books on Monday.

It's really late but it's Friday (well, now Saturday) and I just noticed I never posted the update of Week 1 last week.

We just finished Week 2 of school and things are going well. We've had some organizing to do and we're still struggling with doing things right at the time we're supposed to be doing them and not letting things drag into the afternoon.

Last week on our very first great day back at school my 3rd got injured in gymnastics and was laid out for the night and next day. It was super scared and very stressed because of all of the insurance cards I had, his had strangely and mysteriously gone missing! I was freaking out even though there really wasn't a reason to be. It was a very stressful night for me after a busy day of school and my husband was on call. I was very emotional and my brother, two brother in laws and my sister came over and helped care for me and my little hurt boy. He was better the next afternoon and this last monday he went right back to gymnastics without any problems.

I am so impressed with my kids. I just love them so much and I want them to have happy well adjusted lives. I have been very driven with their education and expect a whole lot from them. They like to learn most of the time and find the information interesting. #1 loves our new work of looking up words in the dictionary and talking about meanings. She loves to guess and she is also excelling in her reading and comprehension.

WE are also taking more time to have friends over which has been good for the kids and me. I need to be more relaxed and giving in this area. ONe of the blessings I've had lately is my friendship with a lady whose two girls play at our house sometimes. WE don't talk a whole lot but I am so pleased to know her and love her girls.

And #2 is rolling right along with reading. She has been so much easier to teach reading than my first but I forget that I started #1 with reading when she was 3 1/2. #2 seems to have a love for books but #1 is was more in love. She is reading American Girl series now and loving them. I am so pleased she loves good books.

I am so lucky to homeschool my kids and thankful for the freedoms to do so. I can tell this is the greatest blessing for our family. At church when I commented to a gal I know that I haven't potty trained #3 yet because #1 is so hyper (what I was really saying is that she is draining and making an excuse I shouldn't have about the whole potty training thing) and this person said something about her possibly not getting enough stimulation and when she insinuated that maybe she should be in public school and "have you tried it?" I was really kind of ticked off. I don't know why I was other than that I have pride about the homeschooling thing and I wanted to just tell her flat out that I prayed and know it's the right thing and results tell me I'm right. I wish I could really explain how special home schooling is to me. It's our WORLD. IT's OUR LIFE! IT's our IDENTITY! It's our FAMILY! And someone else asked me this week about when I stop being teacher and turn on the mom role and I had to admit to myself that I see myself as mainly their TEACHER and that is what being a mom means to me. IF I weren't their teacher, I wouldn't be their mom.

Days 47-51

This week CC#1 has completed her work except for science and French. I'm having her do school tomorrow as well to make up for that.

Next year we are going to do 6 weeks on and one week off schedule with an extra week off for Thanksgiving and two for Christmas. The extra week off will be counted somewhere along the year as needed. This will give us a 42 week a year schedule. The school years are still basically beginning at the end of August along with public school mostly because I have three kids with birthdays in summer and I correlate their levels of school with their birthdays.

We are also going to take a different approach to CC#1's school. Because of her ADHD she is far too easily distracted to get real book learning done. I have long known about the Robinson Curriculum and I have decided I will go ahead and purchase the information and adopt the self-instruction technique with her. I can truly see how crutches are very damaging to her abilities as well as the lack of perfectly rigid scheduling. As for her environment, she is currently doing her work at our big kitchen table in the dining room where the younger kids and I are coming in and out of all day long. We have a small house and providing her with her own school room is not an option. My husband and i have decided that putting her at a desk in our master bedroom will be the best option because she will have easy access to a bathroom and have a quiet solitary environment. I worry that she won't have enough light in there and that the dark green walls won't be conducive to her learning. It's the best we can do, so that's what we're going to do.

I'm going to make her new schedule and for the entirety of the year that is how we will proceed. I want our goals for the year to be adhered to for the entire year with very minimal adjustments.

In the Robinson Curriculum the plan is to have 5 hours of solitary focused study each day, six days a week (if you do it like they did.) The first two hours cover math followed by two hours of reading and one of writing.

This is going to be a huge stretch for CC#1 because she is such a talker and complainer. Putting her in a room by herself with just her work in front of her will be difficult at first, but I hope that with plenty of other activities to do during the other parts of the day, she will make it fine. I will let her have small breaks and snacks at first and gradually expect more focus of her.

I don't know that having her do two hours of math by herself at this level will be necessary, but if she takes a full two hours to do her pages, so be it. By the time she reaches Saxon 54 she'll be doing two hours of problems.

Now I just want to take a little time and complain about her gymnastics. When CC#1 was 4 I started her in gymnastics at Chow's in West Des Moines, the same place as Shawn Johnson's gym, incidentally. At that gym the kids went through every apparatus during each 45 min lesson and with 6-8 kids per class had very little wait time because of how the training was set up. At the current gym she is at, and it is the ONLY one in the area, things are done quite a bit differently.

I used to have her in an evening class and it was loud and noisy and the classes were run by young people who did not model all of the things they required in stretching properly and warming up. They didn't address my daughter's needs when she was hurt by another student in the class and ignored her. They do not go through even half of the apparatuses in each hour of class.

I switched her to the Homeschool class because I thought she would get better coaching. Then some teen girls joined the class and they "demoted" CC#1 to a 4 1/2 - 5 1/2 year olds class. I asked about them doing this and they said that CC#1 complains, gets bored and won't focus on a task enough to master it. I'm ticked because at Chow's the coaches said she was the best in her class.

They might be right about her, but I don't think moving her to the class they did is the answer.

I am iritated that the coach comes late to class, skips warm up stretches, never smiles, and then ends the class early to give the kids stamps on their feet. (If she wasn't doing what the coach requires she shouldn't be getting stamps. If all that's required is to show up then she shouldn't be going to that gym. Another thing that irritates me is that tons of the coaches bring in fast food and soft drinks. So much for being good examples! Taking her to another gym isn't an option so I feel stuck. I never intended for her to compete, but I am paying for her to learn skills and get some exercise.

As far as the gym goes for the other two kids nothing could be better. There are only a few kids in the class, the coach likes them and is nice.

A New Year is Coming

We began homeschool this year on August 25th. I had just had a baby on August 14th so there was a little adjustment to be done in the beginning and even now. Babies are demanding (nursing) and so are two year olds.

SO we have done school for 13 weeks (with 2 1/2 to go). At 5 days a week that should total 65 days of school. As you can see, we've done 46 days. That means we've really only done 9 weeks of school with 4 weeks of break time. That's a lot of missed school. We'll likely end this half of the year with 60 days of school done.

Averaged over a year's time that would equal 39 weeks of school or 195 days. (That's more than what a public school usually does.)


For next year I've been thinking about a more set schedule of breaks. CC#1 really likes this idea. We would start in January and measure the end of this school year at the last week of August. (I decided a long time ago that our school years would coincide with their birthdays.

The first plan is to do 8 on/ 2 off schedule.
8,2 (march),8,2 (mid-May),8,2 (july),4

28 weeks on and 6 off.
28 more weeks at 5 days a week equals 140 days/ 186 total
28 more weeks at 6 days a week equals 168 days/ 214 total

4,2(sept/oct),9,3(Christmas)

With that it would be a 41 week year and I'd continue on with the same schedule through the next year.

The Second Plan is to do 6 on/ 1 off schedule.
6,1(mid feb), 6,1 (april),6,1 (end of may), 6,1 (july), 6, 1(aug/sept)

30 weeks on and 5 off
at 5 days a week equals 150 days/ 196 total
at 6 days a week equals 180 days/ 226 total

6,1 (mid oct), 7,3 (Christmas)

With that it would be a 43 week year.

The Third Plan is to do a 9 week on/ 2 week off schedule.
9,2 (mid march), 9,2 (may-june), 9, 2 (aug), 2 aug/sept

29 weeks on and 6 off
at 5 days a week equals 145 days/ 191 total
at 6 days a week equals 174 days/ 220 total

7, 2(nov), 6, 2(Christmas)

With that it would be a 42 week year.

We only need 25 weeks to finish the history program next year but it would be great to have time for make-up if we need it (which we will!)

I guess any schedule will work, I just have to pick one. I kind of like the idea of having a 2 week off schedule but I worry that CC#1 needs breaks more often.

More Visitors: Days 45 &46

Last week we didn't do very much school because of lingering sickness, me getting a wisdom tooth pulled on Tuesday (that still hurts today, nearly a week later!) and Grandma Judi coming to visit. Aslinn came over on Wednesday as well.

CC#1 is determined to finish her math book before Christmas and I am proud of her for doing math every day, even Saturday. She didn't complain today and got her math done in record time, even commenting "this is fun" when we did a little lesson.

On Wednesday and Thursday last week the kids did the basic stuff but we missed Friday work even though CC#1 did a little in the morning. We went Christmas shopping and did some crafts after gymnastics in the afternoon.

Even though CC#1 and 2 did school work over several days last week I am only counting two days last week as school days. I don't know where that puts us in comparison with a normal school schedule but considering we do year round school I think we are doing just fine.