We have been talking about homeschooling for several years and low and behold the time has finally arrived for me to gear up and go for it! I have my degree in Education (as well Theater and Music) so I thought for sure this would be a breeze...I mean, after all, its just kindergarten!! HAHAHA "just". Well, I have gained a tremendous amount of respect for ANY home-school mom just from a week of this!
Teaching Henry to read: First off, I promise you that I KNOW how to READ! But why oh why is it SO hard to teach him to read!! Patience...Patience...Patience...along with Phonics!
Teaching Addie her letter and numbers: She could care less! I'll point at an A on a chart and ask her what letter it is and she will say "TWO!!!" and be VERY proud of herself. I will say "No, thats an A"...she keeps a big smile on her face while saying "Ok mommy" not even a moment of care crosses her face that she missed that by a long shot! ... now we have backtracked to 1 letter and 1 number of the week!! Patience...Patience...Patience...and more Patience!
Our First day of School!! Last Monday was our "official first day". The kids went to bed Sunday night SO intensely excited for school the next morning. You would have thought it was Christmas eve or something! We woke up the next morning and went outside to get all the goat milking, gardening and egg collecting done for the day and then we were going to jump right in to schooling! I walked outside and the crisp cool breeze almost took my breath away (very lovely since it has been in the 100's here lately). We were outside for a good hour, all the while Henry and Addie were bugging me to get in and "start school" (oh how differently they will feel someday!!). I feel like we haven't been outside in MONTHS because of the atrocious heat we have been having...so our first "official school activity" was RECESS!! Henry and Addie cheered!! We stayed outside for a few more hours enjoying the delightful weather and then we were blessed with a good rain (which of course we stayed and played out in for a while!). Finally we hussled inside soaked, cooled off and SO excited, quickly changed clothes and sat down for school. Ok...so here we are...the kids are looking at me with such great anticipation and I had a blank stare looking back at them. "Ok, here we go!" We had a good hour of work and it went quite well...they were both asking for more. Then my sister called me and thought it would be fun to go to the zoo since the weather was so nice (it had stopped raining by this point)...To the ZOO we go!!! After spending a few hours at the zoo I thought it was time to get home and maybe fit in another hour of school. Then my sister reminded me that it was ice cream day at my grandpas nursing home. Yes, ice cream and grandpa won!! We loaded up the kids to go see great grandpa Al and have some ice cream. By the time we got home it was getting close to dinner time and the window of opportunity for another hour of school was gone. So we ate, milked goats, got ready for bed and went to bed early to have a big day of work tomorrow :) This was very far from what I always pictured my first day of homeschooling looking like and definitely outside of my lesson plan. Regardless, I couldn't have planned a better day!
Much more to come in our new adventures of homeschooling!!
Teaching Henry to read: First off, I promise you that I KNOW how to READ! But why oh why is it SO hard to teach him to read!! Patience...Patience...Patience...along with Phonics!
Teaching Addie her letter and numbers: She could care less! I'll point at an A on a chart and ask her what letter it is and she will say "TWO!!!" and be VERY proud of herself. I will say "No, thats an A"...she keeps a big smile on her face while saying "Ok mommy" not even a moment of care crosses her face that she missed that by a long shot! ... now we have backtracked to 1 letter and 1 number of the week!! Patience...Patience...Patience...and more Patience!
Our First day of School!! Last Monday was our "official first day". The kids went to bed Sunday night SO intensely excited for school the next morning. You would have thought it was Christmas eve or something! We woke up the next morning and went outside to get all the goat milking, gardening and egg collecting done for the day and then we were going to jump right in to schooling! I walked outside and the crisp cool breeze almost took my breath away (very lovely since it has been in the 100's here lately). We were outside for a good hour, all the while Henry and Addie were bugging me to get in and "start school" (oh how differently they will feel someday!!). I feel like we haven't been outside in MONTHS because of the atrocious heat we have been having...so our first "official school activity" was RECESS!! Henry and Addie cheered!! We stayed outside for a few more hours enjoying the delightful weather and then we were blessed with a good rain (which of course we stayed and played out in for a while!). Finally we hussled inside soaked, cooled off and SO excited, quickly changed clothes and sat down for school. Ok...so here we are...the kids are looking at me with such great anticipation and I had a blank stare looking back at them. "Ok, here we go!" We had a good hour of work and it went quite well...they were both asking for more. Then my sister called me and thought it would be fun to go to the zoo since the weather was so nice (it had stopped raining by this point)...To the ZOO we go!!! After spending a few hours at the zoo I thought it was time to get home and maybe fit in another hour of school. Then my sister reminded me that it was ice cream day at my grandpas nursing home. Yes, ice cream and grandpa won!! We loaded up the kids to go see great grandpa Al and have some ice cream. By the time we got home it was getting close to dinner time and the window of opportunity for another hour of school was gone. So we ate, milked goats, got ready for bed and went to bed early to have a big day of work tomorrow :) This was very far from what I always pictured my first day of homeschooling looking like and definitely outside of my lesson plan. Regardless, I couldn't have planned a better day!
Much more to come in our new adventures of homeschooling!!
Yay! It will come, friend...it's a long, loooong process :) You can do it!
ReplyDelete"A crisp, cool breeze!!!" LOL
"a crisp, cool breeze" the phrase I have been using way too much lately and yet not enough! All thanks to Julie ;) Thank you Julie for bringing such a delightful phrase to all this hotness!
ReplyDeleteYeah for your first day! I started preschool with Jack last week as well. I am very sad that we allowed Madison to attend public school for first grade. She begged us to let her so we decided to let her do it. She needed to see for herself what it was all about. I have a sick feeling in my stomach everyday that I let her go. Roger and I have both decided that we are going to bring her home and homeschool instead. Right now it is a matter of when. I can not remember what curriculum you decided to use. Do you like it so far?
ReplyDelete