Homeschool Confidential II

At Kindergarten's End: 6/15/02

Here we are at the End of our Kindergarten year and I think it was a success! With the more formal aspect of schooling under our belt, I was able to evaluate what I would change and what would stay the same. I am already looking forward to first grade!

To celebrate his "graduation," we took the whole family to Chuck E. Cheese. Nearly three hours of eating and games seems to be a great way to say good job! I gave him a little certificate with a Bee on it to say he made it through "K."  We are now going to work on reading during the summer with our new phonics program - a minor focused study - and we will begin page 2 of this journal with any summer infor or at the very least - at the beginning of first grade. Until then: A tout a l'heure!

 

The Brick and Mortar School 6/10/02

Aden asked why a friend of his can't come and visit every day. This friend is the son of one of my closest friends, so this problem is especailly perplexing for him. I had to then explain about how his friend gets on the bus in the morning (the yellow bus) and goes to a building where there are other kids and desks to sit at, and he goes to school there. Aden's scrunched up his eyebrows and his face showed utter confusion. "Who is the teacher?" he asked. I told him that the school pays men and women to come in and teach. The confused look grew. "Strangers?" "Well, yeah, but they have one teacher all year."

 "And they stay in the school ALL DAY?" Now he was incredulous. "Well, yeah."  "All DAY? Until night?" Now it was complete shock -would he ever recover knowing his friend suffered such indignities? :)  "Well, until the afternoon. Then he comes home."                                                          

Aden looked at me earnestly and said, "I'm glad that I don't have to go to school all day."  If he only knew. . .

 

On timeliness: 6/4/02

My grandmother asked me one day on how Aden can come visit her in the middle of the week? Do we make the day up later? or is a vacation day? Then I read a breakdown of the 180 school days in a homeschooling book and discovered that, since we do (for the most part) 4-on 3-off work week, we can take an additional 7 weeks of "break" throughout the year. Woo-hooo!

Then I sat down and thought about how we budget our time, when do we school, and what do we do one our "days off." A couple things occurred to me.  We probably go to school more than 180 days, since we don't take the full 7 weeks off. Even when we are on "vacation," we still read everyday, talk about what we read, do projects, math, and thinking games, and generally still "school." 

For example, it is June 4th and while the other schools are out - we are still in session for another week and 1/2. Plus, we just began summer reading and we are doing additional things in relation to that.  Additionally, we do projects and reading on Saturdays, over Thanksgiving and Christmas break, and throughout the summer. My philosophy is, I read 1-2 books everyday, why shouldn't my kids do the same?

I guess, all in all, I don't really need to worry about "timeliness" in reagards to our school. The kids are engaged in active learning everyday. And if for an hour or so in the morning they want to veg out to Bob the Builder, I guess I can allow that.  Now I just need to get Kaya off her "Little Mermaid II" kick -ugh!

I guess it is true what the books and articles say about homeschooling being a lifestyle, not just a part of the day. I read books about kindergardeners who don't even know how to hold a book right-side up and I am appalled, but then, we are a family of readers, so reading and books comes very naturally, and not reading to my kids seems more abnormal than reading several books with them daily. With us, homeschool is a lifestyle. We do it everyday, whether we mean to or not.

 An Interesting Development 5/30/02

I came across an interesting idea after our trip to the Library. I picked up some first readers. Now I do this often for Aden, but this time he really glomed on to these, because they have this whole "Road to Reading" thing going, with a multi colored road on the back of the book. Aden liked this idea and wants to "travel" on that road to reading. So we made a car and a "road" (it's red - mile one on the "road to reading") and hence we will travel down this road  (move the car) as he reads more books in this set. I, for one, am very excited.

Aden also did an interesting thing himself. He loves the build-your-own-themepark computer games, but has not played one in a while because Craig has not installed them. Today, during "quiet play time," which is nap time for his two younger sisters, he used his legos and built his own themepark, complete with an entrance and the trees and rides. It is, of course, a sophmoric attempt, but he is only five and the initiative alone is worth applause in my eyes! It is neat to see him using his brain - I have been reading about similar progresses in homeschooling texts, but this is the first time I have really seen it with Aden. Kudos to you, buddy!

 

 

 

 

 

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