Ever have one of those school days?

If at first you don't... find time to homeschool that day...

TRY TRY AGAIN!
The days are getting more consistent! Check us out:

Joel doing his addition
dry erase! money saver and fun

Kate is a part of our school day too

Luke practicing his cursive, he is pretty awesome
Note the dry erase again

Figuring out our homeschool "schedule" with an infant in the house, some days are easier than others

Blurring the lines.

Where do the lines of parenting and home school blur? Should they? Or should those lines be kept straight? Keeping on one side clearly "parenting" and on this side we clearly have "home schooling"? Can those lines even be held rigidly?

Take this morning for example- When Luke is determining how full the syrup is based on the indicator, is it 1/2 full or 3/4 full? In between-so how much should we microwave it for? Not 1 minute and 20 seconds... that is for 3/4 full, not 1 minute...that is for 1/2 full... 1 minute and 10 seconds! Is that "parenting" or does this count for "school" as a math exercise?
When Joel is standing over a hot stove with a spatula in his hand waiting with all excitement for me to say its time to flip a pancake ("not yet....almost...almost..."), am I "parenting" or are we working on some of our "home school" goals by building his listening and follow directions skills?

How can we dissect parenting and education as we focus on character building in the forms of service (setting the table-for everyone), sacrifice (letting your brother get his chocolate milk first), thankfulness (praying before we eat), respect (wait until the person is finished talking to have your turn to speak), contentment (stay at the table until everyone is finished), responsibility (taking your plates to the sink), etc.?

When the parent IS the teacher-how do we keep those lines distinct? Can we? Again I ask, should we?

Lets be honest, I do not count breakfast as "school". School can, at times, look a little different around here, but there will be math worksheets later and enough handwriting practice around here to fill everyone's quota!  The ideas that we are always learning and that we can constantly reinforce what we are learning are exciting aspects of home schooling!

I like structure but I also like a little blurring of the lines as well! 

First Day of School

 What makes the first day of school?
An awesome breakfast: we had pancakes with blueberry syrup, strawberries and orange juice-great start!

What is a first day of school without a picture documenting it?

Second Grade

Kindergarten

 We started with our new planners. They decorated the fronts and then we began!

Streamers make everything fun!

The first day of school was fun, exciting, much anticipated. It was full of emotions-some more fun than others. We had lots to celebrate and some disappointments. So it goes.

New school year here we come!

Parenting.

In wanting my children to be creative I must give them the time and freedom to create.

In wanting my children to love to read I must first read to them and then fill their home with books.

In wanting my children to be comfortable with themselves I must come to know them individually.

In wanting my children to be passionate I must be willing to go out of my way to encourage their interests.

In wanting my children to be responsible I must give them responsibilities.

In wanting my children to be kind I must first treat them with kindness and then constantly direct their perspective towards how others feel.

In wanting my children to good communicators I must communicate with them and then be willing to listen.

In wanting my children to be problem-solvers I must resist the urge to solve all their problems for them.

In wanting my children to be capable I must choose to put a tool in their hand.

In wanting my children to value honesty I must first never lie to them.

In wanting my children to desire to help others I must treasure the ways in which they imperfectly help me.

In wanting my children to explore the world around them I must first let them step away from me.

What would you add to this list?

Planning.

Luke has a strong desire for control.  He really thrives in decision making and any way that he can do it (whatever "it" is)for himself, or be in charge of his own life in any way.
Obviously this creates some great struggles between he and I!  While we do battle over the big things I've found that giving him as much of the small things as I can (while still keeping us in our proper roles) really goes a long way here at home.

We were finding that me giving Luke his assignments day-to-day or as we go along was actually a frustration for him.  Solution: Daily Schedules.

At the table

Luke's schedule

By putting the tasks in little boxes across the page I have also given him the ability to choose what order he does his school in as well.  He has really liked this aspect of the planner and I love the way it fosters time management skills.
He gets great satisfaction by crossing off his boxes.  And I so appreciated the way this keeps us on task and keeps our context for our Monthly Focuses and Weekly Themes that I went ahead and made schedules for Joel too!

Joel's schedule

Joel always likes to be like his big brother!

Another home school lesson here is that you can be constantly evolving, finding out what works and what doesn't work best for you and your individual child (-ren). The challenge to really know them! Isn't that exciting!?

Alphabet

I love LOVE this product! You match up the truck with the Capital letter to the corresponding Lowercase letter.

Joel working it out.

Works really well with Joel who, unlike his older brother, is really more of a do-er than a read-er.  Luke would color his letters and be really happy with that but Joel really needs some kind of action involved!

Really recommend this! So cool!

I also really love the idea of learning Capital and Lowercase letters at the same time.

We watch this video as well. They too, pair the learning of Capital and Lowercase at the same time and add to that learning the letter Sounds!
Great idea! One of my big recommendations.

The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig

A book review.  We recently borrowed this book from the library and really loved it!
Gets many stars from the whole family.  Luke says it is "Awesome." and "Cool." Lots of reading but had Joel's attention the entire time-he laughed out loud some too.

Excerpt: 

"We shall build an even stronger house," they said, because they were very determined. Just then they saw a truck coming along the road carrying barbed wire, iron bars, armor plates, and heavy metal padlocks.
"Please, will you give us some of your barbed wire, a few iron bars and armor plates, and some heavy metal padlocks?" they said to the rhinoceros who was driving the truck.
"Sure," said the rhinoceros, and he gave them plenty of barbed wire, iron bars, armor plates, and heavy metal padlocks. He also gave them some Plexiglas and some reinforced steel chains, because he was a generous and kindhearted rhinoceros.
So the three little wolves built themselves an extremely strong house. it was the strongest, securest house one could possibly imagine. They felt absolutely safe.

So funny! And I have lately been so interested in looking at familiar stories from a different perspective, this is worth the checkout!

Singular/Plural

Luke is a reader, big time! Of course I love that! He is constantly learning by reading.  This year in school I've also been encouraging his writing.  In his school book he is learning about Parts of Speech and Sentence Structure but one of the gaps I'm seeing in his writing is that conversion from singular to plural.  Found this online and quickly noted its simplicity and effectiveness. Tested it out and found out its kind of fun too... Winning combination! 

 Sometimes he just fiddles with them, and sometimes I have him sort them.  Sort them by content category or by ending (-y to -ies, etc).  I'm not really "teaching" this so much as allowing him to see it and take note,  he is already noticing patterns and that is so exciting!

This is one of those great areas of flexibility that I love about homeschooling! This level is considered a bit above a 6 year old, but we get to move along with each individual child to their level in each individual area.
Yay!

Pick up the Worms

Fine Motor Skills for PreKinder Joel (credit to www.prekinders.com )

The Birdie (a.k.a. the clothespin) needs to pick up the Worms (read Pipe Cleaners cut up and made to look all worm-y). Thats the game, simple and fun.

He's having fun, he's just concentrating.

see the tongue action there? Concentration.

Building those little muscles in his fingers and hand to be able to tackle bigger jobs later is so important!

not as easy as it looks

Right now we are watching Joel because he hasn't really chosen a dominant hand, do we have an ambidextrous kid on our hands? I'll let you know!

Good job Joel!

Math: Greator Than/Less Than Game

 First Grade Math! So much fun. Here is one of our reinforcement activities that come alongside what we learn in the school book.  Its a card game that very much resembles War.

Get the printable here. (By the way, all the credit goes to The Inspired Apple.)

Remove all non-numbered cards from your deck, shuffle and divide. Then flip over the top card.  Each player writes in their number and whoever has the desired higher or lower number (depends on which sheet you are filling out) circles their side.  Tally at the end of ten rounds to see who wins!

competition at it's finest!

writing in his scores

Get it?

It won't help you remember which way to face your symbols (< or >) but it reinforces the concept, helps practice and it is super fun!

Luke and Aunt Em

Luke talking with Emily about what he wants for his birthday (expressive much?)

He asked for and got Book 1 of the Adventures of TinTin!

Here is his "report".

Thanks Aunt Em!!

Building Day

 Taking a break from table-learning, Friday we had Building Day!  I just love it when boys can be little engineers! Luke and Joel *loved* Building Day with-a-passion and have voted in favor of a monthly reappearance. YAY

Joel's city with Foam Blocks

Working together with Marble Works

Joel with Wood Blocks

Luke with Duplo Blocks

Joel's spaceship with Zoob Pieces

Luke's very tall tower with Marble Works

Our materials:

These were set up in their own areas with the instruction that once you were finished building you would get a picture taken with your finished work and then you had to take it apart and put it back in the center of it's area so it was available to work with again.  Then you had to move on to a different area/materiel.
Worked excellently!

Working together with Duplo Blocks

Luke's reimagining of town with Foam Blocks

Joel's tower with Marble Works

Luke working

Joel working