Our First Week of School

Our first week of school was immensely successful. All of the kids really worked hard to get through their subjects. Elizabeth is whizzing through her stuff because our district implemented an all day kindergarten last year, and she was able to learn an awful lot more than she would have had she gone only half days. I have noticed several deficiencies in Andy's academic knowledge. He has no idea how to read or write in cursive and he also struggles with division. Josh also struggles with division which makes me wonder if the way that our district teaches division is really helping the kids learn it. Sarah is  doing really well. Her handwriting is not as good as it usually is, but I know that this is because of her vision problems.

Friday's are going to be lighter than the rest of the week as we will use the time for testing, quizzing, and spending extra time reviewing those concepts that the kids struggled with during the week. The kids definitely needed some time to get used to doing school work, and I think that transitioning from summer mode to school mode was more difficult because they are at home now learning instead of down the road. All subjects are up and running with exception of the boys grammar which should arrive in the mail today. We began science this week, but I am not really into the style that we have chosen (neither is Josh).  I am going to streamline science with the girls science, but have the boys go into more depth than the girls will. Since the girls will be spending the first portion of the school year learning about animals (classes, characteristics, etc...) I am going to have the boys do so as well. Then we will move into the human body, followed by plant life for the end of the school year. Since the weather should be cool enough for us to take Sarah out I am looking forward to spending Friday afternoons hiking and going on nature walks to research and observe some of what we will be learning about during the week.

I really love the method of home schooling that I chose. I know that some home schooling families get nervous when they think that someone is providing too much information or is too open with their home schooling technique, but I feel that I have nothing to hide. I also feel that if more people (who did not home school) could see what it is that we, who home school, actually do it would help to bridge any misconceptions and make people less leery of us. I also think that being so open will help keep me accountable. It is so easy to let a day slip by and not to do school work, and then a day becomes 10, and then you are behind. That is my take on it anyway. I know that there are many beliefs on this topic, and I can see other's point of view as well.

On a side note - Sarah's vision today is a 5 (on a scale of 1-10. 1 being the best and 10 being the worst). Sarah said that when her vision gets to be a 7 it will be time to go to the hospital. Let's keep our fingers crossed that we don't get to that point.


(I just realized that I packed away the cord that allows me to upload pictures, so there won't be any pictures from our home for a bit. Not until we sell our house, buy a new one, and then unpack all of our belongings into the new house. If the cord is not too expensive I am tempted to just go and buy a new one because it will take me forever to find the box with the electronics in it.)