- Bible listening time. We start each morning (or as any mornings as we don’t have morning committments) with Bible listening time. We’re using the NIV Audio Bible Dramatized CD
through Audible. We started at Genesis 1:1 on the first day of school, and we listen to about 20 minutes each morning. The kids can either just listen or journal what they’re hearing (for my visual learners). We follow that time with prayer and any PC2TV stuff like CNN Student News. It really sets the tone for the day and gets everyone settled down after the craziness of feeding and dressing 5 kids.
- Schedule. The schedule that I put on paper doesn’t quite happen exactly like that. However, thinking about the school day in subject blocks has been a good flow and convenient for planning. In real life, I start everyone with their work and spend about 10 minutes with Ty. Then everyone who has questions sits at the dining room table with me, and I help where needed trying to work from lowest grade level up (for most this would be youngest to oldest). Once everyone finishes their assigned work for that block, we take a 5 minute break while I get the next block’s work ready and start again.
- Ty’s Kindergarten Curriculum. I know I wrote his K curriculum, but it was one of those things that sounded good on paper, but I had no idea how it would pan out in real life. As it turns out, I love it and so does he! It’s a perfect pace and amount of work for him. He’s retaining information and able to do a lot of the cutting and pasting independently or with minimal help.
We tried that Montessori-stay-on-your-mat trick the other day. I think we’ll employ it more as I think of it. - Dropping CBS. Last year, we were really blessed by Community Bible Study. We tried one week this year and decided it wasn’t a good fit this year. I’m usually really bad about admitting we can’t handle something else in our schedule, but this week (our first sans CBS) was so much less stressful in terms of timing and amount of work. <Insert really big sigh here>.
- CC Presentations for ESL. Every week at CC, each student gives a 3-minute presentation on an assigned topic. John (and Kayla at my request) have totally jumped on the bandwagon and give their presentations at home each week when the others rehearse. It’s been a great way to stretch and practice their English.
What are you favorite things about homeschooling this year?
In my sleep-deprived state this morning, I totally forgot to mention, that I also LOVE having PJ doing guided independent learning for his history and science. So I say, “Go learn about Ancient Egypt,” and he just has to show me at the end of the hour what he learned. He has books and the internet at his fingertips. He’s created assignments that I would’ve given anyway but had way more fun doing them 🙂
Reading! This fall we’ve made such leaps and bounds with reading! First, my boys have read their very first BOB book! Secondly, we’re reading our first real chapter book for our read-aloud: “Charlotte’s Web.”
I remember when Mia first took off reading. It was so validating as a homeschool mom that I was doing something right!