Tuesday we went to Kids Korner in the morning, came home and had healthy lunch, a little free time with playdoh and music, and then naps. For Casey AND Charlie. I was hoping Casey would stay in bed but not sleep and thats exactly what he did. Cool. If he sleeps he will not be tired anywhere near bedtime (730 to 9 ish) and that will be a problem, especially for Steve. But I want my afternoon break! Need is more like it! So Casey rested for about an hour, Charlie took his usually 2+ hour nap.
Wednesday we did a bit of school at home. We talked about what Casey liked about school and what he wanted to continue at home. He didnt "like" anything except gym but he said they were on letter "Y" and so we made some Y's out of cheerios and paper and he spontaneously wrote Yo-yo over and over and we agreed that that was a great fun Y word.
Casey Charlie and I did "music class" with Eska in the basement around 9 in the morning. I played Woody Guthries childrens songs (they are super primal and great, really a beautiful side of Woody) and I laid out 4 little receiving blankets on the floor. White, yellow, blue, and pink, each with one instrument in the middle. I acted all teachery and said "Pick a color!" and the boys scrambled to one blanket, then I went to another one, and one was empty. We then played along with Woody for maybe a minute and then I yelled SWITCH! again. They were very into it but then there was a scuffle about them both wanting the drum. See? Socialization! LOL Later the game turned into dancing and then the interest was waning and so we made a production about folding all the blankets up and turning down all the lights and watching Signing Time, a precious show on PBS about sign language. Eska jumped in her doorway jumper thing (yes she is strong enough for that already! she LOVES it!) and then Daddy brought us the minivan home for his lunchbreak and we took him back to work and went to good ole WalMart for a few things.
We got a whiteboard/dry erase thing and a few more little officey supplies that Casey adores. 3 dollar stapler, etc. SO he "made books" for the rest of the day, evening and now is currently doing so! I must hook up the scanner to show you his cute work.
Today is Thursday and all the kids have no school for Yom Kippur. Things are a bit haphazard which is sometimes ok but I am really sleepy this morning so it has to be. Greta is still asleep and it is 11am. Poor kid.
We are going to go to the zoo or park or something later, all of the kids and me. We get along great when we are out but when we are all home everyone dissipates, which is to be expected, but it makes me a little sad. I miss when we all sat and played together. If I drag them to a place it might happen!
I am looking forward to trying out little things and seeing rhythms and patterns. It is of great importance for me to come up with "Tuesday is library day", etc for the homeschool year. I think it is abundantly clear that a "third party", even if it is the homemade chart or calendar, helps us a great deal to know what to do. I know our timeline at least:
6ish Casey and Charlie wake up
7 wake up Greta and Mickey
8 Greta and Mickey have to be in school
8 to 11 Homeschool activities
11 to 12ish lunchtime
12 to 1 quiet play/I read to the boys
1 naptime
2 Casey gets up (?)
3 I get Charlie up
330 the big kids get home
now this part is all a mess, the 330 to dinner.......
Some nights are boy scouts, girls scouts, daddy needs a ride, daddy works late, all a mess
Some ideas bandied about of me taking one kid to the library for quiet homework help, hasnt happened yet
730 Casey to bed
745 Charlie to bed
830 to 9ish Greta and Mickey go upstairs and hang out/play video game/watch tv
930 Greta and Mickey asleep
Thats it so far! We haven't had one full week yet where there was no holiday or noone home sick so time will tell. Ideas?
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3 comments:
Wow, off to google Guthrie children's songs.
LOL@ Joy 'acted all teachery'! Can't wait to see Casey's books. We still cherish Gabriel's Star Wars book. Complete with x-wing fighters shooting stuff, he was just Casey's age when he made that.
Also, when G was starting to outgrow his nap the summer before last, I'd set up quiet time for him in his bed with an audio story CD. He was welcome to come back out when the CD finished playing. Sometimes he fell asleep, other times he stayed in bed whispering to himself for a little while longer... but always stayed put which was of course exactly the point!
Sounds great, Joy! I'm glad this is working so beautifully for you. I'm not sure if I have any ideas yet, though, since we're still trying to get into the swing of things. We did great with structured homeschool stuff for about two days, and have fallen off the bandwagon a bit for the past 2. Oops. We're getting there at least. I can't wait to hear the evolution of all this.
Love ya!
One thing I have found that is working, though, is to create a lesson plan of sorts at the beginning of the week for the whole week. We don't cover it all every day, and each night I have to re-plan bits and pieces for the next day, but at least it is keeping me from getting sidetracked as easily.
Have you ever read "Paddle to the Sea" with your kids? Awesome book and really a fun way of learning geography!
We've started doing a composer of the month, and began with J.S. Bach. We've been listening to CDs of his music from the library. I even checked out Fantastia from the library and we watched part of it today. So cool!
There are also some really great children's versions of the Odyssey that we've been reading. It's not a peaceful story - lots of monsters and such - but the kids are enjoying it. We read a chapter or so a day (when I remember).
What else? Let's see...
We've been working with alphabet puzzles to learn the ABCs. I'm not sure how Matt managed to get to 6 years old without learning the alphabet song, but we've remedied that. We're also starting to create word families by spelling words like "-at" with the puzzle pieces and then adding letters at the beginning to create new words. Helps with spelling, rhyming, reading, etc. So fun!
This homeschooling is really fun. Unfortunately, we tend to go in spurts. Earlier this week we got a lot done, but the last couple of days have been more sporadic. That's okay, though, because I know they're still learning. Matt wants to sculpt those funny men from Easter Island so as soon as I pick up Josh from the bus I'm going to make playdoh and we're going to do it together.
Gotta go. The bus should be here shortly.
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