Sick day

No home-school today.

C was not feeling good. He didn't eat breakfast or lunch, which is not like him. He even put himself back to bed and slept for an hour. Said his tummy hurt. (sad face) Since C is the one I am really doing home-school for, and he is already past Kindergarten levels of competency, and we are in the summer months anyway, I am not worried about missing a day.

We just read some books and took it easy.

Day Something... Don't remember

Maybe it is because I felt awful last week, had no energy, and was generally no good at anything (read the previous 2 posts)... but I have been thinking about home-schooling, and think that a paradigm shift is in order.

First off, I am going to be taking fewer pictures, since we are going to be doing more long-form things. Second, the kids really don't like formal instruction. They felt bad last week too, and all they could do was whine and beg for video games and TV. It got to a point that I was going crazy from denying them constantly.

I am not going to give in and let them veg out, but maybe there is a way they can engage better with their learning. I think I have been trying to make us stick too hard to a plan and a schedule. So the new plan is to not really have a plan. I am going to insist that we cover all of the Hour of Power subjects every day (maybe not all at once), go outside everyday, and from there we will just wing it. There are opportunities every day that I can incorporate the things I want them to learn, I just need to wait until they are excited about something, and then shift it into a learning opportunity.

It was beautiful outside this morning, so we went straight outside first thing. It was cool, but they wanted hats, so they wore hats.

C found a Rolly-Polly outside. It was one of the biggest Rolly-Pollys I had ever seen! He carried it around for over 30 minutes.

D wanted to wear her wings, sunglasses, headband, and hat. Ok, why not?

Here she is looking super cool. C is in the background making a Rolly-Polly playground.

Seizing opportunity, I decided to invite the Rolly-Polly inside for home-school.

I spent a little birthday/graduation money on a Kindle Fire HD 7" tablet. Amazon has an app called FreeTime where you can subscribe to kid content, build each child a profile, and then they have a safe area with unlimited age appropriate content. This is a great deal, because there are tons of interactive books for free, tons of educational games for free, and tons of kid shows for free. Well, you have to pay a subscription price, so I guess it's not free, but you don't have to pay $1 for each little thing. Plus you can restrict their game time, video time, and book time separately to make sure that they are nudged towards educational content, not just angry birds.

Anyway, here (above) they are watching an interactive book that teaches about insects. See? C found a Rolly-Polly, now let's learn about insects? The book is much more succinct than I could be about the subject, and they were much more interested than if I had told them at the white board.

Of course, that didn't stop me from pausing the book to teach them about the life cycle of cicadas, since we are in a cicada year. They were amazed that cicadas live underground for 17 years.

D was just having fun hanging out.

Not pictured: I had them do some writing and reading exercises, and then let them play a letter game on the kindle. Then we did our Spanish conversation and played a Spanish game on the kindle.

S got bored with home-school, and went off to play. C was into math time, so I let him play a math game (basically just a math problem, and you drag the answer over). He went through the hardest level of math, and the hardest level of subtraction just fine! He is really proud of his math abilities. I am too.

For Social Studies I quizzed them on our leaders and city, state, country. They are really getting it down.

C wants to start an art business selling his drawings for a dollar each so that he can save up money to buy souvenirs from the zoo gift shop the next time we go. I figured that was a good way for us to talk about the government and tax, so I bought a picture for 4 quarters. Then taxes took one of his quarters away.

Then I has S sit down, and got a couple of stuffed animals, and they each earned $2. I told them that a road needed to be built down the middle of the table so that we could go see the Rolly-Polly. The road costs $2.50 to build. Not one of them had the money for the road, but through taxes (75 cents each), the government took a little from each of them and got together $3. This way everyone gets a road, and each person only had to pay a little, not all of their money.

It was an ok example and they understood it, which was all I was going for.

Lunch time, rest time, and free time. They had a big snack only an hour ago, so they had a smallish lunch. I let them do a couple of interactive books for lunch: Rikki Tikki Tavi  and Another Monster at the End of This Book. We went outside again. They cleaned up their room and the living room. Now they are watching the Electric Company, which -by the way- is a great show that is really engaging them and teaching them reading concepts.

The end.



Ok, here's what's up.

Long blogging and taking so many pictures is slugging out my phone and my brain. It takes about 30 minutes two times per day to put together a post. I work on it at rest time and after the day is over and they are watching Electric Company. I've got to scale back.

I think I'll take a few pictures, and put the blog together once at the end of the day. So there may be less in the near future. That is what I did today, and I like it better.

Puke Week Fun

So we were all pukey for a week, almost two. But we still had some fun anyway.

This is from the Friday that I missed a post. I was starting to feel bad, but it was Memorial Day weekend, so I was trying not to let it show. It was Montessori Day, so I let them do centers, run around, watch PBS Kids, and play learning computer games.

After Daniel Tiger we went to the library, so that there wouldn't be a rush. I saw on facebook that the summer reading program had begun. We had to go sign them up right away.

Here they are all somewhat excited about summer reading. If they read 8 books and visit the library four times then they get a medal and a coupon book for free tater tots, ice-cream, etc. If they read 20 books then they also get a bonus prize (I think it is a stuffed groundhog and an inflatable toy).

After the library we went outside for lunch.

They played for a while after eating. It was nice outside.

I read them All In A Day by Cynthia Rylant. It was pretty good. The art was nice.

Here they are all piled on top of the little slide.  That was mostly it for Friday. I was feeling pretty lousy, and so I let them play and learn (probably more playing than learning).

This is D at Memorial Day. This is about how last week went...

 

C was the first to get over the pukes, so he got to have some fun last week building things with toothpicks and marshmallows. The thing in his hand is a lump of palm sugar to represent the sun. I know we did other things last week too, but I wasn't in the mood to take pictures. The kids were not in the mood to have their pictures taken.

So we took last week off mostly. This week should be our off week, but I am having us go through this week and then next week will be our first week off. It really was rough last week, and I am not going to say that last week was any type of relaxing fun vacation time. It wasn't fun for anyone. Bad, bad week. 

So today is the beginning of our 3rd week, and is the last week in Unit 1. Next week will be our vacation week.

Hiatus - Puke Week

Why no posts last week???

Well, we were all puking. It was puke week. First D puked in the middle of the night. Two days later C puked in his sleep. Then two days later I got up and puked in the middle of the night. Then two days later C puked in his bed yet again. Then two days later my wife puked. Then two days later S almost puked. He didn't, and now we are all better. It started the Monday before Memorial day, up until last Saturday. A good two weeks of feeling miserable (with most of it happening this last week).

No I didn't take pictures.

No we didn't do home-school.

I was sick over my birthday, and puked on Memorial day, so now I am a little hotdog shy.

Now you know, and want to forget. Trust me, we all want to forget.

Day Eight - Thursday

Day Eight. Actually, I guess it is day nine. I guess I should include the Montessori day in there from last week. Oh, but the Snow day yesterday. Okay. Day Eight.

We read Good Luck Bear by Greg Foley for circle time. It was pretty cute. The illustrations were better than the story.

Calendar and weather, day of the week and month of the year. I quizzed them on the clock for Lifeskills. We started late, so we watched Daniel Tiger and had gummy vitamins after circle time. Then we went outside.

Lots of running around. I was eager to get them outside today, since it has been cloudy since morning, and I knew it was going to start raining any minute. About 35 minutes into recess it started raining, so we went inside. It was Hour of Power time.

Because we read a book about finding a four leaf clover I decided we would add Fibonacci numbers for math. This led to a discussion about adding using the number on top of a number syntax. I got to explain number places again, and we carried a '1.'

Today's  word was 'good' so we explored the double 'o' sound with a few real words and a few made up words.

Same old same old for Social Studies. I quizzed them today pretty well until they got it.

Our modified conversation for Spanish. I am actually amazed at this. The boys are actually retaining some Spanish. I thought it would be a lot harder than it is. It is still hard, but they are actually picking it up.

We finished the chapter from before that we had to cut short due to listening issues. I realize I forgot to get a picture of their lunch. They had cheese sticks, banana, a carrot, goldfish, and a few fish-sticks.

Since it is rainy and stormy I decided to let the boys rest on the couch instead of make them go to sleep. I think there is a pretty good chance that they will fall asleep due to the storm. Oh, yeah. Good thing I took them out earlier, it has rained non-stop since we came in. You have to take advantage of the opportunities presented to you!

We only did a few centers, and I could tell they were worn out, so we were done for the day. I know Hour of Power is the most important, and we got it covered pretty well. This has been a hard week...

Snow Day

I am calling a snow day today. Sure, maybe there's no snow on the ground. Sure, maybe we are only a week and a half into the home-school experiment. But I am exhausted. The last two days have drained me physically, emotionally, mentally, cosmically, etc...

The last two days:

I wake up between 6 and 7 in the morning, the boys are already up, jumping around. We do home-school, and then they are jumping around all afternoon until dinner. Then I get to get them ready for bed by myself, and lay them down between 7 and 8 at night. Even after the kids are down I can only barely pay attention to anything because they take turns getting up every 15 minutes. So by about 10 they have passed out and I get to work on my homework for the fast-track class I am taking right now. It is a full class in 3 weeks, so there is a 1 hour video to watch every other day, and a 1 hour assignment due every other day, and a 30 minute discussion board post due every other day, and an entire book to read within the three weeks with a 6 page report due at the end, plus a comprehensive final. So that's what I get to do from 10 until after midnight. Then I pass out on the couch while trying to watch a TV show.

With no help for two and a half straight days. I am tired. So I can pretty much say that if I was an only parent I would not home-school. It is too much. I am not good enough to do it all by myself, all of the time.

So I am calling a snow day today. We'll try again tomorrow after my wife gets home and I can rest a little and take a shower and eat some real food. What a rough week...

Day Seven - Tuesday

Day Seven. Tuesday. Wife is still gone. For some reason the kids take this to mean they can be crazy. In spite of their behavior I am determined to have a good learning day. Oh, it's storming outside, so we can't go outside and run off any energy? Great and wonderful.

Circle time went well. We read My Robot by Eve Bunting. We sang a song. We talked about the weather being all stormy, and how there will probably be no more tornadoes (at least not today).

For Lifeskills we are still working on telling time. Today we went around the clock in 5 minute increments.

We used some of our daily words for reading.

Our number of the day is 6, so we added 6 to a few numbers (I tried to pick the hardest problems).

See? Number of the day is 6.

C was complaining that the math was too easy so I made it hard for him. Wrote out the problem as a sentence and made him read it, only writing the equation as he read each part.

Social Studies we went over the same stuff again. President, Governor, Mayor, Country, State, City. I quizzed them pretty hard, they almost have it down.

Our Spanish conversation for Language time. I added in Hasta luego today. Little by little we'll get there. I acted out the whole conversation with two stuffed animals to help keep their interest. (obviously I can't take a picture of myself holding a bunny in each hand).

For science we talked about buoyancy and density. I got the last two pieces of foil in the house for them to ball up and test if they float.

 Yup, they float.

Then I pounded them flat and let the kids test if they would sink. Yup. Change in density equals a change in buoyancy. Fun and quick science.

They watched Daniel Tiger and ate a snack of gummy vitamins and apple slices.

It has been storming all day, so no recess (sad face). I let them do 15 minute centers, and start with computer time to make up for it.

Shapes center. C tried hard at tangrams, but still doesn't really get it yet.

S was excited about something. Probably not this reading center, since he ditched it pretty quick. I didn't chase him down. He's only 4. I let him play.

D wanted to play shapes, and built a wonderful tower.

C at the reading center. Doing well once he quit whining and started trying.

After centers we had lunch. Caesar salad with onions, cucumber, banana, and dino nuggets.

Proof that my kids eat salad. They like it too!

Chapter 12 in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe was read for lunch. We didn't finish the chapter, due to listening issues.

They were so grumpy by this point that I made them lay down and sleep for nap time. No Signing Time on PBS today! They have been pretty difficult all morning. When they are difficult it slows everything down, because I will not demand that they obey me, sit down, shut up and listen. I think if I do that then they will learn nothing, and resent being home-schooled. So when they act up I have to stop everything and talk to them until they understand that we are working together so that they can learn a lot. It works, and it is worth it to do it this way, but MAN does it take a lot of time.

I guess I favor this approach because my personal goal is for them to learn a lot, faster than they would in public school, and to have more fun than they would in public school. If my goal was to get through the day's material, then sure I might just force them to sit still and quiet, while I recite material to their glazed over eyes and walled off minds. That would be easier...

Wow, they were nice and tired, and slept until 2pm today, for a good hour and a half. I should have woken them up sooner, but I'm tired with no wife here to help out, and rowdy kids from dawn until dusk.

Well, we tried expanded subject time today, we really did. But not going outside today has really affected the kids. They wouldn't listen at all. I would rather be constructive than yell, so I had them do extra chores to burn off that energy and we called it a day at about 3.

Considering that when C was at school he said they would go to lunch (at 10:30am), then have rest time, then watch TV until the end of the day, I think we are doing pretty well. I am so ready for the wife to come home tomorrow!