A Day in the Life

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Welcome to a day in our life. Our weekly routine pretty much stays the same, but each day looks a little different. On Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, we go to various co-ops around town. Field trips are mainly scheduled on Fridays, and we try to keep Wednesdays commitment free. 

 

Our homeschooling method would be described as eclectic. There are many wonderful approaches to homeschooling, and pulling from different methods works better for us than trying to fit into one style.  

Today is Thursday, a Valentine themed day. 

7:30 AM:  Despite not falling asleep until 2:30 AM, I am wide awake. My alarm is not due to go off for another 30 minutes. I decide to throw in a load of laundry, and text CJ (husband) until he gets home from work.  By the time he’s here, our children are awake. He oversees breakfast and morning chores while I take a shower and get ready. 

9:00: Isabelle, the kids' friend, arrives for the day. The 3 girls (1^st and 2^nd graders) start on the workboxes they can do independently (Calendar notebook, practicing spelling words, handwriting, journals, and math since we aren’t learning a new concept today).  Samuel, my 4^th grader, reads his Bible and completes a Logic puzzle.

10:00: Valentine craft time- Sarah picked out a butterfly craft for everyone to do last night. We also used scented watercolors to make heart maps.  

11:00: Everyone grabs a book to read, or finishes up their Language workbox.

11:45: Lunch- Since we have 3 children, each one is responsible for helping with clean up after one meal and one snack. Samuel does breakfast, Sarah does lunch, and Madelyn does dinner. We used to rotate who did what meal, but there was too much arguing.

During lunch, I read the Bible, and a story about the history of Valentine’s Day. Then I take care of more laundry before we head out the door for co-op.

12:30PM: Leave for co-op- Thursday’s gym co-op is about 25 minutes from our house, so I bring along a science dvd on the heart. The girls are currently learning about the human body, and you know, it kinda fits in with the Valentine’s Day theme. The kids also grab a few books to read for the ride home.

1-3:00PM: While the kids are having their Valentine party, I find a spot at the church to finish up lesson plans for the upcoming weeks. 

3:30PM: Back at home, details of the party are still being shared as everyone looks through their Valentine boxes. Eventually, the girls run off to play while Samuel finishes up his last few workboxes and a science experiment using magnets. We discuss what he’s learning about World War I in history.

4:15: Isabelle gets picked up, and I declare a quiet time until 6 PM. Their instructions are to read, play quietly, or write/color quietly. I also try to read during this time, but they are anything but quiet. We’ll try again tomorrow.

6:30PM: Dinner- CJ makes tacos while the kids help me straighten up the house. Our craft bin is a disaster, so I pull everything out and organize it. 

7:00: This is the time CJ and I would leave for small group on Thursdays, but it’s canceled tonight, so we watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy as a family. 

8:00: Showers, books, prayers, then bedtime for kids

9:00: Once everyone is tucked in, CJ and I have about 30 minutes to talk before he leaves for work.

10:00: While I’m gathering supplies to wrap Valentine’s Day gifts (snacks and a coupon book), I notice our loving Labradoodle has thrown up all over the downstairs bathroom. Lovely.  I grab some cleaning supplies and get to work.

11:15: Gifts are wrapped and set out for the morning. 

12:15AM: After making sure everything is ready to go for school tomorrow, I go up to bed. Tonight I’m asleep by 1:00AM. I love being a homeschool mom!

Curriculum Choices 2013- 2014

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Well, I disappeared from blog land for a bit. For those of you who don’t know already, we moved back to Indiana in June after spending quite a rough year in Ohio. Life has seasons of ups, downs, chaos, and peace.  We are in a very content, peaceful place right now. If you aren’t happy for us, you truly don’t have our best interest at heart. We’ve moved forward, and that has meant leaving some people behind. There's no room for negativity in our lives! Thankfully, most have been loving and kind, and we love them right back.  :-)

 

Summer will be coming to an end for us with school starting on August 12. There are still several more pool, zoo, and park days in the near future, but we have to get an early start on lessons in order for us to take most of December off and still finish in May. The plan is to go someplace south for Christmas…as in Disney World. Yes, Disney during one of the busiest times of the year, I know. We’re crazy.  I have a breakfast with the princesses booked, so hopefully everything will fall into place! If not, oh well. There are plenty of other (cheaper) southern places to visit...and if you think of a good one, let us know!

For the 2013-2014 school year, we’ll be using Sonlight Core B/C and Core E. Sometimes I look at other curriculum choices and think, “Oh! That looks neat!!” Some of you moms are so creative! Until Sonlight stops working as wonderful as it does for us, we’re sticking with it. The books, scheduling, and way everything is set up just fits perfectly for our family. I love how the lessons plans are already written out for me, and I can choose to add to them or remove certain things as necessary.

Samuel – 4^th Grade

Sonlight Core E: Bible, History, Geography, Science, and Language Arts

Grammar Ace

Worldly Wise 3000: Vocab

Spelling Workout E (He’s an excellent speller so we won’t be focusing on this subject too much.)

Handwriting Without Tears Cursive Success (my opinion…best handwriting program EVER)

Teaching Textbooks 4: Math (really wish I would have chosen TT5, he has started the TT4 lessons and finds them way too easy—he likes a challenge)…I love Teaching Textbooks because the lessons are all on the computer, and grading is done for me. So simple!

Sarah and Madelyn- Combined

Sonlight Core B/C: Bible, History, Geography

Sonlight Core A: Science (finishing up from last year and then maybe we’ll do some unit studies)

Wordly Wise A: Vocab

Draw, Write, Now (adding this in just because it’s their favorite)

First Language Lessons 2 (supplementing with this as needed)

Sarah- 2^nd

Sonlight Grade 2 Language Arts

Saxon 2 Math 

Evan Moor Daily Paragraph Editing

Abeka Spelling 2

Handwriting Without Tears Cursive

Madelyn- 1^st

Sonlight Grade 1/2 Language Arts

Spelling Workout B

Handwriting Without Tears 

Horizons Math 1 (only using this because we have it from last year, otherwise I’d use Saxon)

There you have it! We'll also be doing a co-op, gymnastics, lego club, and field trip groups. I'm looking into piano lessons, but have to wait and see how busy we are with what we're already signed up for. 

Happy homeschooling!!! 

Not Back to School Blog Hop 

Just an Update {Sonlight Core A Weeks 5-8, Family, Apple Activities}

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 Family Update

The stomach flu invaded our home for a few weeks…that’s right…weeks. Each time someone would get sick, I’d go into a cleaning frenzy to stop the germs from attacking, only to have someone else come down with the bug days later.  Somehow we are still on schedule with school, but 4 field trips, 3 weeks of AWANA, and co-op days had to be cancelled. Let me tell you, doing apple themed activities and then having to cancel the big finale apple orchard trip was a huge disappointment for the girls. Once everyone showed signs of good health, I called around to reschedule, but u-pick apples and tours just so happened to be finished the day I called! Bummer!!  We went to to the park, and played with the caterpillars in our yard instead.

For the time being, we aren’t going to attend our co-op regularly until CJ recovers from his back surgery, which is scheduled to happen at the beginning of November. He is currently extremely miserable and in terrible pain, so keep him in your prayers. 

In other health related news, Samuel was diagnosed with a blood disorder last month.  At a routine well-check with our new pediatrician, Dr. S, I brought up the horrible nosebleeds he has on a fairly regular basis. I had mentioned this several times to our former pediatrician, and he was never concerned.  However, Dr. S thought that he should see a hematologist.  After two appointments, blood work, and months of waiting, we finally got a diagnosis. His condition is not life threatening, but he was pretty bummed when he found out he won’t be allowed to play soccer or football. I am relieved that this is a treatable, minor disorder.

Now onto happy news…

Samuel is doing excellent at the private school he is attending this year. He is maintaining all A’s, making new friends, and enjoys his teacher and classmates. There are pros and cons to having him in that setting, but my anxiety has pretty much subsided.  It helps that I’m involved in the school’s parent group and volunteer on Friday afternoons. Samuel still joins our monthly evening homeschool group activities. And no, we haven’t ruled out homeschooling him in the future.  

Sarah and Madelyn finished up soccer. Madelyn was the kid doing ballet twirls, somersaults, and singing while she was supposed to be playing the game. Sarah was eager to participate and learn. They both were fun to watch… for different reasons. They‘ve decided to join an American Heritage Girls troop (Samuel will be doing Cub Scouts at the same time). Somehow, maybe due to the name, they are under the impression that this is some sort of American Girl club, so AHG is now the coolest thing ever. I’ve tried to explain that the two aren’t related, but I’m pretty sure they are tuning me out. Either way, they are having fun, making new friends, and learning.

School Update Weeks 5-8, Apple Themed Activities Part 1

During weeks 5-8, we covered a lot of material. We’ve now studied the Vikings, Early Missionaries, Medieval Times, the Incas, and ancient China. I wanted to go more in depth with the Incas than what Sonlight includes, but the girls were eager to move on to China. Maybe I’ll find a way to sneak in more Inca time down the road! I've been using the camera less and less, not because I don't want to capture these wonderful moments, but because when we're in "school mode," pausing to go into "mom-photographer mode" feels like a distraction. The camera usually only comes out one or two days a week. The downside is, I can't look back through photos to remember details of certain moments...which makes trying to write about 4 weeks of school difficult...even with lesson plans in front of me :).

Sarah loves Draw Write Now...mostly the drawing, of course!

matching ending sounds

As I mentioned in our family update above, we did some fun math and literacy apple themed activities. There were so many activities to do in the pack I purchased that I'm saving some for when we read about Johnny Appleseed later.

 Next week I will be cramming in the rest of our fall and pumpkin crafts. Pinterest gave me more than enough ideas! E

 

Weeks 3 and 4 Highlights {Sonlight Core A}

Pin It I didn't stop to take many pictures during weeks 3 and 4. Here are the moments I did manage to capture...

BIBLE

We memorized Colossians 3:20, Mathew 7:12, and learned about Joseph and his brothers. I will always remember Samuel telling me this story when he was in preschool, exclaiming (in the cutest 3 year-old boy voice ever), “Those mean brudders got blood on his beautiful, beautiful coat!!” The girls used bingo dot markers to make colorful coats for Joseph.

Madelyn said, "Oops! He put on his Christmas coat!" haha!

HISTORY

Weeks 3 and 4 focused on Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. Samuel decided that the rich people must be extremely lazy since they had slaves to do everything for them, but he did think lying down for meals and eating with fingers was very cool.
  

Madelyn and Sarah made Olive leaf crowns.

HEALTH

We discussed different emotions, and how to deal with people making us angry or sad. Sarah wrote about being happy and sad in her journal.

READING

The girls acted out a scene from Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

Madelyn decided Marlie needed to hear a story while she was eating...

 MATH

Madelyn worked on addition problems using her Math-U-See blocks.