A new student

Today, William joins our home school family! I had originally given myself this first year as a time to just teach Hannah, with Audrey on the side. After this initial 8 weeks, I feel like I am getting in to a groove. In the past weeks, William's teacher has expressed to me that his reading is not up to grade and that more time at home was required to bring him to grade level. After spending the morning with the girls, it was a lot to have to spend my afternoons with William's homework and then extra tutoring, on top of my mother responsibilities. When I asked William if he would like to be home schooled, he was excited! In these past few weeks he would often be bummed that he was missing the fun stuff his sisters were doing. So I have decided to bring William home, and out of public school. Today, in celebration of his joining us, we are going to Chuck-e-Cheese and meeting with one of William's soccer teammates who also home schools!

Day 9 - More Writing?

Today there were more complaints from Hannah(H). She didn't complain about her hand hurting, but she is taking for ever to finish her assignments. When i told her she had to be finished in 20 minutes she respectfully asked, "Or else, what?". Stumped by her direct question, I tried to recover by responding, "Or else, you will scrub the bathroom floors and then come back and finish." She finished, but I need incentives for her, not consequences. I personally operate based on obligation. If it doesn't HAVE TO be done, I don't like to do it. I am on a quest to find what motivates H and myself. :)

I introduced Elizabeth(E) to blanket time today. He response was, "I, don't, like, blanket time!" I explained to her that it was not time-out and that she could play with a special toy the next time she sat on the blanket. When the five minutes were up, I congratulated her and gave her a big hub and kiss and the she said, "I want my treat now." *sigh* I told she didn't get a treat, just hugs and kisses. She seamed to be okay with that and then ran off excitedly to tell Audrey that she was done.

Day 8 - Normal?

I successfully alternated in between the children's lessons today! Right after breakfast I started Hannah (H) on her spelling and Vocabulary words. While she was writing I started Audrey (A) on her first few math lessons, which consisted of introducing her to different math manipulatives. Elizabeth (E) enjoyed it too. When the little girls were finished playing with counting bears, I gave them letter D writing sheets and then started H on her next math lesson. H asked if we could do math all day and skip writing. :) Smart girl. Smart girl who is going to learn to spell and write better. :) Then we all sat down and read together.

I have been reading the book 20 and Counting, by Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar. Today I put into practice the 'playpen in a purse'. In a nut shell, this is a method of teaching children self-control and also a way for mom to have a little break with out the children feeling like they are being punished. I sat H and A down in a chair at individual times and talked to each of them about sit-down time. For five minutes I talked to them about being quite, and places that required them to be quiet such as the doctor's, or church, or a waiting area. I told them that sit-down time is not time-out time. It is not punishment time, but they much sit on their bottoms and no their knees or stomachs. Five minutes when by quick for me. A said it was long, but she didn't complain. H said it went by really quick. For E I will sit her on a blanket. We will practice this as often as we can and gradually increase the time to 30 minutes.

Day 7 - Half day

A half day means, H did half her work, b/c I had phone calls to make during business hours. We still did our opening exercises, and then H practiced for voice lessons, and wrote her vocabulary words. Her hand writing has improved greatly, and so has her speed and accuracy. She didn't complain about having to write her words and definitions! A was content drawing pictures and coloring her abc's as always.

Day 6 - We have Saxon books!

I am ecstatic that the girl's math books and math manipulative sets have come! We started the morning with our opening prayer, the pledge of allegiance and the Sing, Spell, Read, and Write song. We went studied the letter sounds flash cards, and then I let A study them on her own. I thought the morning was going pretty well, until my 3 year old nephew had a #2 accident in his underwear. BTW, he is potty training with E. As soon as that was cleaned up, my 15 mo. nephew had a stinky diaper. After that was cleaned up, H and I started on her much anticipated books. She and I breezed through the first 2 lessons. For art, she designed the cover of her math notebook. Then it was time for writing vocabulary and spelling. H does NOT like writing. It took her 1 HOUR to write 11 words and definitions. She drew pictures on her paper. She played with anything in her reach. She asked if she could do the rest for homework. After reminding her that we had a play date at 12:00 and she had 15 minutes left, miraculously she finished 5 words and definitions in 15 minutes.

Our play date was with another homeschooling family that I had met on a walk in the park earlier in the week. I grow more confident in my ability to homeschool when I talk to other seasoned homeschool moms and they encourage me in my efforts and let me know that I am doing well.

Day 5 -Thrifty tears

This was 33% off all clothing at the Thrift Store day. H, A and E all came with me and we shopped for clothing for A and W. I had previous shopped with H earlier in the month and she received a lot of cute things, so this day, she had a responsibility of keeping a running total of our expenditures at the store. Several times when I would call out prices for her to write down, she would say, "Mom, just a minute. Here is a cute shirt. Can I have it?" If it was her size I would say, "Okay, but we are not shopping for you today. Would you please pick up your notebook and write down these prices please." Reluctantly she would comply. After 30 minutes of shopping her attention span was gone non-existent and she was had melted to a heap on the floor. She wanted to shop. She didn't want to add prices. I reasoned with her to no avail, so we ended our trip, much to her horror, because she had wanted to look for a pair of dress shoes. As we checked out she continued to defended herself by saying she was tired and just couldn't write anymore. I came her defense and said, "And since you are so tired, it would be unkind of me to make you walk anymore in search of dress shoes. We are going home so you can rest." Little did she know that her new maths books would be waiting on our front porch when we go home and her days of simple addition at he thrift store were over.

To her credit she admitted that she wasn't tired and lucky for her I was looking for a specific item that I did not find at that thrift store. So, we stopped by another thrift store and H was elated to find a pair of dress shoes that she liked.

Day 4 - Zoo

Fun!

Day 3 - Eating Math

On day 3 we started the morning singing the Sing, Spell, Read, and Write phonics song. H was a little bored with it, but A was catching on well. Little E thought it was fun. I printed more letter work sheets from www.startfall.com (we have covered A and B so far) for A to color, and H and I took turns reading pages about the Titanic in her Magic Tree House book. I was also able to help her with blending sounds in words. Reading and history covered! I am putting a strong emphasis on reading more than anything else with H. Just before leaving 2nd grade in public school, she was selected to be in the gifted program for math, but her reading was average at best. I assigned her to write her spelling and vocabulary words 1x each and then we started on math: fractions with cooking. On the inside of a file folder I drew pictures of measuring cups and divided them into quarters and eighths. I drew a different cup for each measurement with in a cup: ¼, ½, ¾, 1. We quadrupled the recipe of muffins and I had her figure out the ingredients multiplied by 4. She did very well and I was able to use up some very ripe bananas. Waste not, want not.

Day 2 - Accomplishemnts

Day two was manageable with 4 less children in the home. I pulled out the book What Your 3rd Grader Needs to Know and read out loud to my daughter, Aladdin. The day before, I had underlined many words in the story that I thought would be unfamiliar to her. On Day 2 I told her that those underlined words would be her spelling and vocabulary words. The words were fetch, innocent, widow, flames, burst, cuffed, reveal, descend, garment, niche, and moral. I looked up the definitions with her in Webster and simplified or abbreviated them as I dictated them to her. She complained that her hand hurt after writing down 6. She said her public school teacher let her finish work the next day and even take it home if she didn’t finish it the next day. I told her that she was welcome to sit at the table as long as she wanted until it was done. We finished 10 minutes later. I felt so accomplished; 3 subjects from one story! I was beginning to feel a tad bit less overwhelmed with homeschooling.

Quantifying

I mentioned earlier that I have a schedule. This is it:
School Schedule

MWF TR
5:15 AM Lunches
5:30 AM Shower
Get dressed head to toes
6:00 AM Scripture reading
Empty dishwasher
Check email
6:30 AM Wake up children
Get children dressed
Make beds
Clean bathroom
Make breakfast
7:00 AM Scripture Reading
7:30 AM Eat breakfast
8:05 AM Walk to school
8:45 AM Math Science
9:45 AM Reading and apples history & Lit
10:30 AM Spelling and vocabulary handwriting
11:30 AM Lunch
12:00 PM Free time and mommy rest time
1:30 PM Art computer
2:30 PM Walk to school
3:30 PM William Homework


So far I follow it about 50% of the time. I use it more of a guideline so that I can regulate my time. I also made a checklist for daily subjects, again, so I can monitor what I am covering. I never cover all of them in one day. I also apply life experiences to different subjects and write that experience next to the subject for example: Math – cooking and fractions. Here is the list:
Subjects covered today

Math
Reading
Science
Spelling
Vocabulary
Literature
History
Art
Piano
Voice
Soccer

Day 1 - Crash and Burn

I made a schedule for myself because I like seeing what I am capable of during the day. I also like to blow off schedules and ride free style. I woke up at 5:30 a.m. to see my husband off to work. I had scheduled myself to stay up, read the scriptures, check email, and shower before I had to wake the children up at 6:30. I went back to bed and slept in until 7:30 when the children woke up. I kind of rushed to get dressed and then tried to rush the children to get dressed. What’s the hurry? We had to eat breakfast (cereal) and be out the door at 8:05 a.m. to walk my DS a ½ mile to school. All of us. At 7:45 a.m. my DSIL (sis-in-law) knocks on the front door. Oh, yeah, I am taking her 2 DS to school and watching her younger 2 DS while she goes to the doctor for 2 hours

I looked to the internet as my savior and attempt to print out math review sheets for H, only I found an online math tutoring program. I bought a year subscription on the spot and I assigned her to start reviewing. She didn’t like it and my DH was less than pleased to know I had spent more money on top of the new Saxon math books I had recently purchased, which by the way, were now officially late being shipped by the online distributor. I did manage to find some coloring pages for A to color while I cleaned up potty accidents by E and her boy cousin who is only 9 days older than her.

Alas, at 11 a.m. my DSIL came back from her appointment and we both rushed out the door to meet the bus and pick up our friend’s (Nannette) daughter from preschool and her little 15 month old sister. Since it’s the first day of preschool, we both have to show ourselves to the bus driver. We then walked back to my home for lunch and then I put my friend’s baby and E in bed for naps. Since this was the first day of the baby being at my house, she wouldn’t go to bed without some screaming. After about 10 minutes of protesting she fell asleep at the door of the room and I had an hour of ‘quiet’ time. That is, H only asked me to entertain her every 10 minutes. At exactly 1:00, A and her preschool friend woke up the baby and 5 minutes later, Nannette showed up. Yeah!!!!! Then I realized that I had to start dinner and the house was trashed and W needed to be picked up from school at 3:00. Since it takes 20 minutes to walk to the school, and dinners are not Rachel Ray’s 30 Minute Meals, my free time was virtually nonexistent for the day.

When W came home, it was homework time and then dinner time. DH took 3 children to soccer practice and H and I went to church for her young girls activity night. At 9:00 I returned home to dirty dishes and dinner needing to be put away. DH had just finished putting the younger children to bed. So at 9:30 and after dishes, I put myself to bed and vowed to not to sleep in on a school day.

Homeschool accomplishments: Math, reading.

Introduction

This is the first year I have homeschooled any of my children. Although, I was homeschooled in 2nd grade and from 8 grade until I took my GED at age 17. My husband was also homeschooled from K-5 grades. So, the idea of homeschooling was not foreign to me. In fact, I was very comfortable with the idea of homeschooling with one exception: I didn't want to be the one home with my children.

I am a homemaker with a degree in business economics, and many times I have said that if I hadn't met my husband in college, I would have been a very happy and successful business woman. You might think I was a little naive and overconfident. You might think right. I love my children, but it took me years to be happy as a mother. I had let myself feel inferior to the women with perfect homes, hair, and Honda Odysseys. As my children have grown and multiplied to 4, I finally feel happy in my own skin, habits, and mini van. I also have great support from my husband. So armed with determination and saxon math books, I have started homeschooling my DD in the 3rd grade. I have put my DS in public school in the 1st grade. I also have a DD who is starting kindergarten, and a DD who is 3 and is providing me much learning in patience and multitasking with this new adventure.