Oct. 15, 2008 - It's Nomination Time!

Yes, I'm still alive and terribly busy.  I have lots of things to post about, but no time to post.    I saw today, however, that the 2008 Homeschool Blog Awards are underway.  Nominations are only accepted until next Friday, October 24th.  The official voting will begin November 10th.  If you have a great homeschool blog you enjoy reading *hint, hint* *nudge, nudge*, it's time to hurry over here to nominate that special someone! 

Don't know what categories are offered?  Well, silly, just click here!

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Sep. 30, 2008 - A Couple Extra Days Off

We took our scheduled week off last week, traveled back to Michigan to visit family and go to my nephew's wedding.  Everyone had a lovely time except we couldn't find Little Monkeys tennis shoes before we left.  Grandma found them in the bottom of a toy bin and has mailed them to us.  How silly of me not to look in the bottom of a toy bin tucked away in a corner of the basement.  What logical six year old boy doesn't put his shoes there?

Was I eager and ready to start back to our studies Monday?  No, but I would have gladly done that instead of this:

That is Big Man's (8) big toe.  You see, I wasn't feeling well Monday so my darling hubby took it upon himself to restock our food supplies.  He decided to be really brave and take everyone with him to the grocery store.  I bet he will never. do. that. again.  I'm a little fuzzy still on how his toe got tangled in the wheel of the shopping cart, but I can confirm the almost complete rippage of his toenail from his toe.  The immediate care doctor put some numbing cream on it, bandaged it up well, and gave Big Man good drugs to help the pain.  Since he's nicely loopy, we've taken the day off.  We'll see about tomorrow!   Supposedly the nail will come off itself in a few days.  In the meantime, we're watching far too many movies and eating snacks on the couch.

This doesn't exactly come at the best time, with football starting this weekend.  Basketball evaluations are this weekend and next, so we'll do those next weekend, hoping his foot isn't hurting too much in his shoes by then!  Here I was all excited about staying on track with our schedule, even though we had so many things added to our days this year.  Oh well, I'll either make up our missed day this weekend, or I'll tack it on our next break time. 

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Sep. 19, 2008 - Weekly Wrap Up, And A Wind Storm Update

Wow, we've actually made it through our first seven weeks without imploding!  Now we're off for a well deserved week long break.  Before we go, here's a look at what we've been doing since my last update.

Science is going along well.  The kids are enjoying it and are full of questions.  My favorite:  "Mom, if my drink is made up of atoms and I drink it . . . am I killing them?"  Big Man (8)  Ah, always the sensitive spirit!  They have very much enjoyed the hands on nature of Chemistry.  Here they are building molecules with marshmallows:

Big Man has made it thru his first One Minute Reader book.  We took an extra week with the book to go back over the stories to see if he still had good speed.  He was very proud of his results, especially when he beat his top score on one of the stories.  I let him pick the book we would buy for the next level.  He's looking forward to reading about Cool Creatures.

Math is still way easy for Little Monkey (6).  He just buzzes thru things, not struggling with any concept we've come across yet.  Making sure we have a time for reviewing flash cards every day has made a huge difference for him.  He's much faster completing his worksheets!  He's almost finished with his 1st grade book.  While we're off I'll be going thru the 2nd grade book to see what things we can skip (since a lot of the first few lessons are just review anyway).  Big Man continues to struggle with borrowing in subtraction.  It just seems to be the one thing that he can't grasp completely.  As soon as I think he has it, he'll stumble.  Division, however, has come to him suprisingly easily.   Figure that one out.

Both boys are enjoying history.  Last week we learned about Benjamin Franklin.  A historical figure who was full of inventions?  Perfect for little boys!  Due to other things going on, we weren't able to do as much with this as I had hoped, but they still enjoyed it.  They especially enjoyed playing water glasses, then watching a You Tube video of a woman playing a real armonica.  We also played a Virtual Armonica.  This week we were learning about George Washington and the beginning of the American Revolution.  The kids favorite was the Redcoats, so we pretended to be Redcoats camping out.  We ate beef jerky *yuk* and made a very un-Redcoat treat of banana boats (A banana split down the middle lengthwise, then stuffed with chocolate chips and marshmallows.  Wrap in foil & roast over an open fire.  Not as good as it sounds!)  Since we were doing some open fire cooking, we took the opportunity to learn first aid for burns.

We have been very impressed with The Barton Reading & Spelling System, and it's only been seven weeks!  That's very encouraging    The tricks in there for the most common directional errors have been extremely helpful for Big Man.  He's confusing b's & d's far less frequently, never reversing them while writing, and he is usually catching when he is reversing his p's while writing.  Those are HUGE improvements.  His confidence level has increased dramatically, especially his spelling confidence.  He is a couple of lessons into Level 3 and is expected to write dictated phrases and sentences.  These are carefully controlled of course, only dictating what has been taught and mastered.  He has NEVER been able to write a sentence with zero spelling and directional errors until now.  Just that accomplishment has been wonderful for both of us to see!  Little Monkey is on the last lesson in Level 2.  After our break, we'll finish up that lesson and he'll take the post test.  He will then zoom right into Level 3 as well.  His reading is very much improved as well, and he is impressed with himself that he can spell "words that aren't even words" . . . aka nonsense words.

The Great Leaps part of our day is very popular.  After a certain number of stories mastered, they get a date night out with mom.  Big Man already had his first, a trip to see Prince Caspian again.  Little Monkey has one on hold, thanks to Hurricane Ike, but he wants to go see The Clone Wars. 

Speaking of the big hurricane, as you can see we survived the massive wind storm around here.  It has been amazing for our kids to see the fury of a hurricane in Indiana that started out hitting Texas.  We had massive winds that knocked out power to a record number of people in this area.  We feel very, very blessed that our power came back a few hours after going out.  There are people in this area who won't have power for another week to ten days.  We invited some people over from church who don't have power, gave them a hot meal and the use of our washing machine.  Our house held up quite well, loosing close to 50 shingles.  We were suddenly glad we never got around to replacing the trees in our front yard!  We were one of a very few houses that didn't sustain damage from trees.  We have neighbors who:  had fences, sheds, etc. crushed by falling trees; a huge section of fencing simply blow away; and shingles ripped off a third of the way across the roof like someone pulled back a blanket.  Here's a common sight in our neighborhood right now:  Those are discarded tree parts piled twice as high as a mailbox.  One telephone pole wasn't just snapped in half, it was snapped into thirds!!!  The top third is still hanging down on the power lines.  Today, as the kids and I were driving down the road, we saw this:  Not the best picture for what this is:  a huge movie theater sign bent backwards and twisted at probably a thirty degree angle.  Schools around here are pretty much all closed for the week, and my hubby even got Monday off of work since there wasn't any power.  He would have enjoyed the day off had he not been repairing the roof all day!  This has really impressed upon the kids how powerful hurricanes are, and how easy we got off at our house!

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Sep. 9, 2008 - Carnival of Homeschooling #141

The Cates at Why Homeschool have put up the Hero edition of The Carnival of Homeschooling.  I always enjoy browsing these, but I haven't had the time over the past month or so.  I hope to have an opportunity to look at this one, especially since I'm in it!

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Sep. 7, 2008 - Improving Grammar

Our oldest son is a solid right-brainer who is dyslexic.  Our middle boy is probably dyslexic.  Learning abstract concepts like  "pronouns" tends to be difficult for these children.  Hmm, what to do to make grammar an easier subject?  Well, our reading program is color coded.  Some of our math is color coded.  I even found a grammar program that is color coded, although it is for older children.  Here's what I came up with:

Nouns are now officially yellow.  Pronouns are a light purple.  (I only color coded the word we were changing from a noun to a pronoun.) 

I bought those cheap plastic report covers in all the colors I could find and chopped them up into rectangles.  These are great for this use for two reasons:  the plastic is clear enough to see the word underneath; they can be written on with dry erase markers then wiped clean.  For now we will be using these on the white board to complete sentences.  Later this year when Big Man (8) begins diagramming sentences, we can construct a sentence in the appropriate colors and move them around to diagram :)  Any grammar work that is done on paper is color coded with colored pencil, we just shade in the appropriate color for the part of speech.  The boys have really taken to this.  It helps them see what part of speech they are dealing with.  I'm just glad to have figured something out that helps our grammar time go more smoothly!

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Sep. 3, 2008 - Art in the Park

I'm still swamped with things going on here, so I don't have much time to post.  I did want to share some pictures of our first day back in the swing with art.  I'm calling it "Art in the Park".  We went to our favorite park, affectionately called "the duck park" by our boys.  Hmmm, can you see why?

A picture of maybe a third of the ducks that came over when we we arrived with bread.  More came the longer we stayed.

Yertle the Turtle also showed up

While Big Man (8) and Peanut (3) fed some of the hungry crowd . . .

Little Monkey (6) had a couple of fans all to himself.  The big white ones (the Aflack ducks ) were really funny.  If we turned around to get more bread from the bags, they would tap on our shoes with their beaks, then look pleadingly up at us.  They were also the ones we could feed right out of our hands.

Once were were out of bread, we decided it was time to get the sketch pads out.

Big Man's final product.  I had meant to bring along the colored pencils so we could make these more than pencil sketches.  Oh well, maybe next time. 

After all of that hard work, we decided we needed recess and headed over to the playground area

We're cruising right along with our other work.  We have also started science, much to the delight of my children.  We were finishing up a "lab project" yesterday when Little Monkey asked if he was done.  I said that yes, he was a good little scientist that day and got all of his work done.  He turned around with enormous eyes and said, "Was I being a real scientist today?!"  We're learning about slavery in history which has fascinated the boys.  My hubby has to travel to D.C. in a few weeks.  Oh, if only we could come along and visit Mount Vernon!!!

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Sep. 1, 2008 - Auditory Processing Links

Our audiologist gave us two thick reports filled with recommendations.  There were thirty-eight different things to choose from in eight different catagories!  Needless to say, it took a very long time to research everything and come up with the ones that looked like it would fit with our family.  I liked that most of these things are in game form, it makes it easy to have fun while building those processing skills.  Here are the links for the things we're using for Big Man (8) and Little Monkey (6) this year as it relates to Auditory Processing Disorder. 

Earobics software  :  This is an auditory processing/auditory discrimination program.  They work on it five days a week for a half hour at a time.  We have both Step 1 and Step 2.  After getting these, I realized they are similar and thought about sending one back.  However, having both CD's actually helps!  I let them choose which "Step" they want to use that day.  It prevents boredom since there are more games to choose from.  Both the Audiologist and the reading tester HIGHLY recommended this program.

A Metacognative Program for Treating Auditory Processing Disorder   :  A fancy way of saying "this book will help your child listen to and comprehend orally presented material better" . . . also known as "improving auditory processing skills"  Done two to three times a week, it only takes a few minutes.  Each skill is built on the previous skill practiced.  We're still in the very early stages of this book, so it isn't blowing me away yet, but I can see how it will be helpful by the time we get thru it all.

Solve the Problem   :  A game - sort of - to build problem solving skills.  I'm trying to do it once a week, and it only takes a couple of minutes. 

The Auditory Processing Game   :   The best game according to Little Monkey even though this is listed as the 8 - 12 age range.  It's very much a challenge for both of the boys, but they enjoy it.  This is a clever little game, modeled after the game of Clue.  You are only allowed to move if you answer your question correctly.  Many auditory processing skills are covered in this game, and each question card has three questions to choose from so you can match it to the childs ability.

WordBURST  :   A fun game modeled after Outburst.  This builds vocabulary, aids in categorization and association skills, among other things.  Also for ages 8 & up, though Little Monkey enjoys this game as well.

Bea's Hive, A Sight Word Game :  LinguiSystems has discontinued this game, that's too bad.  It's a really cute game to build sight word reading skills.  Maybe Amazon has it or something.

No-Glamour Language Game  :  This is a much more difficult game for Little Monkey, though he tries :)  Develops auditory comprehension and expressive language skills.

Get Me Out of Here!  :  I haven't ordered this yet, but it looks really fun.  You are given a "mission".  To complete this mission, you must build a map to get you there.  It improves critical thinking skills, and mapping skills as a bonus :)

Well, those are the things we're using for auditory processing problems.  There are just as many things we're using for dyslexia, only they aren't in game form!! 

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Aug. 22, 2008 - A Quick Peek

Hmmm, I wonder what we learned about in history this week?

Those heap cute indian braves!

Indian chief "Hamitup":

Yes, we made everything on them, bear claw necklace, tomahawk, headdress, and buckskin (imitation, thanks).  Thank you Hobby Lobby!

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Aug. 15, 2008 - Weekly Wrap Up, The First Two Weeks

We've now completed our second week of the school year.  Whew!  It's been a busy couple of weeks!!!    I feel like I'm on a merry go round and I'm getting dizzy!  On top of trying to get our school days going, I've also been going super speed trying to get other projects finished before their deadlines.  Our church is going to two services in two weeks, in which time the new nursery will hopefully be ready.  My hubby and I are on the nursery leadership team, so we've been helping overhaul the nursery (not physically, praise God there have been wonderful men who stepped forward for that!).  The things I have left to do:  make name tags for all nursery workers, make final decisions and purchase toys for large play area, and put together crafts for two services (three classes each service) for the next two months.  I'm also the Elementary Coordinator for the local homeschool group here.  We've cemented our plans on the group calendar, with the exception of two things I need to follow up on.  I have one more meeting next week before the whirlwind of planning for that commitment will be done.  There are many, many people at our church who are interested in learning more about homeschooling, how to get started, curriculum, scheduling, etc.  It looks like I'll be the person putting together a mini-conference on that one, probably to be held in my home (There's no way that can happen before October, but the planning for it is already running crazy thru my head!).  Dear friends of ours are moving in three and a half weeks .  Today I had all four of their children so they could get the house prepared for an open house this Sunday. . . hmm I wonder if that is why I didn't get anything done today!  I have another five hours of DVD tutor instruction to watch before Monday (more on that in a minute).  The pool in our backyard has needed to be vacuumed for a week.  It is now turning a lovely green color.  Our puppy ate thru her leash, I desperately need to buy a new one so I can walk some of that energy out of her again!    I have two potted hostas sitting in my front flower bed still waiting (for months now) to be planted.  The tomatoes in our garden are beginning to appear (I got them planted very late, so they're appearing very late) and I need to get ready for preparing them into tastly salsa, ketchup, etc.  I'll be traveling back home mid-September for a bridal shower, then we'll do the same at the end of that month for my nephews wedding as well as spending some time with other family up there.  My hubby also has a Elder/Deacon retreat to go on in September, so I'll be alone for a couple of days while he's gone.  Whew again!!!    After typing all of that out, I'm beginning to feel like I have decent reasons to feel a bit pressed for time/frazzled! 

Since I have half a dozen other things I should be doing right now, here's a brief update on our first two weeks:

Reading: 

Big Man (8) completed his first level of Barton Reading, he's so proud   The first level focuses on phonemic awareness, which was a weak area on his testing.  Things that were difficult for him at the beginning & middle of the week were easy for him by the end of the week.  That was SO encouraging!  He could even see how much he improved thru the course of a couple of weeks.  I just got the second level of Barton, but I need to watch the tutor instructional DVD's before we begin on Monday.  The DVD's are very, very helpful.  I'm so thankful to have a program that walks me step by step thru everything (and I mean everything -- those DVD's are thorough!), as well as the comfort of knowing that the author of the program is a phone call away.  The One Minute Reader has been a huge confidence booster for him as well.  We started with the orange book (which was recommended for his age, plus I found it used for $10!)  Last week, his score on Monday was 33 words per minute.  He practices by himself for the next three days.  Friday his score was 88!  Woooo, was he proud!  This week, his score on Monday was 35, today was 104 without a single mistake!!!  I didn't know his chest could puff out that far   At first, I hesitated to buy this program.  Now I have no doubt I'll keep buying the next levels!  We'll be adding in Literacy Leaders to our days beginning next week.

Little Monkey (6) has been the hot topic around here when my hubby and I are alone together.  More and more we are seeing red flags of dyslexia.  This, obviously, is quite discouraging.  Dyslexia is heavily hereditary, so we were told to keep a close eye on the other kids for early intervention.  We have decided that we will begin Little Monkey on Barton Reading this next week.  It will not do any harm if he isn't dyslexic.  It will move the world if he is.  We had already planned on getting him tested by the end of the schoolyear, this is just earlier intervention than that.  The bad thing for me?  Barton needs to be done a minimum of 45 minutes a day, as many days of the week as possible.  Add in Literacy Leaders, Earobics, etc. and we've got a humdinger of a day!

Math:

Both boys are slowly getting back into the math groove.  What has become glaringly obvious to me is that I have neglected drilling Little Monkey enough on his math facts (addition and subtraction).  He takes soooo looonnnggg to finish a math sheet, but he clearly understands what he's doing.  The thing that takes him so long is the actual calculations.  I've begun to drill him daily with flash cards.  This will help him tremendously.

Grammar:

We're going to make some modifications to our program.  I still like First Language Lessons, it just needs to be more multisensory for my kids.  I'll post more about this another time . . . when I have more time!

Earobics:

I have to say that my kids are enjoying this one!  After their quite time on the first day of school, they both asked to play Earobics again.  Oh yeah, you can play as long as you would like!  They are moving into harder levels now.  Background noises are being added into the program as well as the general increase in difficulty.  I've noticed that they both are really needing to concentrate while they are working on these. 

Handwriting:

Big Man is doing well with cursive so far.  We're sticking with Handwriting Without Tears for this one.  I keep hearing that cursive is good for dyslexics, they can't reverse b's & d's.  I'll be interested in seeing how that pans out.

Little Monkey is working on his thank you notes from his birthday for handwriting   Yes, his birthday was almost two months ago.  For family reading this. . . I'm hoping you get your thank you cards before Christmas.

History:

We've been enjoying Tapestry of Grace.  We are continuing our unit on the first colonists in America.  I've been keeping it on "Tapestry Lite" due to all of the other things going on around here right now.  We're reading A LOT, but the book selections in Tapestry are wonderful.  They really keep my kids attention. The geography over these last two weeks has been heavy, but both boys are doing well with it.  We'll continue to review the states we've learned & add in the last couple of colonies within the next two weeks.  They are itching to add in projects once again, which we will be doing next week when we take a week to delve into Indians a bit.

The Extras:

We've played a few games around here (that are used to improve the auditory processing skills).  The most popular one was The Auditory Processing Game.  I've been asked about these games, as well as some of the other things.  I'll have to do a post on this when I get a chance.  I received on of the core books I had been waiting on for Big Mans "Executive Function" problems (only if you've read an audiologist report do you have any idea what I'm talking about . . . maybe not even then!).  Now I just have to wade thru the first few lessons and make the copies I need for those lessons so we can start in on it!

That's all I have for now.  I need to go make three beds, clean the kitchen disaster area, and start watching the Barton DVD's tonight.  All of this before 10:00 so I can watch Olympic swimming.    Oh yes, didn't I mention I've been staying up until one in the morning every night so I could watch?  What, me crazy?  Yup. 

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Aug. 14, 2008 - Public School As Parents

I don't normally post things about the public schools, there are enough people who do a much better job than I could.  Today, however, as I was flipping thru our paper there was an article about the first day of the school year in this area.  Toward the end of the story, I read this quote:

"I'm your school mom.  This is your home for the year."

If my children were in this school, I honestly would have a hard time not backhanding that teacher.  MY child, I don't care where they may be sitting at the moment.  MY home is my childs home, I don't care where they may be sitting at the moment.  Schools are notorious for their disdain of parental authority.  Parents need to assert their God-given authority and stop handing it over to someone else while they celebrate the joy of having a few hours to get their house clean.  Sorry, that just burned my butter this morning.

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Aug. 12, 2008 - Busy, busy, busy!

I've been reeling from all that's going on around here.  I don't have much time to update on it all, but here are some pictures as a quick peek:

The one who broke my clippers mid-haircut (prompting Big Man to ask, "Can we keep him like that?")  I really need to learn how to thin his gorgeous hair before cutting it short!:

A fun, but loud, way to freak out the puppy:  A remote controlled car (she's barking & jumping at it while doing that cute quizzical head turn thing):

Peanuts (3) favorite school-time diversion.  Unfortunately, he pulls out every book and wails when it isn't a "read me" book!  I recorded myself reading a handfull of these books last year.  He absolutely LOVES this.  I'll be going to the library tonight to check out a whole slew of other books on tape!

We've received most of the things I've ordered for the Auditory Processing problems.  Here is a look at a few of the fun games:

We've begun our second week of our homeschool year.  By the end of this week I'll try to update our progress as well as all the other things keeping me running.  No promises though!!

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Aug. 7, 2008 - Plan B

Well, after a couple of days of a non-compliant Peanut (3) my hubby and I have decided to move on to Plan B.  Peanut is clearly not willing/ready to do "official" school at this time.  We'll see if he is in a couple of months.  He's still little-bitty, so I'm not concerned.  In fact, this could be a nice little blessing.  It will give me time to get used to all of the other things we've needed to add in this year before adding Peanut into the mix as well.  We will still be reading every day.  Peanut loves books and it gives us nice one-on-one time together and snuggle time before and after (and sometimes during!) his brothers school time.  Since I need to have activities to keep him busy, I'm reverting back to this list:

• (Mon)  Playdoh / train track building with trains
• (Tues) Wedgits / shape stackers
• (Wed) Puzzles / Plastic dinosaurs with play mat
• (Thurs) Stamps / Melissa & Doug pattern blocks (mosaic set)
• (Fri) Magnetos / Paint
• extra options we have:  Wikki Stix, Marble Run, number & shape puzzle cards, legos, sewing cards, shape sorter, stringing beads, coloring or a craft, Starfall.com.

Peanut also enjoys the Earobics program, so I'm not hesitant about letting him do that.  Hopefully, all of these things working together will keep him occupied and happy so we can do our work with minimal distractions.  Always have a Plan B when you have preschoolers!  Now I need a Plan C . . . just in case!

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Aug. 4, 2008 - Our First Day

I officially have a third grader, a first grader, and a preschooler.  Yikes!  We did a very light schoolday today.  We only did history and the new items I needed to add to deal with the dyslexia/auditory processing problems we've got going on around here.  Here's a breakdown of our day, imperfections and all ;)

• 4:00 a.m. Peanut (3) wakes me up.  I put him to bed.
• 5:30 a.m. Peanut wakes me up.  I put him to bed.
• 6:10 a.m. (moments before my alarm goes off) Peanut wakes me up.  He refuses to go back to bed, but will lay with me now that daddy's gone.  We both fall back to sleep.
• 7:30 a.m. Not believing the other two boys are still asleep (when was the last time they slept this late anyway?), I spring out of bed still wanting to start our schoolday somewhere around 8:30 (HAH!)
• 9:00 a.m. After getting everyone fed, dressed, and chores done, I take my shower
• 9:30 - 10:00 a.m.  I hide the new school items in the back yard (after tying up the puppy) & we have our traditional "First day of school treasure hunt"
• 10:00- 10:30 a.m.  I shoo the kids down the stairs to divide up their new loot.  (10:10 - 10:12:  I work with Peanut on the letter A . . . we'll get back to this one in a minute!)
• 9:30 - 10:30  Introduced both the kids to Earobics and let each have their 1/2 hour while I supervised in case there were any questions.
• 10:40 - 11:00  I work with Little Monkey (6) on his reading.
• 11:00 - 11:50 a.m.  I work with Big Man on his Barton Reading & Spelling Program & introduced him to The One Minute Reader
• 11:50 - 12:50  Lunch, I read their history selection while they ate.
• 12:50 - 1:15  worked on map for history
• 1:15 - 1:30  tried to convince myself it wasn't a failed first day!

Okay, so we didn't do:  math, handwriting, grammar, or Explode the Code and it still took us until after 1:00.  I know today was absolutely not the typical day, but that's just discouraging!  It did nothing for my confidence level with the whole tight schedule thing!  It certainly will help me greatly if I don't sleep in    I'm blaming today's sleeping in episode on Peanut.  I'll blame him tomorrow too.

I think the favorite thing for my kids today was the treasure hunt as usual.  We do this every year for our first day.  It's always a hit.  I buy all new school supplies as the Back to School sales are in full force.  I included a magnifying glass for Big Man and Little Monkey this year since they'll need that for science.  I also include a little treat (a container of mini M&M's for each child) as well as a simple book for each (Mickey Mouse, Star Wars, & Scooby Doo).  What kid doesn't like new school supplies?  Their pencil boxes are now completely filled with fresh pencils, crayons, glue sticks, etc. and all the old, broken things from last year are history. 

Peanuts first day is a baaad look at what's to come.  So, as his brothers are gleefully organizing their pencil boxes, I decide this is a good time to show Peanut what we do with some of this new stuff.  He really liked his scissors, so I got out a page from our cutting book.  He enjoyed that, but only for about thirty seconds.  That's okay, I expected that.  Next I pulled out his Handwriting Without Tears book to the letter "A" page.  He said, "Oooo, dats A".  I praised him, had him say "A says, /a/. /a/,/a/, apple" a couple of times.  Good so far.  Then I had him use his finger to practice the letter A "slide".  He used his finger and did it the best he could a couple of times.  I then had him do this with a crayon.  He did it twice.  He then announced:  "I'M DONE!".   There was nothing more that could be done, he had made his announcement.  Total teaching time:  approx. 2 minutes.  Oh yeah, he's going to be an easy student.  (If you know Peanut, you are NOT surprised!)

I'm not doing the Literacy Leaders with anyone for a couple of weeks.  It is heavy on rhyming, and both my kids struggle with that.  We will work on that before we add in Literacy Leaders!  It was interesting to watch both boys do Earobics for the first time.  It's an auditory discrimination/processing program.  This is going to be a GREAT program for Big Man, and I think it will be a good thing for Little Monkey as well.  I'll be interested in seeing how they both progress thru the different levels.  On a positive note, we reviewed the last couple of weeks of our history from last year.  I was impressed how much they remembered . . . almost everything!  They could both still find the different places on the map we learned about (except the James river, which surprised me since they remembered where Jamestown was settled, and they knew that they settled on the river)  This week is going to be geography heavy for us, especially Little Monkey.  He seems enthusiastic at the moment, so that's good.

Tomorrow is a new day.  I'll add in math, maybe handwriting.  We'll see how I'm feeling then!

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Aug. 1, 2008 - The End of Summer

I've been busy, busy, busy trying to finish getting things ready for the beginning of our schoolyear.  We start Monday.  This morning, as I was running around getting some things done, I spied my children:

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Jul. 26, 2008 - A Daily Schedule

I may still need to be curled up in the fetal position under a table somewhere.  Our days are going to be FULL, and I still need to make choices for the Auditory Processing problems for Big Man (8).  Here's a look at what I've been able to put together.  There are three tables since the last two days of the week are different from the first three days.  The times for some things are off a little.  For instance, One Minute Readers is a program Big Man will be doing by himself, and will only take about five minutes.  Once he is done, he can take a drink or bathroom break until I'm ready for his next item.  I'll do ten minutes of Literacy Leaders for Little Monkey, followed by twenty minutes of reading.  On the schedule, the pink section for reading evens out to thirty minutes.  Here's why I won't be answering the phone or doorbell until two o'clock during the week:

Fridays are usually Daddy Fun Day, so after Art (or a nature walk, whatever we do that day for the subject) they are basically done.  Where, oh where am I going to put the things the Audiologist suggested?  Well, many of those things are games or activities that can be done by the whole family, or can at least be done during the afternoon free play time.  Some of the other things look like they will be things to do one on one or in worksheet form.  I didn't think I'd need to break our schedule down into fifteen minute increments for a while.  Guess that wil teach me for thinking!  Who knows what this schedule will look like once all of the other things are added in!  I just need to deal with what I have now instead of worrying about what will come next month!  ("...do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own"  Matthew 6:34--boy isn't that the truth!!)  We have one more week before we start school.  We normally have a very, very light first two weeks.  Our first two weeks this year will still be light, just not as light as we are accustomed to!   If I had my choice, I would not begin history or science for a few weeks, until I felt like we were in our groove with everything else.  Unfortunately for me, Big Man has been looking forward to starting school again because those are the very subjects he's missed!    Since I really want to play up his strengths, I don't want to deny him the two subjects he enjoys the most while adding in a bunch of new, time consuming things.  We will start history, Tapestry of Grace (TOG), during our first week, but I'm going to attempt to hold off on Chemistry for a couple of weeks.  If there's too much complaining about no science, then I'll go ahead and add that in on the second week.  Stress!!  I'm feeling some stress!!

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Jul. 22, 2008 - Almost Done Planning

Whoo Hoo!  I have my planner complete, minus our choices to deal with Big Man's (8) Auditory Processing problems.  Those choices may take a couple more weeks, there is a whole lot to read thru and many, many choices to mull over.  Everything else is ready to go, including my beloved binder.  Can you see my bad dancing going on?  Here is our curriculum for this year:

Big Man (8) - 3rd Grade:

• Barton Reading & Spelling (a program designed for dyslexics)
• Great Leaps Reading (a fluency building program)
• Literacy Leaders (phonological awareness program)
• Abeka Math - 3rd grade
• First Language Lessons - 3rd grade
• Handwriting Without Tears, Cursive
• Earobics (an auditory discrimination program)
• Tapestry of Grace (finish up year 2 and go thru Year 3, Unit 3)
• Real Science 4 Kids Chemistry, Pre-Level 1
• Artistic Pursuits (Trying this again!  We did not schedule this well last year)
• Themes to Remember (Trying this again as well!)
• One Minute Readers (a fluency building program)
• Leading Little Ones to God & Childrens Story Bible 
• Auditory Processing programs -- yet to be determined

Little Monkey (6) - 1st Grade:

• Ordinary Parents Guide to Reading (picking up at about lesson 120)
• Great Leaps Reading (figured it wouldn't hurt Little Monkey to do this too!)
• Literacy Leaders (ditto from above!)
• Abeka Math - 1st & 2nd Grade (finish up 1st grade left over from last year, will probably complete 2nd grade this year as well)
• First Language Lessons - 1st Grade
• Explode the Code (starting where we left off last year, end of book 3)
• Handwriting Without Tears - 2nd Grade
• Earobics (it would be good for him to go thru this program too!)
• Tapestry of Grace (finish up year 2 and go thru Year 3, Unit 3)
• Real Science 4 Kids Chemistry, Pre-Level 1
• Artistic Pursuits (Trying this again)
• Themes to Remember (Trying this again)
• Leading Little Ones to God & Childrens Story Bible
• Will be in on some Auditory Processing games with Big Man

Peanut (3) - Preschool:

• My Preschool Plans

As you can see, both Big Man and Little Monkey will be doing some of the same things thru the day.  The fluency building and phonological awareness programs are short things that will only take a few minutes each.  Little Monkey doesn't "officially" need these things like Big Man, yet it certainly won't hurt him to have the practice.  We see some red flags with Little Monkey when it comes to dyslexia, we will probably get him tested by the end of the schoolyear.  In the meantime, we'll watch him closely and let him join in on some of the things Big Man will be doing.  It could all be developmental, but the chances for a sibling of a dyslexic to be one too is much higher than in a family with no problems.

The Auditory Processing recommendations are many, many, many.  I have two looooong reports to muddle my way thru.  It isn't leisurly reading for sure!  In fact, it makes my brain hurt every time I sit down with it.  I'll be relieved to have those choices made so I can figure out how to get everything in our days.  I'm glad we had a few weeks between the tests.  It gave me time to research, choose, and get comfortable with the dyslexia choices. 

Now to try and figure out how I can fit it all in our days!  I may crawl under a table and be in the fetal position for a while.

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Jul. 16, 2008 - A Long Lost Childhood Wish Come True :)

Oh, how I always yearned for a Snoopy Sno-Cone machine.  I drooled over the gourmet confections I could create if only I could convince my parents how much I needed it.  So, mom, this one's for you.  Lookie-loo what I picked up at a yard sale:

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Jul. 15, 2008 - Crock Pot Recipes

I try to keep a monthly rotation going of meals so we're not eating seven of the same meals week after week, month after month.  As we get tired of one recipe, I try to find something to switch it with.  I stumbled upon this blog last night.  This woman is AMAZING.  Or crazy.  Could be a little of both  Either way, she is impressive!  She has committed to 365 days in a row of cooking a new recipe in her crockpot.  Some days it's a main entree, some days a side dish, some days a dessert.  I now have many new recipes to try this month before we begin our schooling.  To have a bunch of new favorites that are crockpot meals is a huge plus!!  She has even figured out a way to make cheesecake in the crockpot!  She admits to being a cheesecake snob, but she was quite happy with the results.  My husband is skeptical.  I guess I just need to try the recipe and see.    You must check her out! Even if you only get a couple of new meals your family enjoys, they are CROCKPOT recipes, the easiest meals of all!! 

A Year of CrockPotting

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Jul. 14, 2008 - Preschool Planning

I've spent the last few months trying to get Peanuts (3) Preschool plans laid out.  Work on it has been slow.  I've been working on it a little bit at a time as I had opportunity (it sure seems like there hasn't been much!)  It's finally done, here is the link to our Preschool Plans.

He seems to be getting himself geared up for "schoolwork" this fall.  I keep finding him at Little Monkey's school desk scribbling and saying "dat's A!", "dat's "F!", and so on.  Let's just hope that enthusiasm keeps up when he's expected to actualy learn about those letters ;)  I'm relieved to be just about done getting my planner ready, I only have one subject left to get together for Big Man (8).  Now I just have to figure out a way to get all the extra things we'll need to do to fit in our day!  Aaahhh!!!

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Jul. 11, 2008 - Our Week

I've been lagging in my posts here lately.  We've been busy enjoying the last few weeks of our summer.  We have about three more weeks until we start our schoolyear, so we're trying to make the most of it.

July 4th:  We went down to the waterfront as usual.  It was a rainy, humid night.  The fireworks don't start until the concert on the other side of the river is done, which usually means the fireworks are delayed a bit.  This year, however, things got out of hand.  The concert ended VERY late, and the fireworks didn't begin until just after 11 p.m.!!!!  Here are some pics from our night that seemed to go on f-o-r-e-v-e-r :

Our annual July 4th picture at the waterfront.  The ground was soaked so I couldn't get them to sit there.  This bench had a huge mud puddle in front of it, so I lifted each one on, then off, to get this drizzely shot:

This is what happens when you're subjected to water torture for hours while waiting for fireworks:

Finally, the rain stopped.  But the only fireworks that were going off were brought from someone's home.  We watched, wondering if this would be all we would see for tonight:

Finally, after we had hauled all of our things to the van, and began to buckle people in, the fireworks FINALLY began.  We watched them while standing in the parking lot.  Wahoo.  Since we weren't able to do our puny fireworks after the "big show" on the fourth, this is what we did on the fifth:He enjoyed himself.  After two nights of staying up very late, they actally slept in on the sixth.  I need to mark that in their baby books.  That's monumental.

Later in the week, we were able to visit a farm with a small group of moms from our church to do a little fruit picking.  It was hot and humid, as every summer day is around here, but we brought home what seemed like half the orchard.  First up were peaches:Mmmm, I can still smell them.  So yummy.  We picked quite a few and I'm still getting them processed for freezing.  I found out recently that I can't can on my stove because it has a glass top.  Until I figure out what to do about that, I'm "freezer canning".  Basically, I'm doing the same thing I would do if canning, except I'm placing the fruit in freezer bags.  Here's a very helpful link if you're interested:  How to Can Anything.

We ate ice cream for lunch, yup that's right, I'm mom of the year for that one, then headed off to the blueberry patch.  Here are my slaves . . . ummm darling children . . . hard at work:We each had a bucked to see who could fill theirs the fastest.  As I suspected, Little Monkey (6) gave up first, although he hung in for a whole lot longer than I thought he would!  This one was sharing mommy's bucket.  I had to take it away from him since he was eating the berries faster than I could pick them:It's wonderful to go fruit picking here and be able to eat as you walk along, but I think Peanut (3) ate enough blueberries for six grown men.  This is what happens when blueberry hysteria kicks in:We ended up with about nine pounds of berries, and I don't even know how many pounds of peaches.  The van smelled soooo wonderful on the way  home!  We were very weary, and I've been freezing fruit like crazy in the last couple of days.  We had grilled peaches on Thursday night as a treat for all of our hard work that day.  Yummy-licious!!!

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