Keeping Up....

Well, our first year of homeschooling is coming to a close, and I can’t believe we made it!  I’ve learned a lot about myself and about my children this year. 

I will be completely honest here.  I really doubted myself when it came to homeschooling.  I didn’t feel like I would be able to actually teach my children everything that they needed to learn.  But wow.  They have both completely exceeded my highest hopes.  Both boys are reading now, and not just reading, but reading WELL. 

AJ is halfway through his second math book, which is actually the first grade book.  AJ seems to have his daddy’s brain, and it’s amazing to me the math he can do in his head.  We haven’t done much subtraction yet, but yesterday on our way to Taekwando, he asked me what time it was.  After I told him, he said, "So class starts in 26 minutes, right?"  I couldn’t believe that he did that in his head, and that he did it so FAST. 

Drew loves phonics.  He is almost done with "Getting Ready for the Code" and is so excited to start the "Explode the Code" books in the fall.  I really underestimated Drew when it came to reading.  I kind of let him tag along so he didn’t feel left out, but he has done great and has learned so much!  Yesterday he got a letter in the mail from my mom and he read the entire thing by himself.  I was so proud of him.

Both boys love art projects.  Anything that involves markers, crayons, glue, paint, etc.  The boys have very different styles when it comes to drawing.  We call AJ the "realist" and Drew the "picasso". 

We’ve taken lots of field trips this year, which might just be my favorite part of homeschooling.  We’ve gone to the orchard to pick apples, the pond to learn about ducks, many trips to the library, and much much more. 

We don’t plan to stop school over the summer, but we’re only going to do 2 or 3 days a week.  I want to leave plenty of time for swimming, playing, popscicles, and many other fun activities.  And then in September, AJ will officially start first grade, and Drew will officially start kindergarten.  I can’t believe how big these boys are getting.  And I can’t believe how proud I am of them.

Today we made homemade shrinky dinks!  I found a website with great directions, and my friend Dawn gave me some number 6 plastic containers. 

The boys were very excited to be using permanent markers, and I’m happy to report that no marker ended up on the table or their clothes.  AJ decided to make a red and blue Thunderbird (of which he is the pilot of course), and Drew colored a picture of me standing under a rainbow.

Here are some pictures of the process:

Creating the perfect designs:

All ready to be baked:

In the oven.  I know that my oven door is dirty, so it’s hard to see them, but we were able to watch the plastic curl up and then flatten again.  I think the kids enjoyed that part the most.

And the finished product.  The kids were amazed at how small and thick they got.  We compared them to a leftover piece of the pre-shrunk plastic.

I’m not sure what we are going to do with them now.  I may have Ray drill a hole in the tops so they can be strung and hung.  We’ll see. 

Well, it’s a new year, and we have started back to school already.  I know most people don’t start back on January 2, but my kids just do so much better on their schedule.  We’ll be changing a few things in 2009.  A few things I have planned are:

1.  More science.  We haven’t done much science at all because the boys have really wanted to focus on phonics and math.  But I want to take more field trips and even just walks outside to learn about nature and God’s creation. 

2.  More Scripture memorization.  They’ve been learning a few verses for AWANA, but they could do so much more.  So instead of getting frustrated with the AWANA program, we’re going to tackle a couple of sections of scripture. 

3.  More arts and crafts.  I’m terrible about this because I hate messes.  I really hate most crafts because I hate cleaning up afterwards.  I need to get over it. 

4.  I’d really like to do school outside sometimes.  Take the kids to the park and let them do some of their work at the picnic table (followed by playing, of course).  I think they would enjoy that and the fresh air would be good for them.

So those are my primary goals for homeschooling in the new year.  Hopefully sometime this month, I’ll be able to order AJ’s new math book, as he’s getting bored with the workbook we have been supplementing with.  The boys will also be done with their phonics books probably by the end of the month, so we’ll have to order the next ones of those as well.

I look forward to being better about updating this blog (yes, I’ve said it before…), and sharing about our homeschool adventures.

The boys continue to work hard, and excel.  I am so proud of both of them.  They are good at different things, and it’s fun to watch them learn new things each day!

Just wanted to post a few more examples of their recent work.  I really enjoy going back and looking at these, so ya’ll will just have to put up with me!

These are examples from the boys phonics books.  They LOVE doing pages like this because they can now read the questions all by themselves, and figure out the answers as well.  They love not needing my help. 

Here’s a recent example of Drew’s work.  His handwriting is REALLY improving.  I’m so proud of him because it’s something he struggles with, but he really does work hard to get it right. 

And a similar page from AJ’s book:

Drew is nearly done with book two of the "Getting Ready for the Code" series.  It’s his favorite part of school, which doesn’t surprise me because it’s very basic and simple for him.  Here’s a recent page from that book:
And finally, a few pages from AJ’s math book.  He has finally learned clocks, which he has been looking forward to ever since we started school.  Math-U-See teaches clocks with no numbers, which I think is fantastic.  It does, however, make it challenging for me when correcting his pages, because I’m REALLY at telling time on an analog clock.   AJ gets impatient with me because it takes me so long to correct his work, so often I’ll have him show me how he got his answer, and then I know it’s right.

AJ will finish his math book this week, and will be starting in the Alpha book as soon as we can afford it.

Guess that’s it for now.  The kids will keep plugging away until Christmas time.  They were both challenged by their Grandma to read a book all by themselves when she visits this Christmas, so both boys are working hard towards that goal.  Hopefully Grandma will be impressed.

I know, I know.  It’s been forever since I’ve updated here.  And I really regret it because I really do want to keep a log of how our first year goes.  So encourage me to do better, okay?

Today I thought I’d post some pictures of what the boys have been working on lately.  I’ve really been impressed with how hard they are willing to work, and with what they are able to do.  Every day they surprise me. 

First, I will post some pictures that they colored today.  Tonight, the space shuttle Endeavor is scheduled to blast off.  So we’ve been talking a lot about it, and today colored some space pictures.  You’ll be able to see here how differently the boys color.  Drew likes color and lots of it.  AJ likes perfection and detail.

Here is AJ’s space shuttle picture.  He had to look at a picture of a real space shuttle so he could get the colors right.  He made the fire coming out of the bottom blue because it’s "really really hot", and the sky is black because it’s a night launch.

And here is AJ’s astronaut.  Again, he found a photograph of an astronaut so he would know how to color the suit.  He informed me that the yellow in the sky is stars.

Here is Drew’s space shuttle picture.  You can see that he didn’t really care about the "correct" colors.  He just got creative and went to town. 

And Drew’s astronaut.  He was kind of sick of coloring at this point, so he didn’t want to do the sky.  He told me that the red face was not an accident.  He said, "That’s me mom, and I have a BAD sunburn on my face."

And now for some real schoolwork.

Both boys agree that Phonics is their favorite subject.  Probably because it’s so easy right now.  Phonics isn’t challenging them at all, and we are supplementing with other things to encourage reading. 

Here is a page from Drew’s phonics book.  The "sat" picture was actually very impressive until he drew the boy sitting.  He drew a chair first and it really looked like one of our dining room chairs.  I was very impressed. 

And a page from AJ’s phonics book.  Both boys were able to do this page with no help at all.  They were able to read all of the words and successfully answer the questions.

Drew also does a few pages each day in a supplemental phonics-ish book that he LOVES.  It’s pretty simple for him, but I think it’s good review for him, and he loves all of the different activities.  Here is a page from that book.

AJ is nearly done with his math book.  I don’t remember if I posted that I stopped math with Drew.  He was having a REALLY hard time with it and it was causing him a lot of frustration each day.  I decided to put the book away and we’ll bring it back out sometime next year (he’s convinced that he’ll have an easier time with it when he turns 5).  I’ve been reinforcing counting and simple addition with him using worksheets and dot to dots.  Drew also LOVES mazes.  Anyhow, here is a page from AJ’s math book.  This was a review page, so it shows many of the things he’s been working on.  He has learned to count by 2′s, 5′s, 10′s, 20′s, and 100′s.  Other things he has learned include:  simple addition, solving for an unknown, simple word problems, tally marks, etc. 

At the end of each day, the boys look forward to coloring in their journals.  It’s so interesting to see the differences in what they draw.  I give them complete free reign in their journals, and they are allowed to draw or color or write whatever they want.  AJ is much more abstract in his drawings.  He’ll draw things like dinosaurs or monsters.  But usually his page will just have a bunch of shapes or lines on it that he connects and colors.  Drew, on the other hand, almost always draws people or places that we go (church, home, MOPS, etc). 

Here’s a page from AJ’s journal.  This is a dinosaur.

And here is a page from Drew’s journal.  It’s a self portrait.

And that’s it for today.  Hopefully now that I’ve posted, I’ll continue to post at least once a week.  The next couple of weeks will be filled with books, worksheets, and activities about Thanksgiving, so hopefully I can get some good pictures of what they work on.