Well, I know I've been away for a while. No good excuse, just been quiet. Well, I say quiet but I should say quiet on here. My home has been filled with lots of laughter.

Things have been going really well. We've been going pretty easy on the homeschooling front. We've been letting things go pretty much how ever they go and you know what? It's working well for us! I've still been kind scared and worried but... our days are much more pleasant and learning still happens. I never really wanted to "do school" at home but because of fears that's usually what we do. This week we have found kind of a pleasant medium. It's been nice.

Well, my morning will be coming extra early so I best get to bed. I'll try to come back and post more this weekend about what we've been doing. Have a great night!

A MESS

Well, DS was working on his math this morning and couldn't find this and that so that he could get it finished and so I HAD HAD MY FILL WITH HIS MESS!!!

So, I went up stairs to where we've been keeping his homeschooling things and we got busy and organized and cleaned! It looks great and it all has a place now. Hopefully, he will keep it neat and better organized now.

Now, we didn't get much "school" work done but we did have a lesson on organization and tidiness. It was past time for it.

I feel like we really need to get this under control before DD comes home with us next year. I'm not the most neat person either though so I need to get myself under control and get a better routine.

Lead by example, right?!

Not the best day...

No, it really wasn't the best day and yet we got a lot done. DS is just very careless in his work. He knows how to do it he just doesn't put his all in his work.

In his math he does silly mistakes or sometimes just does half the problem! It is driving me crazy. I've shortened his lessons thinking that maybe they were just too much and he was losing interest or something but that didn't help. I've been making him redo his work when he gets a lot wrong to be sure that his mistakes are really careless and that he does understand and almost always that is the case. I keep hoping that knowing that if he is careless he will have to redo it, will help him get it right the first time but it doesn't. I just don't know what to do at this point.

In his other work, he is just messy! I need advice!! Anyone out there have any?? He's 11 and in the 6th grade. We are using....

Saxon Math 7/6
Learning Language Arts through Literature The Tan Book (6th grade)
History Odyssey the Ancients level two
For Science we are using something from Usborne Books - 10 Terrific Weeks of the Human Body

He plays handbells and is reading music there and he is learning the guitar. We really need to do more of music and art study but right now it's not there for us. His history does talk a little about this but just a little.

Anyway, friendly advice is welcome.

We had home economics today. We planned our menus for the week and then made a grocery list. We then went and bought our groceries. DS was so funny looking for just the right stuff and wanting to find what was cheaper (unless he wanted it and then price was no object. hehehe). It was fun. Then he helped me to put all the groceries away.

When we finished he got busy doing his school work. He did pretty good. It was slow starting but he worked hard. Then he and his sister played together outside and in the basement. When his Dad called he visited with him. After dinner we all went for a walk and it was very nice. He's doing great.

We are looking forward to have DD home with us too next year.

What a week!

The first of the week was okay. Things went well. DS was getting his work done well and we were working together and it was great. Then came Wednesday night.

DS got hurt at church. He's okay now and still has somethings that need be done but he is basically okay. He has some pain and this morning he was very ill but it passed and he seems almost his old self.

So what does this mean to our homeschooling plan? Well, Thursday was nearly shot but we did watch a cartoon version of the Odyssey. He couldn't help himself from talking about it and comparing it to the book. He told me what was wrong, different and how. He actually learned a lot at the dentist too.

I guess you could say that we definitely had real life learning. He did "work" (winking) on the computer some today with a game called "Civilization III". Which he loves and he loves to talk about it too.

Ah.... the blessings of homeschooling... not having to worry about missing a day and having a ton of make-up work. Don't get me wrong... he'll have to get that work done that he missed but "school" contiued even though he wasn't able to do the "work". He had real life learning experiences. It's so funny to hear him even on the weekend say, "Hey, we just had science!" Or "Hey, this goes along with what we've been doing in history." or "It's like when Daniel, in "The Bronze Bow" did this..." I just love it.

Tonight we were watching "The Chronicles of Narnia" again and at the spot where Jadis is leaving after speaking to Aslan, DS says, you know that's kind of like the Last Supper there. Then he said, when Susan and Lucy were walking with Aslan through the woods, this is like when Jesus was going to pray before they took him. It was neat to see him finding different spots of symbolism than he noticed the first time we saw it.

Yes, our plan didn't quite make it but I feel like we had just as good if not better learning going on during this time. On my other blog I've been trying to regularly post things I have going for me. Well, today I need to add....
6. Homeschooling!!!

Good night dear cyber friends. Have a good weekend and a very Happy Easter!

This week....

Okay, well, last week was okay. It started out pretty good but he ended up getting a little behind. He gets so caught up sometimes. I'm not sure how this is going to work for us. I gave he an assignment sheet that what I wanted done by Friday and well, he got up at 5 am to finish this morning. I told him if it wasn't all done by 9:00am today he'd lose his PS2 and the computer. I think it is done now and he even got started on today's work (a little) until he fell back to sleep.

So, this week we are doing muscles in Science, Greeks daily life and Sports and Entertainment in History, rhyming rhythms and schemes and dialect in Language Arts, and he is hopefully going to finish the Iliad this week. We will also be doing lots of Math to include a test. Should be a good week. I hope we can do better this week in following our plan. A plan might not be right for us but we are going to try.

Have a great week!

Learning this week???

There's lots to learn this week! I've got to try to get better organized. We do a lot of work and he is learning so much but we often get off track. So, this week I'm going to put it down on paper what I want accomplished this week and hopefully it will get done. I'm going to say that the minimum has to be done by Friday night or he'll be working over the weekend. We'll see how that goes. This way he can do it at his own speed and when he's feeling able.

This week we will be studying the Greeks and their literature. We will also be studying the human body some more. We have a cool experiment to do with an egg about calcium and your bones. Then we will have an investigation on Data collection and Surveys and work some on percentages and fractions. He will also finish his research assignment and write it up formally for me.

whew! We better have a really good breakfast in the morning! :o) I'll let you know how it goes.