Ok, Biggun is almost done w/ his Headsprout.com Reading program. Now I need to figure out what to do next with Biggun. He is doing better then ever in his reading. He still needs lost of practice and I want to follow up w/ comprehending and spelling maybe? I don't know we have worked so hard to get to this point. I am a little scared to mess up on the next step.
Biggun came home from Awana's tonight and said "Dad can you turn the TV off?" This was a little strange. Let me go back and explain we don't pick him up from Awana's he rides w/ someone else. OK so he walked in and asked "Dad can you turn the TV off?" So my husband turned the TV off and Biggun continued, to share every detail of a game of Dodge Ball.
He was so excited that he won!!!!! He had to tell us all the details. He was so cute standing in the living room using his whole body to tell us how it went down. The Final 5 then 3 then just him. Some girl even yelled "GET ___" (insert his real name)
He was so proud of himself. He was on cloud nine.
I can remember doing the same thing to my parents. What memories that brought back.!!!
We just had our Blue and Gold Banquet w/ Cub Scouts. Our theme this year was Chinese New Year.
Biggun earned his Bear badge in Cub Scout and his Wittling Chip. So now he can carry a knife according to scouts, but according to Mom and Dad, we have to be there w/ him when he has it out. But he has officially been trained. We will work on getting the new boys their World Conservation Badge next. Biggun already has it but that is OK. We have to wait till the end of 3rd grade before he can start his Webelo training.
Biggun is doing great w/ his reading. He is really doing great w/ www.headsprout.com. He gets such a kick out of what the characters do. Biggun is reading the extra books so well, too. He is almost ready to try other books that are not on the program. I am hoping that his confidence will improve soon.
His math is moving right along too, he seems to catch on to thing so easily, which make me happy.
I really would like to get Heart of Dakota for him to start using but we just don't have it in our budget. I am hoping that after the Used Book Sale we will be having in May that I will earn enough money to cover the cost of HoD. I need help implementing other subjects other then math and reading. I think that HoD is the perfect answer.
I have never had this happen to us. Not even when we were using www.time4learing.com, my son said that was fun and he enjoyed it but he only would do it during school time. Well we started Headsprout about a week or so ago. Biggun has really been enjoying this program. He laughs and giggles all the way into it.
He has been enjoying a art class w/ Berry Stebbing this week. (more details in another post) Well this class is from 9 till about noon. Biggun has been riding w/ Ms. D and her kids then going back to their house in the afternoon to play. With that said there has not been much school done. Ms. D has requested I send a Math worksheet for Biggun to do while her kids do their Math. But that is it.
Both Monday and Tuesday Biggun has sat down after dinner and done 2 episodes of Headsprout. All I did was mention that he 'could' do his reading. He replies w/ ok. We set up the computer and off he goes. Both nights he has volunteered to move on to a 2nd episode.
Ok, I have been putting off writing this because I know family/friends who read my blog and I don't want them to get the wrong idea. I will make this statement to family and friends who do not homeschool that this vent in no way is changeing our way of thinking and our belief that God has lead us to keep our children home. All this is, is a vent to possibly get other homeschoolers to give me ideas on how to improve.
See my dear friend who is in school to be a teacher asked if Biggun could help her with her homework. Of course we said yes. She did a Running Record test on him. For those of you who know anything about guided reading this is how you can tell what level your child is reading at. My dear friend has to do a certain number of these w/ different age groups. I was just in the other room and could hear everything when this test was going on. As far as Biggun was concerned it was just reading out load for Ms. C.
When all was done my 3rd grade son is only at a 1st grade instructional level. Boy that just hit me like a lead balloon. I knew he was behind but I did not think that far. I was figuring 2nd grade instructional. So we have spent the last few days reviewing what we are doing. What is working, what is not and well what needs to change.
Hubby was not happy at first either, I totally understand this as he does not do any of the homeschooling. I do 100% of it. Well that is now changing. Biggun will be reading to him nightly. Even if it is something he has already read to me during the day or something he has read before.
We are going to finish up a Viking section on www.time4learning.com and then step away from it for a few months. We are going to use a program that another dear friend Mamma Mary recommended and come to find out the school systems use. It is to help w/ the no child left behind. (That is just a plus) This program is called www.headsprout.com and I was blessed to be given a 50% off code to get it half off. Which means once I cancel t4ling for the next 6 months the price will be about $4. less a month then what we were doing w/ t4ling.
We are going to switch to Horizon Math, I had started out w/ this then stopped because of t4ling, but since we will not have t4ling. We will move on to it. We are in the level 3 but for those of you who do or don't know this but Horizon Math runs a year a head. So he is doing 4 grade type math. Which he is doing just fine w/.
I am up for any ideas on how to help my son in improving and moving along faster in his reading. Yes we already read to him a lot and we listen to books on CD in the car all the time. So any other ideas would be great. Free ideas are the best.
I am glad I waited to write this as if I had written this on Sunday evening. It would have been very negative. I have been in prayer and have recieved a lot of wonderful direction from my local homeshoolers. Thanks my-ppea group!
I also ask that if you think of it please keep this in prayer, as you know as a (homeschool) mom; all you want is your child to be the brightest-smartest kid he/she can be.
Usually when my son needs to read something I will read it to him first then he will read it back to me. Today I wanted to see how much he comprehended when he read it himself.
So he had to read it first then I asked him questions.
While he was reading, struggling to read to me, he would through a fit and started to hold his head and say "My head hurts"
This is a first for him. I don't know what to think of this. He got so frustrated. He went on to say that he does not have to read like this w/ his time4learning.com but I know he does. Yes they help him read but I know he reads too.
What do I do about this.......
Oh and can I say I am so over the whining!!!! It is going to drive me nuts.
"Do I haaaavvvveee to?"
"Aaaahhhh Mommmmmm that's not faaaaiiiirrr"
I keep asking myself "WILL HE EVER CATCH UP?" My son is behind on his reading and I am just at my witts end. Just when I think he is moving right along, the world passes him by. All his friends are so far ahead of him, he gets embarrassed.
I just restarted teaching Sunday School again, I went back to the 3rd grade class where I was when I quit, (got preg.) Biggun is in my class and when it came time to read something I got up and excused myself to the restroom. I really did not go I stood outside the door to see if Biggun would read when it was his turn to read. He read the first word THE then said, "OH, I CAN'T READ THIS" Then the other teacher jumped in. After class I asked if this is how the whole year has been she responded w/ "Pretty much, but he retains the information very well, he just does not read it."
I had mixed feelings myself about that. Yeah that he retains the info but, Fewy that he is still not really even trying to read infront of others.
Today when we did our read alouds he did fine in my opinion. But I know the K and 2nd grader, who are in public school, that live across the street can read what we read faster and more fluent.
Biggun has improved on his mixing letters up, but still is getting b and d confused. We did word searches over the holidays and those seemed to help him w/ his direction of real words. That a real word has an order that is to be sounded out and/or read.
I can hear(read) your comments now. "DON"T COMPAIR YOUR CHILD" I know, I know, I know. I tell other homeschool mom's that too. But it is so hard. When he is not even close to the level of reading he should be.
This afternoon when we did www.time4learning.com he had to write a story about the picture he created. His picture was of a boy throughing pictures in to a fireplace.
Here is what he wrote:
Roy is throing sum pigsh in the firs he did not lik thim. But thay wru his Moms pigts
It took him an hour to write this and I ended up stopping him because he needed to move on. He was supposed to write 3 sentences. This would not be to bad if my son was in k or 1st grade but he is supposed to be in 3rd. Second semester of 3rd grade.
I know my family who is not to keen on our homeschooling will read this post and feel like telling me "I told you so" or "put that boy in school" but I know I am the best for him. I am just feeling sad, overwelmed, unsure of what to do next right now. God is the one who told us to go this route. I am going to pray about this ALOT!!! If any of you who read my blog pray I would love for you to pray that reading will start to click w/ Biggun and he will build his confidence. That I will be able to know what to do to help this process along.
I have not played this game in forever. My son got it for Christmas. WOW what fun we are having. I am amazed at the muliplication and additon that is used in it. I think Biggun is amazed that to see multplication used in an everyday life activity. I know sneaky on my part.
We also got Boggle but have not played it yet. I hope he likes it as much as yahtzee.
Tonight was dress up in what you want to be when you grow up. Biggun said he wanted to dress up just like Dad, and be a Truck Driver! That just made Daddies night. Biggun wore his work shirt and hat.
I am finally getting around to blogging about the history fair. Biggun made a Middle Ages Castle. He labled 20 different places on the castle then had the number match the definition. He, with Mom's help, worked really hard on it. This was a participation fair only. No one won in any age group.
We were all winners.
Last Tuesday Biggun chose to be disobident, disrespectful of others property, smart mouth and to top it off in his anger he rough up Mom while holding Baby Bear, almost knocking us down. All this w/ in 5 minutes. He lost his temper and it went down from there.
Since then he has been grounded from friends and electronics. Another words no playing w/ friends, this is not good for him because not only are the public school friends out of school Friday but he was also given the oppertunity to go to MOSI on Sunday afternoon w/ a friend. O'well! This also means that No TV., no PS2, No game boy, No tomigatchi. Nothing that is electronic at all.
Well not everything electronic.
He still has to do his school work on time4learning.com.
Well his mouth has not gotten anybetter. Infact because he has "nothing to do" as he tells me. He is bugging me to death. He listening to every word I say even when it is w/ other people. Thus he is making comments that he should not be making. Sometimes just the words "I agree" when I am not even talking to him.
It is enough to drive me crazy.
I am "trying" to do my job and TRAIN him in the way he should go (Proverbs 22:6) by stopping what I am doing and correcting his behavior but wow at the amount of time and energy it is taking. I know he is worth it. I think I have prayed more in the last 48 hours for my son, then I have his whole 8 years. Granted most of those prayers are for me on how to handle him.
He is officially grounded until Tuesday. This could change and be longer, if he continues to be mouthy and disrespectful.
Please keep us all in prayer.
My hubby is home from work tomorrow, Friday, he is going to stay home w/ him and help him w/ what ever job Daddy is doing.
Biggun entered into the First Ever PPEA Homeschool Histroyr Fair. It is Nov 3rd. Biggun wants to do a Middle Ages Castle. Pa, my dad, came over Saturday and helped us get started. Thanks Pa!
I am not sure it has totally clicked. But this morning when we were doing school we started our day off doing a diagram of an oyster for our Swiss Family Robinson Lapbook, then I picked 2 books for my son to try to read to me. I have not done this in about a month or so. He started to read them w/ no problem. He looked at me and said "MOM I CAN READ" He was so proud of himself. Next thing he said was " Time4Learning IS REALLY WORKING! " I was so shocked that he put the two together.
See about 2 weeks ago I lowered his level in Language Arts and he has been flying high ever since. That is what I love about this program. You can play around w/ the levelsas you see fit. Biggun will stay on longer then his 30 minutes because he is laughing and having so much fun on this level.
Biggun is also taking his "brain vitamins" daily (M-F) Along w/ no dairy. I think we are on the right track!
When we came home from work today Biggun asked if he could read his Daddy a book. I told him of course. But he refused to try it w/o me there. I had to sit w/ him while he read. So now we need to work on reading out loud to other people.
I did notice when he was reading today and tonight that some words he would start to sound out from the end to the begining. Example step he would start w/ pets. He is also still writing letters and numbers backwards. Where others can read faster he is having to slow and make his mind read it correct.
I don't usually post in the am. Due to we are doing school or running errands. Well this am I need to vent. I am standing my ground! Yep that is what I am doing. I wish my knees were not so wobbly right now!
We started off our morning as usually. Get up, get dressed. If you want breakfast eat it by 9m. or wait till noon. Then at 9am I started to get dinner going in the crock pot. I called Biggun to come and put the dishes away. I told him while he does that we are going to play a game. His response was I thought we had to do school work. I replied this is part of your school work. So he started to unload the dishwasher and I asked him to spell 'cup'. At first he said this is not a game. I asked again spell cup. After about 3 long minutes of huffing under his breath he spelled 'ccc' then after being corrected he finally spelled 'cup.' Then as he is still unloading the dishwasher I asked him to spell 'ship'. I figured we could do words from our Swiss Family Robinson book. My plan was to read a chapter when we were done in the kitchen. That did not happen. Instead it went something like this....
Biggun: This is not a game.
Mom: Yes it is.
Biggun: I am not spelling ship
Mom: I am not going to have all the complaining, would you rather have to do the other school then play this game.
Biggun: This is NOT a game. (said very loudly-not acceptable)
Mom: Ok then we will do school the normal way!
It got quiet while he finished the dishwasher, and I set out to gather his school work. I put together a spellign list. That he would have to copy for his Swiss Family Robinson Lapbook. Then pulled out his Word Building Pace- marked the amount of pages I wanted done and I pulled out a Math Worksheet from his Horizon book.
Biggun: Mom I want to play games, (loud whining voice)
Mom: No you chose your path now you have to walk it.
Biggun: But MOM, I want to do fun games. - Storm out of room.
5 minutes go by, I enter his room and calmly state that he has one more chance to come out and do his school work or he will loose TV and Video Games until Friday. (He just rented a video game over the weekend that he earned for good behavior, he gets to keep till next weekend., he does not want that.) He got down off his loft bed and came to the table, gathered his work and went off to his room w/ it. I sat and rocked the baby.
5 minutes go by and he comes out, I am trying to rock baby to sleep and
Biggun: Mom, I am sorry
Mom: I accept your appology.
Biggun: Mom, can we play those fun games.
Mom: No, you chose your pathm now you must take it.
Biggun: But Mom that is not fair.
Mom: What is not fair is you talking to me that way and disobeying me.
Biggun: But Mom I said I was sorry.
Mom: I accepted your appology, but you still have to do your school work. Maybe you will think differently tomorrow when I offer to do something different.
Biggun - stormed off to his room again.
5 minutes later Biggun comes out w/ his school work. and announces.
Biggun: "I have not done any of it!" then sits down at the table in the kitchen.
I ignore this and take baby to my bed to see if I can get her to sleep there. About 5 minutes into that she is almost asleep when Biggun comes in.
Biggun: Mom you owe me an appology!
Mom: Excuse me?
Biggun: You owe me an appology.
Mom: For what?
Biggun: For yelling at me.
Mom: I did not yell at you. I spoke to you and you did not like what you heard. If you are not coming in here to ask for help on your school work you need to leave. I am not talking to you about this subject any more. If you need help that is fine. If not go do your school work.
Baby finally fell asleep.
About 10 minutes later I am in kitchen browning hamburger that will go bad if I don't. I sit down to start this post, while it cookes. Biggun comes in for a hug, He starts to cry on my shoulder. The meat needs to be stirred so we both walk over to the meat. He holds on tight while I stir the meat. Then the converstaion goes like this.
Biggun: Do you love me? (here is where the wobbly knees come in)
Mom: Of course I do., I love you ver much.
Biggun: whimper whimper whimper sniff sniff.
Mom: I love you very very much. But you still need to go finish your school work.
So this is my morning. Biggun is working on his school work. Granted this might take all day due to the bad start when it should only take an hour or two. The baby just woke up from the worlds shortest nap!
I am still standing my ground!!
I feel better to have shared. Thanks for listening!
This week my son was invited to go to a Good News Club put on by Child Evangalist Fellowship. He has really enjoyed going and playing w/ his new friends at D's house. (See D's blog for pictues of this past week at http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/earthenvessel/ ) Everyday I would pick him up and ask did you have fun? Hoping to have details of what all they did. But each day I got ... "Had a blast!" and that was it.
UNTIL....
My son's birthday is in June and we signed up for a birthday club at a local pottery painting place, the same place we did our Christmas prestents at last year. And you are given a free mug to paint but you have to go in sometime during your birthday month. Well the month almost got away from us, but we went tonight. While Biggun was painting his mug he started singing a song. I had never heard. Something about "Tony Chester Heard God Loved You." I looked at him like he was crazy until it dawned on me this was from the Good News Club. I asked him if he learned that today. He said yes. put down his paint brush and said it has movements too. Right there in the pottery shop my son was doing this little song.
Toe - Point to toes
Knee -Point to knees
Chest - point to chest
Heard -point to ears
God - point up to God
Loves - cross arms over chest
You - Point at someone
Get it ToKnee ChestHeard God Loves You. (Tony Chester Heard God Loves You)
It was priceless. He did this for about 3 solid minutes in the pottery shop. This place was packed w/ 10 other people. All painting away and listening to my son sing his song.
So he did learn something this week and it did sink into his head.
I should have known not to worry about Biggun this week. He has had a blast and had done really good at drinking plenty of water. The bladder back packs have been a wonderful addition to camp. It also helped that our Cub Master is the person in charge of the crafts. So on Monday and Tuesday she called me and gave me an update. She has also taken the time to go find them during lunch to help them refill their back packs.
Lets see Monday Biggun came home and shared that they are all Spy's for the week. His den's name is "Undercover Bears" They got to meet a real "FBI" undercover agent. Biggun also caught a FISH!
Tuesday he learned about the Florida Flag, But the one thing that he was so proud over, that he went on and on about in the car on the ride home was he is a "SWIMMER". See they have Non-Swimmers, Beginners, and Swimmers. In one summers time of swimming in a friends pool about once every other weekend. He has taught himself to swim. He had to go two laps in the pool then one lap backwards and finally float for 1 minute. I am so proud.
Wednesday he said he met a man who knows a ton of different languages. And that you need to know how to speak different languages if you are going to be a spy. He a double bulls eye on his bebe shooting.
Today he said he met a man who does finger printing for the FBI. They all got fingerprinted. He learned how to do a 'deadman's float' and his den got to do the flag retirement.
I was able to go early to get some pictures today of the flag retirement of the day. Tomorrow is a long day for Biggun. He goes for camp then stays for a pizza dinner and at 6pm we go to the closing ceramonies. I will try to take pics of that tomorrow to post. But for today here are a few.
Biggun is right in the center w/ a back pack on and green shorts.
Biggun is the second boy. They are walking back from taking the flag down.
Our friend JS and Biggun standing around waiting for the other den's to arrive. You can tell they had hats on. They had to take them off to do the flag ceramony. They both are constantly drinking out of their back packs. The den leader finally decided that the two of them need to stay as buddies. Instead of seperating them, because they are constantly having to go pee. I told both boys that if the leader had an issue w/ them going pee a lot she could talk to me or JS's Mom. Pee means not dehydrating!!!! :o)
So I should have known that he would have a great time and would not get dehydrated! God is so good!
I am sooo stressed out. My nerves are shot. It is really hard to concentrate. I know I am over reacting but .......................................................................................................................
I am a homeschool Mom and I am w/ my son, Biggun, all the time. So Biggun is at Cub Scout Day Camp. I know it is DAY camp. He will be home tonight.
BUT we live in Florida It is 83 degrees right now and the humidity is 75% and the HEAT index is 90 degrees.
I am so worried he will dehydrate at camp. The water that they offer the kids taste just horrid. Last year I went and was the Den Leader. So I made sure all the boys in the two Dens that were together drank either lemone aid or cool aid. We just flavored the horrid water and it was not so bad.
We found out that his Den leader did not get assigned until LAST NIGHT. Needless to say he was not prepared at all. The best thing to do is bring a wagon to carry everyones items around. Instead of making the boys carry them. (They don't want to do that.)
We did get Biggun a Bladder Back Pack. It is a water bottle back pack that you can drink from a tube over your shoulder. We sent him w/ flavor packets to mix in his water.
So as I sit here at work w/ Baby Bear in the back ground. I worry about my Biggun. This is a first for both of us!!!! The longest he has been away w/ strangers has been to VBS at a local church from 9-12am. Not from 8:30am -4:30pm.
We did make it to the beach for Bigguns birthday. We did not make to Vince Beach where the sharks teeth are usually found. But Biggun really enjoyed going to the local beach. He was in the water w/ his snorkle stuff on almost the whole time we were there. My hubby kept calling Biggun Scuba Steve.
He found lots of shells and had a blast in the water. This was also Baby Bears first time to go to the beach.
Here are my family at the beach. Take note of Scuba Steve.
Biggun got a few gifts for his birthday. But the one Mom liked best was from Gamma. (EDUCATIONAL) Just found our new art program for next year!!!
Last but not least. Here is Biggun and Baby Bear laying on the bed. Baby Bear is loving the colors and sounds from the game boy that Bigguns God Parents got him for his birthday.
Biggun turns 8 on Sunday and this year we don't do a party every year. Instead we ask Biggun what he wants to do. One year he asked to go to the Jerrasic Park (sorry about spelling) ride at Universal. We were able to do that so we did. Last year he wanted a "party' at the beach. We did that and ended up w/ a sand storm and had to end the beach party early. Did I mention I hate sand. Yuck What we do for our kids.
This year Biggun wants to go snorkling. (Sand again) He has asked for a mask,snorkle breathing thing, and fins. We go them last week and we are planning to go on Saturday to the beach close by that is known to have sharks teeth. So that we can look for sharks teeth.
But then my father "Pa" calls and says he really could use my help this weekend to drive 3 hours to see my grandmother. She fell this past week and he wants to check on her. So now I am going to miss the snokling. But Daddy will take him. (of course this means no pictures!!!)
Then on Sunday after church we will have a cake. Or a cookie cake as my son has requested and presents.
This is a Homeschool Mom's dream come true!!!! 
Needless to say he was not prepared at all. The best thing to do is bring a wagon to carry everyones items around. Instead of making the boys carry them. (They don't want to do that.) 
