Early summer, 1972.My sister, who is 5 years my senior, had just bought a brand new album and playing it our shared bedroom, seemed non-stop. I was much more interested in the album cover than I was the music.
This was an album cover that was an actual shot of a school desk, that even unfolded like a real desk, with another shot of the inside of a school desk. It was quite likely one of the coolest ideas I'd ever seen at that ripe old age of 8.5.
Yep, I was 8 years old and suddenly became an Alice Cooper fan, without even realizing it. Granted, I was more of a fan of the album cover artwork than anything, but the band's song "School's Out" quickly shot up the charts and became "one of those songs" that you just don't forget. (No matter how much you try!)
Fast forward 32 years later, and the song still pops up in my memory this time of year - and can still be heard on any classic rock station in North America. I wont bother pasting in the lyrics to this song. Besides, now that I've mentioned it, many of you have the song going through your heads anyway (deny it all you want, you know it's there!). :o)
Isn't it weird how music has such an influence on people?
At any rate, this is the time of year I do all our big-time, in-depth evaluations. One kid at a time, I go over every book they're in, and figure out our fall plans:
1. Where they will be in this book by the end of this school year (which ends in 4 weeks).
2. Approximately what time (in the fall) they'll need a new book in this subject.
Sounds relatively easy, right?
WRONG!
This is where the real work for homeschooling moms comes in. It may not be this way with every HS mom, but it sure is with me.
Five kids, from 3 to 16, in working in roughly 8-10 different grade levels, depending on the subject.
For example, Samuel our 5 year old son's grade levels for the fall:
Bible 3, Math 2, Phonics 2, Spelling 2, Science 3, History 3, Handwriting 2
Jordan and Rachel will be in mostly 3rd grade level in all subjects. Then Jessica does a combination of 3 grade levels. Ruth is easy, she's doing pre-kindergarten stuff and I have all I need for her.
So, it gets complicated. Each subject has it's own workbook, and unlike some HS'ers, the kids really like having their own workbooks for each subject.
Let me just say I am MOST grateful for CBD, where we can get all the workbooks we need from Christian Liberty Press for a low price, excellent shipping rates, and FAST delivery. I might add in that, the dollar store where we can get paper, pencils, folders, binders, scissors, crayons, glue, chalk and literally just about everything else we need, for a fraction of the cost we'd pay anywhere else for all that stuff.
Thankfully, my kids don't know the Alice Cooper song (except maybe for Jessica - she's a fan of the retro-rock stuff and often surprises me with what songs she knows!), and school being over for the year for them means something a little different than it does for public schooled kids.
When school is over here, it just means "formal" lessons are done for the summer. Summer is the time for the big projects, hands-on learning stuff. Yard work, clearing the spot for the pool, tackling the cleaning of the garage, getting out the badminton net, pitching the tents in the yard & camp outs (complete with stories of packs of wild coyotes!).
"School" may be out in 4 weeks, but the learning never stops.
