Has anyone used these books? I was considering getting these for my son to have some drawing. I know he likes to draw but being the literal child that he is, as I talked about in a previous post he struggles. So I wanted to get some book or curriculum for drawing. I think if we did some he'd get the hang of it and really take off. I've looked around but just don't know what to pick up.....lol.

I know its not as realistic as I'd like to try for him but it would be a start. I'd really love to get stuff for teaching like perspective drawing and such, where you draw a cityscape on a corner type thing. I really don't know what its called. I just know we always had a blast in school with that kind of stuff. Basically I just need some drawing stuff. I"m sure there's stuff online but its harder for us to get things down or printed. So a book is a bit easier. So if anyone has used the Draw Write Now books or anything else for that matter please share your opinions with me. Not sure what book to use for my 11 year old either.

Today was the first day of classes with our homeschooling group. It was great. They are still working things out but everything will fall into place.

Caleb only has 2 classes that's the music & art class. Of course in Art they did self portraits next to questions about yourself. Mine answered the questions but *didn't want to draw* so his wasn't on the wall like the others. I really hope he actually does things in the class, he likes art so much. I'm not going to pay and waste gas if he's not going to really try.

He's always struggled in participating, generally he can be alright but if its something he really doesn't know how to do he sometimes/a lot of times doesn't try.

Now I normally don't have things written out for the week. I'm horrible at it. I just grab the books and have DS do the pages.....lol. So very not scheduled at all.

But Sat I got everything entered in Homeschool Tracker for the first week. The work we so that was out of the way and graded.

Then last night I started to enter this week's into HST but didn't want to sit at the computer. So I grabbed all the books I needed, a notebook and calculator and headed to the sofa. There I figured out the week's assignments and the total points needed. So this AM I sat here and entered it in for the week. WOOHOO. I really hope to keep doing things like that to get the week out of the way. Things could change along the way to where something isn't done but I can just move things around.

Next Monday we start 2 homeschooling classes. DS will be taking Music and Art with out local HSing group. Course we have 3 hours between the 2 classes to kill so we'll be taking stuff to do and just do it in my dad's van since we have to borrow that until I have a running vehicle of my own.

Overall I'm just glad to have things planned out for the week. Its so freeing to have that part done! i'm hoping we can add things to it soon, like History. I should have the lesson plans I ordered off ebay soon. Then the next task is to find out what's going on with my Abeka account, I attempted to order what I needed from there twice and its not showing any orders at all. I've emailed them and hope to hear something. Because if I did order twice I need to cancel one of them since I don't need the same books twice.....lol. I just hope its soon because we both want to get started with it!

As I'm sitting here this morning at the computer checking emails and such, suddenly ds comes in and sits down at the desk. I turned around and asked,

"What are you doing?"

"Getting ready to do schoolwork."

"Its Saturday."

"Oh I forgot."

"I can give you work if you want thought."

"Sure, we can do math and spelling."

There you have it my newly turned 11 year old ds wanted to do schoolwork on a Sat. We did math and spelling and a couple pages in a grammar and writing skills workbook I have. Observed the seeds we have in a petri dish in the window sill. And he's now doing his chores b4 heading outside to play for the day. I think since his father was at work today he just didn't realize what day it was and was all for doing work. So its been an interesting morning and now we are done with school.

          We survived our first week of school. And I have to say things went pretty smoothly. Although I've come to realize that 2 programs that have seemed to work for us in the past no longer seem to be working. So at this time I'm looking for something else. I know it happens, I just hope to find the right thing that will work. Even if I have to suppliment with a small workbook here or there on certain things. That's fine.

        The really best part is we finished up our first chapter in Abeka Science. And it went well!! Finally we have a program that ds enjoys and is learning from!! We did the first quiz orally because I got the work book second hand and the first 2 quizzes have been written on, so I figured those we could just do orally. And in the past we've struggled. Well ds got everything right PLUS the bonus points!!! I was so impressed with him!!! Very little hesitation at all on the questions. And normally if he doesn't know the answer or isn't sure you know, because he just has a look on his face and sighs a lot, or seems to be *searching* for the answer. So I'm thankful for coming across this one and it being great for us. I hope the History will be as wonderful for us!

          This week we learned the following.

Reading ~ he learned the most on todays story and was telling me all about Kill deer birds, we have them around the farm here and they drive ya batty with their quick walking and squaking at you. We learned they don't have their eggs in a nest, they are just on the ground slightly covered by a few pebbles and the eggs themselves look like pebbles. So the reason they walk around fast and squak at you is to make sure you don't find their eggs. Also shortly after they are hatched instead of like most baby birds sitting in the nests for however long, the kill deer are up and running around on the ground..

Math ~ he did well on his timed tests, he's getting much better at getting the answers instead of taking forever to *count* so Saxon Math has been wonderful for us, a great change. A lot is review for ds at this time, but as well as MUS seemed it just didn't work for us, my ds just wasn't getting the math facts down like I thought he would. So this change is so far working well! We do 2 lessons a day since its more review. When we get to things he needs to work more on it will just be one lesson per day.

Science ~ we learned that 7 states in the US have Cardinal as their state bird. Two states have chickens as their state bird. Oklahoma's state bird is a scissor-tailed flycatcher, and its tail looks just like the blades of scissors when opened.  He knows our state bird and flower ~ even though both he has to think about. He kept saying at first that Eagle was our state bird . The Canadian floral emblems. Learned that one Canadian emblem is called a Pitcher Plant  and its a carniverous plant,  their are hairs on the spout and the insects slide down getting trapped in there. Inside is filled with rainwater. So the plant just feeds on the insecets.

His words to write down their meaning of were.

Science

Scientist

observation

field guides

range map

range

migrates

Anyway that's what we covered the most. Still waiting on some stuff for history. Then of course anything I find for language arts that will work better!

Has anyone used this program? I was looking it over and it seemed like something my ds would do better at. We are struggling like I mentioned in THIS blog entry and starting looking into other things. And I think its something that would work better. We already have a Spelling program that works for us and its an area ds needs more work in so I already have that to work with. The reviews i've read have mostly not been good. But from seeing sample pages it does seem better then what we are using, which I don't think is working. The same things have been getting wrong so we aren't getting anywhere. I don't want him to struggle so much in this area.

If anyone's used it I'd be really greatful to hear your opinions.

Not with my son, but with the fact that we can't seem to get him to grasp certain concepts in his reading program. We are doing Grade 3 in Pathway Readers becuase I want him to have a good foundation in reading. So we are taking it slower with that then other things. But he just doesn't understand many things and I'm clueless as to how to explain then further. So I'm wondering if there's something else we should be doing. Maybe a different program.

Anyway the main issues we are having are syllables, consonant diagraphs, adding double letters to endings like ing or ed. Long and short vowel sounds where you have to put the symbol above the letter. Also looking up what page and paragraph certain things are on. That one I just don't know how to explain any better then me showing him, which I have. That part is getting better, but he might be rushing or something.

So anyone have any suggestions on things to do or different programs for learning through sounds or whatever its called.

Well we are finishing up the 4th day today. We just have science left and who knows how long it will take us since we have to go outside and look for some things, plus I have a project for us to do. So we'll be building something as well.

Finally thought my ds is liking science, as in the book reading part, b4 he was just all about experiments/projects. But he's finally able to comprehend what's being read and yesterday he was all talk. We were talking about birds, state flowers & state birds. He just was enjoying it!! So i'm thankful.

He even said he was looking forward to History but I'm waiting on something I bought on ebay 2 weeks ago to get here for it. Plus I need either the teachers edition or another student text to make it easier for us to get things read togehter. And am having trouble finding the 3rd edition of Abeka History Gr 4 without it being almost the same price as a new one! Or they are the old ones which I don't want. So I am hoping I can find one soon.

We just finished up our first day of school. It went pretty smoothly. I really need to get up when DH leaves for work though, the new job he just started he starts at 8. I'm so used to him being up and gone by 5:30 for years it was that way. Then recently its been up and gone by 6. But now he doesn't have to leave until around 7:30 or so. And me staying in bed is fine but then I fall back asleep and then its 9 b4 I get out of bed. I was doing well with being up by 8.

So I need to motivate myself to get up around the time DH heads off to work, so we can get breakfast going and get started.

Today we did

Math ~ 2 lessons since its mostly review for DS

Science ~ lesson 1 in Understanding God's World. Went pretty well I hope it keeps it up. My DS is like I LOVE science but what he loves is experiments not any reading part of it. I'm hoping Abeka will help with this. I have 2 science programs the Abeka one and A Reason for Science which is pretty much all experiments. I'm hoping I can put the 2 togehter a lot and make it more fun for DS. We've struggled with science in the past because we'll read the stuff but then DS won't be able to answer anything because he must not of focused enough. He seemed to do better this time, so I'm praying this will work. Or maybe he's matured more that its easier.

Reading ~ the second half of the first story in Pathway Readers.

English ~ 2 pages of review

Spelling ~ just a survey test to check to see where he is at this time compared to last year.

And that was it, I was going to do History as well but I'm waiting on something to get here in the mail for it.

our new year. I had been wanting to be started by now. I figured if we'd gotten started more in August it would go smoothly like it had our first year. But things keep coming up.

Plus since my dh gets paid on Monday's from the landscaping jobs, Tuesdays' I generally have to run into town to deposit the check and pick up anything that's needed.

And that will still be the same since the new full time job my dh will be starting this Saturday gets paid every other Monday. Its tough to change things when for years he always got paid on Fridays....lol.

Then add to the fact that for the first time we will hopefully be able to participate in some homeschooling classes with our homeschooling group. Which will be ever Monday. So my weeks will get busy when that starts. With classes Monday, every other tuesday making deposits then Wed evenings for Awana. Unless I put off the deposits for Wed that is. I'm sure I'll figure it out.

Making all those trips just isn't us. We normally make one trip a week to town then that's it. So multiple trips is just hard to fathom. But we'll make it work.

I'm waiting on a couple items I got off ebay then I should be able to get started in schooling again. It will be nice to get into a groove again.

My ds is looking forward to classes, it gets him around other kids more often then he is. Generally its Awana that he's around kids. I just hope he can connect with some others. Its been rough on him. Even when he was in public school it was rough on him. So I just hope Awana goes smooth along with the homeschool classes. Sometimes kids can be mean and there's never really a reason for it. And sometimes maybe the kids don't realize it. But all in all my ds has dealt with his share of one week having friends to talk to and the next them ignoring him.

I hope it gets better for him because I have been there done that and really don't want my kid to have to deal with that as well. He can pretty much play and talk to anyone so there's no worry there. But he does deal with some mild anxiety's so sometimes its tougher then others.

I managed to buy my ds some pairs of pants today and its really not fun to have a 5 foot 72 lbs kid who will be 11 next week. I had to buy him 14's just to get the length but the waist is huge, thankfully for tie waists and adjustable ones. He doesn't wear jeans much because they don't feel right, since he's skinny they tend to hurt so he's more athletic pants and such.

It will be nice when he puts on weight instead of height.....lol