Jul. 6, 2007 - Pilgrims and Indians

I have decided to take a different approach to hoemschooling for the rest of the month.  I will set aside the boring workbooks, that they hate anyway, and try more hands on stuff.  Today Sam wrote 4 sentences about a dog and his friends.  He was really unsure about the spelling but I promised him I wouldn't get upset if there were misspelled words.  As he ran off to write it, it made me wonder if I am part of his problem of not wanting to write anything.  So I held my promise and read his story and told him how proud I was of him.  Then Austin and Sam worked on a blank multiplication chart up to 12.  They filled in all the ones they knew by heart and did a few that they had to add up.  I had Austin tape it to the fridge so they would see it and feel compelled to finish it.  We'll see if that works!

Katie ran around singing and playing with puzzles and I rocked the baby all the while.  After all that I read to them from The Children's Book Of America edited by William J Bennett.

We read all about the Pilgrims and why they came to America.  Then I tried reading some of the Indian names and I just knew I was butchering the pronunciation.  So off on a google search we went and found an audio clip for each word.  The kids thught it was cool to hear it on the computer.  We had a good discussion on the seasons, planting, Thanksgiving, blessings and so much more.  I think they actually learned something!

The boys are playing with lincoln logs now, so I need to go take a picture.