Aug. 17, 2009 - First Day of Homeschool
Preceded by a night of the three year old puking.
Not always considered two great things and certainly not two great things that go great together.
All in all, a successful day though. Puking was done by 4am. School started at a respectable 10am-ish and morning chores were mostly done cheerfully and well.
For the next little bit, at least until AWANA starts, we are beginning our school day with copywork/dictation from the Character Qualities chart featured on the Duggars' website:
http://www.duggarfamily.com/characterqualities.html
Today's trait was "Truthfulness" and we discussed how twisting and shading the truth can be "putting on falsehood." We also touched on the fact that one can report solely the truth yet still give an overall false report/impression. Good discussion and nice to begin the day together. After copying/writing from dictation the trait, the definition and the associated Bible verse, each kid decorated their paper with colored pencil flourishes.
We then jumped in to our new history curriculum The Mystery of History. All three boys can do this together and it also allows each kid to practice some outloud reading. We will center on Renaissance and Reformation this year. We looked at the Tower of London on google video and created a neat little flip chart to keep all the English rulers straight. The princess finger painted while we discussed the first unit in MOH. Bigger kids also watched another of the Teaching Company's 30 minute DVDs from the World History course.
The big boys practiced their music (trumpet and sax, respectively) while the eight year old tackled Rosetta Stone Latin and I ran out to the store for some supplies.
We reconvened after lunch for me to do some pattern blocks with the eight year old to reinforce the concept of "area" as we finish up his Singapore Math left over from the spring. He should move into book 4A within a week or two. The 12 year old jumped into Harold R. Jacob's Algebra and the 14 year old is learning to use his new TI-89 Titanium calculator. He'll start Thinkwell's PreCalc in the next week or so. After math, bigger boys tackled their Rosetta Stone Latin while I took a short nap and the princess watched Dora and the 8 year old played outside.
In between subjects throughout the day, there were periods of play and all the boys headed out, beating the rain, in the late afternoon. Both of the bigger boys are reading GA Henty's A Knight of the White Cross , which corresponds to what we're learning in history, and the younger boy read some of Cobblestone Publishing's wonderful Appleseeds magazine.
The 8 year old will take a Fun with Physics class at our co-op beginning in early September and might do some hands on science as part of an every other week boys' club I am forming for his age. I am still mulling science options for the two bigger kids and don't have a good solution to that yet. Lots of ideas, few concrete conclusions. The biggest kid right now is signed up for Science Olympiad at our co-op. But we need some time to build into and adjust what we already do have planned, so I am not too stressed about that elusive science component (yet). I am looking forward to the karate, art, woodworking and band that will begin with the co-op. The middle kid will play soccer this fall in a local league as well. Math Club and AWANA both gear up in mid to end of September.
I figure today will be the most organized, most planned, most generous in patience and of spirit that I am likely to be, so if long silence follows before a next update, you will know that replicating Day One has proven elusive. But if you've homeschooled more than five minutes, you probably already knew that.
Blessings, Holly
Comments
Aug. 18, 2009 - first day
Posted by Anonymous
Hey there,
I saw your link on the yahoo group. I tried to post this comment before so sorry if it's a repeat!
Anyway, it was fun to read about your first day of school! We are starting in a week and will be doing school at home for the first time. I will bookmark your page to get some tips!
Emily
http://everydaymomlife.blogspot.com
