Our "School Week"

With the New Year ringing in, we are thinking more about homeschooling. Samantha will be officially registered with the schoolboard this August as a HOMESCHOOLER! I would say we have a pretty good routine going that we are going to stick with. (Now that we are leaning not to lolly gag all the time.) Our week starts on Tuesday and ends Friday. DH works Tuesday through Saturday, but DD and I like to treat Saturday as a weekend.) 

Tuesday is the beginning of our week. We usually relax, draw, play games, watch an episode or two of the Magic School Bus, do an activity or craft, something pertaining to her current interest. One of my favorite days of the week because we can do whatever we want. It is a new adventure every day. And in the warmer months, we go outside a lot to explore! Go to the beach. Walk a train. Go down to the local playground and creek to find new habitats. The colder weather brings preparation for the holidays, lots of baking and decorating, visiting family, and spending time reading books and such.

Wednesdays we go to storytime and get new books from the library. I try to reserve books on the topics she is interested in. (Currently that is the solar system, cats, sign language, and spanish. We are still really focused on the solar system.) And then I let her pick out whatever books off the shelves that strike her interest. I also get my own reading materials. :) She learns a lot just through reading and she has learned a lot about using the computer to find books and she also knows her way around the library pretty well. We have been attending storytime for over a year now, so the librarians are familiar with her and she is comfortable with them. It is also our errand day. I play all the bills online, but I still have to grocery shop once a month or if go to the store for something else I need, I try to do that on Wednesday since we are already out. I Afterwards, we usually go over to fmy friend, Christina's house, and Sam plays with her friend, Grace. We generally don't leave until it is time for me to go home and cook dinner.

Thursdays we go to the Center. I was afraid that Samantha wasn't getting enough stimulation on those days because my mother in law keeps her on some days and I bring her with me others. It is about half and half. So I talked to my MIL and she has agreed to start doing more learning activities with her. I will either send an activity or they will play on an educational computer game. Or go outside and explore. MIL also likes to teach DD about her interests in things like crocheting. And then the Thursdays she goes with me, she learns a lot about serving and office work and being around other adults. Today she helped me count and roll change. We went over the different coins, and counted them out, used a coin sorter, rolled them, and did some simple math. We really had a fun time working and learning together. And we had lots of money to use as learning tools. She also sees me filing and using different machines like the copy machine. And as she gets older, I will teach her to use these things. When I see clients, she stays with one of the women I work with, and she is starting to get to know them better, so she talks with them and sings with them and they play games with her on the computer and whatnot. The Center is very laid back about that sort of stuff. I definitely found the right place to serve.

Fridays are another relaxed day. We sometimes have a playdate. (We prefer to set those up for Fridays rather than Tuesdays.) Other days we stay home and play on the computer, build with blocks, any of the stuff I named above that we do on Tuesdays. 

Saturday through Monday is our "weekend." Since Hubby works Saturday, if we don't have anything planned, we try to treat it like we do Tuesday-free day. Sundays we have church and we spend a majority of a day there or spending time together as a family. (It really depends on the season what we end up doing. But the summer brings loads of fishing and camping trips.) Same with Monday, minus church. 

Our learning definitely doesn't stop when our week is over. Right now Sam is doing some learning on her own. She grabbed her globe and some paper out of the closet while I was typing. It is a VTech globe and it names the oceans and continents as she stops on them. As she does that, she draws a picture of it and names it! And she just started labeling them. We have never done that before. It was completely on her own initiative. The learning never stops! Not to mention when I cook dinner and clean, she is learning measurement, science (different ingredients reacting), and life skills! Just so much to learn. I could go on all day! 

Sam Helping at the Center

Quote From John Holt

I have read many of John Holt's book, including How Children Learn and How Children Fail, and I enjoy reading about his theory's on unschooling. I agree with many of his views.

I am currently reading "Homeschooling Out Children, Unschooling Ourselves" by Alison McKee. It is a good book so far, even though I generally don't like the "autobiography-type books.

At the beginning of chapter 2 in the book, there is a quote from John Holt...There was a teacher "so obsessed with the right answer hidden in her mind, that she could not think about what (the student) was really saying and thinking, could not see that his reasoning was logical and correct." --John Holt, How Children Fail 

As many of you know, we are unschooling Samantha, and right now she has chosen to work on the solar system. We have been doing several experiments and projects, talking about the moon and the stars, the sun, and all the planets.  

This is where I am getting with all this...Wednesday, Samantha and I were in the car, and we were talking about shadows. I asked her what caused a shadow. She answered accordingly. Then she noticed there there was a big truck with a BIG shadow. And my small car had a SMALL shadow. I thought I would expand on this, so I asked Samantha, "Who do you think would make a bigger shadow? You or me?" Samantha replied without skipping a beat, "Me!" I just laughed and replied back, "Oh yah, how is that?" "Because I would be standing CLOSER to the sun." 

I never in a million years would have considered her answer correct if I didn't decide to ask her why. But she is correct. If she were standing a lot closer to the sun somehow, she would make a bigger shadow. And now I truly know that she picks up so much, not only from the world around her, but from the little experiments and activities we do. Who knows where she got that from. Did I "accidentally" teach her? Or did she figure it out on her own? We hadn't gotten to that experiment in her "kit" yet. 

Her comment really reinforced my want to unschooling. Although I started doubting it, because at one point we were not working on any current interests, I soon realized that I was the reason. I was not helping to facilitate her interests because I was wrapped up in my own little world with the house and the whole baby thing. But once I helped her find her resources...well, she hasn't stopped going since. 

Space Activities Coming Up

Samantha,

We will be working on some more space activities soon.

We will be going over:

More about planets. (Hopefully, we will get around to making a planet mobile.)

More about the phases of the moon. (The Moon Isn't Made of Cheese Afterall-Oreo Activity)

The Life cycle of a star. (Links)

And we will continue to use your telescope.

I am trying to stray away from worksheets and pointless activities, so this is going to be harder to find activities. I want you to learn something you will remember.

Here are some reminders for me:

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0By-8pEe8O7e5N2U2NjNhMGYtNTBiOS00ZmVhLTgwYzUtZWQ2ZjBmZmE2Yjc1/edit?authkey=CJD268kJ&pli=1

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0By-8pEe8O7e5ODU0NjcxMWYtZDZiOS00ZmY2LWJmODAtYTY1YjYzODRkYmQw/edit?authkey=CMzdxbML&pli=1

Open House For Brother/School Schedules For Brother

I went to my brother's open house at school the other day, and oh my, how hard it is for me to hold back from doing "school at home" with Sam, especially with this age. I just love how the environment looks, the colorful posters with letters and shapes on them. All the cute toys and manipulatives! The little reading areas and small tables for arts and crafts. And the cafeteria! Ah...Back before we decided to homeschool Samantha, I was so excited to volunteer at her school and do the fieldtrips and all. I feel like there are some things she may miss, but there are things that she would miss being in school instead of being homeschooled too, so it goes both ways. I just have to keep reminding myself that just because the classroom feel looks inviting to me, doesn't mean she will like it. She didn't go with me to his open house because I didn't want her asking to go to school. I have to take him to school in the morning though since my Mom just had a baby, and I am not finding a sitter for that, so I hope that goes well. 

Another thought I had yesterday, because he was going to go to school today, but we decided this morning to let him lay out so he could meet his new baby sister. Anyway, last night I took him and Sam out for dinner and ice cream and to the playground. We generally go out on weeknights as a family, Jessie, Sam, and I. We don't think anything about it. We never look at the time. We just do what we want to do. We follow a general schedule daily, but we don't have to watch the clock for the most part. But last night I kept having to look at the time to make sure that I got him home before it got too late. I had to rush to give bathes and put out school clothes and make sure everything was ready so that I could get him in bed and make sure to be able to wake up early in the morning, just to have to wake up in the morning and rush to dress him, feed him, and drive him to school. It's hard. I am really glad we won't be having to follow a school schedule. We are night owls. All of us. We stay up pretty late. Then in the morning I get up, get Jessie's lunch. Get him out the door. Then I have awhile to wake myself up, take a bath and read, clean up a little-piddle. Then finally, around 9, maybe later if she went to bed later than 1 o'clock, I wake her up and we slowly eat breakfast, make the bed, get dressed. We are totally going by about 10:00 generally, but on a normal day, not before that. Most everything we do during the week starts after 10:00 am, storytime, parent meetings, etc. The only thing I do that actually starts at 10 is go to the Women's Center on Thursdays, and I just cut out breakfast with her and MIL feeds her. And most of the time I am running late for that. I couldn't have a job. I would get fired. :)p

Space Studies

Well, Samantha has a new interest, and that is space. We have been adding a little space stuff to her room here and there and I have shown her some silly move clips about space and played some games about space, got her some books, and the more we do, the more excited she gets, so we decided to buy her a telescope. (Like with the butterfly garden, if she sticks to something at least a month and shows a growing interest, we will spend about $20.00 to $25.00 to get her something big to go with that particular interest. With the butterflies it was the butterfly pavilion and eggs. With this, we got her a kids  telescope.) Now, telescopes are expensive, so I have to say that in this case, Craigslist was my friend. We got it for $15.00. It came with two extra lenses, the tripod, and the telescope itself. We set it all up on Wednesday night and Jessie found the moon for her to look at, and she got to see a star up close. She was extremely excited, but I told Jessie next time we will let her play with it herself so she can use it how she wants and get familiar with it. Afterwards, in her journal, she drew a picture of what she saw. She drew the moon, stars, her telescope, Dad, Mom, and Sam. The description she had me write said, "I saw star and moon and love and a heart and the candle that I blowed out." (Not sure what the love and heart thing was about, but the candle was something from earlier that day.) Here are some pics. 

Homeschool Expo 2012

This year I was able to walk into the homeschool expo with a whole new view. I actually understood what was going on and what I was looking for.

I got Samantha some cool stuff too. There were a lot of used book stands there, so I got her Diary of a Worm- Cutest book ever. It is just what it sounds like, a diary of a worm. You learn some facts about it, but the other part is just silly. Sam Loves it though. There are also a few others, Diary of a Spider and Diary of a Fly. Samantha has been checking them out from the library constantly, so I figured it was time to buy it for her. And then I got her a Magic School Bus book about Space. (We also recently ordered her the entire series of Magic School Bus on DVD for her birthday off Amazon.) Then I got her a magnifying glass because she has been begging for one. And a plant root viewer. (We tried to do a homemade one where we planted a seed in a water bottle, but we got no results, so I am hoping that this will work better.)

I attended two seminars, both based on the Charlotte Mason method, called Learning Through Living Books, which basically explained the best ways to use detailed stories, fiction and non-fiction, to learn about History, Science, etc. instead of using textbooks. The other one was "Quiet Schooling of Nature" which explained in detail how to best use things like journaling and photography and such to help your child learn more about nature.

I also learned a lot today by talking to the HSLDA. I was asking about the legality of unschooling in Georgia. And he informed me what I could and couldn't do. And also told me that I don't have to enroll Sam with the county until she is 7, which means that is less time they will be over us. And I pick her grade when I turn her intent for in, so it isn't like we are holding her back. 

Her telescope also came in today, but unfortunately, they only sent one part of it, so now we are having to wait for them to send the other part. She says she can't wait to see the phases of the moon up close. It makes me so happy to see her get excited about that!

Sorry. Everywhere. Just...Excited.

Unschooling Thoughts

We are finally all moved into the new house, and able to relax. :) Ah...a very nice feeling. And I have realized how many new opportunities this house will give us for unschooling! All the extra space for projects and the area outside for exploration. She has more freedom to express herself without the landlord breathing down our necks. She can even be loud here! Which means we turn up the Dr. Jean CDs a LOT! Now that she is getting older, I have decided to put more learning opportunities in her reach, for her to initiate of course. So I am going to try to figure out a way to link different pages with references and information onto my blog for Samantha to look over if she chooses. 


*Side Note: We have decided to purchase the Magic School Bus series on DVD for Samantha. I am very excited! :p 


Now to do figure out how to link these things...