School

We have been so busy this summer and fall!!  Our beef cattle operation is well under way and we added a few pigs too.  The last few weeks have been packed full with getting the farm and animals ready for winter.  One of the other things we started this fall is pretty exciting to me.  I started homeschooling our kids.  Grace is only five so would not have to go to Kindergarten this year, but she went to preschool last year and I wanted to see if she could do some Kindergarten work.  While she does that, I teach most of the same things to Micah, at a slower pace. 

I'm glad school starts at the lowest level, it would be so hard to jump into eighth or ninth grade!  They are starting with numbers and letters.  We have focused on one number and one letter each week since the beginning of school.  I can tailor activities and projects to each of their knowledge levels so they stay interested.  The fact that they are not quite old enough for Kindergarten and Pre-K takes away some of the pressure that we need to meet specific goals this year.  I have a Kindergarten text/work book that I have based most of our day's activities on.   The kids are doing so well with it that I am not worried at all about scrambling to finish it at the end of the year. 

We also make time for art projects and Bible stories.  Grace would spend all day every day drawing or painting!  We have a drawing course book that she brings out and does on her own if she feels like it has been too long since I taught from it.  Since we are doing organized school I have tried to guide their art a little bit too.  Typically I ask them to draw or paint something specific, it is so fun to see what they come up with!  Each kid is so different.  They both love painting the most but cutting and gluing is right up there too.  Sometimes I will set all the art supplies around the dining room table in "stations" there is typically: painting, markers and stamps, color crayons and pencils, cutting and gluing and stickers.  I give them each a piece of paper and let them go to town.  They rotate around the table until they feel like their picture is complete.  We have also done this when I want them to make a card to someone, although I usually leave out cutting and gluing if the project is going to be mailed because it gets too bulky. 

JJ sticks around sometimes but at this point he is more of a distraction than a serious student.  I am more than willing to let him listen and participate (to his ability) when I'm teaching and love it when he does want to be with us.  He usually participates in the activities outside writing on paper, he loves to sit with us when we look at flash cards and has learned to say his letters and to count.  He is also around when I'm reading to the other two, although he kind of comes and goes at will. 

My favorite part so far has been watching the kids learn.  Watching them use something they learned is so exciting.  I have been teaching both Grace and Micah to write their own name.  Grace has been able to do it for several weeks now but Micah surprised me and wrote his name on a coloring paper at church!  True, he can't do it all on his own, I have to say the letters for him but I'm impressed that he can write it out.  They have both been into addition lately too, one of them will put up a couple of fingers then add a couple more from the other hand and yell out the total.  I love  it!

So far school has been fun, some weeks are better than others and both of them have been sick a day or two here and there.  They love to do school and are always excited to get started in the morning.  My hope is that I can keep it interesting and engaging so they enjoy it all winter.