Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Preschool Fun
A friend and I do a little preschool once a week for our four-year-olds. It's scheduled when Harry & Sam are in classes, so they're out of the house and Annika is my Special Helper.
Anyway, today we read about caterpillars and butterflies. We also made this adorable craft from pinterest, where everything fabulous and guilt-inducing is found.
I love preschool day. It's work but it's also Emma's day to have some undivided attention. And for a 4yo that's the youngest in a homeschooling family, that's pretty rare, and dare I say, special.
Anyway, today we read about caterpillars and butterflies. We also made this adorable craft from pinterest, where everything fabulous and guilt-inducing is found.
I love preschool day. It's work but it's also Emma's day to have some undivided attention. And for a 4yo that's the youngest in a homeschooling family, that's pretty rare, and dare I say, special.
Monday, February 27, 2012
Good Things
Most afternoons Emma sleeps and the rest of us try frantically to finish as much as we can before we head out for activities. But somehow today we were able to finish most everything in the morning.
That makes for a more peaceful afternoon, even if Emma is awake.
Here are some quick pictures from a minute ago:
That makes for a more peaceful afternoon, even if Emma is awake.
Here are some quick pictures from a minute ago:
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| Playing Sorry with Cinderella and the Cat |
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| Playing physics games |
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| Weaving on her loom |
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Changes: A Math Story
For the record, I hate change. So I swore that I wouldn't become a curriculum-hopper when I started homeschooling. I would stay with something and make it work.
You all can laugh now, if you need to. I understand.
That philosophy lasted me a couple of years. Things went swimmingly for Harry and Math U See until they suddenly didn't anymore. I remember it vividly, he was at the end of Gamma where the multiplication changes to multi-digit multiplication. It didn't stick and he was ending every math lesson in tears. So I let him off the hook for the rest of the year and we just played math games and did lots of printable math worksheets. His confidence was so low that I had to bring him back to where he trusted that he could do math.
I switched him to Singapore Math at the beginning of fourth grade, which started out great. The books were engaging and he loved it. I did too. Sam still worked with MUS and did really, really well. He could finish a level in a semester. But we stuck with it because it was working well. I thought we had it down.
And we did, until...Annika came home for school this year. So now I have a 5th grader, 3rd grader, and 1st grader. I started Annika on Singapore. They did not get along. There were battles of epic proportions to get her to listen to me and to actually do the work. She is good at math but she suddenly was saying that she isn't. I freaked and got rid of all of the Singapore 1A books because I'm not having my incredibly smart and talented girl telling me that she isn't good at math before she even hits seven.
I stepped back and tried to figure out what to do. I went the route of playing games and printing stuff until I decided to try MEP. So far so good. She's working through Year 1 and a lot of it is easy, but there's enough of a challenge that I'm okay sticking with it. Annika doesn't tell me that she's bad at math anymore and I'm hoping she doesn't actually remember that she thought she was. She does about three lessons a day, but worksheets to only two of them. I know it doesn't make sense, but it works for us.
A funny thing happened when Annika came home for school. All hell broke loose. I don't know how else to describe it. She's high maintenance and trying to teach two separate Singapore levels and stay on top of Sam and his MUS was too much. We were spending half our day on math. So I decided to give Math Mammoth a try for Harry. He needed a little more practice with fractions, so I got the fraction book to try. He liked it (I feel like saying it like Mikey) and we switched after Christmas to MM for Harry's math.
Sam is just plugging along with MUS and doing well, so he's not changing. Ever.
Really, I swear. No more changes.*
*Unless absolutely necessary. I get to decide what "absolutely necessary" means.
You all can laugh now, if you need to. I understand.
That philosophy lasted me a couple of years. Things went swimmingly for Harry and Math U See until they suddenly didn't anymore. I remember it vividly, he was at the end of Gamma where the multiplication changes to multi-digit multiplication. It didn't stick and he was ending every math lesson in tears. So I let him off the hook for the rest of the year and we just played math games and did lots of printable math worksheets. His confidence was so low that I had to bring him back to where he trusted that he could do math.
I switched him to Singapore Math at the beginning of fourth grade, which started out great. The books were engaging and he loved it. I did too. Sam still worked with MUS and did really, really well. He could finish a level in a semester. But we stuck with it because it was working well. I thought we had it down.
And we did, until...Annika came home for school this year. So now I have a 5th grader, 3rd grader, and 1st grader. I started Annika on Singapore. They did not get along. There were battles of epic proportions to get her to listen to me and to actually do the work. She is good at math but she suddenly was saying that she isn't. I freaked and got rid of all of the Singapore 1A books because I'm not having my incredibly smart and talented girl telling me that she isn't good at math before she even hits seven.
I stepped back and tried to figure out what to do. I went the route of playing games and printing stuff until I decided to try MEP. So far so good. She's working through Year 1 and a lot of it is easy, but there's enough of a challenge that I'm okay sticking with it. Annika doesn't tell me that she's bad at math anymore and I'm hoping she doesn't actually remember that she thought she was. She does about three lessons a day, but worksheets to only two of them. I know it doesn't make sense, but it works for us.
A funny thing happened when Annika came home for school. All hell broke loose. I don't know how else to describe it. She's high maintenance and trying to teach two separate Singapore levels and stay on top of Sam and his MUS was too much. We were spending half our day on math. So I decided to give Math Mammoth a try for Harry. He needed a little more practice with fractions, so I got the fraction book to try. He liked it (I feel like saying it like Mikey) and we switched after Christmas to MM for Harry's math.
Sam is just plugging along with MUS and doing well, so he's not changing. Ever.
Really, I swear. No more changes.*
*Unless absolutely necessary. I get to decide what "absolutely necessary" means.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
New Desk
When we bought this house four years ago, part of it's attraction was the large loft at the top of the stairs. The model had a built-in desk along one wall that we really liked. Eventually we looked to see how much it would be to have someone build us a desk and it turned out to be way more than we wanted, so Jason decided to build it himself. (I'm pretty sure he wanted an excuse to buy tools too, so it worked out for everyone.)
Anyway, this is the desk in the garage:
It is really long because it will go across most of one wall. There will be three "slots" for kids to use and they'll put their books in the shelves underneath. As of now there is trim on it and Jason is ready to stain the wood. After that he'll put something on it to protect it from little people's pens and pencils. Eventually it'll make it into the upstairs.
This is part of the wall it will go across:
Not an exciting wall, yet. But soon...
Anyway, this is the desk in the garage:
It is really long because it will go across most of one wall. There will be three "slots" for kids to use and they'll put their books in the shelves underneath. As of now there is trim on it and Jason is ready to stain the wood. After that he'll put something on it to protect it from little people's pens and pencils. Eventually it'll make it into the upstairs.
This is part of the wall it will go across:
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| Why yes, that is the head of a four-year-old |
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
This is Valentine's Day
Finally, and no picture for this, but this is their Mom saying thank you to everyone that participated and spent the time to send Valentines to a bunch of kids you don't know. It really made our day! Thank you.
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