Looking Back & Looking Forward

James has been in school for 2 weeks now and has done well. He is anxious to start doing homework full time, which I know sounds odd, but he really likes doing homework.  He has had 2 projects so far; (1) a report on state flowers and (2) a letter to a friend explaining why Peter left his job to follow Jesus. I like SOS a lot, but the projects can get to be much. There are usually 2 per unit, per class. With 5 classes of 10 units each it works out to 100 projects or essays for the year. Too much. I usually only keep the ones that reinforce the lesson and any that sound "fun" to the kids, like in science.

Jeanna finished her first half week last week. She reviewed letter sounds, long and short vowels and phonics. I taught her to count to 200 and we talked about 1's, 10's and 100 places. I will spend 1 more week on that kind of review to catch her up to the 2nd grade curriculum that we use. She is eager to learn, but needs lots of repetition and brain gym breaks.

This week, Jackson starts on Tuesday and Joshua starts on Wednesday.  They are both very excited.

Great news!! We finally finished our new school room! It is Beautiful and we are all so happy. I will take pictures to post later this week. We got the whole basement repainted and the floors had the tile removed and masonry paint applied. This weekend we went down just to sit in the room and grin. LOL!

No school on Monday due to an appointment.

Have a great week.

It's Official!!!

I now have 5 students!!! Our adoption has been finalized.

Jeanna was funny. When I told her that it was final, she said, "Whew! I've been waiting for those papers to be signed!"

We did not have a court appointment as Jeanna was afraid to go before the judge, this is our 5th and 6th adoption and my brother and father were not able to get away, so we just had the judge sign and the agency let us know.

And so...now I am Jordan, James, Jackson, Jeanna and Joshua.

We are having an adoption party in a couple of weeks. This is the picture we used for our announcement.

Yay!!!

"Preschool"

My youngest turned 4 years old on Tuesday. He is the one I refer to as "Preschooler". He does have a name... I was kinda waiting until the adoption to introduce them officially. Also, I have decided that he is not going to do the preschool curriculum again, but is ready for Pre-K. I don't usually like to start my kindergartners until they are six, so I am not sure what will happen next year.

Anyway...Happy Birthday, Kid!

First First Day

Today is James' first day of school. He got up on his own, had breakfast, got dressed and got to the school room before I was even up good. At this point he has completed Language Arts and Math lessons 1 with 100%. on both. Good start!

Olympic Goals

Jordan and my brother both had a serious case of Olympic fever! My brother and I were able to go to the 1996 Games in Atlanta and had planned to go to the 2000 Games in Australia, but I ended up adopting the year before and could not go. In 2016, my brother is planning to go to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and has invited Jordan to go with him. She is super excited and already planning her budget to save money. I am excited for her. It will be such a great experience and the perfect High School graduation present.

Orientation

We had orientation Moday and it was crazy. My printer would not "listen" to my computer. Microsoft Office was "not responding" and well...it was nutso, but it was us and everyone was excited to see their new books, schedules and even their homework schedules. My student body has grown so much. Of course, the dog had to be included as he tends to have perfect attendance!

Testing 1, 2, 3

My father has close friends whose grandson was killed in a house fire last week. So very sad as it is reported that the child ran back into his bedroom to hide instead of getting out of the home.

I have mentioned this before. It is important to me. Please check your smoke, fire and CO detectors.  Change the batteries at whatever interval you like...even if the old battery still works. Test you detectors often and then the most important, plan and practice escape routes.

I run practices day and night. During daytime practices, I sometimes have the children wear coats/jackets zipped up and on backwards with the hood up to simulate the darkness, the heat and the disorientation. Teach alternate routes. Practice crawling and feeling for heat. We asked our neighbor if their porch could be our meeting place.

My children STRONGLY DETEST middle of the night drills, but I believe those are the ones that need to be practiced the most.

Peace!

That Time Of Year

This is what's going out in tonight's "mail" ( I don't really mail it...just will mix it in with tomorrow's mail).

I think I have start dates figures: 

James, August 13

Jeanna, August 22

Jackson, August 27

Preschool, August 27

Jordan, September 4

I have all of my curriculum except 1 book which is easy enough to get, I just don't want to pay full price for it. I am a very frugal shopper. I am currently working on my portfolio folders. They have become messy and unorganized over the years. 

I am kinda looking forward to getting back into the schedule. Jeanna is very excited... the rest are kinda ready.