And She's Done!

Jordan completed the 9th grade last week! She was so excited and I am happy she made it as it was rough for a time there. The program we use has a great deal of essays, reports and projects. Almost one for every unit of every class with the exception of Algebra. So with New Testament, World Geography, English I, and Integrated Physics and Chemistry classes, each with 10 or more units, there was a huge amount of writing  Writing is not her strong suit. There was a lot of it that was repetitive, so I took quite a few off of her to do list.

James is coming along in 4th grade and is nearing the finish line. He is excited to be shopping for next years curriculum. Funny kid. My old G8way laptop finally started dying (it's over 10 years old) and so we had to switch to my HP Mini...he loved the small notebook, but I could not get his Bible class to transfer to it. He had to use the G8way for Bible class. He was always so amazed at how big a difference the screen size was as he switched back and forth. The mini is very convenient for taking school outside to enjoy the weather. Next year I will have 4 kids on laptops....I think mini's are the way we are leaning. Time to get on E-b*y!

Jackson is doing well, but is a bit behind. He works steadily, 2nd grade is just a big switch from 1st grade and the work load is heavy. He is a meticulousness worker and likes stuff to be just right, so he sometimes gets hung up on things that may not really matter to the lesson's requirements. I loaded some 3rd grade onto 1 of the laptops so that he could start practicing doing SOS and he really enjoys that. Switching from workbooks to laptops is a big change.

Jeanna is making progress. It is a very slow trek for her as she gets "stuck" often and needs loads of coaching to get back. When she first came she was on a very strict sensory diet that we had kinda worked down, but I am seeing a need to get back to it a bit more. Her dysregulation comes quickly, with me sometimes missing her triggers. She likes school and when she is on task, she does very well.

Joshua has completed Pre-K. He really mastered many skills during the year. He will continue this summer with large and small gross motor skills. I still have not decided about next year, but I am leaning to another modified pre-k. I just am not ready for him to do the Kindergarten curriculum yet.

Next week is a school week...the following week is a week off.

6 Week Progress Reports

The time is flying and yet sometimes it feels like we are standing still. Progress reports have gone out and most are very happy. 1 of my 2nd graders does not have enough grades yet, so we are waiting for that.

Jackson is doing well in most areas. Bible verse memorization seems to be more difficult for him this year. Spelling however is a strong area with him earning 100% on all of his spelling test thus far.

James is doing very well this year. History and Geography gives him a bit of trouble as it is so abstract to him, but he is doing better at keeping up this year.

Jordan is having a wonderful year so far, earning a 4.0 GPA for the first marking period. She enjoys New Testament Survey and Science.

Pre-K is coming along nicely. He is very eager to read and has almost mastered his high frequency words list.

Wednesday is Entertaining Angels. We now have approx. 274 people on our list and are now purchasing between 300 and 400 items each month. It is an amazing and wonderful experience. certainly bigger than we ever imagined.

Moving along....

New School Room

I have been talking about this for 2 years now and this summer we were finally able to get our school room. We really like it and especially like that we don't have to break down school in the evenings and weekends so that we can eat at the table or have our living room back. Also with the school room being downstairs we actually "leave" school in the evenings which is very much needed.

Custom Monogram!

Pre-K Bible lesson

homework drawers

Joshua is already very good at puzzles

Second and fourth grade busy at work

Working on stacking.

The student with perfect attendance

Pre-K's circle time calendar.

The new and improved play/recess room.

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.

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!

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!

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. 

Progress, Pies and Reborns

Progress reports:

Jordan loves to bake. This week she made a graham cracker crust pudding pie with a cherry fruit topping. Very yummy. 

As an early birthday present, Jordan received a reborn doll. He is a Michelle Fagen Sculpt by the artist, Cindy Sales from the Bountiful Babies Nursery. She loves him so much. She dresses, grooms and changes him several times per day. He goes almost everywhere with us. Last night he had his first photo shoot. She took no less than 70 pictures of him. LOL! Here is 1 of my favorites. The picture with the 3 babies shows my 2 reborns with hers. I have 2 Berenguar Reborns whose artist I cannot remember. They have crazy, wild hair as I did not prepare them for pictures. :)

 

That is what we are doing around here. I am hoping to work on our use-to-be-playroom-that-turned-into-a-storage-room-because-we-had-too-many-toys-room as we are hoping to change it to a schoolroom. 

Have a Great weekend!

Peace!

Starting Again

We are getting ready to start our first full week after a wonderful vacation. It was good to be back at church today, although I was uncomfortable with the comments made about going to Nassau.

1st grade opened his unit 4 Lifepacs today in order to get ready for tomorrow. He is always excited to get new booklets. I was using Spelling Connections for 1st grade, but switched to ABC Teach spelling units as I liked the activities that could be done throughout the week for practice. He seems to like the sheets too.

Our home-school group is having the annual Spelling Bee in February.  I think I am putting a hold on everyone's spelling program to focus on Spelling Bee words.

4th and 8th grade have several essay projects coming up in the next few weeks so I think I will make Fridays a project day for them. We have a very old set of encyclopedia's that I would love to replace. I still like them to use reference books for research instead of the internet. We have not had our consistent weekly library trips yet because we have been so busy. I need to get back on track with those as they have yet to fulfill any of their required reading list. So much to do...so little time. LOL!

We were surprised today with a very generouse donation today for our Personal Needs Closet. We are so excited for the opportunity.

Home School Lite

We made it home Sunday, early evening and the kids decided that they missed school enough that they wanted to get back into it. They set up school and got everything ready without me even telling them to. My foster child, Jeanna*, DID NOT WANT to go back to her public school and promised to cry Monday morning. I debated back and forth as to whether to send her or not for the 2 days before Thanksgiving Break and her teacher (who really does not like Jeanna all that much) had suggested that I just keep her home for those 2 days. But school attendance is an issue that I don't want to have problems with, so I sent her on Monday. Luckily the hot lunch for that day was a meal that she liked. It was the only reason she went. Ha Ha!

We are doing just review type work here in Rottie Land. 8th grade did a couple of hours on Monday as well as 1st grade. 4th grade ended up doing a bit more as it is just the nature of his gig. Today is my birthday so we will watch a movie together...my choice even though I will most likely fall asleep and only see the opening and closing credits as usual! LOL!

Our church added a Wednesday morning prayer meeting that I am excited about as I never get to go to the evening one (bedtime conflicts), so we will get to attend that tomorrow morning before Entertaining Angels. We have also decided to give out meals to any families that come for personal needs on Wednesday. We will be giving out a small chicken, a bag of potatoes and a can good. Just a small meal for hard times.

Thursday we look forward to our traditional grilled cheese and french fries Thanksgiving dinner.

To my Sister-girlfriend: You know I love ya! We are making arrangements.

*My foster daughter's blog name

Schedules, Homework and School on Vacation

Schedules

When I first started homeschooling, I used a very detailed schedule as my oldest (who was the only student for the first 2 years) really needed that type of setting. Over the years, while we still use a schedule, it's a more relaxed situation where the 2 older grades can do whatever class they want during whatever period they choose as long as they complete assignments on time. Since I actively teach 1st grade, he does not have that option. One of the helpful parts of the schedule is that I can stagger classes that people are more likely to have difficulty in, such as math, so that I am more available to help. So if science is your difficult class, then it is easier to have my full attention as it has been scheduled during everyone else's free reading or something like that.

This is an example of what our schedules look like:

This year we are using a binder system in which the kids keep their attendance calendar, school and homework schedules, supplies needed to do school in the car and on the run and whatever book they are reading at the time. It has been the best system ever as the binders are smaller than lugging around backpacks and if some particular classwork does not get done, they they can just stick it in their binder for homework.


The great homework debate.

My kids have homework. I use it as a time for them to work independently, we used it as school work if we have to run errands and we use it for vacation. I also believe, and this may sound morbid,  that if something happens to me, the single parent, my kids will most likely have to back to school, so they may as well know how to manage their time to include homework.

These are our homework schedules.

Vacation

Every year I have to decide how much schoolwork to take with us on vacation. This is especially important if we are going to be gone for 4 weeks or more. In order to take time off at Christmas, for spring break and to still get out for a summer break at the end of May, we just can't take off 3-4 weeks of school.  Eighth grade has been working super hard to complete assignments through December dates so that she does not have to take her laptop and only do "vacation school work". Fourth grade is ahead in one class, but he always ends up taking his laptop with him because if he gets behind, it is very overwhelming for him. First grade is ahead in all classes, so he will only have to do "vacation school work".

This year they will be doing a unit study on the Solar System and then their regular vacation assignment of interviewing someone from another county to learn more about other places around the world. We will take spelling and some math word problems and also reading. We have not decided on the family read for this year.

13 days.


No passport yet... ~sign~

First and Second Week Done

Jordan surprised the kids with green eggs (no ham) for breakfast this week. Not a pretty sight, but tasty.

4th grade has finished his 2nd whole week and his grades are right on track. He is very much "set-up" for success in that he cannot move onto the next lesson until he masters the one he is working on.  He is also working more at his own schedule this year. While he has a chart that tells when to do math, language arts, history, etc... he can do them as needed and does not have to change classes when the bell rings.

1st grade finished their first week and they were excited. I used this same curriculum 3 years ago and had forgotten all of the extra prep work that is needed. I will spend this weekend making all of the copies I will need so that next week can be a bit more smooth. In History & Geography we learned about Betsy Ross and colored flags.

1 Day Down

We made it and James says that he had a good day. He kinda had a rough start. James is not a confident reader...capable, just not confident, so when he started his dolch readings, he had to have lots of restarts. But yippee!!! he finished all of his assignments for today! My first graders are chomping at the bit to get started. I had to keep shooing them away. 8th grade did a great job of getting the younger kids breakfast and dressed so that I could focus completely on James. I am happy he had a good start.

Fourth Grade Start Your Engines...Maybe

We are scheduled for James to start school tomorrow (8/15) and he is very excited. Today kinda got away from us time wise and a late bedtime might cost us a smooth start. I did finally make it to get school supplies and still need to get to St*ples to get their 1 cents folders.

Well...Praying for a peaceful and successful year for all.

"That'll Be 3 Cents Please"

Off*ce M*x has their lined paper on sale for 1 cents a pack (limit 3 per person). So each kid got three pennies and in they tromped to get our 15 packs of paper. We will go back again tomorrow and we should be set for the year.  I am in a slight software crises. I totally did not shop early to get our curriculum and am now in a race to get 8th grade's software. I was able to get 1st grade's stuff early for a really great price, but I keep getting outbid for 8th grade.

On a side note...we got our vacation confirmation e-mails today and my mom suggested looking at all the passports to make sure they are all set. Oh My Goodness!!! Jordan's passport expires next month!!!!  So we rushed to the post office and applied for a renewal. I am so glad we noticed that. We would have been so much in trouble at the airport.

This week: completing paperwork, updating portfolio files and getting joint subjects all together.  We are taking music, art, foreign language  and PE all together.

Screeech....Changing Lanes Again

We made changes to the start dates to stagger each grade a bit more. Orientation is still on for tomorrow even though our new school shirts won't be here for 2 more weeks. I kinda went shirt shopping crazy because the Mart of Wals had such a great sale on school polos with free to home shipping and then I ordered the new shirts with our school emblem as the other shirts are over 3 years old.

Old school emblem

New school emblem on navy polos

Fourth Grade still starts Monday, August 15th. James is excited.

First Grade will now start Monday, August 22nd. Jackson says he is happy and is very excited to get to his new Lifepacs. My foster daughter will start with him on the same date as Public School does not start until September 6th. She does not state how she feels about going back to school, but if I were to let him start and not her, she would cry and say she wants to come to school too, so I take that as a sign that she likes to be a part of things.

Eighth Grade will start Wednesday, September 7th. Jordan has been offered an invitation to take part in a small class offering group piano lessons, but I am not sure if she will be able to take it as our November vacation would cause he to miss so many classes. She is not looking forward to school, but is kinda excited about her new math curriculum (we are changing to Life of Fred.)

Pre-School. I am back to having a pre-schooler. My foster son will be 3 yrs old next week and he is already learning so much that we have decided to let him join in slowly. When Jackson first came home, I thought it would be good to start him at a preschool level to give him a chance to bond and mature. Jordan basically taught him and has offered to teach this level again. We use the Brightly Beaming Letter of the Week and I think my 3 year old will enjoy many of the activities. Anyway, he will start September 15th.

 

Fade to Black

Summer school did not go as planned, but that is alright and a part of this path. We were doing pretty well until I got very sick and you know... when mama gets sick, not much gets done. (at least that's how it is for me as a single parent) So we kinda faded out to our end of summer break.

It turns out I did not really like the Summer Skills books that I picked as bridge books for the summer. They did not flow very well and jumped from review stuff to not yet learned stuff and then back to review. I usually use Summer Bridge books but wanted to try something new this year. Next summer I guess we will go back to what we know.

Dates are set for school:

Orientation - August 8th

Early Start for 4th grade -  August 15th.  (He needs the extra time as he struggles to keep up during the year)

First Day - September 7th

Summer School

The troop is outside for class today. Notice the dog upside down scratching his back in the grass behind the teeter totter.

Summer school is going well. We do 2 classes together and then they break for their skills. For devotions we are reading Hind's Feet on High Places  (thank Christie for the recommendations) and they really like the story and groan when I come to a stopping place. We are also doing Draw Write Now, Book 1 (thanks Christine for the idea)  which is so funny  because we have had some very interesting farm animals drawn so far.

For individual skills the 1st graders and the 4th grader are doing Summer Skills Daily Activity Workbook and 8th grade is doing Life of Fred - Fractions . She loves it and I think it might be closer to her learning style than what we ususally learn.