Homeschool and fun

We've been having a lot of fun this summer and have not really kept our blog up to date. I haven't even gotten our summer pictures off of our camera memory cards and played with them or organized them yet. You can say we sped through the summer! Soon after the last post which showed the school room all set up, we had a little flood in the basement due to a busted drainage pipe. That was repaired and all of the books we own (which is probably in the 1000's because of Kyle's school and theology books and homeschool books) were relocated upstairs. Thanks to many friends from church, we finally have our basement back in working order! The break from the little amount of schooling we did in April and May ended up being a blessing. I had a lot of time to think and pray about the way the first 2 months of homeschooling went. It was a great time for reflection. God helped me realize that I needed to change some of my expectations and attitudes and confirmed some things I was wondering about. I'll start with my heart change...

God showed my that I really need to enjoy these young years. I was planning on preparing Jo this spring and summer to start Kindergarten this fall. I was torn because he's just a couple of weeks past the public school age cut off. He's eager to learn and I'm eager to teach, so I thought this was the right thing. However, it was clear after 2 months of starting that I was pushing too hard and he has some fine motor skills that just need some time to develope to be ready for kindergarten. When I say I was pushing too hard, I mean that I was thinking he should understand things that he wasn't grasping and getting frustrated with our results. When we took the 2 month break and came back, he had some time to grow and he's improved so much with his coloring, memory, and desire to learn. I am doing a modified K-4 year with him and K-3 with Micah. God is so good to show us where we need to be and we are having a lot of fun. We do a lot of coloring, play-dough, music, and outside play.

Reading and Writing

As for the R's, we are preparing for Kindergarten. We are enjoying Sonlight books. Some are from the Preschool age 3/4 core package (we just have a couple of these that I bought used online) and I just ordered the P4/5 core used for a great price that I found on a forum I visit often, The Well Trained Mind forums. Sonlight has great books to read out loud to your kids and it encompases history, science, language arts, and Bible. It is an enjoyable introduction to many things. It includes many good treasury books that have so many quality classic picture books.

We are learning the 26 basic phonograms of the English language to prepare for a language arts curriculum that I linked in the last post called Spell to Write and Read (SWR). It's an Orton-Gillingham approach to reading, writing, and spelling. I'm hoping to go to a training seminar to better know how to teach the program, as it's very teacher intensive. But, it is a wonderful program that will give them a great understanding of our language. For this year, we are learning the phonograms and Jo is starting to read some Bob Books, http://www.bobbooks.com/ which gives him a start on reading. This isn't really recommended in the SWR program, but it gives him some practice at reading some of the phonograms he's learned. I've also done a few lessons from a book called Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy lessons. However, I will have to modify some things from the lessons in order not to confuse Jo since some of the concepts are different from the approach of SWR. Although, 100 Easy Lessons has given us a great foundation for how to blend the letters by saying them slowly. Here is a link of the video I put on line of him reading his first Bob book to his little brother, Micah. It was a sweet memory.

Math

For math, they are learning their numbers with flashcards and by tracing the number with their finger. They already have a good habit of counting the right way and we are counting objects as we do a number a week. We are going to start Right Start Level A after they learn to recognize numbers 0-10. We started Right Start Level A in the spring, but Jo wasn't quite ready. I think he'll be ready in about 2 months, though.

Little brothers and miscellaneous

You might be wondering how in the world is this done with a 4, 3, and 1 year old? Well, it is interesting and God gives a lot of grace. I do "circle time" in the morning with Jo and Micah. We pray together and go over our phonogram of the week (so far we've done m, s, a, and e) and the number of the week (we've done 1-4, I forgot 0, eek, I know I should have done that one first, I'll have to explain that one later). Usually Micah interupts some, but he loves being included on this part of school. Jo and Micah have gained a lot from the consistency of circle time and they love going downstairs to do school. During this time, Sammy is usually either napping or playing with toys in the school room. Sometimes, he's sitting in my lap. After circle time, I let the boys color, play with play dough, cut stuff, or play with toys.
In the afternoon, I do a reading lesson with Jo while Micah is playing and Sammy is napping. Jo does a little science some afternoons by observing the tadpoles Kyle caught and brought home. We're studying the lifecycle of a frog and drawing pictures in a science journal. Hopefully we don't kill them before they become frogs! Next, we will watch a caterpillar grow into a butterfly with our Butterfly Garden that our friends Kris and Andrea got Micah for his birthday. Fun stuff. For K-3 through Kindergarten or 1st, we will do geography. Right now, we are just learning the continents and oceans along with a song from Geography songs . They each have their own color coded map that I copied and colored and laminated (so it doesn't get destroyed:) We point to the continents and oceans as we sing the song. We'll probably go over this for a couple of months to really learn it.

I'm hoping to post a few pictures soon after I download them onto the computer and organize them.

Starting Homeschool

Our family is starting out on the new adventure called homeschooling. We started last month due to Josiah's peaked interest in learning and doing something productive during the day besides playing with toys, or watching T.V. (he'd do this all day if I let him, but I love him too much:) Because of my background of working with children and (thankfully) my education degree I have been very excited about this day from before Josiah was even born. That, coupled with the love for the three kids we now have, I am overjoyed to be able to be my childrens' Mom as well as teacher. I am so thankful to God for allowing us to homeschool our kids and I don't take it for granted. Since the summer of 2004 when Kyle and I attended the conference for the Association of Classical Christian Schools, we knew we wanted to use a "Classical Christian" approach with our children. Classical, meaning it follows the Trivium of Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric, and Christian being Christ- centered in all we do. The reason we are doing this is so we can better honor the Lord in our training up of our children in the way of the Lord.

Below, I want to post some pictures from our school room. This room is in the, very nicely finished basement (thank you Bethlehem Baptist--it's a parsonage). The "Claunch Academy" sign as well as the desk top were a birthday gift from Kyle to me. He's so sweet! My Mom and Dad also gave us some wonderful items for the room. We are so thankful for this special room.

The boys enjoying the room, okay, so they are posing for this picture:)

Some links relating to our homeschooling
A great link that explains the Trivium
Spell to Write and Read - the reading and spelling, and writing program we are using.
SWR for young ones
Cursive First used along with SWR
A Classical Christian homeschool blog who has helped me immensely.

Snake Handling

I caught this "little" fellow while I was going to dump food scraps in the woods behind our house. He was in the back yard. True to form, Micah touches the beast right away. Josiah hesitated greatly: "I wish that was a toy snake." But he finally touched it.



I tried to let the snake go, but he turned and headed right for the house. So, I had to catch him again and throw him further into the yard. When my foot came down on his head (to pin him down), I felt my heart soar a little: "The God of peace will soon crush Satan underneath your feet" (Romans 16:19) because the Seed of the Woman has already crushed him for us. You lose, Serpent!

Pumpkin Patch

This week was a fun one. We got to take the kids to Boyd's Orchard. They have a pumpkin patch, apple orchard, animals, and some really fun playgrounds for the kids. It was the perfect fall weather and the kids had a wonderful time. Some of our friends from church went and I thought you might enjoy seeing some of the pictures from the trip.

It's hard to get 6 little ones to pose for a picture:)

The kids showing off their apples.

Micah didn't quite get what Kyle was telling them "Hold your apple and raise your hand"

Jo and Ash by the apple orchard

Jo talking to Graeme in his baby voice.

Sweet Isaac, Andrea and Kris' little boy

Kids running in the apple orchard.

Micah's perfect form... see the apple at the bottom? That's the one he threw.

I told the kids to hug for a picture, and hug they did.


Victoria (left) is doing her own thing.

We didn't forget sweet Sammy, he liked taking a picture with the pumpkin.

Tennessee fun

We had a fun weekend visiting Ashley's parents in Tennessee. We sometimes meet and see each other for one night so we can have some time together, since we live 12 hours a part. It was a beautiful weekend and we had fun celebrating Josiah's birthday. We also went to a state park that is beautiful, Henry Horton State Park. The boys, including Papa had fun skipping rocks in the pretty river. Here are some pictures...

Papa, Nonni, and the boys

Papa and the boys at the river. There's just too many interesting things for the boys to look at the camera.

Micah has a killer arm...a baseball player perhaps?

Mom enjoying Sammy while the boys play at the park

Okay, this is my parents Yorkiepoo. He's so cute! His name is Harley (Harlan-my dad's name and Ashley) He's my only sibling and we never fight!:)

The birthday boy! Can't believe he'll be four on Oct 17th!

Can I open them now, please!

Papa enjoying him some Sammy.

Nonni, Sammy, and Ash

Kids say the funniest things!

Micah sang to Kyle the other day:
"Row, row, row your boat gently down the drain..."
...Is that what you say when you're having a bad day?:)

Kyle and Josiah were reviewing Bible verses Jo has learned, particularly, "love the Lord you God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength..."
Jo said, "I love Him with my whole heart, do I have to love him with my legs too?"

Sometimes we find ourselves saying the funniest things because of our funny kids.
I heard Kyle declaring from the bathroom the other day:
"Micah, we do NOT put our head in the toilet!"

... these are fun(ny) years indeed.

The Young Preacher

Below is Josiah's first sermon. His rhetorical skills are superb. He deals well with the distraction of the young child who keeps invading the pulpit. He needs to work on staying on subject. But all in all, great sermon!




Here's the Transcript: "Turn your Bibles on... to the book of Ephesians. I am the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, and I want you to sit down and listen to me. I want to talk to you about little kids walking on the ceiling and nobody holding you on there... I am the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, and I would like for you to come sit down. I would like for you to just sit down... and um... sit back. Can you do that for me please? ... They put nails on him, and they nailed him on the cross, and they threw him into the water... Really did they throw him in the water, daddy? They put him in the tomb, and one day he raised from the dead, and Mary was bringing something to him, and angels said, "Jesus isn't there anymore. He came back." ... Well, I'm pretty tired, so one day we're gonna go home. And one day we're gonna play a game of raising from the dead."

Here's his second attempt at preaching a few minutes later. He's definitely more focused this time.




Transcript: "God made the earth... He made some people... One day when there was a flood, all the dinosaurs died, and they got killed by the flood. and the flood got turned into the ocean, and God turned the flood into the ocean so people can enjoy the ocean. and people can see crabs and find some sea shells and have tons of fun and wade into the deep water... And I would like for you all to sit down." (perhaps he received a standing ovation).

I put Josiah up to this, but the only scripted line was "turn in your bibles to the book of Ephesians," which being interpreted meant: "Turn on your Bibles." Everything else was his own original words, completely unprompted.

Enjoy!