Homeschool Mother's Journal 9/27

It's amazing what a week off can do to your perspective. It sounds kind of funny to be wishing for a week off this early in the school year, but it was actually way over due. Glenn and I really have not had a chance to get away in a very long time. So it truly is not that I wanted a break from school, but just a break in general. It gave me a chance to do some reflecting on my life, on school, and the kids. It gave me a chance to think on my goals for the year and what is working and what makes me tense. We had a great time just relaxing, no agenda, and a change of scenery.

Fishing makes him happy.

In My Life This Week: My time off led me to remind myself .......again that I keep putting us in a box. I have such advantages at my fingertips and I keep forgetting this and keep trying to put us in some standard classroom type setting. I find myself becoming an easily irritated teacher. Upon reflection I realized I am not happy when I teach like this and honestly my kids are not either. I'm an outdoors girl and when I put us in the "classroom" setting I feel like I all I love is escaping. Once I finish school I feel like I have to run around the house trying to do chores, get supper on, and then it is evening and I might not have even gotten a chance to be outside. So I am reminding myself again that the world is our classroom. Also, I'm on  a quest to get back some of my identity and enjoy things I like. This week I got on a green broke horse for the first time in over a year. I have not been riding much at all, something I miss dearly, so it felt great but also a little scary. I'm not in riding shape and that messes with your mind because I know one silly move from a green horse could end me up on the ground easily. I also know how hard that ground can be and how much older I feel without moving to the ground in rapid speed. So I had to swallow the knot in my throat and hope he was as ready as I thought he was. Thankfully besides being a bit sluggish and trying to figure out my requests we had a decent ride and I felt like I'd over come a huge mountain in my mind. YAY!

In School This Week:

We spent more time outside. We had been studying Lewis and Clark's journey, read the book and watched a short movie on it. So we decided we'd try out our own map making skills and draw a map off our back pasture. The kids put on their backpacks, took their notebooks and binoculars and off we went on our journey.


 



I don't know if he's Lewis or Clark, but he's leading the way.



Our letter for the week was C so we decided that was a great time to make cupcakes.

Brooke loves it when the letter of the week involves eating something.

Here we are doing a few more fun things that start with the letter C.

What's working what's not: I am really liking Abeka phonics and language from a teaching aspect, but I also liked Sonlight's creative side. Since I actually have the Instructor Guide for Sonlight's language I pick out some of the creative things they have listed. I feel like it makes it really well rounded and Bodie seems to enjoy it. The work sheets are super easy for him, but he struggles with the creative things. This gives a chance to use both.

I am inspired by: classical education. At this point it is still intimidating to me, but I can really see the benefits and may try more of it as time goes by. Any advice? Pointers.

Questions I have: Has anyone done classical and standard education? What are pros and cons of each?

I felt like it was a great week back and am excited to what this next week holds as well.