First Day of "School"

I suppose it is time to get back to school. What I love about homeschooling is how much of real life is school. We do some schoolbooks, but we also do a lot more of real life!

Colt and Dane are doing hard core online highschool diploma courses this year. Cassidy is waiting for his SEVENTY SIX books to come in the mail. I LOVE how good quality, living books can fill a child's mind with knowledge and cause them to love to read. His books will take him through the history of the Eastern Hemisphere in one year.

But the rest of the clan are waiting for mum to get things organized. I plan to do Five In A Row with the majority of them: Austin, Cooper, and Mesai. But I have realized that Gadisae is not ready for school. Though she is tall, she is definitely not much older than Briton. He is a puny little thing - we all know that, so size doesn't determine much. Gadisae is supposed to be his 'twin', with being 3 months older than him. Plus being a girl, we all know that gives her a head start! LOL!! Not that my boys like to hear that this might be true!

So Briton and Gadisae will be doing lots of preschool activities, and Mesai and Cooper will certainly join them for all the hands on crafts and play, as I am a firm believer in "Better Late Than Early", when it comes to education. I believe that they have so much energy and imaginative play locked up inside and to tie them to a desk fulltime, before they are ready is not the right way for me. Sorry folks. I like them to play, as it is no time at all before they are busy, busy, busy with schoolwork and then working hard at college and jobs. What is 6 or 7 years in the scheme of 70-90?

After dinner and baths, Mesai and Gadisae go to their rooms and play quietly. Last night, I had drawn some things for them to copy. Gadisae proudly showed me her 'drawing'. It did not resemble anything. Mesai, on the other hand, had drawn exactly what I had drawn. I then proceeded to write out Mesai's full name, so that she could learn it for school. Gadisae asked me to do the same for her. I did. Mesai then proceeded to copy it out nicely, as a 5-6 year old would. Gadisae did her best: she drew a bunch of little half moons and circles beside the letters and then happily showed me her work.



Mesai can write banana, flower, car, apple - but they are mostly spelled wrong: bnanana, appl, flowr, car. I think these are words they saw written on the board at the Transition House because when I asked her to write bus, she looked at me funny. *smile*

But when I called out the letters of the alphabet in all different order, Mesai got all of them correct, minus one!

Writing Names

This morning, I got the big boys going on school and then tried to work my way from child to child getting them going on 'something'. I am FAR from organized yet, but I did want them beginning something. Mesai started the ball rolling by finding a LeapFrog Math Game - I took the opportunity to show her how it worked and get her going on that. She has a real attention span! She was on that for about 30-60 minutes!!

Math Time

Cassidy, my creative, keep himself busy child, decided he was going to build a dinosaur world. He has taken cardboard boxes, a gluegun, xacto knife, and scissors, and has begun building a world that he will later cover with paper mache and then paint and shellac. This all began because he was at a friend's house where the boy has a ton of dinosaurs and neat things. So Mr. Creative came home and decided to create a world of his own. I love homeschooling! He plugged in an audio: The Hiding Place, and sat listening to a biography while having fun.

Briton - With My Hair Dressing Kit

Is the boy about to give himself a haircut? He is patiently waiting for me to get to him.

Cooper Doing His Leap Frog

I have had this stuff for two years and I think I can finally say it will get used for what it is worth!! And there is even a different machine for each age bracket!

Two Cute Preschoolers

When I sat and taught these two how to use this book together, it was so cute. They worked as a team. I think Briton figured he was smarter than Gadisae. When it was her turn to push the pages to make the sounds he would take her finger and press.

Austin on His Spelling

By 11:30 he was asking to go out and play. Uhh, NOT. Sorry kid, school lets out after nap. Well, in theory it does. In reality it finished after spelling!! LOL!! Got to get more organized first before I get get tough in lessons.

Science Boy

Grade 12

How much nicer is this than a desk?? LOL!! Not my style of working!

I'd Say They Are Settled In - Just Like the Rest of the Apes!

Lunch time and the monkeys arrived. *smile*

After the morning, Cassidy made a pumpkin pie and Dane went for a 2km run, then rode his bike all over the yard playing with the kids. Cooper, Mesai, Austin, and Gadisae (she was a tag-along) began our first Five In A Row book. I have no clue what they got out of the lesson, but they seemed to enjoy reading the story book. We will continue to tomorrow.