A Day in my Homeschooling Life

After reading two chapters of "Our Island Story" I looked up at the clock and noticed that at 2:54 pm school was still in session and both children were happy.

It's been a full day, with plenty of learning and little squabbling (I type as I now hear screaming in the schoolroom - is that my mini-alphabet fighting with each other, or is it their wooden people warring; acting out The Battle of Stamford Bridge and The Battle of Hastings (I've since checked - thankfully, it is their wooden people and armies in the midst of block castles)?

Phonics and Reading, Marmots and Squirrels, Hurricanes (thanks, Theresa, for the teaching idea I picked up from you yesterday!) and English History, Music and Forts. Hmmm, I don't see the Math in my list today. There's still time. Although it can be trying at times, having my children constantly by my side, underfoot and within earshot (boy, are my ears shot some days!) what I love about homeschooling is just that - there' still time. Most likely when Daddy gets home. He loves to quiz them about their day, testing their math skills and teaching them spelling. He has such a way about him. A man who is able to make learning fun is a grand man indeed. My memory flashes back to the first year we were married - it was spring of 2001 (we'd only been married less than five months) and the birthday card I gave him none of his friends could understand. It was a picture of a daddy knealing down to his little child (whether it was a picture of a boy or a girl I really don't recall). How odd, they must have thought, since we were newlyweds and children nowhere in sight. However, there was something I saw in my new husband which has always stuck with me: in spite of his "gruffness" (which I insist is a product of his geographical environment) the gentle way he is able to teach his children something new constantly amazes me.

Anyway, as far as my day has gone, it has been a good and full school day topped off with meatball soup simmering on the stove, piano lessons for all three of us and happy cries and shouts from my mini-alphabet as they play and their little brains sort through all they've learned today. I sure hope some of it sticks!

PS - if you're a fellow homeschooler, I would love to hear about a day in your homeschooling life! Or if you're a teacher in a public school, I'd love to hear a comment about your day as well!

Apology Accepted!

John Bunyon's apology - is it over yet?! Why, oh why must I read this? I can hardly get through it and barely understand it with it's old english words, much less explain very much of it to my Mini Alphabet. Dost and doth, wouldst and woldest along with many words ending in "eth" and "est" not to mention the order all these words are placed! I wondered aloud how long it used to take people using old english to express a thought?

So nearly ready to put the book aside, when I read a simple line containing "stick like burs" and all was changed! Both children exclaimed aloud, "We know what that is!" and a renewed excitement for what I was reading (by hearers and reader alike!) took place. Three short paragraphs was all we had left so we carried on. Our next reading will finally be the actual story itself!

Thankfully, I have tucked away in the back of my mind my sister's encouragement, "Don't give up" even though the old english is difficult to read, "it will pay off."

Ok. I'm not giving up yet. I can wait for payday. Apology accepted.