Homeschooling

When we chose to homeschool the boys, it was so that they would have the best education possible especially since Jaxson was so smart I didn't want him to go to school and be bored in a classroom. The whole process has been a learning experience for us all.

I know families who choose to "unschool" which basically means they use everyday situations as learning tools and don't really use a specific curriculum or plan much activity. Some days I envy them (especially at the end of the year when I'm playing catch up with everything). I would love to just take things as they come and make sure the kids are learning from everything. And in a lot of ways, we do this, too.

BUT, since I can't even organize stuff that's given to me I can't see myself ever going that route...though I think it's a fine route to take.

This summer we are trying to do some sort of school every morning. I want to do fun things and stuff they want to learn about. Jaxson is a history nut so I would really like to find some history things that make the rest of his "school" seem less like school and more like learning is fun. Carson loves animals and asks so many questions I can't keep up with him. Edison is just getting started and is a little resistant to the whole idea, but he enjoys working on stuff with his brothers. Ella is just too little right now, but at least she hung out with us in the school room today and wasn't all that disruptive.

Today was my first try at "summer school" and overall I would give it a solid C, but that's just average and I want to do so much better than average. Eddie read one of his phonics readers from Progressive Phonics. Carson reread a story from one of his text books. Jaxson read two little novels. Then we worked together on a couple of Scholastic newsletters that we didn't have time for during the school year.

And, like I said, Carson asked about 100 questions while he was reading a story about a crab trying to find a new home..."Do crabs breathe air? What is a mammal? How can a Kangaroo and a human both be mammals when the kangaroo has hair everywhere? Is a snake a mammal? No, it's a reptile...a lizard, now there's a reptile." and those are just the ones I remember - and he asked this just as fast as you just read them. I am keeping a notebook now so that as he asks a question, I can write it down and come back to it instead of just ignoring it and trying to move on through whatever we're doing.   :)

I would like to continue with similar activities this summer while throwing in a fun game here and there and making sure that everything we're doing the rest of the day that has value and learning potential is capitalized on. As for tomorrow, we will just continue without much of a plan and hope that by next week we're just swimming right along.