The week in review

After a difficult start to the week, I think it went pretty well. The key, I'm learning, is to not really have too much planned and to be *very* flexible in terms of timelines.

It is HARD to get any teaching done when Rowan is awake. When awake Rowan wants to either be (a) in my arms, or (b) causing trouble. So, when Rowan is happily occupied with something other than me, it is usually a toilet brush in a toilet, or the newly planted brussel sprout pots, or dog food. Darn baby!

But, back to school work. This week we worked on form drawing, a Waldorf concept. And, we did a ton of reading. We're just about done the first in the 'Boxcar Children' series and we all really like it. We also started 'Little House on the Prairie.'

It is amazing how it has turned from HOT SUMMER to cold, windy, rainy fall. It is such a welcome change.

This coming week, we are going to start a Math block on the 4 processes. I have not decided whether I am going to use the Enki stories or Christopherus.

We're also going to start learning recorder, which means that either tonight or tomorrow I need to learn some recorder!!

Well, the kids are throwing all the dolls at the wall and I can't concentrate anymore, so I am off.

One of those days.

Today was one of those days, and not in a good way.

I think it was because I didn't eat breakfast. 8 cups of coffee (1/2 caf) with milk and sugar does not equal breakfast, at least not to my blood sugar and related mood. So, I was not a very patient mama today. Poor Clarke kiddos!

Also, we have reached a milestone in Rowan's babyhood. I get... well... MAD at him sometimes now. Yep, when he was just a sweet smiling lump, I never ever got mad at him. Even when he grew past lumphood and started crawling and then walking, he was still just... well, perfect in each and every possible way. But now he has developed a free will and it is driving me crazy. Not always, but sometimes. And he is still the sweetest little thing and adorable and completely hilarious, so we will definitely keep him, but oh my gosh does he drive me nuts sometimes?!

Ommmmmmmmmm.

Playing in the creek

More on homeschooling, warning lots of words, NO pictures.

This is just some boring old writing, no pictures of the Extremely Cute and Talenteds.

I think homeschooling is going to be a lot of trial and error- hey, just like gardening!

It is very difficult, I am finding, to decide what kind of curriculum will really work for my kids. When I started researching this, mid summer '07, I fell head over heels in love with Enki
At the risk of sounding like a total New Age/Hippie freak, it just really spoke to me. I knew in my bones that it was right for Noah. Well, long story short... though there is a lot that I still love about Enki (and that we will still use), we just cannot be hardcore Enki'ers.

So, then I thought, well maybe pure Waldorf might work better. For more on Waldorf philosophy look here
So I bought the Christopherus first grade materials. I really like everything I received from Christopherus, but as with Enki, I just don't think it's for us. I will probably use some of it, but not a whole 100% All Waldorf/All the time approach.

After spending hours (in few minute chunks- HA! the life of a mom) reading homeschooling message boards I decided to try another approach: Moving Beyond The Page

First we got their recommended math curriculum, Right Start math.
We started that yesterday and Noah quickly informed me that math was his favorite subject. Granted, we flew through the first 14 lessons as total review, but he really liked them. He wanted to keep going, but I insisted we take a break. It is very well laid out and easy to use and has tons of fun manipulatives, and I think we will really enjoy it.

Then today we got our package from MBTP. I only ordered one "concept" to start, finally realizing that I ought to try things out before I invest a gajillion bucks in them. So, I ordered the 6-8 Culture Concept.
I am so SO excited about it. I really think that Noah is going to love it, and it is going to be just what we were looking for, along with the Right Start math, the reading stuff (I'm getting to that), and the Waldorfy/Enki aspects that we will keep (crafts, nature stories, recorder....)

Because MBTP doesn't have actual reading instruction, I also bought their recommended reading program: ABeCeDarian
Noah is reading SO well these days. I'm not sure that we really need this, but we'll give it a try and see.

So, that's that. We are all really enjoying our homeschooling adventure this fall. Lilah is going to preschool two mornings a week and loving it so far.

We've joined 2 homeschooling groups: MASC
and 'Waldorf in the Piedmont.' Noah and Lilah both are taking classes with MASC on Monday afternoons. They are taught by other MASC parents. I'm planning to teach a knitting class in the Spring! This fall Noah is taking Spanish and board games. Well, the board games is just playing board games. Lilah is doing a young kids language class and music class. They're both also taking nature classes once a month through MASC.

WitP meets once a week at a beautiful creek to play. The last TWO weeks we have seen snakes!!!

Also, Noah is playing soccer, which means 2 practices a week and at least 1 game per weekend.

And both big kids are going to Sunday School at St John's Episcopal on Sundays.

I am really really thinking about finding a stable and signing them up for riding lessons, but I'm worried that will make us TOO busy. Thinking, thinking....

Homeschooling

So...

I have not posted anything in so long, and because I have not posted in so long it is hard to get started again because I feel like I have so much to catch up on. So, in the spirit of actually getting back here, I am going to not try to catch up. Instead, I'll just jump right back in, okay?

So, yes... homeschooling. We are, well Noah is. Lilah is going to preschool 2 mornings a week.

First- pictures! These are from the first day of school here at St John's Academy...