Training Days

"Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it."

Proverbs 22:6

 

The time has come to begin our second year of homeschooling.  Our high school boys will begin school on August 6th, just over two weeks away; so I decided it might be a good idea to get our younger kids accustomed to the idea of doing school again.  I had the best of intentions on keeping our toes wet this summer and doing reading/math each morning, but then vacation happened and we never got back to it.  It is probably a good thing, I think we all needed a bit of a break!

 

The idea came to me when I started to look at mapping out our school year.  Maybe we could start slowly, just a subject or two for the first week and add from there.  So this week we started our "training time"

We are working on our morning routine.  We started a variation of the Accountable kids program.  I bought the book and read it this summer.  Then, Brett made the boards for me.  The first peg holds their morning chores right now.  They are flipped over in the picture onto the second peg because they have been completed.  The third peg holds their school subjects and will also get flipped over onto the fourth peg once completed each day.  On the last peg is a punch chart.  They get one punch for each activity completed daily.  They are earning tablet time by completing their daily work.

Part of our "training time" is working on calendar

we are also working on an obedience bible study.

This week we learned-

1. Obey without delay (study of Jonah)

2. Obey completely (study of King Saul)

3. Obey without question (study of Abram)

4. Obey joyfully (study of Moses)

In preparing for this school year, I have spent a good amount of time in the study of God's word and through prayer asking for God's direction for our study this year.  Last year we used a box curriculum, My Father's World.  It was a great curriculum and required very little preparation on my part, which was awesome for a first time home schooler.  This year however, I felt God leading our family in a different direction.  I started reading, "The Well Trained Mind" last spring and felt prepared to venture out on our own with curriculum this year.

 Memory Boards

Reading/Spelling Curriculum

Kate/Andrew- All About Reading, All About Spelling

Emily/Matt- Rod and Staff

 

Science Curriculum

Apologia Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day

 

History Curriculum

Story of the World 1

Math Curriculum

Math U See Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta/Epsilon

 

Grammar Curriculum

Kate/Andrew- First Language Lessons

Matt- Rod and Staff 3

Emily- Rod and Staff 5

 

So, week one of training is almost complete.  The kids have done well.  I am extremely happy that we started our year off this way.  We will have our first official day of school on August 6, 2014.

 

Our new upstairs classroom is ready.

My prayer request now is that I can find lots of activities to keep our Luke occupied and engaged throughout our home schooling day. 

Since this is Luke's preferred activity during the day, you can probably understand why I might be worried. 

Here are a few of the ideas I have come up with for Luke

1.  We put a door on the homeschool room in hopes of keeping him within eyesight.

2.  We started "quiet" room time this week where he spends about 30 minutes playing and reading in his bedroom.

3.  My sister has encouraged snack/educational tv show in his highchair as another activity

4.  Sibling/Buddy playtime

5.  Tot school tubs

I know that with time, patience, and routine, Luke will not only thrive in being a part of our homeschooling experience this year, but will enjoy learning and growing along side his siblings.

 

I am looking forward to updating our blog this year with our homeschooling experiences