Its that time of year when Back to School sales are in full swing and summer is winding down. When I cannot resist the purchase of $.25 crayons and glue sticks for no good reason (I think I still have 10 unused boxes). But to be fair Nic has a thing for $.17 notebooks. Fall clothes are entering the store all too soon and everyone is pouring over their supply lists.
We started school this week. It may seem early but I want to end school within the first couple weeks of May as well as allow myself some days when school just will not get done. I didn't think Kindergarten ended well last year. Belle was over our curriculum and frankly I was too. I knew what I wanted to use for our 2nd homeschooling year before the 1st one had ended. You can read about our curriculum here. I have pretty high hopes this year and I hope it lives up to expectations.
Belle was given the challenge to finish a summer bridge book before school started. It's basically a workbook that covers kindergarten skills over the summer. I was hoping it would help with brain drain. I told her that we'd go out for donuts the first day if she was able to accomplish this goal. She did with 3 days to spare.
We are only 3 days in to school this year and things are going great. We are doing things a little different this year. We no longer have a "classroom" and apparently Belle loves this. She didn't like sitting at her desk, she much prefers the dining room table. And a big shocker has been that she has asked to do spelling. This was always a struggle last year. And while some things change, somethings stay the same. Belle still hates handwriting. But so far she is able to get through it if she can listen to music. Something about having Pandora set to a kids music channel does the trick. I'm going with it, whatever works. I hope that this year will firm up Belle's reading skills. She's doing pretty good, but still very rough around the edges. And she's doing well in math. Just today on our walk she figured out that 10+10+10 = 30.
One thing that I didn't do a whole lot of last year was Science. This year Belle begs for some sort of science experiment EVERY DAY. Ugh, not my forte. But I'm going to surprise her with an online science class next week. It will involve science experiments (if I can find all the supplies this weekend). And the best part, it's free and taught by a real scientist. I just need to get my hands on some sort of substance called "water glass" so that Belle can make a bouncy ball.
Oh and then there is Ethan. He's my crazy kid. A bit like nailing Jello to the wall kind of kid. I had high hopes for his preschool year. And of course the first day was pretty sobering. He wanted no part of sitting and listening to a book (although just today he sat and listened to Belle's Helen Keller book). His favorite phrase is "I can't know". But he pleasantly surprised me in other ways. He has loved all the crafts we've done that has involve coloring or cutting. Last year he wanted no part of that sort of thing. And he's doing really good with his tracing. Each week we are focusing on a letter, so this week he is learning how to write his A's. While he has known his letter sounds for a year, we are trying to begin to recognize word's beginning sounds as well as rhyme.
And since Ethan is my crazy active kid, we've enrolled him in soccer and gymnastics. He's excited for his "soccer team". And while I was having Belle try out a gymnastics class Ethan sat beside me and said sadly "I wish I could try". How am I supposed to say no to that. So luckily there is a preschool class at the very same time. He's quite the natural. He swung on the bars and jumped on the trampoline like he was a pro.
I've been very pleased with how school has gone this week. Although it is only the 3rd day. =)
