Week 4

Handwriting Practice

Joshua's handwriting practice, he gave it to his friend.

Working on math.

Nikolas working on handwriting.

Taking turns reading to each other.

Reading to us.

Focused on math.

Week 3

Finished week three today. Still moving things around and finding our groove. Nikolas is flying through his math book, literally he is on page 103 of 250. He picks up on new things so quickly and he isn't even 5 yet! His birthday is in October. Nikolas told me that math and science are his favorite things to do in school.

Joshua is so stubborn and sometimes so difficult to get through to. It can be very frustrating for both of us. He is really smart and reading more and more words every day. But, I know he is easily distracted and really doesn't like to be told what to do. This may be a hereditary issue. Just sayin'. But we did talk last night about what he enjoys most and least. He told me he likes science the best (after guitar and art) and then math. He is over all the handwriting and copywork. I think I'll back off on that only because his handwriting is pretty good already.

Joshua's passport for Expedition Earth

This week we finished learning about Egypt and started Ancient Greece and Rome. We learned about weather and it was great that the boys could tell their dad why the thunder comes after the lightning and what the thunder really is.
I think I mentioned this is week two but I wish everything held my boys' attention like Curious George. He is a miracle worker!

Week 2

It is interesting to watch how different my boys are. Nikolas colors lightly and slowly. Joshua colors hard and dark. Nikolas is going through about ten pages a day in his math book! He really loves to listen to me read. Joshua, on the other hand, is really hard to work with sometimes. He has a hard time focusing and is still not a fan of workbooks. But he also likes to listen to me read but he has to be playing with trains or something while I'm reading, which is fine by me as long as he is quiet. His reading is always improving and instead of reciting our memory verse he read it today. We are finishing the Core pretty quickly but the language arts seems to drag a bit, I may cut some out because they are a little ahead of the game with phonics and reading. Week 2 has been another success. Whew!

We learned about rainbows and weather this week.

Ready for lunch!

 We also learned about the Egyptians and did some hieroglyphics. 

We also finished The Boxcar Children, early! I have really enjoyed reading it to the boys. They always want to know what happens with the kids next. We finished it a week early! I am enjoying the books that Sonlight has chosen, it is only week 2. We also started reading The Complete Adventures of Curious George. The boys love George! Two other books we read that are not part of our curriculum are The Brave Young Knight by Karen Kingsbury and What Happens When I Talk to God? by Stormie Omartian. These were both great books with vibrant pictures and even better words. I highly recommend them!

What Happens When I Talk to God?: The Power of Prayer for Boys and Girls By Stormie Omartian / Harvest House Publishers It's never too early to assure your children that their prayers really do make a difference! Bestselling author Stormie Omartian helps kids ages 3-7 get to know God better, thank Him for His love and ask for His help in tough times. Bright, contemporary watercolors present a beautiful picture of kids growing closer to God in prayer.

The Brave Young Knight By Karen Kingsbury / Zonderkidz What distinguishes a great leader? Is he faster, stronger, or smarter than everybody else? Not necessarily, as one young knight learns. Join him as he competes with other boys to become prince of the land---and discovers that those who have the courage to fight for what is right and true are the real winners.

Week 1

We completed week one of the 2012-2013 school year. Sonlight is going to be great! It made my life so easy and the boys enjoyed the reading. Joshua would rather read than do math but he is liking the Math from Critical Thinking better than others we have tried. Nikolas loves the math and does about 4 pages per day. Explode the Code is always a hit, Joshua is doing his online right now. It went well, better and easier than I anticipated. There was some whining and moaning but we got through. Next week we have Vacation Bible School and I don't plan on doing any school. Then on 8/13 we will be back to 4.5 days of school per week. I think it will be a great year!

Celebrating Dad's birthday at ComicX for dinner.

Final Box Day

Why was the most exciting the box the last one to arrive? It finally got here last night!

Joshua trying to move the box for me. We didn't get it too far.

Pulling out the paper.

Happy for new books!

All organized into piles for labeling and storage. 

Organizing curriculum!

Joshua asked to start school tomorrow! I love the sound of that. sigh. I am so excited to read all these books  with my boys. We might not wait until 8/13 like I had planned. We shall see.
This is the link to Our Box Day on Sonlight!

Planning... the plan, anyway.

Praise God that Sonlight is mostly planned for me. That is one reason I chose it. Going to school full time myself doesn't leave a lot of extra time to plan. Sonlight allows me to spend more time with my family and less time at my desk. If you click on the banner you get $5 off when you order!

I am a planner by nature though and these are a few things I use to plan:
-The Old Schoolhouse Planner for general planning like days we'll school, days we won't. The planners have a lot of pages that you can customize and are so much more than calendars. The new TOS planners are available for download now. If you sign up for a membership with Schoolhouse Teachers then you get the planners (ALL of them) for FREE! Plus The Old Schoolhouse magazine and new e-book every month and a TON of great resources. If you are military then you should still be able to sign up for FREE! YEP! FREE for military families!
-I stinking love Pinterest for so many reasons. I am very visual and it helps me so much. I'm sure it sucks more than a little time from my day but I have found some great stuff there.
-And this was a great tip that I will be doing this year for sure to keep schoolwork organized!

My fruity purse size planner!

-I also have a purse size weekly planner that I carry with me. I don't put anything school-y in it unless we are doing a field trip or something like that. It helps me plan everything else and keep track of my husband, too. I got it at Staples and Joshua picked it out for me. I added the tabs (they are from Martha Stewart's collection).

-In my last post I mentioned the Better Binders from Staples, they have reinforced binding and will last a lot longer than traditional 3 ring binders. I added some pocket dividers to mine and I am ready to fill it up! My "To-Do Today" came from Time-Warp Wife.

DONE

I finally got all our curriculum ordered! I am so excited for it all to get there. Hubs? Not so much. Poor guy has to carry it all home. I have updated the 2012-13 curriculum page for you to check out. But I will list what we chose with bonus items right here, right now. The kids are in bed, hubs is traveling and I should be doing homework but I can procrastinate a bit longer on that!
The majority of schooling will follow Sonlight Core A: Intro to the World: Cultures. It will include Bible, social studies, history, geography, lots and lots of reading, as well as a timeline to keep along this Sonlight journey. I will also be using Sonlight's Science A: Biology, Botany and Physics. Joshua loved Explode the Code last year so he will continue with that and Nikolas will start it. We will be adding in A Reason for Handwriting for a little extra practice. I will be following Sonlight's schedule for language arts. For math I chose Mathematical Reasoning from Critical Thinking. We will be using See the Light for art. I got the Art Class set for one year of lessons. And Joshua will be doing regular lessons on his guitar with Alfred's. I also got the Jesus Calling for Kids devotional. I love mine and I think it will be great to read together.
Some exciting tools that I was able to get are the Staple Better Binders (they are on sale but only until 7/14) and I am so happy that I did! Next I got a new printer because the one I got last year is... junk. And the cherry on top... a laminator! {I forgot to mention new sharpies, pens, pencils and highlighters, they make me so happy!}
Something crazy that happened was me winning a $250 gift certificate to Veritas Press! I used it to purchase quite a few reference books, the In A Flash series for math, lots of books for the boys and a couple for me, too. What a blessing that was. Everyone knows a homeschooler always needs more books!
My poor husband. teehee.

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