heartofthematteronline is doing a blog hop this week where families post “A Day in the Life” and I thought I would join in on the fun.
*Disclaimer- This is only the 3rd day we’ve been doing this. A year from now I’m going to look back on this and laugh*
First of all, let me introduce you to my biggest challenge when it comes to homeschooling:
Cute, blue-eyed babe, soaking with drool, toddler who thinks that everything that he spies is his and all he needs to do to claim it is to shriek long and loud! He naps once a day and for much the rest of the time that he is awake, he’s frustrated and cranky because he wants something he can’t have or is trying to do something that isn’t working the way he wants it to. Schooling presents a bit of a problem for Isaac because Ethan and Audrey get to use things that he would love to get his hands (and mouth) on. Today I pulled out some Easter eggs to distract him! It ended up working pretty well.
I’m trying to work our routine to cause the least amount of Isaac melt-downs.
6:45- Kids get up, eat breakfast, clear their dishes from the table, get dressed, make their beds and wave, “goodbye” to Daddy.
We do morning chores. I start laundry and load the dishwasher. Ethan washes and dries the table. Audrey washes the bathroom countertop.
8:00- Ethan, Audrey and I do a reading from the Children’s Bible and we pray together.
Once that is done our official “school work” begins:
Update our calendar and days of the week and do our weather chart.
Table Time in the kitchen for Ethan and Audrey. They think they get to do whatever they want, but I fill their little craft bins in the evening with cutting and pasting projects. They spend a good amount of time on this because they love it and it helps with their fine motor skills.
While that is going on, I play with Isaac. We do puzzles, read books or I pull out something like the Easter eggs pictured above!
9:00- Snack time. While they are eating and Isaac is locked in his booster seat I introduce the number of the day and then I hide some printout of that number throughout the Living Room and have the kids look for them.
If the weather is nice, we take some time to play outside for a while. Some days I let them make up whatever they want to do and some days we play hot potato or variations on other kindergarten level games that we can do with the three of us.
11:00- Lunch/Clean Up
Isaac goes down for a nap after lunch. During that time we’ve been working on our ABC’s: singing, using flashcards, other fun letter games and do work through our Math-U-See Primer book. Then we all grab a pillow and blanket and find a comfortable spot for story time. I’m working through a list of fun read out loud books.
2 evenings a week, Nathan does more in-depth science with Ethan.
By Labor Day, we’ll have finished 10 days of basic alphabet fun and we’ll be ready to add to our routine working on writing the letter and number each week and focusing on letter sounds and starting to put letters together. Reading! Yeah!
Sounds like you are all having fun! Good times. And remember, Isaac is getting older every day, so it won’t be long until he isn’t such a problem. I know – it seems like it will be a long time, but in the whole scheme of things it won’t. Until then, just keep being creative and you will stay on top of things!
Love,
Chris