Ethan has made it through all his single digit addition facts! We started working on subtraction concepts this week. He’s already done some of that in his head by solving for unknowns. Now he gets to do it with symbols. I’ve been pretty excited about his progress. I want to make sure he really masters concepts before moving on to the next thing. So far, he’s been mastering things pretty quickly.

Today Ethan was working on reading the “ou” and “ow” combinations like in the words “flour” and “flower”. We also did some geography extra handwriting and worked on some Christmas music. While I was messaging Nathan today, Nathan decided to write some of his message to Ethan. Ethan could actually read most of it without help!

Audrey was feeling a little sad on our way home from AWANA tonight. Nathan was asking Ethan a lot of math questions and she felt left out. So, Nathan gave a chance to answer some different questions tailored to her. I took Ethan in the house while Nathan and Audrey were still talking. A few minutes later, Audrey came upstairs and said to me, “1 plus 1 equals 2″. She was very proud of herself. Nathan did a great job of reminding her that we think she is smart and special too.

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It about time for a homeschool update.

Believe it or not, we’ve actually completed over 30 days of school for this year already!

Today’s highlight was working on solving for unknowns for his math work. He did fabulously. I had the manipulative blocks out for him so he could use those to visualize the concept. He used them one time and didn’t really need them again. He did it all in his head. These are just simple addition problems, but seeing him easily figure out the unknown numbers encourages me that as we move on to more subtracting, he wont have much trouble thinking “backwards”.

Audrey keeps hounding me to “do school” with her. Lately, we’ve been working through some preschool workbooks I picked up at Target. If I can keep Isaac occupied, it’s really a nice one-on-one time with her.

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Ethan has been working very hard at his school work! I have a first grader! Of all the things that we work on, Science is his favorite. He loves the hands on stuff and learning about how things work. Last week we were learning about seeds and we read a great book from the library on dandelions and how the seeds travel. We went to the park later that day and he was watching the seeds float through the air and guessing where they would all land. He can also tell you why the dandelions grow back even if you pick them! I love that life is so interesting to him.

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We’re using a curriculum that recommends the book Drawing With Children by Mona Brookes. I picked it up from the library recently and had a chance to do one of the exercises with the kids today.

Here’s Ethan’s work. He copied the pictures from the first and third lines into the boxes below. I thought he did a great job!

Nathan didn’t want to miss out on the fun. So, he did one himself.

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After doing some research, I decided that our school schedule would follow a more balanced calendar approach. So, we’re actually getting ready to start school in a little less than a month! The idea of the balanced calendar is that our school breaks are spread out throughout the 12 months instead of having a 3 month break all at once. It’s the same number of days of school, but it’s just spread out throughout the year differently.

I like the idea of this because less knowledge is lost, we don’t have as many unstructured days at one time (not that I couldn’t plan some different sort of structure apart from school), and we can take advantage of the nicer summer weather for outdoor projects.

I’ve made a weekly list of supplies for the first 10 weeks of school. It feels so good to have that done! Hopefully, this will eliminate last minute scrambling to find things I don’t normally keep here at home. I’m also getting ready to work on compiling a list of read-aloud books that will be appropriate for Ethan and Audrey this year. The last big thing that I need to do is to come up with a basket of toys and supplies that Isaac can use while I’m working with Ethan and Audrey. Keeping him occupied will be one of my biggest challenges!

I let him play with stickers while Audrey was doing some coloring earlier this week and that worked out great!

Ethan will be doing 1st grade this year and Audrey, since she wont be 5 until the end of September, will be doing some pre-K projects with me. I’m looking at using some of the resources from letteroftheweek.com and I’ll be reading lots of books to her. I don’t really see any reason to rush into Kindergarten since she wouldn’t be starting for another year if we weren’t homeschooling.

I’m really looking forward to blogging more about our homeschool experience this year!

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We may be on summer break, but that hasn’t actually stopped me from requesting  educational books from the library that I can read to the kids. This week I’ve been reading books about the American flag. There were so many quality children’s books on the subject. It made me happy! We’re all ready for Flag Day next week.

What did I learn? Children’s books are an excellent way to learn history! Also, the story of Betsy Ross may or may not be true. I don’t know if I had learned that before.  Betsy Ross’s grandson claimed to hear the account from his aunt some time after his grandmother’s death. It was interesting to read and see drawings of the different variations of the numbers and placement of the stars and stripes. Did you know that there are designs in place for a flag with up to 56 stars should we add other states?

And now you’ve had your history lesson for the day!

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