homeschooling thus far, again

February. You all know my thoughts on February by now. But you know really, dressing children for outdoor play aside, it IS nice. Its cozy. There is the woodstove crackling and hot tea and knitting. All good things. And then of course, Spring IS coming.

So I tell myself.

And yet.

The snow is beautiful. It glitters on the trees as the sun rises. It glows on them from behind our little woods as the sun sets.

And yet.

Somewhere around the beginning of this month all of February in its February-ness got to me. Dour. Grumpy. Etc. And as I was kicking toys out of the way to find our homeschool supplies, yelling at the kids to COME AND DO SCHOOL I was kinda like...WOAH...What in THE HELL am I doing with this homeschool bit???

IT IS TOO MUCH.

I CANNOT DO IT ANYMORE.

Is it okay to admit that?

I am not in this space now. But for a week or so (or more) I was, like,  um, looking at jobs and researching local child care/school options.

Here is the thing.

It is hard. Homeschooling is adding another thing to our day. Like a job's worth of a thing. And I have to prepare and research and plan and read up on things and organize supplies and ohmeohmylifeitellyouisoverwhelmingitslateatnightishouldnotbetypingishouldbesleeping.

But, here is the other thing.

I AM doing it. So. There is that. And we are getting into our groove and learning what we like and learning how we learn and I'm trying my darnedest not to be hard on myself especially when friends post pics of their kids reading full chapter books at the age of five and I WANT to compare so BAD. But.

Isn't parenting like this, homeschooling aside. We make it about us too easily, but in the end this is about him. And them. All three of them. And us as a family. And what we have determined to be the best route for them thus far. And this IS it.

SO.

I shall keep working. Because you know, I think I could be good at this. And truly its amazing how I am feeling myself stretched to be better, a better me, you know? And not for myself, but for them. Which, in the end makes me a better me for me too. Right?

Here are some pics.

after our alphabet journey intro we did several weeks
of copy work where we made our own readers based
on a favorite story from the journey. little man
chose the fisherman and his wife, by grimm brothers
and the golden bird, by the same.
after those two we started to do an intro of small
letters, reading a chapter of the book "The Wise Enchanter"
for each letter.

we are also doing the "Alphaphonics" reading book,
which is really simple and slow and perfect

this was today :)

 

my chalk drawing of the E story

a fun way to work on sight words, following
a path, taking a step forward when he gets it right
one step back when he needed too much help.
(little miss following along for fun)

teaching place value. notice my lovely (sarcasm) hand made math process gnomes in the corner?
why gnomes to introduce math? um, i dont know! but gnomes are fun and their 
obsession with gems leads to a lot of great math game options... ;)

and of course...lots of outdoor time!

proud of his number one page.



little miss had to do one too

roman numerals "secret symbols!" with corresponding gems
to teach amounts. they loved this game which
went along with the gnome math story we are telling