(Mommy) School

Today in school:

1. Andrew looked up the weather and temperature on the internet and recorded it in his notebook. He has a line graph of the temperature that he's been working on and a chart where he records the state of the sky and the types of clothes we might need outside each day.

2. I wrote Andrew a letter. We've been working on the -ing and -y word endings and both types of words were in his letter. First he had to look for those kinds of words and we recorded them on a list. Then we wrote other -ing and -y words on the list. I pointed out that the letter would have a few tricky words that he doesn't know yet. I wrote them on a wipe board and had him find them. THEN, he read the letter. He read it a few times and then we talked about what the letter said.

3. We've been working on using counting beans in math. I painted one side of the beans brown and the other side red. Then I would give him a set of 6 or 7 or 8. He would shake them up and spill them out and record all the ways there are to make 6 or 7 or 8 (3 red beans and 5 brown beans is 8 beans. 2 red beans and 6 brown beans is also 8 beans).

4. He finished a story he was working on. He's written about 5 stories so far. The latest one is called "Snowballs". It goes something like this: "Mommy! Watch out for snowballs! The snowball crashed. It crashed into 2 pieces. I threw another snowball. The snowball crashed. It crashed into 4 pieces. It crashed into Mommy." For these stories, he sketches out the pictures by himself. Then together we work on recording the words. The little words he more or less knows and can write by himself. The bigger words I sound out and he writes down the sounds he hears. I wish his writing was more independent and I'm not sure if it's not independent because I tend to hover, or because he really does need lots of redirection to stay on task for writing. My students would be able to do this independently and Andrew really can't yet. I'm trying to figure out what to do about that.

5. We read a book called Snow. First we looked through the book to figure out the setting of the story. We figured out it takes places in a city in the winter and that it mostly takes place outside. Then we tried to figure out some of the plot from just the pictures. Then we read the book. I used to have my students make "Text To Self" connections. Like, "this book reminds me of a time that I thought it was going to snow..." etc. But Andrew really struggled with that. The book is clearly pretend and he kept explaining over and over that nothing like this happened to him because the book is pretend. I think I need to back up and talk more about real versus pretend before I work on these connection pieces.

And not in (Mommy) School:
We made scones this morning! Andrew had to find "1 cup" and "2/3 cup" on the measuring cup. He read some of the ingredients and we talked a lot about 'zest' and what it is.

Andrew got his flashlight and held it up to all kinds of things to see what it would shine through and what it wouldn't. It shines through his hand, but not his foot. The netting of the trampoline, his shirt, my hair, but not the wall. Some plastic, but not all plastic. And it shines right through the juice. Even lights it up a little.

Sometimes I panic that we are not doing enough so I wanted to write down what we are doing to remind myself that we are doing enough. That he is learning plenty. That he is still on track academically. And he is. He really, really is. He works hard (except for that tricky writing part!) and he's coming right along. Homeschooling him is certainly not ideal. I just can't fill the social hole like lots of other homeschooling moms can. And man oh man do I hover. I need to relax a little and let him independently figure things out. So, it's not ideal, but it's pretty dang good for now. I really enjoy it and he has not asked about school in ages.

So, that's where we're at.

These scones are great! They are Carrot Cake Scones. I made them to get some veggies into Isaac. He'll never see it coming, I tell you! Guess where the recipe is from!