Tuesday's Work

Here comes a huge understatement: Tuesday was a busy busy day. 

The Laundry monster ate up my whole afternoon and a bit into the next day, today. (Envision Fraggle Rock's Trash Heap but as clothes and you'll have a significant idea of what it was like yesterday) So between that and my prep work I didn't get to go to book club - pretty much the only social event I even attempt to commit to (insert laugh here, as I have only been to one in months). It was a bummer since I actually read the book and would like to have a social life that doesn't revolve around kids, but I digress.

Back to the point: When I am not spending between 4-5 hours home-schooling, I spend a lot of time prepping. If you are thinking about home schooling be prepared to spend a lot of your time scrounging the internet for worksheets, ideas, videos, and other items to meet your child's specific learning ability. My daughter Kelsey is very visual, so we have to really illustrate the concept for her, and then she is golden. This takes a huge search effort for things that work on more abstract concepts, but I promise is well worth it. If you can ignite the spark that would have been lost in translation then the hours spent searching were worth every minute. No one tells you that. So I am. Home-school doesn't end at the end of the "school" day. The questions commence. You are always looking for new things, always discovering. Each kid is different, so they learn differently, and it takes work to find things that work well with your specific kid.

Having said that, my poor kid could probably use some time in front of a boob tube with the old school game Tetris. After some tries, she finally got it. There is no cure for that, but to let her try and see why the shapes didn't work, and start to see the shapes come together.

She then had to take her filled shape, and graph the amount of shapes she used.

She can do that easily.

We have been struggling with math facts a bit. She does not have them memorized, and she tends to want to use her fingers, a hundred chart, a manipulative, or a number line. I tried so many things, and some were frustrating, some were just okay, but nothing was really working particularly the way I wanted it to. Through looking for ideas on Pinterest, some of which worked, some of which didn't, I found this - "Rainbow Math". I didn't get to it right away, because I doubted it would work well for her, finally I gave up on the other ideas, and gave her this. Well I should have done it sooner. She is adding faster, and she is excited about it. I guess you really do have to try everything, even things you think are stupid, or will never work. I apologize creator of "Rainbow Math". I thought your creation was stupid and a waste of time. Bah! I said. This is too simple for my prized belly-fruit! And yet, I printed it as a last resort. Well you showed me! Well played, sir! People who do not create games, should not knock the games that are already available for their simplicity. This is where I think I should have tried for an engineering degree. Then I could create the perfect software to help each and every kid, and I would be rich, and successful! But Nay! I tell you! I just had to get that Theater degree! (This is the obligated blurb about not actually having finished my degree, and depending on your stance it was either a saving grace to have quit wasting my parents' money on a useless theater degree from a school that was known for business and engineering, or it shows that I am also a college drop-out. You decide! :D Either way, the world did not stop moving, I assure you!) There I go again, off on my tangent! Back to home-school!

For Literature, she was to write a friendly letter. Apparently this was spaced out to work on for 3 days. We finished it that day. I figure why stop, she was on a roll. She actually wants to send it to Ruby Bridges. (Since it is almost Black History Month, and just passed MLK jr day, the curriculum called for "The Story of Ruby Bridges". Let me just tell you it is no easy feat trying to explain why what would seem like ordinary nice adults would be screaming and "wanting to kill Ruby" - yes it says that in the book- Ruby a first grader. :/ Talk about a weird conversation. Um, people are stupid, and so they are afraid of things that are out of the norm, sort of the same reason people will think you wandered off of a commune if you ever tell people you are home-schooled. The sooner you see that a lot of people are just plain stupid, the better! Speaking of that, here is a funny video my friend sent me about the seven lies about home-schooled kids.

Back to school now:

This was part of our history lesson. They are carving in (homemade clay) to see what it was like for the Ancient Egyptians, and the Sumerians. They are actually carving their names in Cuneiform - the language of the ancient Sumerians.

Our science project doesn't often make it in my blog because it is always interactive. I can't take pictures and dramatize the effects of inertia, force, and work. So you'll just have to do without. It mostly consists of me rolling around on a rolly-chair and pretending to drive a car, then running into things and showing hoe the chair stopped but I didn't and other "experiments" like that.

Now, I have to blog about today.