Tuesday was our first outing to a HS group, the NOVA Unschoolers. They were having a potluck and book/materials swap for not-back-to-school. I met my goal of dropping off more than I brought back and left with a handful of Magic Schoolbus tapes and assorted other things. Everyone was nice and there were plenty of boys and girls for Kate and Zack to play with. It was also nice to not get that cockeyed look when I said we didn't have a curriculum.
Tuesdays are going to be busy. The unschoolers have a park day in the afternoon, then home to get some work done, Zack has fencing at 5pm and I have something at 7pm. I think this was the night that Pete taught Zack the basics of the ten times tables too.
Wed, we started butterfly and volcano books and the kids labeled pictures (magma, lava, vent and caterpillar, egg, chrysalis, etc) and glued them into the books. Their printing is coming along, spelling, not so much. Went to Ready Readers at the library, we go early to pick out books and then the kids spend about 40 minutes with Miss Ginny for some stories. I'm saddened to learn they have cut this back to every other week :-( however, we'll probably still do library time Wednesday afternoons.
Zack lost his third tooth! One of the big ones on top. He was very excited and immediately put it under his pillow.Thursday--The tooth fairy came and left 25, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 cents...gee that's a strange amount to leave, maybe you should check again...no she left $1 Wow!
Off to the farmers market and then the National Archives which has been re-done recently with lower display cases, a movie theatre and an exhibit on the public vaults and what info they really keep there. The kids were less than interested mainly because you can't really see the writing on the docs all that well and when you can see it, it's so scrolling that they can't read it. I pointed out B Franklin, T Jefferson and G Washington's signatures and that seemed to impress. Also hit the main points of the Constitution again and 3 branches of gov't. The vault was very good and the kids were much more interested in that. Should have let them do that first, like they wanted to intead of try to ram the important educational agenda I had in mind down their throats. Are we learning yet....
Home and time to separate Kate and Zack for a while, so reading in their rooms. Then Katie was off to dance and Zack watched a volcano movie we checked out of the library.
Today was about cleaning up and getting more organized downstairs. Fairly successful. I also had the kids sort their own laundry and they helped with the grocery shopping. I explained why it's actually less expensive to buy two small jars of Skippy instead of one large jar of Jif, etc.
Home to read the great books I got from Scholastic's dollar sale. Also got some multiplication wheels, which look more fun that the addition/subtraction flash cards they've been using. So, clean up, laundry, outside time, journals, reading, math program, a study of physics ala hotwheels tracks and the PTA/Civic Association picnic and I am pooped.
Socialization--geeze, we've got plenty and we haven't even started scouts yet!
That's a full week at homeschool. Not too bad. Still winging it but generally moving along. My main concern is trying to decide what sort of "proof of progress" to supply the district with at the end of the year. Hard to determine what exactly they will want out of a portfolio. I have to decide by January, so will begin to ask around and find out what others are doing.
Hope the skies are bright in your part of the world. Looks like lazy Katrina will visit us tomorrow. Nice of her to wait until after the picnic.
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