"School" Part 2

A while back I wrote a blog entitled "School" laying out the fact that Colin and I haven't decided what we are going to do in regards to schooling for Jackson yet.

We still don't know.

Partly because we still don't know where we'll be living, but partly because we just haven't made up our minds.

Since my first post I was able to go to a homeschooling conference here in town. Here are a few things that I got out of the event:

1. We've got time! Jackson is FOUR! Most states don't require you to declare your intent for education until age 6. I think I was just feeling a little peer pressure watching friends and family send their kids (who are actually older than Jackson) off to school this fall.

2. We can make our educational decision one year at a time. If we choose to do homeschooling for the first year that doesn't mean we have to commit to it for the rest of Jackson's academic life. However, I've heard from several parents that it's much easier logistically to start homeschooling first and then move to public or private schooling because of the hoops the government requires you to jump through when you change (each state is different though).

3. Homeschooling is a lifestyle. It will affect our family as a whole ... perhaps not more than public or private school, but differently. It will be a lot of work on my part.

4. Homeschool communities are essential. Parent's swap tips, curriculum, set up co-teaching arrangements, group field trips, events, sports, etc. You name it, they do it. I'm not sure I'd even consider homeschooling if there is not a homeschool community where we will eventually live.

5. Every body's reasons for homeschooling are different and not all of them are because they want to "shelter" their kids from the world. I wanted to walk away from the conference with "my reason to homeschool" or even "my reason not to homeschool", but I didn't want to walk away on the fence or with someone else's reason for homeschooling. After a looooooong talk with my husband, I think we both concluded that our reason for homeschooling and what excites us most about homeschooling is being able to tailor our children's education to their strengths and weaknesses.

Like I said before and contrary to what it sounds like from the list above, we STILL have not decided officially what we'll be doing once Jackson turns 6 years old, but we've got a little time.

In the mean time I decided that I needed to do "School" this year with Jackson to see if I could handle having more structure in my days, weeks and months as the "teacher."

So, at the beginning of September we started the "Five In A Row" curriculum that I mentioned in my first blog. Only this time I am much more consistent and structured in what I'm doing for Jackson. It also means that I take weekly trips by myself to the library to load up on books for the week's lessons.

We've also started "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons." Jackson has had a grasp on phonetics for a long time now, but has yet to have the confidence to just put the sounds together and start reading. We're only on lesson 8 of 100, but so far I can already see his confidence level growing in reading AND writing.

Anyway, here is what we do for "School" in a typical week. Note: "School" lasts about 45 minutes to an hour depending on how much I want to get accomplished and how quickly we can get Micah down for a nap in the afternoon.

Everyday: Calendar, Prayer, Weekly Bible Verse, Reading and Writing

Mondays: Review the Sunday School lesson from church.
Read the story for the week.
FIAR Christian Character and Bible Supplement

Tuesdays: Read the story for the week.
Social Studies

Wednesdays: Read the story for the week.
Art/Literature
Supplemental worksheets (optional)

Thursdays: Read the story for the week.
Math/Science

Fridays: Review/ Catch Up
Pbskids.org

Friday's are typically my days to clean the entire house, so we don't have "School" on those days. However, Jackson does get some time to play on the PBS Kids website and they have a lot of fun educational games on it that I'm comfortable with.

Here are a few pictures from the week we read through "The Rag Coat" by Lauren Mills



Jackson's "Quilt" he made during his art lesson. He LOVES to cut with scissors!



Pretending to be a "coal miner" in my closet during his science lesson on coal was one of his favorite lessons for this book.

Anyway, I know this was a long post and I know it may seem like I've dropped off the blogging planet, but I'm here! I have SO much I want to blog about and so little time ... isn't that just about every blogger's mantra?! ;)