Thinking about changing their schedule.

I'm thinking about changing the boys' homeschool schedule up a bit again. We just have to find what works best for us, and so far, multiple subjects in one day is too overwhelming...to both them AND me. lol That's the beauty of homeschooling. It's not "public school at home" unless you want it to be, otherwise you can set your schedule how you want it set. And in our case, one subject per day might be the best. At least until the boys get settled into it better. That way we won't feel rushed, and I won't feel like we're falling behind if they go slower than anticipated.

I don't know. We're going to give it a shot for a while, see if it works. If it doesn't, we'll change the schedule again. I'm actually almost tempted to just let them start a Summer Vacation already, but at the same time I'm afraid they'd forget evrything they've already learned thus far. We'll see. I may end up having to do two different schedules to accommodate each of the boys' needs. Which is fine. As long as I can figure out what each of them needs.

URGENT PRAYER REQUEST

I got this prayer request in my email from one of my homeschooling groups. If you're the praying kind, please keep this one in your prayers.

(BTW, the last time I asked for a prayer request was about a boy who was assaulted at school and had a broken neck. His neck wasn't broken, he was fine, just told to take it easy for a couple of weeks. The perp is being charged with aggravated assault)

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I have an urgent prayer request. My very close friend's nephew was shot in the face this morning. He is currently in the Critical Care Unit. Apparently he was shot in the mouth and has a crack in the skull. Because of the nature of the crime, the hospital is unable to give out much information. My friend's brother just arrived to the hospital (it is his son who was shot) and was in court all day, so he doesn't really know what is going on either. We will find out more in a little bit and I will update you all...Please, please, please keep him in your prayers...

Please pray that he heals and no changes for the worse...

His name is Deshawn Dyre

Struggling

I hope no one is overly interested in my lesson plans, because I can't guarantee they'll be posted any time soon. I've been really slacking in the organization department. And while some of you might try to tell me to just relax and not worry about it, what you don't understand is that I HAVE to be organized in some aspects of my life or I feel like it's falling apart. And this would be one of those areas.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder at it's worst.

The next few weeks will probably be rather slow for this blog. We're coming up on what would be my daughter's six month birthday had she lived, and what is my first Mother's Day without her. And try as I might to not let it get me too down, depression slips in when you least expect it and takes over. Which is probably why my organization is slacking.

I'll be slowly updating the Archive blog to this one, probably doing one subject at a time for each week I'm behind in it. So it'll be a while before it's fully updated, but I'll get there. Slowly. Not like my lesson plans are intensive anyway, lol. You could probably do a better job than me anyway.

I'm still rearranging the schedule. I've already changed the schedule from doing History and Science every other day, to doing History for two weeks then Science for two weeks. But in doing Ancient Egypt, I came to realize that two weeks just isn't long enough for some topics. My boys were very interested in the pyramids, and two weeks didn't give us near enough time to cover all they wanted to know. So I may just relax on that part of the schedule and instead of setting a length of time limit, I'll just let the topic take us where it wants to go. If that means going a full month or month and a half on one topic in the same subject, then so be it. Whatever it takes for my boys to enjoy learning.

So far, so good.

Now we're doing Science. Earthquakes, to be more specific. I'm struggling to find GOOD quality information on Earthquakes that will interest them enough to pay attention. We got some books from the library today, but I question how interesting they really are. And my boys seem to learn better by having visual AND audio combined, which means videos. And the DVD's at the library I wanted to get were either grabbed before we got to them, or are located at another library in the county. I put in requests for them, but sometimes they can take as long as 10 days or more to get to my library. We'll just have to wait and see, I guess. In the meantime, there's always YouTube.

How do you do it?

How do you keep from stringing them up by their toenails? Or taping them to the wall with duct tape?

How do you keep from banging your own head against the wall day after day?

I know they're boys. I know they're kids. I get that. And young boys have the nature of ADHD, whether they HAVE ADHD or not.

Some days I can handle this. Other days (like today), not so much.

And this time it's not just Micheal. This time it's Christopher, too.

Neither one of them is concentrating on themselves. When one of them needs help with a problem, the other one has to sit there and watch. As if that weren't bad enough, the one doing the watching chuckles at the one needing the help if the question is something the one doing the watching already knows and apparently thinks that everyone should know it.

And then there's the ever present "I don't understand the question" (the question being [fill in the missing number] 1500-____=500)...FROM MY 4TH/5TH GRADER....after having done these sorts of equations for AT LEAST the last three weeks and could do them practically with his eyes shut from the start.

And it seems we have all of a sudden forgotten how to do basic addition. 2+2 is confounding today and in order to solve that problem one absolutely MUST use a calculator.

Does sunshine cause the brain to malfunction? Something like....Sunshine Alzheimers? Because that's what it looks like is going on here. The sun comes out and all of a sudden everything is forgotten.

And it doesn't help them any that Mommy is having an especially OCD sort of day and everything must be done precisely as planned in exactly the manner planned. Yes, I have OCD. Sometimes it's a problem, sometimes it's not. Some days I'm normal (ha ha) and spontaneous and fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants, but some days (like today) I'm very by-the-book scheduled. When it comes to housecleaning, it's great. When it comes to homeschooling...not so much.

Oh dear. **EDIT**

Well, I think it's safe to say the novelty has already worn off. I'm not being nearly as organized this week as I was (or as I should be). And I am highly unmotivated. Do you ever go through feelings like that while homeschooling?

Maybe it's because of the sun shining outside and the warmth. Yesterday we only did a couple hours of classes. Today we got three classes done in less than two hours. And we're done. We're not done because we got it all done, we're done because I neglected to create lesson plans for this week for a couple of classes and therefore I have no idea what to do beyond what we've already done for those classes.

Serious laziness has abounded this week.

Maybe it's because I am Mommy, and being a Mommy also means I am female. And we all know what THAT means.

But *shrugs* At least we got the most important subjects done...Bible, Math, and English/Grammar.

I sent the kids outside at 9am and told them to play outside while the temperature is still acceptable. Christopher came in 20 minutes later, washes up, and comes to sit down in his desk chair and tells me he is ready to learn some more. And while there is no more learning planned for today, it warms my heart that he WANTS to learn, as opposed to the way he was before when he couldn't get far enough away from a textbook.

This is our third week of homeschooling, and I would already call it a brilliant success.

**EDIT**
Me: Since we've got so much done today and still have lots of time, why don't we do tomorrow's work today so we can have a free day tomorrow.

Chris: No, that's okay. I kinda like doing the work.

Mikey: Christopher likes to do the work.

Me: Since when?

Chris: Since homeschooling.

Me: Ok, who are YOU, and what have you done with MY children?

Rough Week

Had a bit of a rough week getting everything ready. I'll update the lesson plans and links when I get a chance.

Another day, and a beautiful gift

Last night I started a project to use for our Bible classes next week. Since the boys struggle with being able to find Scripture because they don't know where to find the various books of the Bible (with the exception of Genesis and Revelation), I decided we are going to spend the next two weeks going over the books of the Bible in order, beginning with the Old Testament.

So I started looking things up, found a good lesson plan that covers both Old and New Testaments. So I split them into two lessons. Then I started thinking about what would be the best way to teach them so they can retain the information. So I put in a request for information regarding free Books of the Bible songs that can be found on the internet, because the ones I was finding ....well, they just wouldn't work.

So my friend Kimberly said she has a children's cd with Books of the Bible songs, and she burned it for me. And it has JUST the song that I wanted! And the song that helps me when I have a brain fart and can't remember where to find Hosea or Hebrews.

Then, I started looking for crafts or other projects that we could use for hands on learning. I found a visual aid of a bookshelf with the books of the Bible divided into categories. I printed it out and grabbed a poster board, pencil, and ruler, and started on the project while my shows were on. I didn't get to bed until 4am because it took FIVE HOURS to draw the silly thing!!

It took three more hours today to color it. But it's done. For the Old Testament anyway. Wednesday I have to start on next week's for the New Testament.

Before completion


Finished!


I'm so glad to be done with it! It was HARD WORK! The bookshelf itself didn't turn out like I had hoped, but I was never good at shading. But otherwise, I think I did a pretty good job, if I do say so myself.

I also got all the lesson plans for next week done. I've decided that for the Histories and Sciences, we're going to do a two-week schedule for them. Two weeks for World History, two weeks for American History, two weeks for Earth Science, and two weeks for....(I call it) Natural Science (because I can't think of what it would REALLY be called, lol). They'll all be done during the same period, but if we break it down into two week increments, we won't be as pressed to get it all done. So third period the first two weeks will be World; third period the next two weeks will be Earth; third period for weeks five and six will be American; and third period for weeks seven and eight will be Natural. That gives us longer to focus on the topic, too.

Like this week we've had Egypt for World History. Cramming it into four days is just not feasible. They don't learn anything. So I decided to extend it and we'll be doing Egypt again next week. Then in two weeks we'll be doing Volcanoes, and we'll take two weeks to study those so they can learn about volcanoes, what makes them, where they're located, famous volcanoes throughout history. i just think it'll be better that way.

Homeschooling is getting better. I've joined a couple of sites that send out homeschooling freebies (like e-books and the like), which makes things easier. Loads of sites that have worksheets for various subjects. And now that I know exactly where to look and exactly how to search, it's getting easier.

Oh my goodness! You HAVE to listen to this video! She is ABSOLUTELY AMAZING! And it's nice to see Simon Cowell in awe. She gets ridiculed before she sings, but OH MY GOODNESS!!! She's AMAZING! I can't embed it, so here is the link Britian's Got Talent. You won't regret it. I promise.

What did I tell you? Was I right or was I RIGHT?