All fake names. Working as a family to be home more. Not doing choir, soccer, or much 4H this semester. Only going to main 2 monthly clubs (Blue Knights and Little Flowers) and family Faith Formation classes. We ran errands yesterday to register our new van, go to church, and go to the State Museum for the last time before our membership expired that day.
I revamped the chore chart which is helping get enough pickup done, rotates monthly. The entropy of 6 children in a small house is enormous. The building of a routine is small but steady at this point.
Rise, Read Bible, Room and Groom, Breakfast, Morning Chores, Math/English .... whatever else fits, Lunch, "Liza's" babygirl -2yo nap, and quiet couch Reading. Other lessons here as they fit, Afternoon chores, Dinner, After meal chores (AND kitchen cleanup by the kids including washing dishes - new in 2018!) Family play, Family prayer, occasional readaloud, Bed.
Noting that I really want to keep up the routine. I AM so bad at being consistent. If I can get the kids to help I have hope. I want to do more evening readalouds again.
Read 2 picture books about saints during morning Bible reading. Wildflower(11) did a good job with family science narration "Science in Ancient Greece." Modeled good narration to other kids. No other family meeting topics today.
We haven't been doing our checklists, but doing the essentials on the fly, using my weekly sheets to help determine priorities. I'm not really comfortable and lots is slipping through the cracks, but we ARE making progress and having more good days than bad. The checklists were good, but sometimes I let the list trump the relationship.
Today's highlights:
"Wildflower" - 11yo girl. Excellent reader and writer
Self led work:- Currently Rereading strewn Life of Fred A-I,Fractions and Percents, mentally doing work as she went
- Colored and labeled map of selected Caribbean islands and drew flag of Cuba along with BuilderBoy, spontaneously and joyously following along with him and me, after final readaloud chapters of "Where the Flame Tree Blooms" set in Cuba.
- Laughed uproariously at Sir Cumference and Lady Di Ameter books.
- Danced to Peruvian music as BuilderBoy starts new geography readaloud "Secret of the Andes"
- Typed letter to friend, mostly using correct form.
- Made oatmeal cookies - problem solving: fractions for butter and lack of ground cloves=grinding whole ones we had on hand
- After supper, with brother BuilderBoy, took tea in travel mugs and glow in the dark star book outside to look for constellations. (Part of astronomy work we haven't done all year.)
Used wall hung 3x5 card "cheet sheet" of books/subjects to focus; Culled from larger year long topic breakdown. Today did: A few grammar sentences related to adverbs, Saxon Math 56 lesson, Geology reading and narration 3 pages. Started with grammar sentences because it has been a struggle to do after "everything" else wipes out her brain. Stayed present with her as we worked through identifying adverbs modifying adverbs, adjectives, and verbs. (Last week focused on Bible reading, World History, and US history along with math and writing.)
Other items on the list, not touched today:
Writing practice, Astronomy, Dictation, Math, Hamlet, Around the World in 80 Days, Book of Discovery.
"BuilderBoy"- 10 yo Boy Still gaining reading fluency. Mechanically minded, Artistic.
- He was sad to finish "Where the Flame Trees Bloom" but happy to start "Secret of the Andes"; Took to filling in a Caribbean map well. [I had not prepared this ahead of time, but copied map on the fly as BuilderBoy's interest was there and we wanted to look up where Camaguey was.] Labeled Havana, Camaguey, Jamaica, Haiti, and Dominican Republic. All islands with personal connections (honeymoons, donations). We discussed Fidel Castro, U.S.S.R., JFK, Cuban Missle Crisis - lifetime of his grandparents and imagined the stress and worry of nuclear war. He asked what was the Cuban government before Castro. (Answer: a Republic, per Wikipedia. Looked it up in History Encyclopedia but couldn't find answer, so turned to internet.) We listened to Peruvian pan pipe music during chores.
- Stayed focused during math lesson and made 2 simple arithmetic mistakes. Saxon 54. While the rest of the family watched Star Trek: The Next Generation last night, I made him finish up the math lesson he had wasted time doing during the day, sitting with him to be encouraging and make sure he didn't rush into errors. I think his focus today was improved! Ha.
- Copywork in cursive of "Gentleness and kind persuasion win where force and bluster fail." from Aesop's fable the North Wind and the Sun in preparation for dictation tomorrow.
- Alphabetized 5 words from fable: boastful, dispute, exploit, hastened, persuasion.
- Did about 200 jumping jacks, 100 lunges, and 20 squats after making rude comments (10-100 assigned as needed. I should have had him do some inside laps too.) He is going to be a strong boy - both in character and body by the time we are done. Consequence of physical activity is actually happening, whereas copywork didn't because I had to help set it up and kept not following thru and making him do it. He said his legs were tired. Good!
- The character building of doing math and physical activity is what he needs right now to build himself up and not end up in a puddle of tears. I am staying with him, mostly keeping my temper, handholding as necessary, applying food as much as needed. Hot tea and readalouds too. Me and him together with tea and The Children's Homer helped him last week a lot when mixed numbers and fractions nearly did him in.
- He just finished the Readaloud Challenge and did an excellent job following thru with his 10 minutes reading aloud, even late at night to his brother if needed.
- After supper, with sister Wildflower, took tea in travel mugs and glow
in the dark star book outside to look for constellations.
"Johnny" - 8 yo Boy - Middle child all over. Loves his siblings, Penguins, gardening
- He struggled during morning chores (new rotation as its the 1st of the month.) Made him do 50 jumping jacks. He doesn't really have good whole body coordination with arms and legs working in unison. Worked with him to slow it down, 2 at a time, saying "out, in". Helped a lot.
- Proactively started his math on his own after morning chores.
- Asked me to make a bullet point note in his journal for him, which I did.
- I think he's finally mastered regrouping/borrowing with 3 digit numbers. He did his math work spelling out numbers in cursive voluntarily. 2 pages filled with problems.
- Then, however, I was too wrapped up in Wildflower and BuilderBoy handholding to do much with him.
- 10 spelling words dictated and spelled excellently in the afternoon. Hooray! So much progress here. All in cursive.
- Helped rehearse and perform in "Star Show", a self created performance with his 3 baby sisters. All took turns on the bunk bed. There was a star song, a star fairy, and a star ballet. Amy(5) did ballet in a tutu, Lily(3) sang and danced, Liza(2) sang as well for me and the other 2 big kids. They had charged 10cents, but let me in free since I didn't have any change. It was really creative. They used a baby blanket with stars, held by Johnny in the "sky". It was really cute and tied together well.
- Read during couch reading time.
- Really helped watch the littles. Played memory with Amy.
- We've been flying through his stories, poetry reading, grammer talks, and copywork on most other days, so I was ok with the trade off of making sure Wildflower and BuilderBoy had better focus today. He had so much fun playing with the girls. He's a great big brother. They also played "doctor" and Lily had a "broken" arm which had a cast made from a gallon bag ziplock cardboard box.
"Amy" - 5 yo Girl. Easy going, cheerful, outside shy, blessing of a girl
- Working on focus during chores and not getting distracted, even after assigned single easy task (fold these 4 kitchen towels). I need to do some partnering here, and work WITH her. Did a good job wiping the table after supper.
- Started her math workbook after I called her.
- Spent most of the day playing with siblings. Sang and dance in the show, choreography was cute.
- During baby's nap, spent 15 minutes copying vowel sound examples words on spelling reference page. Practiced using dry erase marker under my example before copying words into her book. Sometimes chose not to practice and directly copied with pencil. Did a total of 8 words, best copy # so far. Has excellent pencil grip.
- Able to read cvc words. Sometimes confused by vowels. Had fun with magnetic letters making words yesterday with selected letters: s, m, t, p, d, b, i, e, a, o, u. Loved the magic of "making" words.
"Lily" - 3 yo girl. Mischief maker and heartbreaker.
Has cut her hair more and done more Sharpie damage than all other kids combined.
Just played all day. Loved dancing to the pan pipe music. Had fun being the "Star Fairy" in the little kids show. Loves to sit on her bed and "read" thru books. Super friendly and happy to meet anyone.
Used wooden shapes to fit letter forms for capital letters, C and T particularly.
"Liza" - 2yo girl. Curly headed baby. I had to go to 6 to get one with curly hair.
Sang and dance in the show with siblings. Sat and read board books during school. Got into her sister's special chapstick. Tore apart made bed. Colored toenails with a marker, again. Fell off coffee table. Bit 2 people. Took a too short nap. Cuddled with mom after and made it all better.
