Week 3

This is an amazing field in all seasons. I may like winter the best! (Lena Thompson Memorial Park)

The kids hid behind a tree waiting for Charles to arrive.

Week 3 was an adventurous week. MLK Day was gorgeous outside, so we did some work indoors in the morning, and then went out exploring. The kids were so excited to just have an adventure with nothing they "had" to do. Charles was able to get out of work early and meet us on our hike, and the kids were super excited about that!

Leif thought it was pretty funny to surprise Daddy.

Leif getting a better view of the penguins.

Tuesday, we visited the Georgia Aquarium, which was emptier than usual because of the holiday weekend. Since Charles doesn't work until mid-afternoon on Tuesdays, we went in the morning and enjoyed several hours of an empty aquarium. Leif's assignment was to pick one animal and find out a few things about them, and draw them. He chose Penguins. These are African penguins, found off the coast of South Africa. Leif was totally bummed that they were not cold-climate penguins, and also that penguins in general lived in the Antarctic, not in the "north pole" as he had imagined. Sigh. We got to experience the penguins calling to each other, which sounds like a donkey braying. Because of this, they are also know as Jack-Ass Penguins, which I DIDN'T tell the kids! (couldn't they just call them Donkey Penguins?) Anyway, here is Leif's drawing, and a penguin craft:

Wednesday and Thursday were home days, and maybe because of our adventurous beginnings, Leif seemed less enthusiastic about getting on task this week. Which is to say we had several conversations that went like this.
Me: Here is your next assignment.
Leif: I don't want to do that.
Me: Lovely. (okay, I didn't really say that out loud) Okay, well, here are the next 3 things I had planned, pick one and get started.
Leif would pick one then and work. He just needed some control in the situation, which is honestly fine. I want him to enjoy learning, and start to desire to explore in learning, which can't happen if our days are just about checking off assignments.

Friday when we arrived at Home School-school, some of the kids were doing carpet work, which was "I-spy" mats, and as soon as we walked in the door, two kids called Leif over to their group and asked him to work with them. It was so great to see Leif included and invited into a group. This is only week 3 with a class which has been together since the Fall, so it was encouraging to see that Leif was included. When we arrived home from dropping off Leif, Owen wanted to do a home-school lesson (be free, child!) which was pretty cute.

Our obligatory front entrance photo at the GA aquarium.

Beautiful jellyfish.

Leif and Owen both loved the Jacks.

One of the divers in the big tank came to the window and was waving to the boys.

Seahorse! When we first found out that we were pregnant with Owen I was already 7 weeks, and she said he was about the size of a seahorse, so we called him "Baby Seahorse" for most of my pregnancy.

The leafy sea dragon, one of the creatures we studied our first week on home school, who uses camouflage for protection.

We got to see the dolphin do tricks for a trainer doing hand movements thru the glass.

Such a cool exhibit: The kids could ask Deepo questions, and the digital fish answered them and swam around. It was pretty amazing. Haven't you always wanted to talk to a fish and have him answer you?

This is how empty the aquarium was: Leif was laying on the conveyor belt in the main walkway staring up at the fish overhead.

Charles and Owen looking at the large tank.

Ice Balloons

We made colored frozen spheres using water balloons, food coloring and the freezer. We tried to freeze them outside, but missed the coldest nights, so had to resort to the freezer. Extra lesson objective: freezing point.
I had hoped that we could stack the spheres and make ice men, or something, but they were odd-shaped and well, freezing. So we set them in the sun and admired the frozen bubbles and the crack lines from dropping them...
And then it got fun. Leif asked if they could get hammers and smash them, so, they did. A boy with a hammer is a happy boy.

Week 2- Being a kid.

Picking Owen up from school.

This was a week of revelation. Monday was brilliant. Owen was in Owie school, and Leif and I had a morning of discovery learning: consonant blends led to onomatopoeia; talking about Owen having the next Monday off for MLK Day led us to watching King's I Have A Dream speech and discussing slavery and equality and dreams. It was amazing. For me.
Tuesday morning Leif broke the news to me: Home school was not what he imagined. I wasn't fun, and he didn't want to do it. Also, he thought home school meant he could do whatever he wanted. So, I let him know that the good news was that we only had a half-year that we needed to complete and that we were open to other options. The other good news is that we are still working on what home school looked like, and so I was open to suggestions. I asked him what he wanted home school to be like, and he said he wanted it to be more like what they do at home school school on Fridays: crafts, songs and fun stuff.

Owen said, "I am an artist."

My teaching experience is with high schoolers. Who would think that my kids would like crafts and kid songs? By chance, I put a sticker on a sheet Leif had completed and he was thrilled. I couldn't believe it. I forgot that my kids are kids! I know this may sound ridiculous, but Leif has grown up so quickly intellectually, and physically, that I forget sometimes that he's not even 6 yet. I have been living with these little people like they are little people. This week, I had the great delight of living with these little people like they were kids! And kids are a blast. We played games and did crafts, lots of crafts. Thanks to Pinterest, I am learning how to be a Kindergarten teacher. And my house is beginning to look like a kid's art gallery. By the end of the week Leif said he had a fun week, and so did I.

The water cycle. Using glue drips and gravity.

Thank-you Pinterest for this rain craft.

I tried to come up with craft ideas that went along with Leif's lessons. This week his science lessons were on weather & the water cycle.
My revelation about my kids needing to be kids and doing kid-like things not only transformed my view of home school, I think it's going to change the way we live in general. I think I was the one who learned the most this week. 

Owen's watercolor. He says its a meadow, or a restaurant, or a pony.

My water color of a lightning strike.

When Leif learns cursive, I first have him close his eyes and let me write the word for him with his hand, so he can feel the sweep of the letters.

Leif thought up this craft. He wanted to buy 3 wooden spheres (his words) and make them into snowmen. The only disappointment: he had hoped them would be "normal" snowmen size, like about as tall as a chair. But he settled for these cute guys: (yes, I knit them caps, and braided scarves)

Leif had his buddy Kaden over for a play date this week. Kaden made a snowman with us, and it was warm enough for the boys to enjoy some trampoline time.

We set up our new basketball hoop!

Leif injured himself and the first thing he said was, "Can we FaceTime Daddy?" Luckily Charles was on lunch break and he told the boys a story.

The Singing Hen

 Leif and I have been doing word trees. You start with a word, and you can change one letter (or sound) and create the next word. Here was our word tree (I allowed a rule change for hen to hung): hen, hung, lung, long, song, sing, sung, sang
So, I wrote a poem (it's a little autobiographical):

The Singing Hen

The hen hung his head.
He longed to sing a song,
But his lungs could not sing.
So he listened to his heart,
And opened up his beak,
And sang a long song,
While his heart sang along.

And we watched a YouTube tutorial on how to draw hens, and then painted with water color.
Leif's (notice how he made it a singing hen):

Mine:

And I copied my drawing, and Owen painted:

Now Leif wants me to write a poem for ALL of our word trees! I think I'll have him start writing poetry as well. 

Week 1

5 degrees in GA= frozen bubbles!

Exhaustion. Friday night, kids in bed, exhaustion. It was a good week, a bad week, a week of brokenness and learning limitations. I am thrilled about our new journey, but I have to be honest and say that I had several moments of panic on Tuesday and Wednesday wondering what I had gotten myself into. I was throwing myself into the creative aspects of home school, but forgetting to keep up with some basics. By Wednesday, we were out of bread, milk, eggs, and countless other not-so-essential groceries, and I couldn't remember if I had showered on Monday, or was is Sunday? I announced to the boys that we would be going grocery shopping and Leif threw a fit, "Groceries??? I wish I was back in public school and you could go shopping without me!" I nearly said I wished the same thing, but in my heart I knew it wasn't true, and somehow God plugged my mouth. Definitely a low.
Wednesday evening I got to go to a spin class (yay!) and shower (double yay!) and Thursday seemed to go more smoothly. My main goal was to remember how to have fun together. I think that needs to be my main goal most days. Thursday evening I found about about a home school Kindergarten enrichment class that started Friday morning. I emailed the director around 7:30pm and was shocked to hear back from her that we could register in the morning. So, most weeks, I will teach the boys 4 days, and on Fridays Leif will go to class and PE for several hours.
I'm thrilled, he's thrilled. Hope is renewed.

Here are some highlights of our week (because I don't photograph the weeping):

Leif got a new Nerf gun, so our math lesson for the day was addition and multiplication. Shoot a bullet, write down the value and add or multiply with next value. I allowed him to use an abacus for any, and a calculator for some because he started writing 53, if his shot hit on the line between 5 and 3, so his numbers were getting pretty high! 

Macro shot of my beautiful Leif.

Macro shot by Leif.

After photographing the frozen bubbles, I kept the macro lens on my camera and took some fun photos. And Leif even photographed me!

One of the things Leif has requested to learn is cursive. So, we started with his first name. We are still working on basic print as well, but he's learned to write fast and sloppy, so starting cursive is a great way for him to practice beauty. I think it's pretty beautiful.

Don't breath. Don't move. They are both working quietly!

Leif's first morning at "school for homeschoolers", as we call it.

Leif's favorite project from class.

The kids making their own sculptures.

Leif's final sculpture from the High Museum.

We went to the High Museum for home school day. The kids got to do a scavenger hunt, and make their own sculptures. Owen did lots of "inappropriate" things like laying on his back on the floor and scooting around, and enjoyed how much his voice echoed. Luckily Charles and I were both there, so Owen and I spent a lot of time inside the kid's discovery area, while Leif and Charles looked at some art work. Both children enjoyed the creative time. Owen did discover a love for gluing things, but still requires close observation. His glue comment: "Can I sip this glue? It looks tasty!" 

Hercules. The kids might have noticed that he was naked. Okay, they did.

Owen loves glue. A lot of glue. We dyed noodles, and this is his project.

Posted by Dawn.