Getting started

We received our package of curriculum this Friday. I have been looking through it and examining it very carefully. I am in need of more time to examine it. Being that I have never Waldorf homeschooled and it is intensely different than traditional schooling.

We have been busy this week. Sam and I took Jonah and Zane to the lake on Memorial day to look at all the trash left behind from the weekend fishermen. It was not well taken, bugs, trash, and all. We left. We live close by, so it was a quick trip there and back. Tuesday we hung around the house, did much of nothing, made brownies for the following day, took care of the chickens. Wednesday we set out for the Waldorf enrichment class. The kids had a blast. It was more of a get to know each other day, but James had 3 of his old classmates there, so he already knew quite a few. Jonah told the teacher that he was colorblind and so was Zane and she had a concerned conversation with me. I think I will need to keep talking to her. She seems so bent on making sure they only paint with the colors they can "see". UGH! I told they can "see" just fine, they just take it in and process it differently. Some shades of red, blue, green, and such look differently. Like pink looks either white or blue, depending what shade it is. Light pink is white and hot pink is blue. Anyhow, that was that discovery, someone thinking they need to "fix" my colorblind children. The nerve! Ignorance, I have found, can be found in the most unlikely places.

Thursday we hung out at home until time to go to the Cub Scout meeting at the public school. We signed up the younger two and James is in Boy Scouts. Taken care of! Now they are all going to be busy!

Friday we arrived late to Lego group. James and his hair was holding up the show again. I have decided to withhold $1 allowance to the person(s) responsible for us being late to something because they did not manage their time correctly. He was told to wake up in plenty of time and he did not get up, so he was late doing everything.

Saturday we went to a tiny, almost not worth mentioning it, Cajun festival. James ate a huge bowl of crawfish. I cannot eat those things. I have not been able to eat them since I lived in Jacksonville, Fl and went to their HUGE crawfish festival. EW! But he LOVED it! He LOVES Cajun food. I never liked Cajun food at 12, loved the music though. We did some shopping and then left. We stopped by the local church to look at their mini-car show. It was maybe 5 cars. There were some beauties though. The boys yelled for me to stop when they saw the Hudson.
They jumped out, looked around then jumped back in the car, all within 5 minutes. We came home and hung out for a bit before heading to the Hare Krishna program.

We finally got home at 11pm! I was so tired. The kids just flopped right into bed. No one argued.

This morning I woke up with a rip roaring sore throat and achy body. My dad would say it was from being in the rain. I would say it was because I was living with a 6 year old all week with a sore throat! We set the chickens out of the brooder for some sunshine and natural foods to eat.

That was our mundane week. It will get spicier. We will begin school very soon. I have supplies to buy now that I have the list.

Time to read more about what to do.

TTFN

What is going on these days......

I have not written about homeschooling for a long time. In fact yesterday I decided I would, it had been 2 years since I had. I deleted al but my favorite story, the marriage. We decided to send the kids to a local Waldorf school. It was not perfect, and things happened and we left. We are back to homeschooling, but this time around we are going with the Waldorf approach. It worked for my kids. They really enjoyed how they were learning, stress free and with creativity. Since I have been an on again off again homeschooler for 6 years and I am an artist, I thought I could pull this Waldorf gig off. We are not totally Waldorf either, this makes us unlike many of those people doing Waldorf schools/curriculum.

We have not officially started school this school year, granted it is Labor Day and all the schools around us have started, we have not. We are currently waiting for our Live-Education Waldorf curriculum. We ordered just before the holiday. I will get it at the end of this week, I am sure. I also have decided I will read it all over and take a week to digest it for myself first. not jump into as soon as the box arrives.

Unofficially we began a few weeks ago. We received in the mail a huge box of dead animal specimens to dissect with kit. The kids are loving it. We have dissected an earth worm and a crawdad. Next we have grasshoppers, 2 of them in fact and I think one is male and one female. Should prove to be interesting.

We have been listening to lots of books on tape as we travel about. I will begin to jot those down for record on here. I have decided I will keep a running homeschool journal/blog for my record keeping for the state. They never check these things, but if they ever decide to, like a mean relative turns you in for not teaching them properly, they can come check. I figure I will keep it here. I can email the link, Ha!

We also received via snail mail baby chicks. We are raising meat chicks. This Wednesday it will be 1 full week we have had them. They ship them the day they hatch. We have seen many changes and I will leave details about that. The kids are to come out there and help do something everyday. Water, feed, clean brooder, lay down new paper, etc....

They are having Science.

We begin this week a Waldorf enrichment program with another Waldorf school an hour away from us. The one 20 minutes away has no such program for homeschoolers. We are thrilled to be able to have such a class. It will be all day and the kids will learn Spanish, knitting, drama, art (Waldorf method) and many other things. I will have a day off once a week. WOW!

I am looking into French lessons with Jean-Claude and perhaps French Club with Alain for 2 of my boys. We are already involved in First Lego League; robotics, math, and science club all rolled into one.

We have Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts. We should be busy enough to not worry about being bored.
In fact I am trying to figure out when I can take a class on quilting with their schedule. Hmmmm....

Anyhow, this will be what the blog is about. What they read, what I read, what I taught, and what they/we have done.

I want to write a little bit each day, but I think that is overly ambitious and not realistic, I am going to reach for every other day, perhaps less or more, but at least once a week to make sure I have it all noted for my records.

Until my next post.................