Yes, I'm a terrible mother for making my kids start school on Labor Day! But it is "labor" day right. It just seemed like a great day to kick everything off so we went for it. Washington State has one of the later school start dates...most states all start the end of August. Not that our schedule is determined by that, but it worked out to be a great start time. I'm thankful that I had already gotten all of my curriculum lined up and school area organized back in July. This summer has been sooooo busy. Camps, Vacation Bible Adventure, Missions Trips, teaching on Wednesday nights, Impact Kids on Sundays, and on and on it feels like. I can't even believe that it's September!!!
We had a bit of a rough start this morning getting back into the groove, but ended up getting a lot accomplished and went out for a milk-shake when school was done. I planned to be done by around 2 pm, but we ended up going from 8:30-3:30. We started with our song for the month "Trust in the Lord" and then did some dancing which got Javon in a bad mood. He isn't one prone to dancing. You'd think so because of his outgoing (slightly hyper!) personality, but he has never enjoyed dancing around with me to music. Reagan on the other hand would dance with me all day. After that we worked on our weather cart which I was very excited about starting and went and checked out what kind of clouds there were....overcast! Surprise, surprise! It's Seattle. The chart took a bit longer than expected because of having to get it all set up for the month.
I use ACE curriculum so then we dove into our PACE work.
Math - Money and Time
English - Review of the alphabet. Writing upper and lower case letters and going over the vowels and consonants.
Social Studies - Reading and questions about Jesus saving us from sin.
Science - Creation Days
Word Building - Review of a list of new spelling words, drawing shape patters, and writing some of the new spelling words.
He also did his typing and then art with dad.
We didn't get around to health (once a week) and piano, but we'll shoot for tomorrow. I didn't want to push anymore. He worked really hard and I was very proud of him. Although there were times during the day I thought this is the HARDEST job anyone could ever have. The patience required during these young years is pretty intense. I can see why some moms feel like they can't do it. It has to be a passion/conviction or there's no way you could pull it off.
In the middle of all that, Reagan did real preschool for the first day. Last year she pretty much did a portion of what Javon was doing in Kindergarten, but his year he has much more written work so I had to work with her separate on some preschool activities. She really enjoyed all the attention!
We read 5 books about the zoo.
Worked on counting to 20.
Found things the color blue.
Watercolor painted a picture.
Colored a picture with crayons.
Worked on a memory verse.
Danced and sang and played dress up.
Anyways, it was a VERY long, but rewarding day. Even if no one else ever sees or understands why I'm doing this, my kids will reap the benefits and I also know that God is watching and cheering me on. Praise the Lord for His grace, provision, and never-failing love.
Tomorrow is a new day that will present new challenges and I will try to figure out some new positive ways to teach and continue reinforcing things I'm already doing. Oh, and then there's church and the house and all the things that come with them, but for today I'm just "Mama" teaching my children to the best of my ability how to love God, respect others, and be the smart little people I know they are!
Blessing to you as you begin your '08-'09 journey!
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