Friday night at a church party, I caught up with a friend who is also homeschooling for the first time. "How's it going?", I asked. "Well", she replied, "We have our up days and our down days... but overall things are getting better." That's exactly what I would have said if she'd asked me!
This week has been 1000 times better! Week One was the honeymoon. Week Two was "Oh my goodness what was I thinking how will I ever be able to do this for nine months?!" Week Three has brought the realization that we'll be evolving and growing and settling and stretching--but I can do this.
Dallin is not a particularly flexible child. It's hard for him to have things change at the last minute. So the idea of having school on a holiday to make for having to go to a funeral was NOT a good one in his mind. Monday was rough, even though "school" lasted all of 90 minutes and was, mostly, pretty fun. Fun or not, in his mind, it was still school, and school and holidays don't mix. The next day, funeral day, he and Sariah were both angels.
The last three days of the week have gone very, very well. This week we started our first Language Arts/Nature block. For the month of September, our primary focus will be on those things. We still do math, for about 15 minutes every morning, focusing on oral and mental math skills. He's practicing skip counting while jump-roping prior to learning his first times table. We've been playing games to drill his ability to do addition and subtraction in his head quickly. For example, one morning we rolled four dice, and he had to add together whatever numbers he rolled. We also made flashcards using watercolor pencils. I drew a plus and a minus sign on a piece of paper, and he had to roll a dice to determine whether he'd be adding or subtracting. Then he had to draw two cards from the pile and either add them together or subtract the smaller one from the larger one. Almost every day he has a short, oral word problem to solve. Sometimes we also do "half-way" problems, for example, "Tell me the number that is halfway between 10 and 18."
We begin each day with Circle Time. This is our gathering time, and a great chance to involve Sariah. We say an opening verse together (well, right now, Mom says it... but hopefully if I do it enough, they'll get the idea they're supposed to join in). We sing a hymn--I've chosen hymns with a nature or seasonal focus, so right now for Autumn we're singing "For the Beauty of the Earth". We have family prayer. Then we read our daily verses from the scriptures. After that, we do movement activities and games, which is part of our PE. There is a huge emphasis in Waldorf on helping children with sensory integration through LOTS of movement. Dallin loves this--in fact, he told me that "circle time is my favorite part of school... except for the singing". (Meaning that he wishes we didn't have to sing.) We start by me giving the kids several different physical challenges to try out, such as doing headstands, somersaults, walking on a balance beam, wheelbarrow-walking (Dallin can walk up and down the stairs doing this! He blows my mind!), and, below, walking with a book on his head:
He is already really good at this, and the next step will be to have him walk with a book on his head while blindfolded.
Then we usually play a couple of fun, active games that get the kids moving. They don't know it, but I'm going to surprise them tomorrow by pulling out Twister (they don't know I bought it).
After Circle Time is math, and then we go into the main lesson. This is where the theme of the month comes in, and this is where we put most of our time and effort. Our block this month is focused on Aesop's Fables, and as I said before, the emphasis is on both language arts and nature/science.
First, Sariah has her story. She has a different story each week, generally related to the seasons and nature, or sometimes a simple fairy tale. After Sariah's story, Dallin has a story. These are stories that I tell--or at least, the goal is that I will tell them from memory. The reality is that telling a story from memory is really hard, especially when there are two per week for Dallin plus another for Sariah. Dallin's stories this month are drawn from Aesop's Fables, but they are expanded to include scientific information (presented in a creative, fun way) about the animals in the stories. This week the two fables were The Lion and the Mouse and The Bear and the Bees. In both cases, I chose fables with characters who were similar to Dallin in temperament and who may have been dealing with behavior or personality things that Dallin could stand to work on. The over-arching theme of our school year is the duality of man; on the one hand that humans can do and be very, very good--and on the other hand, that humans have follies and foibles that can get them into trouble. The animal fables showcase the consequences that can come from giving in to our character faults.
We school four days a week, and then the other day is for field trips or larger projects. The four "regular" days are divided into a two-day rhythm. The first day, the focus is on telling the story and then experiencing the story in a creative way. So, we always do some kind of craft or other type of fun project to help cement the story in his mind. With The Lion and the Mouse, we modeled a little lion and a mouse out of beeswax. With The Bear and the Bees, we made adorable bees out of wool, and we also made a little snack in the shape of bees:
They were basically little logs of crushed graham crackers mixed with peanut butter, with melted chocolate "stripes" and almond "wings". (And they tasted gross, but hey, it's the process not the product, right?)
Day Two of the rhythm is "head" day, or the day we focus on the academic piece. It begins by Dallin doing some kind of re-telling of the previous day's story. As much as possible we will be making this an active re-telling. Who knew that Dallin enjoys puppetry? I sure didn't!
The re-telling of The Bear and the Bees gets a bit out of control as the poor bear tries to escape being stung by a whole swarm of bees. (OK, you gotta imagine that there are more than two...)
Then, his next task is to write (with my coaching) a short summary of the story. I put it on the board for him, and we discuss things like proper punctuation and capitalization. Then he can copy it into his special Main Lesson Book and illustrate it:
We then do other academic work, such as reading skills, vocabulary, and spelling, all based on the current story. As much as possible, I try to use games and other fun ways to teach things. We introduced spelling words by playing Hangman, and then he copied them into his English notebook:
You can also see that I am being stretched by having to provide a chalkboard drawing to accompany each story! Do you like my lion and my mouse?
Artistic skills are considered to be extremely important in Waldorf education, because it is the arts that touch the emotional, feeling realm of humans. It is considered to be important for the child to be able to express himself in that realm as well as through writing in order to be a better-balanced human being. I've been surprised by how much Dallin seems to be responding to this! I honestly wasn't sure how he would be with it. One night he saw a picture that I had drawn with crayons, and he wanted to know how he could make one like it:
And he did! A landscape, even. This is done only with the colors red, yellow, and blue, so he must learn to blend and shade the colors. I was stunned that he asked to do this!
So far, this curriculum really seems to be reaching him. When I tell him a story, he is all ears, even as Sariah is trying to distract everybody. The activities are definitely fun, but it seems to go deeper than that.
We have also been reading a lot each day. We have been reading the Animal Stories series by Thornton Burgess, to go along with our animal fables. Thornton Burgess was a naturalist and children's author who lived in the early 20th century. His books not only tell a great story, but they detail the habits of various animals. Some so far have included frogs, foxes, muskrats, cats, dogs, squirrels, mice, chipmunks, chickadees, jays, and weasels. The child who reads them is getting enjoyment, but also a pretty in-depth science lesson! When I first got them, I thought Dallin would consider them babyish, just from the covers. But once I got him into the first one, he hasn't wanted to put them down. We've read five of them in the past three weeks, and we have four more to go. (And there are many more I could order.) Sometimes I read to him, and sometimes he reads to himself.
Homeschooling is still a bit overwhelming for me. It is definitely a LOT of work! At least this curriculum is! I've heard that Waldorf is the most intensive for the teacher of any homeschool method. I'm still kind of treading water, just trying to keep up on every day and hoping that as I get used to things, it will get easier. We have yet to start knitting, penny-whistle, and watercolor-painting because I'm still trying to be prepared for those things. I'm enjoying the time with Dallin, and he seems to be enjoying having my attention. I haven't heard any complaints about not being able to go to school and be with friends. He and Sariah are generally getting along better; the household is definitely more peaceful. I'm just not getting anything else done! Housework is the absolute bare minimum. I do have a few hours left in the day when school is over, but I'm too tired. I'm still waiting for my body to adjust to rising early. Even though I've been getting up at 6:00 for three months, I'm soooo tired all the time! But things are going well, and I'm happy to be having this opportunity.
This week has been 1000 times better! Week One was the honeymoon. Week Two was "Oh my goodness what was I thinking how will I ever be able to do this for nine months?!" Week Three has brought the realization that we'll be evolving and growing and settling and stretching--but I can do this.
Dallin is not a particularly flexible child. It's hard for him to have things change at the last minute. So the idea of having school on a holiday to make for having to go to a funeral was NOT a good one in his mind. Monday was rough, even though "school" lasted all of 90 minutes and was, mostly, pretty fun. Fun or not, in his mind, it was still school, and school and holidays don't mix. The next day, funeral day, he and Sariah were both angels.
The last three days of the week have gone very, very well. This week we started our first Language Arts/Nature block. For the month of September, our primary focus will be on those things. We still do math, for about 15 minutes every morning, focusing on oral and mental math skills. He's practicing skip counting while jump-roping prior to learning his first times table. We've been playing games to drill his ability to do addition and subtraction in his head quickly. For example, one morning we rolled four dice, and he had to add together whatever numbers he rolled. We also made flashcards using watercolor pencils. I drew a plus and a minus sign on a piece of paper, and he had to roll a dice to determine whether he'd be adding or subtracting. Then he had to draw two cards from the pile and either add them together or subtract the smaller one from the larger one. Almost every day he has a short, oral word problem to solve. Sometimes we also do "half-way" problems, for example, "Tell me the number that is halfway between 10 and 18."
We begin each day with Circle Time. This is our gathering time, and a great chance to involve Sariah. We say an opening verse together (well, right now, Mom says it... but hopefully if I do it enough, they'll get the idea they're supposed to join in). We sing a hymn--I've chosen hymns with a nature or seasonal focus, so right now for Autumn we're singing "For the Beauty of the Earth". We have family prayer. Then we read our daily verses from the scriptures. After that, we do movement activities and games, which is part of our PE. There is a huge emphasis in Waldorf on helping children with sensory integration through LOTS of movement. Dallin loves this--in fact, he told me that "circle time is my favorite part of school... except for the singing". (Meaning that he wishes we didn't have to sing.) We start by me giving the kids several different physical challenges to try out, such as doing headstands, somersaults, walking on a balance beam, wheelbarrow-walking (Dallin can walk up and down the stairs doing this! He blows my mind!), and, below, walking with a book on his head:
Then we usually play a couple of fun, active games that get the kids moving. They don't know it, but I'm going to surprise them tomorrow by pulling out Twister (they don't know I bought it).
After Circle Time is math, and then we go into the main lesson. This is where the theme of the month comes in, and this is where we put most of our time and effort. Our block this month is focused on Aesop's Fables, and as I said before, the emphasis is on both language arts and nature/science.
First, Sariah has her story. She has a different story each week, generally related to the seasons and nature, or sometimes a simple fairy tale. After Sariah's story, Dallin has a story. These are stories that I tell--or at least, the goal is that I will tell them from memory. The reality is that telling a story from memory is really hard, especially when there are two per week for Dallin plus another for Sariah. Dallin's stories this month are drawn from Aesop's Fables, but they are expanded to include scientific information (presented in a creative, fun way) about the animals in the stories. This week the two fables were The Lion and the Mouse and The Bear and the Bees. In both cases, I chose fables with characters who were similar to Dallin in temperament and who may have been dealing with behavior or personality things that Dallin could stand to work on. The over-arching theme of our school year is the duality of man; on the one hand that humans can do and be very, very good--and on the other hand, that humans have follies and foibles that can get them into trouble. The animal fables showcase the consequences that can come from giving in to our character faults.
We school four days a week, and then the other day is for field trips or larger projects. The four "regular" days are divided into a two-day rhythm. The first day, the focus is on telling the story and then experiencing the story in a creative way. So, we always do some kind of craft or other type of fun project to help cement the story in his mind. With The Lion and the Mouse, we modeled a little lion and a mouse out of beeswax. With The Bear and the Bees, we made adorable bees out of wool, and we also made a little snack in the shape of bees:
Day Two of the rhythm is "head" day, or the day we focus on the academic piece. It begins by Dallin doing some kind of re-telling of the previous day's story. As much as possible we will be making this an active re-telling. Who knew that Dallin enjoys puppetry? I sure didn't!
Then, his next task is to write (with my coaching) a short summary of the story. I put it on the board for him, and we discuss things like proper punctuation and capitalization. Then he can copy it into his special Main Lesson Book and illustrate it:
Artistic skills are considered to be extremely important in Waldorf education, because it is the arts that touch the emotional, feeling realm of humans. It is considered to be important for the child to be able to express himself in that realm as well as through writing in order to be a better-balanced human being. I've been surprised by how much Dallin seems to be responding to this! I honestly wasn't sure how he would be with it. One night he saw a picture that I had drawn with crayons, and he wanted to know how he could make one like it:
So far, this curriculum really seems to be reaching him. When I tell him a story, he is all ears, even as Sariah is trying to distract everybody. The activities are definitely fun, but it seems to go deeper than that.
We have also been reading a lot each day. We have been reading the Animal Stories series by Thornton Burgess, to go along with our animal fables. Thornton Burgess was a naturalist and children's author who lived in the early 20th century. His books not only tell a great story, but they detail the habits of various animals. Some so far have included frogs, foxes, muskrats, cats, dogs, squirrels, mice, chipmunks, chickadees, jays, and weasels. The child who reads them is getting enjoyment, but also a pretty in-depth science lesson! When I first got them, I thought Dallin would consider them babyish, just from the covers. But once I got him into the first one, he hasn't wanted to put them down. We've read five of them in the past three weeks, and we have four more to go. (And there are many more I could order.) Sometimes I read to him, and sometimes he reads to himself.
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