It's working!

So I know many homeschoolers are in full school swing by this point in August, but we here are just starting to get slowly back into the groove. My biggest goal for the weeks I consider "warm up time" is to see what kind of daily schedule I can work out for us all.

I want to fit in the basic, and mostly independent, school stuff for Punky and have been trying out a few different methods to see how he can best know what he needs to accomplish during this time on his own in the day. So far, though we've had some days when he is clearly not all there and plugged in (he is a seven year old boy - I would expect no less!), he seems to be getting the hang of just setting to work and getting his independent work done quickly and efficiently, with much less tendency to be distracted than when we started.

During this time when he is productively occupied, I am also trying to figure out how I can best use my time elsewhere. Should that be a time to get all my household duties done? Would that make a good pre-k time for Finny and Goose? Should I make it a mommy-daughter time with Girly Pie before she has her nap? I'm not sure yet... but since GP's nap is in transition from two medium naps a day to one longer one, she's still not a concrete person to count on at any particular time in the day yet, so I am leaning towards chores or pre-k time.

I also want to make a time in the day (hopefully while GP is asleep) when I can dive into the fun stuff with P and F. We'll be doing some unit studies, though I do not want to make them super-duper academic. I want that part of our schooling to be fun, exciting, mentally stimulating but not overly taxing - and really the part of the day we all look forward to the most. So having one less distracting little one around is a good fit for that. That will be the time when we do related crafts, science experiments and any bigger games or activities involved with our topic of study. I might also do the reading on the topic then, but I'm not sure.

And of course I need to make sure I'm available every two hours to be heading up the OT exercise for Finny, so I'll need to fine tune what the others are doing during those short but important times when he and I work together. Distraction is particularly hard for Finny to work through, so I am learning way s to have others occupied so he and I can find those 5-10 minute times to just focus on our work (it's harder than it sounds in a house with four young children to keep the other three from distracting one in particular)

The other key to our new days is learning how to keep everyone directed, even when I am not personally involved with each of their activities. I am learning the art of assigning and rotating activities for all three boys - even just fun, simple stuff like Duplos, playdough, blocks and magnets. Instead of letting them roam freely in between set work times, choosing those same activites or others as they please, I want to have more of the day structured where they are focused on specific kinds of activities, though still mostly playing (since they are still so young!). The focus and direction is mainly for Finny, since his therapist has encouraged me to minimize his completely free-range time, as he tends to lose his self regulating ability when left to his own devices for more than a few minutes. This new kind of directing and rotation is not really my natural approach to things, so it's been a bit of a slow learning curve, but I am finding fruit in it for all of us, and as I get more accustomed to it, I think it will suit us well over the coming years.

So all this to say I have a lot to finagle into our days, and that's really not even including basics like meals, most household work, one-on-one time with any of the kids... and many other very important things. But it's a good start, and we're finding some ways that work - and some ways that don't!

But today, it really went beautifully for the morning, even though we got off on a late start. We had a false wake at 4:40 from Miss Girly Pie and though we all fell back asleep, we were slow moving when we did wake up. Then our aging dog surprised us with a nice smelly mess in his kennel this morning, so among other things, we just had a lot to do before we could really get moving this morning. So I was sure all the school/schedule stuff was going to be a wash this morning. But Punky, though late to start, cruised right through his independent work with not a lick of help needed from me, Goose happily spent his free time playing nicely with Finny, and I was able to finish the morning work later than usual and to put GP down for nap, again later than usual. But when I came down from GP's nap routine, I found Punky sitting at the work table diligently plodding away at his math book, and right across from him was happy, "just right engine" Finny, who had decided this looked like the perfect time to pull out his reading lesson and begin going through it on his own.

Normally we do that together, and it is not something I am at all looking to have him do independently. (what's the point of homeschooling if I can't even be the one to sit down and watch my kids learn to read!?) But I was just so tickled to see that with all the effort I've been putting into our mornings, it seems the idea of working and staying on task with productive efforts seems to be setting in. The fact that instead of coming down from the nap routine to find Punky distracted by Finny's play time with Goose, I found Finny drawn into the quiet table time. I guess it's time to find at least one or two kindergarten-ish workbooks so that Finny can have something to do for his own "work" time, since he clearly would like something of that nature to call his own.

And that is something I hope to see more of in the coming years, though I know there will still be many a day (month, year...) of finding the workers distracted by the players, I do hope that we will see more and more of the players joining in on the more directed learning experience.

So it is working. My children are learning routines and self direction. They still have plenty of time to play in the day, and much of their directed time is still spent in just doing simple activities that they enjoy, with none of the three R's covered through the process. But they are learning something through it all.

And so am I!

Home. Sweet home.

We went to the Seattle Science Center today (with Mary Grace and crew) and we had the best time!

Girly Pie did great in her first big outing with the Ergo. ;o) Goose was enchanted with the moving dinosaur models. The butterfly house was a big hit for everyone, as was the science of bubbles demonstration we watched. Finny and Punky had a blast. We really and truly had a wonderful day.

Too much fun stuff to post here in my short time on the computer. But I did come back with a very clear realization...

Yes, the Science Center was great. Sure the kids loved a big day out in the city. Sky scrapers, the Space Needle, taxi cabs and buses with the fancy little poles on top that let them run off of electrical wires in the city rather than diesel fuel... it is all quite fascinating... on a rare occasion.

But as we left the hustle and bustle of the"big" city and drove the +/- hour back through freeways, suburbs, highways, smaller cities, small towns... and the concrete faded away as the green of the countryside where we live took over... I was overcome with a deep gratitude for the simple and beautiful place we are blessed to call home. I was so thankful to turn onto the last highway heading to our house, and to see fields of grass and flowers... and old weathered barns and pastures dotted with cows. The mountains were just visible as daylight faded away and it was so nice to see how dark they all looked, way out there - no big city lights blaring all around us. I had felt borderline claustrophobic in that city. I hadn't realized how on-edge I had been all the time we were driving in the city. It wasn't until I hit the home stretch of our drive home and I looked out at the vast expanse of the valley leading home that I literally took in a deep breath and finally felt myself relax again.

I'll take inconvenient-but-peaceful-and-beautiful-green over in-the-middle-of-all-the-action-gray any day.

Indeed it does take us near half an hour to get to a decent grocery store. And no, my children will not be exposed to a whole lot of opportunities for expanding their minds with fine music and theater and all that other great stuff that I'm sure big cities must offer. But I wouldn't trade our simple, beautiful home for anything.

I like that going into the city is an event... concrete and sky scrapers and big freeway interchanges are something to be marvelled at.

And I love that fields of green are... home.