The Plan!

It's the Monday after the new year. Our tree has been undecorated and removed, all the decorations have returned to their boxes, and it's time for some normalcy. No more hot chocolate for our 3 year old with breakfast! The treats are mostly gone. Today we 'officially' start our homeschooling adventures. I actually have a hard time calling it 'school', especailly for a 3 year old. I want to try and escape that categorization because I don't want learning to be compartamentalized. I want learning to be fluid, being intentional about our wording will hopefully remind us of this value we want to uphold. But for simplicity sake, when I refer to 'homeschooling' it's refers to the learning intentions of the day, or as we are going to call it at home 'The Plan'. The nice thing with plans is that they give some direction, but are also adaptable, especially if they are not working with your day, our plans anyhow.

Each day we are going to create a page such as this:

The Plan - Monday January 4th, 2010.

1. Book work - listing a story from our Sonlight Homeschooling Program that we have yet to read. There are also ideas for activities for each story. Again, doing what works for our child. Today my husband did this portion and he said the activity lasted 10 minutes (whihch I thought was actually good). She also wanted a few more stories read to her, which was awesome! This girl loves being read to. Actaully the other day she told me that she wants to read but she can't because she's not a big girl.

2.Active Play - this will be outside fun, active game, dress up.

3. Creative Play - some sort of creative exploration fun.

4. Family Drawing Time - this won't be each day, I'm saving it for times we need a little quiet space.

So far today this has worked for us. We'll see how things shape up in a month or so!

The Creative Family

Ok, I am just loving this book. Such great ideas, that are simple to include in your everyday life. We are having so much fun as a family. Here are some of the things we have been more intentional about since reading this book, well most of it, still have a section to go and it is already well worth it.

-Games, simple games, my daughter likes a variation of Marco Polo, or hide an seek. We are going to incorporate game time as after dinner fun.

-Cross stitching, I got an 8" ring, and a blunt plastic needle, and some burlap and tread. It cost me about $15 for everything, and I got duplicates for my nephew and ample thread and burlap. My 3yr old loves it. It's a nice quiet activity. I'm excited to try it myself.

-Family Drawing time...ok we haven't started this yet, but I asked for a journal from santa :) and I hope to introduce this in the new year. But I have already been doing this with my daughter. She has her drawing journal. But I never thought to draw myself. This is probably one of the biggest things I have come away with, I can be creative too! It's good for my daughters to see me excited about creating. I've kinda put that part of myself aside as a grown up. But I am now exploring, even started some crocheting and borrowed my mom's sewing machine.

-Dress up. My daughter likes to dress up, but most of her dress up stuff is princess related. So we've been encouraging her to think of other things she could be. She has a scarf and it became a pirate hat, our ottomon quickly became a boat, and I was the princess she was saving. With a tutu on my head, I sailed away on the ottomon with my 'good' pirate. I plan to keep an eye out for more scarves, and different hats. We brought all the possible dress up clothes into one location for her to use. That was helpful.

I'm not big on schedules, mainly because they don't work for me, I always stray. But my 'plan' for the new year is to incorporate 3 elements into our day:

1. Reading time (besides bed time, we always read before bed), and any activities that come from the themes of these stories.
2. Family Drawing time - probably after lunch, or during baby's morning nap.
3. Active game time, or outdoor fun.
4. Creative time -either dress up, crafts, or baking.

*I find if I have some sort of plan for the day I feel I have accomplished something. Also, we don't get bored as often, wondering what to do next to amuse the kids. Lately I have been doing one 'project' per day. That's been good and it's pretty organic as to what we do. But I am going to take that project a step further and try and focus on the above 4 elements.

Homeschool Excitement!

Yesterday we went to pick up a long anticipated package, Grace's Preschool Program! Most of the books will be gifts from family over Christmas, but we had to give her one. We are very impressed with this first book. So much so that today all 12 stories were read, some of them twice, that's over 420 pages! Great start to our homeschooling endeavors.