Summer School Update

We are about to finish our last week of "summer school".  We live in a year round district so while we have been doing "summer school" everyone we know has had their summer vacation and has already gone back to school.  

I don't know how we will work things in the future, as far as when we will start and end school.  This year there were a few things I wanted to get out of the way during the summer so our school year would be more relaxed.  Of course, I was working under the assumption that we would be further along in our adoption process than we currently are and things might be a little chaotic around here with a new little brother.

We spent the summer learning to write the alphabet, both upper and lowercase.  We have five letters left in the lowercase alphabet, but it went smashingly.  I intend to do a review of the curriculum we used at some point.

We also learned some sight words.  Mooky has mad memorization skills which is both good and bad.  I used a Bob Books sight words kit.  We learned three or four words every week and each week's words had a Bob Book to go along with it.  I had to be very careful that she didn't simply memorize the book and was actually able to recognize the words.  Even with my best efforts, I can tell that she struggles some with memorization vs. actually knowing the word.  For instance, I will flash a word on a flashcard and if she isn't instantly sure of the word, she will run through the other words we learned the week we learned that word.  Half the time I can't even remember which words are her sight words and the kid can remember all the words we learned in one grouping.  I'm sure this gift of memorization will take her far, but it will also always be a struggle for me to know if she has true understanding.

The place where her memorizations skills have been a blessing is our language study.  I don't know what language we will ultimately end up having her learn, but for know we are working on Amharic.  Amharic is the main language spoken in Ethiopia.  I say "main language" but with so many tribes there, I'm not sure that you can say there is any such thing as a main language.  At any rate, regardless of the region our son comes from, he will be hearing Amharic spoken in our agency's transition home in the capitol, Addis Ababa.  I want to learn some Amharic so that our son will at least have a few familiar sounds around him when he comes home.  We are using a simple children's book and I have an app on my phone that helps us with some of the pronunciations.  We are certainly not experts, but we have learned basic body parts, animals, shapes, colors, and we just started learning numbers.  We still have quite a ways to go just with this children's book of words and I have an adoptive parents book and a travel phrase book to do more work with.

I just started her on the reading program we plan on using about two weeks ago.  It is her least favorite part of the day right now, but I think once she can read she will be thrilled.  I have a hunch she is going to be a book worm like me.  I bought this program because it seemed to be the main one EVERY homeschool blog I found was using.  It was also very inexpensive.  However, I was surprised by what I found when I opened it.  And to be honest, for the first 5 lessons or so I really wondered about it.  After 10 lessons though, I'm starting to understand the method to its madness.  When we are through with it I'll give a full review.

I also ordered a summer craft kit because I know if Mooky went to public school her favorite thing would be crafts.  She has really come along with her scissor use, which is good because we haven't done much with scissors in the past.  Pumpkin on the other hand will probably be a scissor expert.  One of the activities she does to stay occupied during school time is to cut up scrap paper.  My sister, the teacher, had a ton of old papers she didn't need. I took the stack home and it is now our scrap paper.

Mooky has also made leaps and bounds in her drawing capabilities.  I'll admit, I was getting worried that this child was just not going to be able to draw.  Now, I have no talent for drawing, but I thought she was going to be even worse than me.  Her perfectionism made her very apprehensive about even trying.  If she couldn't make something that looked the way she imagined it, she didn't even want to try.  But one day, she took a stab at it and now she loves to draw and we can actually tell what the picture is of.

Pumpkin sits in with us while we do school, so she is learning a few things too.  We start each day with prayer, the pledge, the song "This is the day the Lord has made", a song about the months of the year, a song about the days of the week, and calendar work.  Just by sitting there with us, Pumpkin has learned everything but actually being able to figure out what day of the week it is. While Mooky is doing "busy work" I spend just a bit of time with Pumpkin.  One week I focus on colors, the next shapes, the next letters and the next numbers, then I repeat.  She has greatly improved on each of these areas, but Pumpkin is a bit of a free spirit and just doesn't care yet.  She's two, what more can I say.

I know a lot of people wonder what to do with their toddlers while they are schooling.  Here are a few of the things Pumpkin does to keep busy during school time, but she definitely causes a lot of interruptions.  I was reading an article about homeschooling and I really got a kick out of it when it said "can you imagine a school where the biggest disruption is a typical fight between your 9 and 10 year old about whose turn it is to do the dishes."  Ha!  Maybe if you don't have toddlers around.

- Cuts up scrap paper

- Colors

- Pretends to write on whitboard

- Uses colored chalk on chalkboard

- Looks through books

- Digs through rice to find hidden items

- Puts together puzzles

- Occasionally will play in another room, but she likes to be part of the action

So now we are taking our "summer break" and will take a few weeks off and then start in on our first real homeschool year.  I've decided to go with Sonlight's 4-5 Preschool curriculum.  I have not ordered it yet.  We are trying to be very careful with our money right now; so, I plan on just buying what we need for each trimester of the curriculum as it comes up.  I've found several items used as well.

I have a few extras I would like to add to the curriculum but I'm going to use a wait and see attitude with those.  If things do start moving along with the adoption I think it would be good to keep things pretty simple.  I may also want to have some things to do over next summer.  Doing "school" everyday has been keeping us on a nice routine and keeping our days full.  Mooky also just loves school and even asks to do it on the weekends.

I feel like this post might look like a bragging on my kid type post.  Please don't read it that way.  I just want to chronicle what we are doing, how far we've come, and keep our out of town family updated on our life.