An Update to my last Post

OK so I related the "realities" of homeschooling in my last post, now let me just list some of the benefits of our experience.

JORDAN

Jordan has slowly gained a level of confidence I have not ever seen from this child. She LOVES being home schooled, even on the days she fights that something is hard I ask her if she wants to go to a school and learn from a teacher...her answer and unequivocal "NO." She is reading and starting to read well, she is willing to do and try things she never would have before, hence the bicycle riding. She is learning to write cursive and my fighting to get her to write in manuscript has changed since she is learning to write cursive. She can't wait to write her name. This past week the girls and I had to do a presentation in front of all of our co-op families on Roman Architecture, Julius Cesar, Cesar Augustus and the birth of Jesus Christ (you can imagine condensing some of this information). Both girls did a great job, they had to act out some of the different characters and say some lines Jordan loved it, and because we were so busy with our presentation, we did not get to prepare for her show and tell, didn't matter she got up in front of her class and spoke randomly about the gymnastics class she and Kaleigh are taking. She is blossoming into a really sweet little girl. She is so happy, she is walking around hugging me all the time and telling me she loves me. Quite the difference from the girl who came home fighting to do homework every day last spring. She can tell you about Ancient History, she is learning Latin, she can tell you about the last book she read including almost all the details and why she liked it, she can tell you the noun, verb and pronoun in any sentence and she can skip count using songs by 2's, 3's, 4''s, 5's, 9's, 10's, and I think 11's. We are still working on 6, 7, 8 and 12's. She is learning to tell time to the minute and slowly learning time lapse. I am hoping to teach her how dissect a story, the main theme and then all the details, so she can learn to write her own. Will see how that goes, some days it's harder than others, but the joy I see when she gets something just fills me and lets me know we did the right thing for her.


KALEIGH

What can I say about this child, she is an open gate to learning, she is amazing. She is a sponge! Where Jordan will fight me on things, Kaleigh can't get enough, she flies through her worksheets and wants to just keep learning. We went to her 6 year old check up and the doctor was really impressed at what she knew. She can read pretty well, she can skip count 2's, 5's and 10's. Can tell time to the 5 minute and wants to learn to write a story. She's a hoot. She was in her element doing our presentation, she's very social, loves CO-OP and really loves when Michael does science with them. She can also tell you about Ancient History like Jorda she was Julius Cesar and yes she did say "Et tu Brute?" when Jordan stabbed her. (I wish I could have gotten pictures of this). Will see what she will do with all this brain God has given her. She does make it easy to teach (so far).


MADISON

She can tell you the colors, yellow, red, pink, purple, green and red. She can count to almost 10 and can tell you when she has only one in her hand that she wants 2 or 3. She loves singing the songs the girls sing for Co-op even if she doesn't know what it means. She loves singing the 10 commandments, it's one of the songs, it's her favorite. She loves playing with Jordan and Kaleigh and getting to do science with Michael as well.


What I love about homeschooling, other than being with my kids and seeing the confidence that comes from them, is the love they are really growing for each other and for me. They always want to sit on my lap (all of them) they fight to see who can sit on my lap first. Even Jaden will try to push them off if he wants them to (he's hysterical) he refuses to be pushed aside because he's the baby. If he can't get them to move, he'll resort to screaming, that usually works. I am learning new things every day, and new ways to teach things. It's fun and I'm so glad that God has led me to this place. Even though I may not have hours to myself any more, or I get frustrated that my house is sometimes a disaster, it is TOTALLY worth it.

Although these pictures have nothing to do with this post, it was too cute not to put up. Since it's been so cold her lately we had to get hats and winter coats for the kids, this one was to cute to pass up.