Homeschool!

We are already in our THIRD week of homeschooling! Wow, we've been so busy the first few weeks have have just flown by. We're getting in our groove at last and I've got to say - we're having a blast!

We got off to a bit of a rough start. Brooklyn was sick her first week and she was in no mood to do school, but I pushed her anyway because I didn't think she was that sick. She looked like she despised everything we did in school, even when we were doing things I had expected her to enjoy. Near the end of that first week, I began to wonder if she had something more serious going on but lab tests for Malaria and Dengue came back negative. Then I worried some more - was I killing my child's joy in learning with bad curriculum choices?! Was she actually depressed or going through a major emotional, developmental shift? (She was really not herself.) Was the spelling we were doing that horrible? What was wrong?!

The second week went better but Brooklyn was still acting ill and just not herself. Finally, we figured it out...she had a sinus infection and she probably had one for a long time now that I look back at the signs I was missing. We put her on antibiotics 4 days ago and the difference is amazing - we have our little girl back! Phew! Sometimes we parents can be soooo slloooowwww. Poor girl.

Anyway, after a rough start (with Brooklyn, at least) we are now doing much better. We did wind up making some minor adjustments (that happens every year) but now we've hit our stride and I'm feeling quite relieved!

Brooklyn is in third grade - her favorite subjects are Science, Spelling, Math, History, and Reading - in other words, most of them. She is a fantastic reader! Sean teases me that my inner geek is swooning every time I catch her up late reading. Yup! Brooklyn always does really well in every subject. She is a model student in every sense of the world. Well, with the possible exception of handwriting. Oh, how she hates handwriting. I suppose some people just skip handwriting altogether these days....I won't say I'm not tempted at least once day to skip Cursive and head straight to typing. ;-)

Maddie is amazing me every day. She begged to start Kindergarten last year and we started in January with lots of breaks and stops and starts. But she is an insatiable little learner! She begged me more than a month ago, when we were supposed to be on break, to start school again and I finally gave in. Well, we've finished the majority of her Kindergarten work now, and will be moving on to first grade stuff far sooner than I'd planned. (At least this year, I have the materials so we can keep going!) She is an excellent little reader - I cannot tell you how much I have enjoyed being the one to teach my girl to read.

Both older girls are loving our science that we do together each morning. We also do Bible and History together before moving on to our core subjects - it's fun to have Madison old enough to join in those studies! I had wondered if they might be too advanced for her, as they are really more at Brooklyn's level. Needn't have worried about that one. These are by far our most fun moments of the day.

Paige keeps things interesting. Oh. My. Dear. I've found she can leave her sisters alone best if I let her play on the iPad while I work with the older girls and then do some preschool one-on-one with her when her sisters are done. She's a smart little cookie and quite proud of the progress we're making through the alphabet! I really enjoy spending time with her in this way - the other girls went away for preschool and I'm treasuring this special time with my baby.

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