Expedition Earth: China

The boys and I have been doing Erica's (@ Confessions of a Homeschooler) Expedition Earth curriculum. The curriculum is only $15, but you will need quite a few geography resources to go along with it. It's still a great deal and a great curriculum!

Each of the boys got their own passport for the journey around the world:

Our first country is China:

We'll be reading The Story About Ping tomorrow to go along with our China study (we also read it as part of our Five in a Row curriculum):

Today we made Chinese lanterns:

And you know with 2 boys around they wouldn't stay upright for long:

Since they are only 5 and 3, we're just learning some basic facts about China (we didn't get into the fact that people can speak Mandarin and Cantonese):

We'll be finishing China this week and moving on...probably to Thailand since we'll be visiting there in real life in a few weeks. Fun, fun!

Republic of Singapore Air Force

Today we went to the RSAF Open House with our homeschool group (and a bunch of other school groups). We had a great time; the boys LOVED it! Here we are after clearing security at the entrance to the exhibits.

Levi inside an F-15 fighter jet.

Caleb on Daddy's shoulders for the air show:

Mommy and Levi at the air show...yes, it was HOT!

Chinook helicopter carrying a vehicle:

Boys inside a Chinook helicopter:

Boys standing outside the Chinook helicopter (happy as clams...see?):

Caleb shooting a basket inside the kids carnival section. It was air-conditioned, and there were hardly any people in there. It was fabulous!!

Bugs Bunny bouncy castle:

More bouncing and climbing:

This Open House was really well done! I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to go this weekend...it's open to the public Friday and Saturday!

Homeschool-Writing and Other Things

We've been working on handwriting in school. We are not even to the lowercase letters in Caleb's book, but we've been working on writing his name with just the "C" in uppercase. He's doing pretty well.

After that last picture I said, "Can you put your shirt back on so I can take a picture?" They are always trying to run around in their underwear! Boys.

Levi is working on his name as well. I had to make little dots for the "e," but he's doing great. It helps that they both have short names! Notice this day they are wearing the same pajamas. We often do school in our pajamas. I figure it's less laundry, right? :-)

Levi working on Mighty Minds, a shape design activity.

If you look closely, you'll see Caleb is not doing what he's supposed to. He doesn't like it when he has to do something more than once (repetition), so he usually rebels. If I know he's grasped the concept, I usually don't make him do all of it.

People have been asking a lot how homeschool is going. It's going pretty well for our first year and for having a 3-year-old and a 5-year-old with me at all times. It's not easy, but it's definitely what's right for us right now. I've been struggling with Caleb and his reading. Reading comes easily for him, but he hates doing it. He can read simple readers (Level One and Two of Bob Books), but it is a struggle to get him to do it. We're taking a break from that for a while. Since he's only 5, there's no need to push him and I don't want him to have negative feelings toward reading. We try to sneak it in when we can, and we have a reward chart for him where he gets to pick out a toy once he reads 25 books or does a combination of reading lessons with me and actually reading books. We'll see how it goes. We have some friends who are starting to homeschool here and in Texas, so it's always good to have others along on this journey with us.

The Post Where We Pretend Fall Exists

The boys and I stole this idea from my friend, Erica (a friend from college who is a children's book author! So proud of you, Erica!). I can be crafty, but I am not creative on my own, so I'm always up for stealing other people's ideas!

The directions are here for the pumpkins. It's so simple, and the boys enjoyed stuffing the fabric into the rolls of toilet paper. We went and bought fabric today (not as easy as driving to Hobby Lobby, but not terribly difficult, either), and the rest of the stuff we just improvised with stuff we had on hand. No sewing, no glue. My kind of project!

Starting the process with my monkeys:

Caleb with his finished product:

What a 3-year-old does when you are taking too long helping his brother:

The finished "pumpkin patch" (and apparently whatever was outside the window was more exciting than me taking the picture):

We stuffed some tissues between the toilet paper rolls and the fabric so you couldn't really tell they were made from rolls of TP!

A fun, easy-for-the-kids project. Thanks, Erica, for letting us steal your idea.

Grace Academy Homeschool

When people first find out you homeschool your children, there are a variety of responses, which I will outline for you here:

1) "Wow. I could never do that."
2) "Why did you decide to do that?"
3) "Did you not like the schools here?"

and, by far my favorite, a response I have only received once:

"Wouldn't it just be easier to send them to school all day?"

Why, yes, it would! But we do not make decisions on something as important as education based on what is easiest for us.

My sweet friends are always asking how school is going, and I always tell them it's going well, but it's challenging. Keeping Levi occupied is by far the most challenging part of my day. He wants so badly to do everything his big brother is doing, but his ability is just not there yet. I've been searching for things that will make Levi feel like he's doing the same work as his brother and be less frustrating for him.

We're about 3 months into homeschooling now, and we're already tweaking our curriculum. I started with a full purchased curriculum because I don't know enough about my kids' learning to design a curriculum on my own yet (and the options were completely overwhelming), but I have already learned some things we like and some things we really don't. Caleb loves anything he can create (drawing, painting, cutting, pasting, etc.); he is constantly grabbing the scissors and blank paper to make something. (His love language is also gift-giving, so most of these creations are made for someone, usually me.)

I am really enjoying spending so much time with the boys. It has been a wonderful change for all of us.

Here are some pictures from our school time:

Today we read The Story About Ping:
Then we made lapbooks to go along with our study:
We learned about China, where The Story About Ping is set. We cut and pasted the China flag and various maps of China:
Then we found where China was on our world map. The kids can now point out Singapore, China, Russia, Canada, and the United States. Today we learned that there are two countries larger in area than China (Russia and Canada):
Here's our reading corner in our school room. This is where we usually do our Bible reading and read-alouds for the day. Sometimes we switch it up and read on the couch or someone's bed:
So proud that he did this ALL by himself!
Two of our memory verses:
Another book we love and read often is Chicka Chicka Boom Boom:
We made a lapbook for this one, too, and have been putting each letter of the alphabet in the pocket as we study them (this is mostly for Levi since Caleb knows all the letters):

We've been having fun. Homeschooling is not easy, but it's definitely what is best for our family. Now I'm looking at what we're going to do in the Spring. I need to find a new math curriculum (or some supplements) for Caleb since our current one combines writing and math, which I'm not a big fan of since Caleb's not ready for so much writing. His math skills are above where we are in the book, and I need to find some math activities that allow him to work on his math skills without writing numbers.

I want my kids to love God, to love learning and to love reading. So that's what we're focusing on...making learning fun.

School At Home

After years of talking, researching, praying, scouring the internet, getting advice from people we know, and praying some more, we've made the decision to homeschool the boys next year. We're being much more intentional about teaching/learning at home now in preparation for full-time school at home next year. Caleb is constantly asking me how to spell words and saying, "what does this say?" so we know he is ready to start learning to read. And I'm ready to teach him!

Today while Levi was napping we were spelling words on Caleb's Magna Doodle using our magnetic letters. He thought this was great fun. These words were his idea, so we even got in a science lesson. He first wanted to spell "blood," and then wanted to spell "vein" since that's where the blood is. (Is it obvious he's a boy?) Then he asked me what was inside our blood, so we then spelled "cells." Later on he spelled "off" all by himself and knew what word it was. When I asked him where he learned that he pointed to a toy guitar with an "off" switch. I'm really enjoying our "school" time together.

Levi has been doing a lot of this lately (he's not feeling well):

And this shirt could not be more true!

We checked out Olivia from the library, and I've decided my boys are just like her because "she is very good at wearing people out." :-)

I've recently started reading Third Culture Kids, a book about kids who spend at least part of their developmental years (birth-18) living in a culture other than their parents' (home) culture. It's fascinating so far, and it will be really helpful when we repatriate to the US (whenever that will be). I think it's good reading for anyone who is raising kids in another country for any length of time.

I've also been reading The Well-Trained Mind. I'm also loving that book. It's great for anyone who is teaching their kids at home, full-time or supplementing what they learn at school.