First Quarter Results

We made it through first quarter online. It felt more like school than the way spring ended. I helped Nathan find his way of working through his classes. He ended very well with 5 A's and 1 B. Some days he only had school work 1-3 hours, being he taught himself without any live meetings. Now, he has discovered that he prefers to do work at night to leave his day for relaxing and adventuring around the neighborhood in his scooter...I'm now not giving him hints on deadlines and leaving it up to him to be responsible. Between the two, we'll continue to see how his grades continue but he has shown to be responsible that I don't have to worry.

Aaron is different. Aaron, while he may have completed his independent work, seemed to rush through without following instructions some of the time/or mis interpreted instructions. I'm having to remind him of his live teacher meetings to log on. This quarter will involve a bit more hand holding to see how it goes. I now review his work before he turns it in. He generally needs additional support, so we will be watching the COVID counts and how 2nd quarter goes online to make the decision on him going back next quarter. It is a difficult decision, as once we allow the kids back to school they are to stay there. 

I don't think either boy minds being home, (the lunch food is certainly better!), but I feel bad that they are away from their friends and just anything resembling typical school for them. I'm definitely proud of everyone regardless on just making it through a difficult, frustrating and unpredictable time without complaining much. Having record summer temperatures for months upon months has not helped us either. They have not been able to be outside to play. FINALLY, we are seeing cooler temperatures in the mornings and evenings. Next week we might even see Fall!! Being outside to play and exercise will help a good deal I think. We only realize how things seemed a bit 'easier' when we had another option. 

Now below are a few pictures from first quarter. Second quarter (one week in) has been going well. I am glad to have the consistency of online and no worries about school shutting back down or having to be quarantined, or....while the situation is still stressful, it is one less thing to worry about which is what mama wanted. 

One thing that has happened in the several months since is I have been interviewed for our local news a few times on the choice of selecting to do school from home. Didn't realize that I would feel like the face of a movement  in a way because I feel like 1 out of 5 people making this decision in our state. It's been predicted the shoe will drop at some point, I've chose to trust the scientists making this prediction...I guess we'll see in the winter if I'm right. I just hated to put the boys back into an unstable situation. Really though...I don't feel like there's any RIGHT decision. Keeping my kids home keeps them safe. Keeps them relatively happy. It gives them more flexibility and freedom to their days a bit. We've learned to make decisions more at the last moment. December will be a big month - if we decide to keep the boys home yet for 3rd quarter, it basically means for the year. Especially for Nate, it would be too difficult for him to go back and refigure into classes in school in between quarters. I guess we'll have to see if there's even in person school at that point. Oh the year 2020! 

First Day of School

Funny as I document this day that we are in the second quarter of school! 

The first three weeks were rough. All kinds of technical problems, Nathan's classes were gradually loading onto the software (and then he had the adjustment of learning how to deal with 6 classes). Aaron needed to get adjusted to live teacher meets and doing classwork independently and the online systems to turn things in....

I'm happy to say we started to settle after that. I also began to learn the best/most interesting ways Preston liked to learn. We had to find a groove in other words. 

Getting Ready...

Knowing then that I was going to homeschool Preston, the many preparations began to start. I knew I wanted to have our own area away from the other boys to work (that meant a separate desk). Then to buy all the general school supplies. That followed by trying to figure out what the heck kind of curriculum I would follow or what activities I wanted to do or other materials to use. I discovered virtual preschool as something else to supplement a bit. As a result of the pandemic, I was able to secure free money and a loan. I used every last dime of the free money I received and threw it back into materials for school. Here are some of the things I came up with :

Treasure Chest box of prizes

Grabbers - our currency (more on that below)

Workbooks and games

Planner

Montessori learning toys

Lots of playdough

Really tried to find a variety of learning toys and activities to use. I even found a curriculum that I thought was going to work, that at the time I really liked by Blossom and Root that focused more so on learning through nature, reading, music, art. I had the best intentions.

Fast forward -----> Preston's attention span is not long and we have to take play breaks. I discovered he learns best through play and generally dislikes worksheet type work. Basically, if I can discreetly be teaching him without him knowing it, that's the best way! haha. He will do some worksheets and sit to read and other activities, I just have to space them out. We also take at least 1 weekday completely off a week. I also definitely do not try to do any type of all day or multi hour type school. It's pretty sporadic day to day and in some cases I need it that way to help the other kids with their schoolwork. It would stress me out too much to try and stick to a rigid schedule. I've largely dropped the main curriculum and am now just mixing a bunch of different things. 

The older kids were gifted laptops by my family - such an amazingly sweet gesture. This would prevent a lot of computer hopping around. 

Seeing that this would be an extended learning journey at home, I began my own "home"schooling page on Instagram so I could document our year and have it to reflect on. Wow will there ever be things to reflect on from this year!

Meet the Teacher

To recap what has been going on in our state (even more detailed in our city), our district proposed decisions to be made on if we wanted to do an online academy where the older boys would do their school work online at home OR if we wanted to elect for "in person " school (we would stay with our home schools until it was voted in that it was safe to physically return). We knew we were not ready or comfortable with the boys returning to school physically anytime soon. We had hoped they could be online with their "home" teachers, but couldn't pick this option in the case our district voted for the kids to go back to school. As it turned out, (very last minute), our district decided that all kids would be online for the first quarter, whether they were going in person or through our online academy. They also extended our summer break one extra week to allow for extra training (and because our daily count of virus cases was reaching all time high levels). 

We elected to keep both older kids home and through the online academy for the first quarter with the option to return to in person school in the second quarter if things were better. Preston will be home all year as his school did not have any cautious rules. Therefore, I am managing the older two with school and teaching the third. Busy times indeed.

I decided I wanted to still hold a "Meet the Teacher" day for them to still "meet me", haha. I got cookies to make a good first impression and we even had a pizza party to follow. My family came to be the "families". I made a presentation even on what I planned to use as materials to teach Preston. It was sad that even the days leading up to Nate and Aaron's first day of school, I had no idea how it was to work or what was going on. That really brought on a lot of anxiety. 

At any rate, Meet the Teacher was always an event we looked forward to, to kick the new school year off. Here are a few pictures from ours :

Living the Woods Life

For just about a week we spent time up north in a city called Greer. It may have been mentioned before as I spent some of my time there updating this very blog. Now I am home to write about our trip there! 

It was much needed and much appreciated. The weather to begin with was thirty degrees less than at home, which made the high's to be in the 70's. It was such a nice break to actually be OUTSIDE. Naturally we spent a lot of time outside doing all the outdoor stuff - we hiked, fished, went on kayak rides...

I think we all felt at ease and relieved. It even helped us forget a bit about what was happening in life that we could just enjoy what we were doing. We had a nice patio that allowed us to sprawl out to enjoy meals, reading or naps out! I know I spent probably the most time out there. Our first evening we saw deer from our patio. 

This was our dog's first trip/family trip. He did an excellent job and also seemed to have fun. We are excited to go back in another month to the same city for the same relaxation! There's something just so relaxing about being in the woods and nature. Peaceful. Just what we need right now.