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Life, Homeschooling, Rambling
Mar. 22nd, 2009 11:19 pmIt was a supremely ordinary day today, but a rather nice one. It was full of mom things. I cleaned the house, went to Wal-Mart for groceries, praised crayon drawings, raced the kiddo to the mailbox, and even took him to Target to buy a toy. The trip to the toy aisle reminded me so much of what it was like to be a little kid. I remember bargaining future chores for toy money just like the kiddo did today, and I remember my own mom sighing and saying, "Are you sure you really want this toy? Are you sure you don't want to save your money until you can get something better? It's a whole month of taking out the trash with no allowance..." I felt so much like her when I repeated that little speech. I don't remember my mom very well, so I just love those flashes of memory.
This evening, I cooked dinner and wrote lesson plans. I discovered the best activities over at the BBC school website. This one fits in perfectly with the unit on ancient India in the kiddo's history book. The whole BBC school site is amazing. All I can say is that the Brits must have a better educational system altogether. These activities are designed to fit in with their national curriculum, and the little snippets of curriculum standards they include make me want to download the whole "Key Stages" document. It makes so much more sense than the "Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills." Apparently, Texans are supposed to be essentially confused.
Anyway, we're having fun with his Social Studies/Language Arts stuff. This week was Robin Hood, reviewing European geography, and introducing encyclopedia use. (Funny how much more he liked King Arthur, the little snob! :D )Next week is reading Ananzi stories, writing poems, and a review of African geography. After that we get to do ancient India, more geography review, and then tigers with the encyclopedia. Then on to ancient Greece!
Homeschooling has always been exhausting, and I'm starting to realize how unprepared I am to be a teacher. Sure, I can teach the stuff--it's not rocket science--but I find myself wishing I had studied early childhood education. There must be some sort of secret to making sure everything is taught the way it's supposed to be taught. I don't want to teach him the way I was taught in public school; I want him to be interested. Yet, I also know that we need to cover a bunch of stuff that isn't very interesting--at least it isn't very interesting to me. I'm trying really hard to get Larry to take over the math and science. He actually gets excited about it, and I'm just sitting there saying, "Are you done with your worksheet yet?" *hee* Maybe we should just move to England and stick the kiddo in a public school.
This evening, I cooked dinner and wrote lesson plans. I discovered the best activities over at the BBC school website. This one fits in perfectly with the unit on ancient India in the kiddo's history book. The whole BBC school site is amazing. All I can say is that the Brits must have a better educational system altogether. These activities are designed to fit in with their national curriculum, and the little snippets of curriculum standards they include make me want to download the whole "Key Stages" document. It makes so much more sense than the "Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills." Apparently, Texans are supposed to be essentially confused.
Anyway, we're having fun with his Social Studies/Language Arts stuff. This week was Robin Hood, reviewing European geography, and introducing encyclopedia use. (Funny how much more he liked King Arthur, the little snob! :D )Next week is reading Ananzi stories, writing poems, and a review of African geography. After that we get to do ancient India, more geography review, and then tigers with the encyclopedia. Then on to ancient Greece!
Homeschooling has always been exhausting, and I'm starting to realize how unprepared I am to be a teacher. Sure, I can teach the stuff--it's not rocket science--but I find myself wishing I had studied early childhood education. There must be some sort of secret to making sure everything is taught the way it's supposed to be taught. I don't want to teach him the way I was taught in public school; I want him to be interested. Yet, I also know that we need to cover a bunch of stuff that isn't very interesting--at least it isn't very interesting to me. I'm trying really hard to get Larry to take over the math and science. He actually gets excited about it, and I'm just sitting there saying, "Are you done with your worksheet yet?" *hee* Maybe we should just move to England and stick the kiddo in a public school.
