Yesterday was an off day for me. I started off the day declaring it would be “Mental Health Day” all week. Then I pulled a muscle in my chest. Yup, it’s official. The 5 yr old is now too big for me to lift. *pout* So, momma was in no condition to teach.

It was also Monday, which means Pizza and Movie Night in our house. GeekBoy was so excited, it was his night to pick! But alas, it was only 4:28pm, and he had to wait until 5pm to put his movie on. He looked at the clock and then told me he had 32 minutes til movie time. I smiled. This from the boy who claims to hate math, despite his mathematical genius. For some reason he views math as pure evil, and subtraction, specifically, is the bane of his existence. I couldn’t help myself. I told my son, “Guess what? You just did math. And guess what? You did subtraction!”

My son was thrilled with himself. So thrilled, he decided to look at the length of the movie, given in minutes, and figure out how long in hours it would be. When he again came up with the right answer in under a minute, I cheered him on and said, “Guess what? You did more math! Subtraction even!”

He was so ecstatic. He ran off to his brother’s room where his brother and sister were playing, shouting the whole way, “I did math! I did math!” But when his sister decided she wanted to do her math workbook too, Geekboy told her, “I didn’t do my workbook… I lived it.”

In today’s history lesson we talked about the makings of a successful settlement. We compared the maps of Jamestown and Plymouth.  Discussed the need to readily available water and food, and the need for protection.  The kids were supposed to draw a settlement, but GeekBoy said:

“I have a better idea! I can build one in Civilization 3!”

He’s been building cities, increasing knowledge, exploring countryside, and negotiating treaties ever since lunch.

I know. It’s been a while. I’m working on that, trust me. Meanwhile, a couple of local homeschool moms have gotten together for the second year and put on an awesome Science Fair. As a big thank you to all the companies who sponsored a bunch of homeschoolers and their scientific pursuits, I’ve copied (with permission) the sponsor information from Lydia. Please support these homeschool-friendly businesses.

Thank you to the following homeschool-friendly businesses for supporting the GUESS Homeschool Science Fair and the young scientists of Hampton Roads!

Green Olive Tree is an internet company based in Portsmouth, Virginia and owned and operated by a homeschooling family. They offer a broad range of internet services, from reliable web hosting to corporate infrastructure solutions and server administration.

SKS Science supplies homeschoolers and other educators with all the science supplies you need to turn your dining room table into a proper laboratory. Browse their site for test tubes, bottles, face masks and other lab supplies and books.

Book Exchange is the largest used bookstore in Eastern Virginia. Unlike most musty and confusing used stores, this one is clean, bright, inviting, and has a huge selection of used homeschool books. There’s always an interesting curriculum find on these shelves!

Folkmanis Puppets makes the most delightful animal puppets available outside Santa’s workshop. Meet their most unusual creations like llamas, Chinese dragons, ostriches, flying squirrels. Unusual materials create realistic textures, and they all move in very realistic ways. Irresistible.

The Happy Scientist, Robert Krampf, hosts an online wonderland for budding scientists. With online science lessons, experiments to try at home, a science photo of the day, and new content added all the time, you’ll love setting your kids loose on this site.

Mad Science is Hampton Roads’ premier provider of science enrichment classes for children. Summer classes include “Crazy Chemistry” and a space camp developed with NASA! New homeschool science classes are being offered in Norfolk and VA Beach, with more planned for fall. (**I can totally vouch for the good folks at Mad Science.  My son took a Mad Science class a few years back. The teacher was awesome, and even let the little two join in.  Plus my kids learned a few German phrases from her. Bonus!)

Moore Expressions is a homeschool bookstore in Virginia Beach, VA. They sell used and new homeschooling curriculum, host a support group, and publish a newsletter called the Bayith Educator. They are the premier source for homeschooling books in the Hampton Roads area. (** Again, this is a great store! Dangerous for me to go into as I always wind up spending more than I planned! But they have soooo much good stuff, and you can trade in your old, didn’t-work-for-us curriculum for store credit. Awesome.)

Norfolk Karate Academy offers classes in Tang Soo Do (Korean karate) and Gracie Jiu Jitsu (Brazilian grappling and self-defense). With classes for children, teens, and adults, it’s a great way for anyone to get in shape and kick things in a socially acceptable way!

Brooks Systems offers standalone software and web applications that check legal compliance in all municipalities in all fifty states, and create truth-in-lending documents for residential lenders. Using Brooks for your automated mortgage compliance, you can be sure your loans are safe.

eScienceLabs creates boxes of joy for science loving homeschoolers. In each kit is a complete science experience — from individual lessons to full years of high school labs. Hands-on science kits are the answer to your laboratory woes. Everything is in there: test tubes, goggles, and fun.

Mariner’s Museum has amazing programs for homeschoolers learning about maritime science, history, and even pirates! Their spring homeschool series features lessons about the Civil War. Visit Mariner’s Museum for historical exhibits and educational programming. (**This is a fun place.)

Virginia Air and Space Center was host to the homeschool science fair this year, and delivered awesome science classes for homeschoolers from their education department. The VASC is the educator resource center for the NASA Langley Research Center.(**Another really fun place. We’ve been many times.  They also have Free Admission for Military Families Days. Rawkin’)

via Little Blue School: Steal This Post.

Today we discussed the Lost Colony of Roanoke.  I knew this one would be a big hit because GeekBoy loves a good mystery.  So we read the short little bit in the book about the Roanoke colony, and then we watched the NatGeo special (embedded below). After ward, we discussed the Eleanor Dare stones, and some theories, and the kids each gave their own theory of what might have happened to the colonists at Roanoke Island.

GeekBoy’s idea:  A hurricane hit and wiped out most of their colony, forcing the survivors down to Croatoan Island.  Then another hurricane forced them to the mainland.  There they moved to South Carolina and married into the friendly Indian tribe down there.  I think Eleanor Dare carved the first stone.  Then some point later, she died.

thePinkDiva’s idea:  They got captured by Indians.

BigBoy’s idea: they married the Indians, then they died.

My personal theory, is that they, much like the colonists in Plymouth, got very sick that first winter.  Most of them would not have survived.  I think the few that did decided to move to the nearby Island of Croatoan with the friendly Native American tribe that lived there.  I believe it’s possible that a hurricane hit that drove the remaining survivors inland, where they intermarried with Hatteras Indian Tribe and the Pembroke Indian Tribe.  Both tribes are reported as having “light eyes” and speaking as the English did, and both tribes would have been in the right area.  The Hatteras are descended from the Croatoan.  There is documentation that the Pembroke Tribe had many of the last names of settlers, and claimed to have ancestors from Roanoke. (Here’s a link to one of many sources for my theory.)

One thing is certain.  Whatever happened to them, it’s a mystery to us.

And now, for your viewing pleasure, a 2 part NatGeo special, hosted by Leonard Nimoy.

Just letting any of my readers here know – I posted about the Obama speech to the kids over on Conserva-Kat. Enjoy (or not.)

Week one went pretty ok.  Yea, we had a few bumps…but over all it was fun.  It generally takes about 2 hours to teach 3 different grade levels.  Wednesday we did a science project that involved pouring melted butter over a plate of flour to watch the “lava” carve it’s own paths.  Thursday, the weather was soooo pretty, that we declared a “Nice Weather Day” and the kids played outside, all day.  It was great!  Friday, we whipped through lessons in record time and even had time to get ready for Daddy’s birthday party.

We’ve got a full week ahead.  GeekBoy has soccer practice on Monday – yes, on labor day.  Hopefully most of the team will show up, because we only have one practice a week, and last week was rained out.  That means we will be heading into our first game next Saturday without ever having a full practice. Not a good position to be in to start the year.

I knew today was going to be rough when BigBoy woke up with a very croupy cough.  Luckily I saw this coming last night, and had his cool mist vaporizer running already, but still.  Nothing can derail a homeschool day faster than a sick baby kid.  Thankfully, a dose of Robitussin seems to have helped tremendously as he is currently rolling around on the floor playing legos, with very little of that nasty cough.

thePinkDiva kicked off our school day by asking to play with the Math-U-See blocks again.  (See, I told you it was a big hit!)  I have to watch her like a hawk though, because she has a tendency to take little pieces and run off with them.  I don’t mind her playing with them, but… We are still missing about half the counters we got with the K12 curriculum a few years back, Candy Land is missing most of it’s cards, and the rest of our kiddie board games all have pieces missing.  There is a reason why I got Family Game Night & Monopoly for the Wii.  And that reason’s name is thePinkDiva.

So, Diva and Geekboy ripped through their math lessons in record time.  They ran off just in time for BigBoy’s Robitussin to kick in.  He walked into the kitchen declaring he was now “good enough to leave my room.”  He snuggled up on my lap and whipped through MUS Primer Lesson 4 (the one on rectangles).  He ran off, and thePinkDiva came back for her phonics lesson.

This is where the drama started.  You’d have thought I asked her to read War & Peace, instead of HOP book 7, The Fog.  She screamed at me, and got sent off to her room for a 20 minute fit of temper & rage.  When she finally settled down, we compromised and only worked on sight words today.

Then GeekBoy continued the drama when I asked him to come back to the kitchen and do his language.  We started going over Prepositions yesterday and I realized that the “book” I have to use with him isn’t so much a grammar book as it is one of those testing review & reinforcement type books.  So, the two pages we did yesterday were obviously not enough. Today I used this site to find the nine most common prepositions, and listed them on the board.  Then we talked about how to tell if the word was being used as a preposition (if it comes before a noun).  I pulled one of his favorite mystery books off the shelf, picked a page at random, and we looked for prepositional phrases.  He seemed to really catch on after that.  Then we looked over today’s workbook pages and found a review of punctuation that he ripped right through.  Until we came to the writing part.

I know writing is his weak point.  He has struggled with it for years, and been officially diagnosed with Dysgraphia.  The main strategy for overcoming Dsygraphia is to practice writing. So I made him think about the things he wanted to write and tell me.  Then I dictated his sentences back to him, and let him write without thinking too much about what he wanted to say.  This is when I noticed the way he curls his hand over his page.  It kind of reminds of the way the lefty kid in high school used to write, except, my son is a righty.  Our new goal is to help GeekBoy re-learn his writing technique and use a straight wrist.  I’m hoping that once we get a good writing technique into his muscle memory, writing itself won’t be so much of a pain.

History today was just a review of the continents and compass direction.  We are working on American History this year using Heritage Studies 1 by BJU.  Should be a fun year.  I’m looking forward to taking advantage of the area’s rich history with field trips to various locations we’ll be studying.

Believe it or not, I’ve gone 2 days without picking up my camera!  So no pictures yet.  I’ll have to try to remember to take some tomorrow.

Day one done, & nobody got hurt. I’d call that a success.

Actually, it wasn’t that bad.  Math-U-See is a big hit.  The kids love the blocks, and the video.  It’s a great help for me, because I really have no clue how to use all these blocks and stuff with math.  I was never taught with manipulatives.  I was taught using the old flash card memory idea.  BigBoy blew threw lesson 3 in Primer, and is well on his way to catching up to thePinkDiva, who started on Primer lesson 9.  thePinkDiva loved Decimal Street and “-ty”.  Mr. Demme’s explanation of adding the “-ty” to all who live in the Tens house really helped her figure out how to say the double digit numbers.  GeekBoy, who started on lesson 18 in Alpha, has had trouble with the concept of subtraction in the past.  But after watching the video and playing with the blocks, the concept seems to have finally clicked.

thePinkDiva is still working on the Hooked on Phonics yellow book (aka Kindergarten).  We got about halfway through it last year before life overwhelmed our “school” year.  So today we just did a quick review of what we had already done.  It would seem that the 6 months or so we took off have actually helped her. She had no trouble at all reading the different sections we choose to go over as our review.

BigBoy decided he wants to learn to read.  So he is starting the Hooked on Phonics yellow book this year.  Yes, both kids are using the same book.Today we went over the alphabet and letter sounds.  He only missed a handful of letters, and already knows most of the sounds.  So, we’ll see how quickly he catches up to thePinkDiva.

The only hiccup of the day came when I asked GeekBoy to do his Grammar pages about prepositional phrases.  See, he was under the mistaken impression that when I said he was done with math that I meant he was done with school.  But he changed his tune when he learned that his latest Lego Brickmaster magazine had come in, and that I wouldn’t give it to him ’til he finished both Language and Science.  Mean rotten momma.

Science is one of two classes that we are doing together this year (the other being History).  We are going to finish the Astronomy course we started last year.  We’re using Apologia’s Exploring Creation with Astronomy.  Last year year, we got all the way through the solar system to Mercury!  Yea, that far.  So… today we reviewed what we did last year.

The funny part – it has taken me longer to write up our school day today, then it took to teach 3 children 3 different subjects.

So… yea. It’s that time of year again.  I’ve decided to start our “school” year off on Aug 31.  This has everything to do with Daddy getting home from a 6 month deployment at the end of July, retiring from the Navy at the beginning of August, and then taking a much-needed month long vacation.

So for the last month or so I’ve been gradually planning out the schedule for the next year, signing up for classes and activities, choosing curriculum, and lesson planning.

Lesson planning sucks. I just hope and pray that GeekBoy isn’t bored to tears with the work I’m setting up for him.  I hope that the material is challenging enough for him, but also fun.  I hope that thePinkDiva gets it.  I hope I’m not pushing BigBoy too hard.  I’ve been playing with HomeschoolTracker Basic as I plan though.  So far, I like it.  I’m considering buying the full-featured Plus version.

This year we will be trying out Math-U-See.  We’re also going to try using Heritage Studies 1 as a basis for our history course.  I’m hoping we will  finish Apologia’s Astronomy book this year.  The little two will be doing phonics, while the big guy is going to be working on his writing and reading comprehension, with a dash of grammar and spelling thrown in there. The boys are signed up for soccer again, and looking forward to the season.  All three will be taking art classes at the local Cultural Center.  GeekBoy gets to take Martial Arts and Drama there, and thePinkDiva will be taking ballet as well.

The first semester is filling up fast.

We had an impromptu Music Appreciation class last night at dinner.

I had music on in the back ground, and Skillet’s Comatose came on. GeekBoy said it sounded like it would give him nightmares. Well, the intro is kinda creepy because it’s really choppy violins & hardcore keyboard.  But we talked about the different instruments they were using, and listened more closely to the song to try to pick out the Violins, Keyboard, Drums, & Guitars.

Then we talked about the meaning of the song, and how it’s song about the singers relationship with God, and that he has drifted away and feels like without God he’s sleeping (comatose), and that he wants God nearby to help him “wake up” or deal with the stuff in his life. It was neat.