Going with the Flow
Today has been a beautiful Monday. The weather is cool, actually pretty crisp, and it's sunny and glorious outside. I had done my planning last night and had lots to do in my book today. We got started almost on time, but the day ended up winding and twisting like a dirt road in the country, peaceful and tranquil and full of beautiful visions along the way.
Dakota started his morning work and enjoyed his independence. This is such a pleasant change from the reluctant student who I had to beg to start every morning last year. He does his journal, a language arts starter book, a page of cursive, a weather/temperature chart, watches the BrainPopJr app of the week on Monday and checks his Today's Special board for whatever is there for the day. Today it was The First Day of Autumn, which occurred over the weekend. When he was through, we took our Awesome Autumn book out to the deck and sat on the swing to read it, finding out why the leaves are turning colors and talking about all the cool things fall brings. We decided leaf rubbings were in order, so Dakota went into the yard and collected some that were still green and others that were in the process of changing or already had changed and we taped them down, covered them up and peeled our crayons. Two nice leaf rubbings later, we took our works of art down to Daddy's office so he could laminate them for later.
The second half of our morning was spent learning about our own history in preparation for the start of our Story of the World, Volume 1 unit, to begin next week. We have a sponge painted tree waiting to be finished, but today we wrote out a family tree, discussing Sr. and Jr., stepfamilies, relationships with aunts, uncles, cousins. Then we pulled out the old pictures I spent time going through yesterday and he got to see pictures of lots of aunts and uncles he rarely sees and best yet, pictures of his three grandfathers whom he had never met because they all passed away before he was born. He had alot of questions and it turned out to be a very interesting topic!
After lunch, when Natalie was also awake, we went out on the deck to finish our math and language arts and to start our unit on the moon for this week's science. I am proud of myself that I am not stressing too much over being "behind" on history and science. This isn't where I had originally wanted to be at this point in the month, but it's been a nice September so far, Dakota is enjoying school and I don't feel burned out. That's a remarkable feat for me, as I am usually overdone by now and I have a stressed out kid. I AM improving!
Now for a quiet night with some work and some TV. I found a new, easy recipe for dinner and it's in the oven cooking now while I decompress and wait for my husband to get home. Yes, a very ice Monday, indeed!
Dakota started his morning work and enjoyed his independence. This is such a pleasant change from the reluctant student who I had to beg to start every morning last year. He does his journal, a language arts starter book, a page of cursive, a weather/temperature chart, watches the BrainPopJr app of the week on Monday and checks his Today's Special board for whatever is there for the day. Today it was The First Day of Autumn, which occurred over the weekend. When he was through, we took our Awesome Autumn book out to the deck and sat on the swing to read it, finding out why the leaves are turning colors and talking about all the cool things fall brings. We decided leaf rubbings were in order, so Dakota went into the yard and collected some that were still green and others that were in the process of changing or already had changed and we taped them down, covered them up and peeled our crayons. Two nice leaf rubbings later, we took our works of art down to Daddy's office so he could laminate them for later.
The second half of our morning was spent learning about our own history in preparation for the start of our Story of the World, Volume 1 unit, to begin next week. We have a sponge painted tree waiting to be finished, but today we wrote out a family tree, discussing Sr. and Jr., stepfamilies, relationships with aunts, uncles, cousins. Then we pulled out the old pictures I spent time going through yesterday and he got to see pictures of lots of aunts and uncles he rarely sees and best yet, pictures of his three grandfathers whom he had never met because they all passed away before he was born. He had alot of questions and it turned out to be a very interesting topic!
After lunch, when Natalie was also awake, we went out on the deck to finish our math and language arts and to start our unit on the moon for this week's science. I am proud of myself that I am not stressing too much over being "behind" on history and science. This isn't where I had originally wanted to be at this point in the month, but it's been a nice September so far, Dakota is enjoying school and I don't feel burned out. That's a remarkable feat for me, as I am usually overdone by now and I have a stressed out kid. I AM improving!
Now for a quiet night with some work and some TV. I found a new, easy recipe for dinner and it's in the oven cooking now while I decompress and wait for my husband to get home. Yes, a very ice Monday, indeed!
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