2nd Week of School

The rest of our first week of school went much more smoothly than the first day. On the second day of school, Milly sounded out three letters and put them together to officially read her first words (hen, peg, bat, etc.) Needless to say, I was such a proud mommy! It only occurred to me later that she actually read her first words even earlier than Rachael did...maybe I'll have a second bookworm? I can only hope!

Wednesday was Rachael's half-birthday. She was up with the birds and knocked out her science assignment before breakfast. She is really enjoying having a class that's done primarily on the computer, and usually wants to do that one first. Given that I haven't been a great science teacher, Switched-On Schoolhouse was a great investment for our family. We didn't do much school that day - just her favorites (science, art, Latin) - since they don't take long and she had a friend over to play for most of the day. Hooray for flexibility!

Only...flexibility can go wrong in a hurry.

On Monday, I babysat for a dear friend for a little while, then visited my mother-in-law in the hospital, took the girls out for lunch, and went to the grocery store. It was a little after 2 by the time we got home, so our school day was practically non-existent. I think we got through spelling that day.

On Tuesday, I babysat for a little longer, and Rachael got a few subjects knocked out while we were there - even though I was a mean, mean mommy for making her do schoolwork at her friend's house. We got home in time to eat lunch, and then did another couple of short subjects...but really, once it's past lunchtime, the school day just feels like it should be over.

On Wednesday, we played catch-up. Sort of. I mean, we were pretty far behind what had been written in my lesson plan book by this time, and we just kind of got lazy and enjoyed spending the day at home.

On Thursday, we went out for a playdate that lasted from 10 till 2. Rachael did English and vocabulary during the first part of the playdate, because I'm an ogre and made her suffer the consequences of not getting her room cleaned. I probably don't even need to confess that we didn't do any more schoolwork once we got home.

And by the time Friday rolled around...eh, we're this far behind anyway. What's one more day? We'll catch up next week.

Oh dear. Being flexible last week has certainly created a larger work load for us this week.

I have actually come to realize, over the course of four years and two weeks of homeschooling, that anytime we leave the house - for whatever reason, for however small an amount of time - I can toss at least half of that day's lesson plan right out the window.

We're not exactly morning people around here. I know some homeschooling families who are up at dawn and can knock out a day's worth of homeschooling before a 10 a.m. playdate. That's awesome and I envy them, but it just ain't us. My girls will sleep until at least 8, sometimes 8:30, and far be it from me to wake them up earlier. No, being an utter night owl myself, I enjoy every minute of sleep they give me in the mornings. So by the time you roll out of bed at 8 or 8:30, eat breakfast, and get three females ready to leave the house, you're looking at it being 9 or 9:30...and we live in the middle of nowhere. It takes me 20-30 minutes to get anywhere. So if we have somewhere to go at, say, 10:00...well, no schoolwork is getting done before we leave the house.

Of course, by the time we get home, everyone is either ready for lunch, or tired, or crabby, or something that prevents us from being very productive. So schoolwork gets shoved to the side again.

And the day is a wash.

Now, I'm not suggesting for an instant that we should never leave the house, never want to leave the house, or anything else that's going to offend anyone. Some things are absolutely worth rearranging our schedule for. Even playdates - goodness knows I need face time with my mommy friends as much as the girls need play time with their friends.

However, knowing and understanding my own limitations (and tendencies to call the whole week off when we get "too far behind"), I simply must start being more prudent about our daytime activities. Except for extenuating circumstances (and those have been popping up in spades recently), we'll have to do our best to limit outings to once per week - and anything we fall behind on that day, we'll be able to catch up on Saturday morning while Gene is at work.

Preschool, kindergarten, and first grades were so easy - we could knock out our schoolwork in an hour or two and have the rest of the day free to spend however we wanted. Even second grade wasn't too bad. Third grade, though, has picked up the pace a bit already. Maybe it's just that we're still learning our way through the new curriculums, and maybe this too will slow down with time. We can always hope.  :)