School Days

Can you believe July's nearly over already? We've had a great first two weeks of school, though I'm very, very tired. The rest of my house is in shambles, laundry is way out of control, I haven't couponed in a month (see my growing pile), but school's going beautifully. :)

Science, beautiful science. Who new studying surface tension could be such an artistic venture?

Here J-Bear is learning foundational math concepts. If he stays motivated, we should be finishing up Kindergarten before Christmas (a good month or more before his 6th birthday) and ready to officially move on into first grade.

I'm pleased to say that Princess R. is making huge strides in spelling this year over last, after mastering the idea of letter pictures.

Speaking of pictures, here's her self-portrait with the chickens. ;)

Big J., having had very little formal language arts training through elementary school, pre-tested in at a solid B for his English assessment last week. I was truly impressed with this since some of the testing involved terms he had never been directly introduced to and I was unable to offer any instruction or explanation during testing, so he had to figure out some terminology based on context and his working knowledge of how language should flow, without the advantage of always knowing all the labels. He mastered several concepts with 100% comprehension and only has one area, out of 27 evaluated skills, that he is yet unfamiliar with.

There have been times I have doubted myself in the wisdom of a purely literature-based approach that holds off formal instruction in parts of speech and so forth until jr. high (especially when others challenge me on why we have taken this approach), but his test scores have made a believer out of me. Now that he has gained a natural feel for English through reading challenges, we have an excellent foundation to build upon this year as we explore the formalities of why English works the way it does and the technical labels for all those rules. I anticipate his end of the year scores will show a dramatic improvement this year! Thank you again, My Father's World, for your guidance in our schooling adventures.