First Day of Homeschool

Let’s try this again. I’m a little less stressed than I was last night (or early this morning) when I apparently deleted my entire post about our day. I still have no idea how I did it, but life goes on.

Our first day this year went very well. They enjoyed their new school supplies – personal dry erase board, notebooks, long floppy erasers, and a little gift. LegoFan got a box of erasers shaped like puzzle pieces (He loves the Autism Speaks logo!); and Diva got a mini notebook and pen, decorated with butterflies.

Then we had one of their favorite dishes for breakfast: French Toast! While I”m sure it has a bit too much sugar on it, I didn’t hear any complaints!

Then, before the academics began, we started both our year and the day with a little scripture. We decided that we would read one Psalm a day, in order, and the Proverb chapter that coordinated with the date. (We actually skipped #5 as I did not feel it was appropriate for young kids getting ready to start school!)

On to academics! For history we do <a href="Click here to visit RC History.” target=”_blank”>RC History and love it! I cannot say enough good things about this program. We have completed Volumes One and Two; and are currently working on Volume Three.  It’s great to know that all the living books suggested in the program have been pre-screened; so I’m not afraid to give either child any book on the list. We are working at the Grammar Stage now, but it’s set up so that we can spiral back through and delve deeper into history as the children get older.

This week, so far, they have done two map exercises. I don’t expect them to know how to fill everything in at this point so we talk about it and they fill in the important boundaries, names, rivers, etc. Then they get to color! We use Knowledge Quest’s Blackline Maps for the ancient world and the Americas.

We also learned a little bit about a couple of saints from the same time period. One was St. Anthony who is said to have been blessed by a visit from the Infant Jesus.

The second one was St. Hyacinth who was saving the Holy Eucharist from and invasion when he heard the Blessed Mother call out for him to save her statue as well. Apparently, this statue was much too heavy for him to carry, but it became miraculously weightless as he carried it out of the church. All were safe from the attack.

Science is Exploring Creation Through Zoology 3: Land Animals of the Sixth Day. We’ve been through their Astronomy, Botany, Zoology 1, and Zoology 2 courses as well. The kids enjoy the short lessons and activities; and I enjoy the fact that God and His creation are at the center of the program.

For Language Arts, Diva is finishing up with First Language Lessons of the Well-Trained Mind, Level 4; but since there is no Level 5, we had to find something else for LegoFan. What we found was Lingua Mater. We haven’t started it yet, so I’ll have to report on that a bit later.

Our spelling program is also amazing: All About Spelling. This program works great for LegoFan who had Asperger’s and ADHD; as it is a multi-sensory program. He gets to learn to spell words through magnetic tiles, color-coded cards, speaking, and writing. Diva likes all the different activities too. In fact, this program has eliminated many of the, “Mama, how do you spell…?” questions.

Math is Singapore Math. The spiral format, again, is great for LegoFan as he gets just the right amount of one topic and then moves on to another one. With each book, they delve deeper into the various skills.

We are also doing Art (Artistic Pursuits), Music (Classics For Kids – Free online course), Religion (Faith and Life), French (a free program from the BBC), Geography (using Holling C Holling’s books), and an introduction to Shakespeare. It’s a full year, but the kids and I are looking forward to it!

We found, and are following, a curriculum put together by Michele Quigley and Kathryn Faulkner called Mater Amabilis. I wish I would have found this curriculum earlier.

But back to our day… after the academics were complete, we had a dinner of the children’s choosing – pizza!

All in all, it was a very good beginning to our school year. After their prayers, they each told me that that they enjoyed their day; and that they were looking forward to more. That sounds like a first day of school success!

This post is being linked to Building Our Homes Together and Women Living Well – hop on over to see what these other ladies are doing this week! Some of the links in this post are affiliate links; and they are all for books we have actually used and enjoyed.