As the Garden Grows...

Luk's garden is looking great. His plants are growing strong, and he is so proud to have them getting taller.

Thumbs up... Awesomeness!

YAY! My garden is growing! Collard Greens, Cabbages, Carrots, Squash, Tomatoes

Proud Boy! Going to check out his Banana Peppers and Green Peppers.

I love how he handles his plants with care. He is truly a sweet boy. I can't wait to see his expression when he begins to see the actual vegetable; he is going to ecstatic!  More to come...

Science and Social Studies (Check)

As you can read from my past posts, I have Math, Handwriting, and Science Curriculum selected. The science curriculum is me putting together things that is needed to fulfill the Kindergarten Standards. Through www.homesciencetools.com, I have selected a focus on plants and insects. To expand on this, we will discuss how the weather and earth/the solar system effect these things. Along with this follows how we live and the human body. It is an easy way to incorporate all the standards for science. Home Science Tools materials that I plan to use are: Butterfly Garden, Backyard Naturalizer's Backpack Kit (catching/examining bugs and plant life), Backyard, Woods, and Pond Series of Nature books, Butterflies & Moths, Insects, and Weather Series guides, Earthworm Nursery kit, Ant Farm Habitat, Insect collecting vials,  Carnivorous Creations Plant Growing Kit, Desert Hothouse, and Journeying into the Human Body Kit. Seem to be what we are looking at for exploring and experiments, however looking at workbooks, I have a few that I have to choose from: Stepping into Science Kit, Science is Simple, Science Arts, Bite Sized Science, and Sense Abilities.
I highly recommend www.homeschooling.families.com, this site is FULL of great resources. The more I have looked into the more I am excited to be homeschooling Luk. Reson has even gotten more excited about all the opportunities that we can offer the boys.

Social Studies Standards look at culture awareness. To fulfill this, we are purchasing the "Flat Stanley" book series. I am really excited about this opportunity. 

Here is the beauty of this book series. There is this site: www.flatstanley.com. It is a site that offers a list of participates (upon registration, which is free) from ALL over the world. You mail your Flat "Luk" or Flat "Logan" to these locations, and the people that receive them will take your paper doll around to locations that is in their country/state so that you can experience their culture. Then people will send their dolls to you for you to do the same thing. I think it would be great to show people in other countries our "country" town and FL beaches. It will open Luk's eyes to what this world has to offer.
Also, if you check the Homeschooling Families site, it gives many sites to Holidays and Traditions teaches for this subject. I think that the Flat Stanley Project is going to be a great experience, allowing me to show Luk cultures of all kinds, human needs around the world, jobs, awareness of others, and appreciating the wonders that God has created.

The more I look into experiencing this with Luk, the more I feel lead to do it. It is my duty as his mother to teach him these things. The best part is getting to incorporate God's intricate plan for all of these things. Man, I am so looking forward to attending the Homeschooling Conference in May and starting a school schedule with Luk in the Fall. He is hungry for knowledge, and now more than ever I am ready to teach him.

Curriculum Standards

I found the curriculum that I was using from the World Book website. They charge now to look at the information, however there is another site that has them available on pdf.  This is the Preschool Curriculum:

I feel that Luk knows all of the above, so we will be working on the Kindergarten Curriculum:

He knows about half of these things, and we have been steadily working on it as time goes on. It is strange to think that my three soon-to-be four year old knows the subjects that a Kindergarten student is learning. The great thing is that we are not even trying to do it; it is just happening as he wants to learn.
I'm currently looking through Science curriculum. I just got my catalog from www.homesciencetools.com It is a great site full of experiments and activities. This is the route we want to go with Luk. We will be focusing on a Butterfly Garden, Ant Farm, Plant House,
and Bug/Insect exploring Kits.
Math, Science, and Handwriting curriculum done. Now, to still find the right phonics program, which I am currently using the Letter Factory and Word Factory with Luk.

He knows all his letter sounds and can tell you what words start with when you ask him. So, now on to short and long vowels. I think that at this point I have Alpha Phonics and I will just be using that unless at the FPEA Convention I find something I like better.

Good times to come. It is exciting having Luk learn so much

Gardening

Luk is gardening with Reson's parents, it is something that he really enjoys. They are growing some vegetables that I am hoping to make into baby food for Logan. This is really a great experience for Luk as he learns the ability to garden, see the life cycle of plants and what they offer us, and just spending time with his grandparents.

Sight Words, Counting, & Money

We don't have a formal school day in the house. With me finishing up my degree, Logan nursing exclusively, our schooling is on and off for Luk. I will be finishing school in May, and Logan "should" be a bit more independent, or possibly less clingy. This is my dreaming. =) However, the little bit that we are doing now consists of sight words, counting, and money.
Reson and I decided on teaching Luk sight words and phonics. Along with him keeping up with his letter sounds, I have been working with him on words like: see, I, the. It is the words after "I see the ____" that he is sounding out.

I plan on buying the "BOB Books" because all the words are readable. In this particular book, there is some toughies like "elephant" or "monkey", but Luk still seems to understand that he has to sound out each word and their letters. So, I am okay with that since he is aware of it.

Luk seems to love numbers, so we have been working on counting. He can count to 100 with a little bit of assistance. We are trying to make him understand the tens right now. In the beginning he would say "19, 210." He can count to 30 completely alone, but again remember after 39 is 40 seems to be tricky for him. He wants to understand why that is. He has the personalty to want to know everything at once, so we are having to create our own baby steps for him. He knows basic addition and subtraction, but is not familiar with their signs + and - or =. 

We are doing the Dave Ramsey plan in our house. So, Luk is learning that he earns money for doing work around the house. When he helps cook, do laundry, vacuum, clean, etc he earns work money. 

 When he gets his jar full, we go through teaching him that 10% goes to God, 10% goes to his savings, and then we give him the choice to buy something for himself. When he goes to buy something, we make him survey the entire toy section. We want him to think about his purchase before he makes it. In the end, I have to say he picks out the better value. If I am right, he picked the wrong thing once, got upset, and realized that he needed to be smart with his money. A friend, who is homeschooling her daughter told me how she taught money starting with pennies ($0.01) then dimes ($0.10) because the learning of the tens place, then she went back to teaching nickels to represent fives. That is what we are currently doing.

I was going to post the site that I use to determine the curriculum standard for Luk, however they are now charging to look at that information. I will try looking for another site.

Stay-at-Home Moms Group

This is just one of the many reasons, I love the idea of homeschooling. I can take Luk and Logan to so many places to create a learning environment. It doesn't have to only take place in the classroom, but with the outdoors. So, this is our time with Luk and friends at the Pioneer Park Animal Refuge.

Luk loves his time with friends. It has been especially hard for me to get out of the house with Logan being very clingy, and knowing that I have homework to get done. The good news is that this is my last class, and there are only 7 weeks left. Here is just a few pictures of the kids and their refuge adventure. I never regret taking Luk to a playdate because spending this time with his friends and mine are rewarding to our lives.

Logan is precious. He is quite the clinger, but man look at those eyes. Sure he may look like Luk, but the boy is his own person. They are quite different in their mannerism and personalities. He is was bright eyed going in, but quickly fell asleep.

These two are so sweet together. Luk and Eva really enjoy each others' company. What can I say? It is adorable, and it is nice to see Luk being such a polite lil man. Especially as he goes through his "testing mommy" stages.

Here is the whole group together. They are great pals. Luk was really happy knowing that Noah and Eva were going to be there, and it was just a great and rewarding outing this afternoon.

 

 On a good week these guys see each other on Thursdays at Library Story Time, and these trips around our small town is just a bonus to their friendship. We are blessed with having Noah (and on occasions Eva) at church. I can only hoping that this leads to a great foundation of some great life long friendships.

I have to remember this as I rush through the door wondering if I should go. These are some great times in my boys' lives, and I am so happy that I get to stay and home (or out go) to enjoy it with them.

Educational Method

Here is where things start to get tricky for our decision making.
1) Which evaluation will be best for our family?
- We are leaning towards the Evaluation by a teacher. If there is educational delays in the boys we will seek a test or psych eval., depending on what exactly is going on. Basically, we will cross that bridge when we get there.
2) What is the educational method that will suite us best for this time period?
The choices are:
- Conventional Method (Systematic) - each subject is taught separately textbooks, worksheets, highly structured, easier on time for prep
- Classical Method (Progressive) - all things brought together, listening is key not visual, K-5 Grammar Stage listening and memory, 6-8 Logic Stage analyzing, organizing, debating with help from the key facts, 9-12 Rhetoric Stage expressing and developing conclusions in oral and writing forms
- Unit Study Method (Integrated) - all subjects are covered while studying one topic, hands-on, dramas, experiencing, and experiment, teaches several grade levels simultaneously, enhances knowledge retention
- Charlotte Mason Method (Gentle) - direct teaching, firsthand experiences, observations, reading literature, child narration for understanding, retention, self-educated
- Learning Lifestyle Method (Eclectic) - family's educational endeavors and studies developed around that, there is no distinction between school and home
- Principle Approach (Reflective) - looking at everything in the purpose of God's universe for a Christian Worldview, Biblical principles, America's Christian heritage, self-education using reasearch
- Unschooling Method (Unstructured) - natural learning following the child's curiosity/interest, formal teaching only when needed, uses books and other resources
- Delayed Academics Method (Unhurried) - low-stress outlook, child demonstrates readiness, typically happens between ages 8-14 they are in a mature level to learn, the brain is ready for learning, academics balances with work and service.

I'm thinking that we have a little bit of it all going on at this point, however thinking in terms of Luk and me as his teacher I have narrowed it down to three methods: Unit Studies, Charlotte Mason, and Unschooling. There is no doubt that there will be Christian worldview being used in all levels, however in the Principal Approach I don't always agree that our U.S. is the best example of the Christian heritage.


Next up what his curriculum will look like.
Again this is coming for the FPEA Guide that was cited in the previous blog.