School starts soon!

Yep, we gotta get back into the swing of things!   We took the whole month of December off.   Now it is time to go back to school.   It would be nice if we could move into our new school room.  I have been sick all week and have gotten very little done.  Hopefully, tomorrow I will feel better.   I need to sort through all our stuff, and do some serious purging.  I can’t paint the room untill Todd is home to move out the wooden hurricane shutters.  I need shelving installed as well.  Oh, well.  I can’t have it all done at once.  All I really need is the table up, the computer running and our lesson plans all set.

Speaking of lesson plans, I don’t have any written for January.  I am sitting here, surrounded by stacks of curriculum books, and contemplating our focus and direction.  Nathan and Todd really want to focus on science.  I need them to focus on everything else.  LOL   

I have been contemplating on the importance of certain TOPICS in certain subjects.   I  had started teaching the boys ancient history.  Interesting, but not at all necessary is it?   I would rather start with history a little more current.  American History is where I would like to begin.  World Geography is also something I want to focus on too.    Current events would be excellent for the older boy.  That could also lead into Social Studies a bit.   One thing just leads into another, really.

Language Arts is another subject I would like to pick apart.  Nathan should definetly learn the basic parts of speech. Both boys must learn grammar and puncuation rules as well.  But, really… does anyone remember what a dangling participle is, and why would we care anyway?   I wonder how much of this is on the SAT’s.   Language Arts is important for reading, writing, vocabulary and spelling.  They all go hand in hand, so why can’t I combine them and they learn as they go.  The constant slew of worksheets to underline direct objects and predicate nouns is just BORING.    I am still thinking on this problem.   I did create blogs for each boy.  I want writing to be interesting for them, so I figured if they had an audience it would help.  We shall see how that works out.  If nothing else, I have touched on computer science and technology. 

So, anyway.  I sit here surrounded by the possibilities of a new semester.  The beauty of homeschooling is being able to change the plan, go with the flow.  Nathan hates his science book.  He has asked for a different one.  So, I found one probably 2 grades above him.  Covers the same material, just a little more in depth.  I bet he could handle it.   He doesn’t need to master it, just absorb the concepts so they are familiar when they come up again next year and the year after that.   That is the beauty of education.  It is just a layering of information and the layering doesn’t stop untill we go on to meet the Lord.