Everyday Things...

Everyday things are school, and play, reading, and swimming, cleaning, and cooking, going to the beach, and spending time together as a family.

There are no families like home school families for spending time together. We are together day and night. We have few breaks from each other, but that is ok because we are really good friends for the most part.

Ezra is keeping me on my toes with school. He picked up so much while Enoch was learning to read and do math that he gets board so easily with his books. Especially with reading. I am having to adapt the lessons to a higher level since he gets so board. He is reading words easily and doing two lessons a day to keep it exciting to him. He loves reading the words and stories but hates the exercises that teach them how to sound out words etc... They are just too easy, BUT I have adapted them for him and he is much happier and less board now. Now I need to come up with creative ways to help him with his counting by 2's, 3's, 5's and 10's. He can do it when he applies himself but he mostly thinks its boring and turns his brain off which throws me over the edge inside. I am getting better at handling it though and learning to make things more challenging for him. It's a good thing the child isn't in school though because he would be so bored he would constantly be getting into trouble and the teachers would think he was stupid because when he turns off his brain he can't even remember his own name the little stinker.

Enoch has finished his reading lesson book and is now just reading books from the library and standing over my shoulder trying to read my emails and such. He is not as easily bored as Ezra but he complains sometimes that the work is boring. They are just about done with these books though and Enoch will be moving to second grade math and harder books and Ezra will be moving to first grade math and reading harder and longer stories. Over the last week Encoh has moved past reading level one AND two but the level three are a little overwhelming for him. He gets frustrated with the chapter books because they have too many words he doesn't know by sight and he is a little bit lazy abut sounding out new words.

If only I could get them to put some effort into their handwriting and not doodle all over their math. Any suggestions?

I have just ordered their first science book and writing book and I am about to get their Latin roots/spelling book so that will help engage them as well. But seriously it's hard to teach kids who are moving so quickly and who are so smart. They are lucky they have a parent willing to homeschool them and who trys to keep up with them because they wouldn't get much from sitting in a classroom with 20 other kids each day. They would get 6-8 hours of social time everyday, but I doubt they would learn much.

Lol, get this- yesterday Ezra was doing that irritating thing where he turns his brain off and was staring blankly at me as I was singing him a school house rock song over and over to get him to learn to count by 3's. I stopped in the middle and asked him what comes after 24(when you are counting by 3's)And he stared at me and said 25 and Ethne looked up from her playing and said "twenty-seven". LOL Enoch, Ezra and I all stared at her and couldn't believe what we heard. We were dumbstruck. SHE KNEW THE ANSWER. She had been listening to the song over and over as I sang it for Ezra and she KNEW THE ANSWER. He didn't, but SHE DID. Smart thing! It was a good thing somebody knew cause I seriously felt like dropping a book on Ezra's head after all that.