School prep!

T-5 days to the door! My boys are so excited they can't stand it! They have been helping me a lot with all of the prep work of homeschooling :) If you are a fellow hs'er, you totally get it. If not, imagine that the school teachers are in their rooms at least a week before classes start, then add 2 extra grade levels :P
First off, a person can only laminate so many things, right? ....................wrong. I am Ashley Russell, and I am a laminate addict.  Seriously, I *love* that thing! Things will last so much longer and we can reuse them every year, if we continue to be led by the Lord to homeschool (:
I set up the calendar and laminated all the #'s. May awesome husband (our principle) took the huge calendar to Staples to get it laminated for me, as my scotch won't do that big 'ol poster. I added velcro tabs to the months and days and we will just switch it every month!
The little boys (kinder and 1st) will be learning the days of the week, and the order they come in.  Bradley knows this already, but it will be a reminder, and a fun morning routine! So, here is my nifty project #1:

We will also be learning all about weather, so project #2 is this:

My boys *love* to help, so everyday we will have a 'mom's helper.' This person also gets to do his work in a super cool chair I picked up today (will post pics of tomorrow!)  Here is the mom's helper project:

I also decided to do a behavior chart. They will start a "star" and have the chance to be a "super star" or just have an "ok day" or a "sad day." :

And, if they are a SUPER STAR, they get to pick one of these cards and use it whenever they want!

I could bore you to death with all of the stuff I have prepared, but I am going to cut this post short, as it is 11:30 and this mama is SLEEPY! 

I will post more tomorrow of stuff I have been working on, and once the school room is all set up, I will post pics of that as well!

'Night!

Homeschool vs. public school

I have someone that is very important in my life, and she brought something to my attention the other day. So, what kind of friend would I be if I didn't blog about it? No, really, it kind of pinged my heart, so I thought I would address it here in my little spot on the world wide web.  I have done the public school thing & was very impressed with the school we attended. It wasn't really a 'public' school, more like a brain based private school, but never-the-less a school setting with teachers, tests & a principle.  Do I think that sending your kid(s) to public school makes you any less of a parent? Absolutely not! Been there, done that, and guess what? It didn't screw up my kids.  Why does society have to think that one is better than the other, or that homeschooling kids are smarter, or that public schoolers are more social? I mean, really people? We ALL as parents do what we feel is best for our children at that time in our lives.   It is like the whole breastfeeding/formula debate. Ive done both, see I'm a rebel like that, and guess what? ALL of my kids still get sick!!!! OH MY! True story.  God already has a plan, and if it is His plan that your children go to public school, and mine learn at home, it is just that-His plan. I can say, without ANY doubt,  that the Lord brought us here, and God doesn't make mistakes.

Lesson planning

Whew! I never knew how much went into lesson planning, especially 3 different grade levels! I know it will get easier, but this first week was crazy (crazy in a good way, exhausting in another).  I have decided to just make lessons for the week instead of a month or semester at a time. I do have a general outline of what the year will look like, and what goals that we need to meet, but we are doing this one week at a time for now :P  Here is a little of what my table looked like for 3 days this week:

I have decided to do somewhat of a workbox type system, only there will be no workboxes, lol. Each kid has a binder with dividers in it labeled Monday-Friday.  All of their worksheets for the week are in the binder, as well as a computer time card, read to self card, journal card, & book work card (all laminated). Once they are done with their work, they will turn it into the 'finished' box on my desk.  

We are just trying this out, so if we need to tweak it, or change it all together, we will.  We have lots of brain break cards, and between working alone, we will do some subjects together.  Here are my little scholars today at 6 Flags:

Tonight my (awesome) landlord, friend, & neighbor volunteered to take all 3 boys to her house for a while to play!! So, I got to have a surprise date night with this hottie:

Next week begins setting up our classroom!!! I am SO excited and so are the kiddos :-)

Tuesday's ramblings

Tonight is the boys first night of extra curricular activities! We plan on keeping them VERY socialized. I capitalize that because, quit frankly, it's one of the biggest things debated when you mention schooling at home. As if you get much time to actually socialize at public school, lol.   Rest assured, my boys will not lack in that department. In fact, we are having to scale down on socialization :P One class that they will take every Tuesday & Thursday is 'Kids in Motion'  It is a one hour PE class taken at our local Y.  And tonight marks our first class :) They will also be apart of Agape, which is a group of home school families that come together for physical education classes. The goal is to help children improve their fitness level and to learn physical education and sport skills. Also, to do this within an environment that encourages the students toward good character and sportsmanship. This class meets 3 Fridays a month & they are in age appropriate classes.  They will also take a class at the Fort Worth Zoo once a month!  We are super excited about all of our fun learning we will get to do this year! 

Todays creation with Legos looks something like this:

I also scored an awesome (FREE!) desk with a big shelving unit above it! It was set out for trash down my street and I lugged it home. It is a pale yellow, and desperately needs some TLC, but once it is a beautiful teal paint, it will be perfectO!  I was going to have to share a desk with my *fabulous* husband, but this desk will likely save our marriage, seeing as he is a total slob and I am a total organized neat freak.  

Fitness update:  I am down 43 pounds :) We worked legs/abs yesterday, which is my strongest muscles, but it was an intense workout.  I love love love the feeling after you finish a workout & I crave it every singe day.  I did, however, make a not-so-healthy eating choice for lunch. PIZZA! It has been a month since I had any & I was craving it. So, I used 347 of my daily calories to eat Dominoes. *hides head in shame*  

Oh well, YOLO!

The countdown has begun!

Bradley, my middle guy, loves and thrives a schedule. He loves learning as well, so he wakes up every single morning asking "When are we starting school?!" I found this awesome idea online and we decided that it would be great for a countdown for back to school. Only, our boys aren't going "back" to school, so we will call it our "not back to school" countdown! 

I also printed off some fun activities for them to do while we wait to start school. We officially start August 27th, when the public schools start. Our first week will be going over rules and guidelines and reviewing previous years work. Bradley is obsessed with word searches, so here he is doing a not back to school word search:

I did put away all my books/curriculum last night.  They had been strung all over our dining room table for 36 hours, just because it made my heart happy to look at it all.  But, we might need to eat at the table eventually, so to their homes they went:

Once our school room is finished, this will go in there, and I am sure things will be moved around and such. The stuff on the top will be on my desk.  Games and supplies are being store somewhere else right now. It is driving me insane to not have it all put away where it belongs! We will get there eventually though! 

Happy Monday (:

Power out

What an adventure yesterday evening was. Whew! We had to go get a power cord from Fry's for our $5 computer (awesome, huh?!). When we got home about 5, it was storming like crazy. Thunder and lighting and super high winds.  About 5 minutes after we got home, the power went out. No biggie, right? It goes out all the time, so I thought I would give it 10 minutes or so, and it would be back on. WRONG. Even though it was storming and raining outside, it was still 95 degrees. It got hot in our house, quick. By 8, we couldn't take it anymore, and decided to go to Walmart. Hindsights 20/20....we thought we would get our grocery shopping for the week done, and by the time we got home the power would be back on. WRONG again. Here we were, with $150 worth of groceries and no power to the fridge! By this time, its 9:30. We decided to go get some ice and fill up the ice chests with our perishable foods. We ended up going to Taco Bell (ew, I know) to eat and waste some time. We drove back by the house about 10:30 and no power still!! We were not prepared for this, at all. So, back to Walmart we go! We got candles and flashlights. The boys were literally begging to go to a hotel, because they were 'scared.' Well, we ended up having a blast!! We moved a twin mattress of the boys into our room, brought the lego box in and played legos in candlelight :D Then, we decided to call it a night, but we let the boys have flashlight wars first. They loved it!
Gods blessings in disguise.

2012-2013 Curriculum

Our first official year of school at home is in effect! We are so excited! I feel like God has blessed our family and put this in our hearts, because it is His plan. I will have a 4th grader, Brendan, a 1st grader, Bradley, & a k4, Brady Paul.  Because they all have strengths and weaknesses, we have decided to not buy a 'boxed' curriculum this year, and just go with what God has lead us to. We will do some subjects together, and some separate. We plan on schooling from 9:30-2:30, though our days will surely not be on a strict schedule. If we are having a fun time learning, we will do school until our little hearts are done...and if we are having a not-so-educational day, we will just pick up the next morning with no sweat!

Here is the loot for 2012-2013 school year:

This is curriculum, chapter books, first readers, supplies, games, incentives and much more! 

The subjects we will learn together:

History-Story of the World Volume 1

Science-Unit Studies

We have lots of things to study and experiment as far as science. We are doing a child led approach on this subject, because I have some boys who just love this kind of stuff! Semester one we will be doing a bunch of boy things like: sea life, insects, amphibians, solar system, dinosaurs, sharks, rainforest, and much more!  We plan to do science 2 times a week, as well as add our unit subjects to other areas of our school day.

Art-Mom's curriculum ;)  We did not buy a curriculum for art either, but we made one ourselves. We have lots of books on arts and crafts and plan to just make this a *fun* experience! They will have art class 2 times a week, but are free to do art anytime their little hearts desire. We have so many art supplies that they can use!

Bible-Our Father's World, Creation series, as well as a scripture a week that is in Spelling curriculum.

Spanish-Abeka

Music- Dad's curriculum ;) My musician husband is taking over this coarse, and he will use our keyboard, guitars, xylophone, and practice drum set, as well as lots of music books to teach them to properly read and play music. The boys are super excited about this subject, and so is Daddy!

time4learning.com-All 3 boys will be using this awesome site for supplementing!

spellingcity.com-All 3 boys will be using this awesome site for supplementing!

coolmathgames.com-All 3 boys will be using this awesome site for supplementing!

P.E.- Agape Co-op, soccer & baseball, and classes at The Y.

4th Grade Subjects

Spelling-Bob Jones Spelling 4

I love this! He has a scripture a week, a journal entry idea each week, as well as awesome spelling words and activities!

Reading-*Lots* of reading! Read aloud, read to self, and book reports! I also bought some Scholastic reading comprehension workbooks.

Writing-Brendan did very good at learning cursive in 3rd grade, so we will just be journaling twice a week to practice and improve his writing.  

Grammer-Abeka

Math-Saxon 5/4

1st Grade Subjects

Spelling-Bob Jones Spelling 1

I love this! He has a scripture a week, a journal entry idea each week, as well as awesome spelling words and activities!

Reading-We have *tons* of first readers Level 1,2 & 3

Bradley loves reading! He will also be involved in our read aloud time and will write and draw pictures on our real aloud stories.

Writing-Handwriting without Tears

This program worked awesome with my older boy, so we will use it to polish Bradley's handwriting skills.

Grammer-Abeka

Math-Horizons

Kinder 4

We have decided that Brady Paul is ready for most kindergarten work, but since he is only 4, we did not get him a set curriculum. Instead we will be doing lots of activity books, hands on learning and workbooks. Most of this stuff came from Mardel, Scholastic, and Half Price Books.  He is writing very well, and he can recognize sight words. 

Well, there you have it! I am 100% certain that I have left some things out, because during this post I have got pulled away from the computer 1,027 times. 

Comment, and go see what everyone else is doing for curriculum at the Not Back to School Blog Hop!