First Day and Cookie Bars
Our first real day of school went about as well as can be expected, I suppose.
We started off with Mystery of History. The boys enjoyed that because they like when I do lessons with them. As they get older they do more and more independent work, but it is nice to do some work together.
Both boys did Math. I decided Luke needs to do more with math this year. I told him he could continue Life of Fred, if he wants, but he's primarily doing Saxon. The first several lessons are review so nothing new there. Gabe is continuing with Life of Fred. Today's lesson was already difficult for him and he became very negative. "It's too hard." I told him that jumping in with a bad attitude was only going to make it harder and encouraged him to put a positive spin on it. He kept grumbling and I hate to admit that I got snippy with him. I reminded him that it's all about learning. The book is there to teach him and while it may not be easy, it's not full of trick questions. I reminded him that math is about patterns and that if we took it step-by-step we could figure it out. Which, of course, is exactly what happened.
By this point we needed to break for lunch and get to our chiro appt. After the chiro we drove to my brother's house to feed and water his cats. Then we picked up some books from the library. The boys were not happy that they still had language arts and chores to do. Ah well, such is life.
This year we're trying Total Language Plus for LA. It's supposed to be spelling, grammar, literature, etc, all in one. It's really not difficult, but Gabe immediately got it in his head that it's "completely stupid." He cried and fussed and crabbed for an hour.
I've learned with him that fighting or making demands doesn't work. I just quietly went about making dinner. Finally I went and snuggled him a little bit. I asked him questions and tried to understand what he didn't like about the curriculum. He kept saying it was stupid and dumb. I told him that it's a shame that he doesn't like it, but that he's older now and he needs to start spending more time and effort on some of these things. I know that's not what he was hoping for, but it's true. I'm all for trying to find good fits for the boys when it comes to curriculum, but they aren't going to love everything and not everything is going to be super easy or simple or fast. That's just life.
As usual, once he calmed down he did all the work and was finished in about 25 minutes. I'm such a slave-driver.
And finally, tonight I tried these Magic Cookie Bars from Food, Faith, Fitness. I had high hopes, but was disappointed. It's not that they're bad, it's just that they're insanely sweet. They are more like a candy. So that's fine. I'll cut them into little bitty squares, freeze them, and let the boys have them as a rare treat, but I probably won't make them again. Or maybe I will. It might be nice to have a "candy" stashed away in the freezer.
We started off with Mystery of History. The boys enjoyed that because they like when I do lessons with them. As they get older they do more and more independent work, but it is nice to do some work together.
Both boys did Math. I decided Luke needs to do more with math this year. I told him he could continue Life of Fred, if he wants, but he's primarily doing Saxon. The first several lessons are review so nothing new there. Gabe is continuing with Life of Fred. Today's lesson was already difficult for him and he became very negative. "It's too hard." I told him that jumping in with a bad attitude was only going to make it harder and encouraged him to put a positive spin on it. He kept grumbling and I hate to admit that I got snippy with him. I reminded him that it's all about learning. The book is there to teach him and while it may not be easy, it's not full of trick questions. I reminded him that math is about patterns and that if we took it step-by-step we could figure it out. Which, of course, is exactly what happened.
By this point we needed to break for lunch and get to our chiro appt. After the chiro we drove to my brother's house to feed and water his cats. Then we picked up some books from the library. The boys were not happy that they still had language arts and chores to do. Ah well, such is life.
This year we're trying Total Language Plus for LA. It's supposed to be spelling, grammar, literature, etc, all in one. It's really not difficult, but Gabe immediately got it in his head that it's "completely stupid." He cried and fussed and crabbed for an hour.
I've learned with him that fighting or making demands doesn't work. I just quietly went about making dinner. Finally I went and snuggled him a little bit. I asked him questions and tried to understand what he didn't like about the curriculum. He kept saying it was stupid and dumb. I told him that it's a shame that he doesn't like it, but that he's older now and he needs to start spending more time and effort on some of these things. I know that's not what he was hoping for, but it's true. I'm all for trying to find good fits for the boys when it comes to curriculum, but they aren't going to love everything and not everything is going to be super easy or simple or fast. That's just life.
As usual, once he calmed down he did all the work and was finished in about 25 minutes. I'm such a slave-driver.
And finally, tonight I tried these Magic Cookie Bars from Food, Faith, Fitness. I had high hopes, but was disappointed. It's not that they're bad, it's just that they're insanely sweet. They are more like a candy. So that's fine. I'll cut them into little bitty squares, freeze them, and let the boys have them as a rare treat, but I probably won't make them again. Or maybe I will. It might be nice to have a "candy" stashed away in the freezer.
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