The aftermath

Oy, today was definitely a learning day for me!  I did the lesson plan.  I filled him in.  I even spaced it out over the entire day.  I had enticements and flat out bribes.  I even had the pleading puppy eyes down pat.  I still barely survived.

He had 7 math problems, a spelling list, and a writing prompt.  Easy peasy don't you think?  No...he broke down into tears.  There were some math problems he'd never seen before, words he didn't even know the meaning of (and weren't in my dictionary...I need a better one) so how could I expect him to put them into a sentence....and the biggest thing that he just couldn't understand was that he hadn't even had a summer vacation and how could I be such a horrible mother to not even let him have a summer vacation!?!?!?

I had to run an errand in the afternoon.  I had given him his list of spelling words to write into sentences and the (obviously lacking) dictionary to look words up while I was gone.  After going through everything above I finally gave in.  I didn't have time to sit and console my child about how everything would be fine for two reasons: 1. I was going to miss my bus and 2. He was absolutely right.  I was a horrid mother who didn't even let her child have a summer vacation.  So I told him he didn't have to do anything and that we could discuss it later.

We came to a compromise.  First I asked him how much time of summer vacation he needed and after some bargining, we agreed on 1 full month.  Then I told him that I would agree to a month of having fun on 2 conditions.  First, we had to continue doing the things from the calendar.  I mean really, tomorrow's holiday is to "Yell 'Fudge!' at cobras in North America"....who wouldn't want to do that - plus I could sneak some learning in about snakes and stuff.  Second, he still had to do his writing prompts every day.  He agreed very quickly and so it seems that our journey has started.

Now, as to what we learned today about feet...we stumbled onto an article about "Why do my feet stink" and here's a particularly interesting snippet (talking about sweat):

"The smell is actually caused by bacteria on our skin that eats the sweat and excretes waste that has a strong odor. "

Here are some photos we found along the way.

 And one more thing for you to enjoy.  Here's a video of a man with backwards feet, dancing.  He's pretty inspirational.

The first day!

Tomorrow is our first "official" day of home learning! We're not going to do much...just really ease into it all.  There's a spelling list and a writing prompt and do you remember the calendar I created with holidays for every day?

This week's spelling words:

1. media
2. medium
3. immediate
4. vibrant
5. chisel
6. chiseled
7. pulse
8. pulsate
9. pulsation
10. ecstasy
11. temporary
12. critical
13. begrudge
14. irritable
15. magnificent
16. contempt

Tomorrow's writing prompt is:
Electricity is a recent discovery.  Think of 12 things to do when there's no power.

Tomorrow's holidays are:

1. National Heimlich Maneuver Day
2. National Go Barefoot Day
3. Say Something Nice Day

Obviously we're going barefoot all (or most of the) day.  On the learning side of things, we're going to learn about the man who created the Heimlich Maneuver and why he did it and for the barefoot day I thought it would be nice to see what different cultures didn't wear shoes...Aidan decided he wanted to learn about feet.  So we're going to learn about the wonders of feet!

Eventually I think I'll post our calendar so you can see all of our holidays and maybe come up with ideas we can use to learn about them!

A breakthrough!

I finally go through to Little-A yesterday.  We were sitting down for a nice Ramen dinner (which he fixed for us) and I casually asked him a simple question.

"If you could learn anything in the world you wanted...what would you want to learn?"

He said he wanted to learn how to take care of animals to help him in college when he's studying to be a Veterinarian.  When I told him we could learn everything there was to learn about it I saw that spark in his eyes.

You know that spark....your kid gets it after days/weeks/months of fighting you on something that you know is a good idea and you'd bet your life that they'd enjoy it but they disagree with you either on principle or simply because they can't see the bigger picture.  You try every way you possibly can to get their interest.  You beg, plead, cajole, threaten, put your foot down, ignore, and even bribe...but they still won't give in.  

Then comes that one innocent moment.  You probably didn't even plan it.  It just happened....and it finally clicks in their head.  "Wow!  Mom might be right....this could be fun!"

That's the look I was waiting for and I could see his brain working and thinking about all the possibilities that one answer held.

He's totally into my idea now ;)

He did ask how he'd know if he was learning and if he'd get grades so I agreed to give him tests and grades if and when he wanted them.   Oh, and we've decided to not call it home"schooling" and instead we're calling it home "learning".

On a side note,  I'm really looking forward to starting D's learning.  I think he'd love learning how to do computer programing so I'm going to start him on that.

This is me excited