It's over

That's my report for today. It wasn't the most fabulous of days, if I can be honest. We had fun during the actual learning, but it really felt like we were under attack today. First, we still had lessons from last week to finish, so today's lessons were a little longer than usual. Then, Caleb was extra cranky. And for the finale - my full, 32 oz cup of iced tea got knocked over by my laptop. Thankfully, the laptop & all of our school books were spared, but the water spilled onto the coffee table, on the shelf under the coffee table (where several wooden puzzles & board books are stored), and on the carpet. I managed to run for the paper towels while still teaching, so it seemed fairly harmless at first. Some of the stuff on the shelf did get wet, but I was able to mop up the tea before it caused damage. But then... I found a foamy part of the carpet. I have no idea what was there. I don't remember ever treating that part of the carpet with Resolve or any kind of soap. Oh... now that I think about it, I'll bet that it was car wash soap. While I was pregnant with Caleb, Jimmy drank car wash solution. I had been in the bathroom. Poison control said that it wasn't harmful (besides the possibility of diarrhea - wonderful), but I was freaked out anyway. That happened on the coffee table. I guess some dripped on the carpet. Well, whatever it was, it wasn't coming up. It just kept foaming. I went through an entire roll of papertowels until I simply gave up. The funniest part - I was teaching about crisis thinking. So I had to stop & go over the crisis thinking rules with Jimmy about what I was doing. "Calm down & don't panic." Deep breath for both of us. "Be quiet & think carefully - what am I supposed do to?" Find papertowels & mop up the mess. It actually ended up being a terrific example of today's lesson, since Jimmy isn't likely to find himself trapped under a frozen ocean surface with the tide coming back in (more on that later). But it still got me flustered. My mantra at the moment - "it's almost nap time. It's almost nap time."

Ok, so that aside... we had some pretty cool stuff to do today. We started with last week's book, NotMJ. We read it for the last time. Our activity was coins & their relative worth. Jimmy learned that a nickel is worth 5 pennies, a dime is worth 2 nickels or 10 pennies, and a quarter is worth 2 dimes & a nickel or 5 nickels or 25 pennies. He asked me for a quarter for his piggy bank afterward, but I gave him 3 dimes instead. He learned that 3 dimes are actually more money than 1 quarter. (Plus, it's easier to divide 3 dimes by 3 - his piggy bank has a section for offering, saving, & spending.)

Next was math, since I wanted to double up the second section. We reviewed the calendar. Jimmy is definitely getting better but has a long way still to go. I'm glad he is still challenged by this, since the rest of the math is getting rather boring. I'm considering speeding things up for him. Then we did the manipulative work. First lesson was making a graph. We asked family members, including aunts, uncles, and grandparents, what their favorite color teddy bear counter is. Jimmy lined up the bears according to color on a grid to make a chart. Blue was the obvious winner with 6 bears. Next was purple with 3 bears. Green, yellow, and red each had 1 bear. It made a very nice looking graph. I'm glad I added extended family, tho, because everyone in this house chose blue. =) The next manipulative lesson was more of what we did earlier. We counted 10 bears onto our work mats (aka construction paper). We slid them to one side as we counted, then we put them on pattern block "chairs" and slid them again to count. To clean up, we made a pile of our teddy bears & a pile of our pattern blocks. Jimmy learned how to quickly clean up the toys afterward by putting one pile on the work mat, picking up the mat, and sliding into the appropriate bin. He did the same for the other pile. I sense that I will be witnessing practice sessions of this new skill. =)

We moved onto this week's book - The Very Last First Time by Jan Andrews. It's about an Inuit girl named Eva living in northern Canada. The villagers rely on muscles from under the sea roof for food. The sea roof is formed when the top of the ocean forms, then the tide goes out. The sea floor is exposed, but there is a ceiling of frozen water over it. Eva has always gone with her mother, but she is now old enough to go all by herself. She climbs down, fills her muscle pan, and then, since she is enjoying the experience, does a little exploring. Her candle goes out just as she hears the tide returning. She starts to panic, but then remembers that she has more candles & matches in her pocket. She manages to light another candle, find her muscles, and return to the ice hole safely. Our activity today, as I mentioned earlier, was discussing crisis safety. Eva calmed herself down, thought carefully, and made a plan - find & light another candle. Both boys were mesmorized by the story. Jimmy even noticed, right on the first page before the author explained it... "There aren't any trees!" Good eye, my fellow.

Last by not least, letter of the week. It's C this week. We read the Bible verse & its story explaining what it means. I love this verse for obvious reasons - "Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord." Colossians 3:20. God, bury this one deep, ok? LOL! Jimmy learned how to write a big C and a little C. This letter is going to be tougher than I thought. How can C be hard? But he keeps trying to close the loop, making them all look like O's. We're going to have to practice this one. I also had him write a few A's and B's, both big & small, as a review. They looked pretty good, although the little a's need some extra attention.

That was it. Whew. We're going to have most of the lessons for the next week & a half on the road. I hope I can post entries for those days, but I might not have an internet connection for part of it. I'm praying that our lessons go smoothly as we travel!