Halfway through phonics!

Last week (Thursday, to be exact) marked the halfway point of Caleb's phonics program. I am very impressed with how well he is doing. I had struggled a little deciding if he was ready. He likes being the baby. But he is very diligent & he has great memory retention. We're both having trouble with doubling up the phonics lessons, but I'm finding ways to keep him motivated through both lessons. I am allowing him to take a shortcut - each lesson contains a story that is supposed to be read through twice. I'm letting him skip the first reading & go right into the Q&A style second reading. He is doing a fabulous job!

Jimmy is having no problems with doubling his math lessons. He balks a little about doing the worksheets, but I think that is more because he would rather listen in on Caleb's phonics lessons. Jimmy picks up new math concepts like he'd already been doing them for years. I have to be careful to make sure he's using correct format (like in how he carries numbers in a horizontal addition problem, so he'll borrow correctly in a subtraction problem) because he tends to be able to do stuff in his head. I am having flashbacks to my own math teachers growing up. "You have to do the easy problems this way so you'll be able to the harder problems later."

For his birthday, Jimmy got an NIrV Bible - New International Reader's Version. It's the NIV made easier-to-ready for the 6-10 year old range. Jimmy isn't the best reader, I thought, but it would be a great place to do copywork for now. Well, Mr. Prove Me Wrong struck again! After his first stint with his new Bible during quiet time/nap time/reading time (whatever you want to call it), he came up to announce that he had read Matthew, Luke, Proverbs, and something else Old Testament that I can't remember. We thought he was lying or exaggerating... but then he gave us examples that were in those books! Now he reads along in his NIrV while I read their Psalms reading for school from the NLT. This whole thing got me rethinking where his reading level truly is, so we checked out some chapter books from the library. He read them all in one nap time & told me all about what happened in each one. Guess we're moving up to the next age group shelves in the library!

First week of the Cram

As I said in my last post, I've decided to speed things up so we can finish this year's lessons by the end of May. This week was the first week of what I'm calling "The Cram." I cut out all but the bare bones of finishing up this year. That meant FIAR is on hold; I'm hoping to make that a light summer program.

The bare bones elements are as follows: allowance (1X per week), Psalms (1 or part of 1 per day), math (more on that later), Caleb's phonics program (more on that later), Jimmy's memory work, & Caleb's catechism work.

The joint work should be pretty obvious - on Monday's, I hand out their allowance & we review what it is to be part of a family. ("I am part of the family & I share in the work & the rewards.") Then we read a Psalm or, for the longer Psalms, a reasonable chunk of one. Tuesday through Friday just has the Psalms.

Jimmy's work: He reviews his memory work. The memory cards are in sets of 12. We'll go through all 12 in 4 sets each (weeks 1-4, 5-8, & 9-12) twice, then 6 sets each (1-6 & 7-12) for the final 2 weeks. On math test days, we'll review either the US Presidents (using flashcards) or the US States (using flashcards & a US map). Math gets more complicated. Generally, we will have 2 math lessons. However, when a math test comes up, we will only have the math test lesson. Math test lessons have 2 worksheets (the independent work and the test sheet), but there is no lesson. That frees up time to work on the presidents or states. See?

Caleb's work: Each day, he gets 2 phonics lessons. On Monday through Thursday, we'll have a math lesson. He gets a reprieve on Fridays. Caleb's memory work is still his catechism memorization. We are continuing to add 1 catechism Q&A each week, reviewing all questions to date each day (we're currently up to question 26).

This has resulted in quite the juggling act. It's too much, for instance, for Caleb to go through both phonics lessons back-to-back. It's also a lot of time spent with 1 kid while the other gets bored (read: gets into trouble). Here's a sample of what our lesson schedule evolved into over this past week. I'll use a typical Jimmy-has-2-math-lessons-and-Caleb-has-math day:

• Math lesson with Caleb while Jimmy works on first math lesson's independent work.
• First math lesson with Jimmy while Caleb plays with math toys.
• First phonics lesson with Caleb while Jimmy finishes first math lesson's worksheet & works on second math lesson's independent work (Jimmy plays with math toys if he finishes early).
• Second math lesson with Jimmy while Caleb practices handwriting for first & second phonics lessons (Caleb plays with math toys if he finishes early).
• Catechism memory work with Caleb while Jimmy finished second math lesson's worksheet.
• Memory cards with Jimmy while Caleb wanders off somewhere, bored with the math toys (this is still a work in progress).
• Call Caleb back so everyone can sit (mostly) still for the Psalms reading.
• Heave a big sigh of relief that no one burnt down the house while I was busy with the other child. Make & serve lunch.
  

Teacher's Inservice

I had almost forgotten how sweet unscheduled days are. Wow, did I need that! We slept in... or at least tried to sleep in. The boys played all day... when they weren't trying to bug Grandpop. Elena-puppy slept in a cozy nook... as usual. I read a few books... more quickly than usual.

I also started a new diet. I thought it would be best to get through those first cranky days without forcing the children to deal with a cranky teacher. I'm not sure how everyone else thought I behaved, but I certainly didn't *feel* cranky. So I'm thankful that the diet kick-off went well.

Now that we've had a much-needed break, I've been able to reflect a little on our plans for the rest of the school year. I'd really like to give the boys a summer break this year. (Last year, our summer was taken up by preparing the house for sale & catching up on school work that didn't get finished because of the house stuff.) I'm still hoping to do light school work, but I'd like for them to finish this year's math & phonics before Memorial Day.

So now I'm off to figure out how to squeeze all of those lessons into 8 weeks...