A long day (homeschooling day 6)

Andrew finished his schoolwork early today. I guess he was a day ahead in 2 of his subjects, so he was able to finish early. He spent the rest of the day playing guitar and keyboard, and practicing for the musical he's in. Because he hasn't gotten his Geometry book yet, he went on http://www.mathleague.com to to get some practice.

Charles and Isaiah started their Total Language Plus books. Each 7-8 week Workbook is based on a novel. The fun part for me is that I get to read-aloud great books to my kids. Charles and I started reading "The Bronze Bow" by Elizabeth George Speare and Isaiah and I started "Charlotte's Web " by E. B. White. Then they completed the comprehension questions, Vocab, spelling and grammar pages for the day.

I had made a schedule, which we are following somewhat, but I'm going to make changes already. For one thing, as much as I'd like to follow a rigid time schedule, we just do so much better with block scheduling. And we're flexible, If we don't get to something during the allotted time, we can always do it later in the afternoon or evening.

Today just the basics took way too long. We're just starting the new school year and everyone needs help at the same time it seems. Sophie and Christian have been starting to play nicely together, so I let them play with toys while I was helping the older boys.

My problem is deciding when to have Christian do his schoolwork. He has some attention issues, so last year (1st gr.) I told him he couldn't use anything electronic until he finished school. So, when he was ready to do it ( which was usually sometime before the end of the day:) he would sit down and do all his subjects-then he would use the computer or whatever. It worked out really well, but I didn't want to do that this year. I want to get his schooling finished early in the morning, but he doesn't seem ready during the first part of the day. We'll eventually work it out.