Homeschool 2014-2015

This year the kids and I've been doing homeschooling.  It's been an interesting year with ups and downs; at times I didn't like it and I was ready to send them back to public school immediately, and other times it's been so great to have everyone home and spending the entire day together learning.  It's been hard because I also teach piano lessons and do medical transcription and I don't feel like I can put my all into it with the time I have to work.  The year really flew by though!  I worry I'm not teaching them enough or keeping up with school standards, which is completely normal I'm sure for people just starting to homeschool.  I know the boys have really enjoyed it!  They like having more time to play of course!  We are still debating about next year if we will continue to homeschool, well mostly me.  Bryan doesn't like the factory-type learning that is currently in public schools and thinks homeschooling is best for our boys.  I like the idea of it and when we started brainstorming last year about doing it, I had all these grand ideas and plans, but things never seem to go as planned and the day totally changes when one child just doesn't want to do anything, or they are fighting all day, or don't want to listen to me and would rather play Legos.  There are good days too, but overall it just seems like they would do better listening to another adult than their parent, since they already have to listen to us on so many things.  So I don't know.  They were going to a school out of our boundaries and I don't know if they have room for them to return there, and I know my kids only want to go there and not to a brand new school.....so we'll see. 

We concentrated on reading, grammar, and math with little bits of science and history videos.  I'm afraid to get behind with their reading and math, so that was our main focus for the year.  We used Singapore Math.  We also used the Brain Quest books for their grade that have all the subjects, which we are still trying to finish through the summer as a review.  They were reading the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, which I really wasn't happy about, but it really got Austin motivated to read.  Now that they've read all of those they have been reading their scriptures and the friend magazines for their reading time.  It was nice to be able to go to the Rec Center and have the pool practically to ourselves while other kids were at school.  We also went to Corn Belly's in October for a field trip.  They were supposed to go to this really cool place in Pleasant Grove that is like a space station and you get to pretend your on a space mission with a group of kids.  My kids were too nervous and shy about it, though, so we didn't end up going and I sold my tickets to someone else.  I took Austin and Aubrey to the Scera shell play "Pinkalicious".  They both enjoyed that.  It's also been great that Ethan has such a love for technology, drawing, and Apple products like his dad.  He bought Bryan's old iPad from him and uses it to draw.  He also has learning apps, a Spanish learning app he's been working on, and he's been keeping his journal on it, which he writes in often.  His thinking is a lot like mine was when I was little, though, where in my earliest journals I would write everything I did in my classes at school, where I wish I would have written more about my feelings or thoughts etc.  Ethan's been going most Thursdays to Bryan's studio.  He takes out the trash, dusts, mops the floor, and straightens up, and then he will draw or learn something from my brother Jake about animation or from Bryan about drawing on the iPad.  He loves going there and says when Jake's there it's so much fun. 

We have downsized a lot of our stuff the last year, and the boys pretty much just have a huge bucket of Legos.  They have a few other toys here and there, but Legos are pretty much Austin's life.  All through the school year when he wasn't learning, and still a lot during the summer when he's not playing with friends, he's building Legos.  Aubrey has started to enjoy them this year as well.  She loves things her brothers love and will go in their room and take stuff to play with......which the boys aren't usually too happy about, but sometimes they are nice and let her play with stuff.  We went to story time at the library a handful of times during the year for Aubrey.  It seemed we had a lot of illnesses through the winter months, though, and ended up inside a lot. 

In January or February I added one more day of teaching piano in Alpine instead of doing medical transcription on Wednesdays because Aubrey is slowly transitioning and not wanting a nap every day and I was finding it hard to type so much with her needing me while she's awake.  Then she was at my mom or sister's when I taught.  Now that it's summer I've condensed it into one day of teaching in Alpine and one day for Provo.  I didn't like going up twice a week to Alpine, though, it was pretty hard, so I'm not sure what to do when school starts again or if I can fit everyone in the same day or not; and my sister is way too busy to babysit with being a single mom of 5 kids who are in all kinds of sports and activities where she is constantly running around.  My mom has my brother's kids living at her house and having my kids as well was getting to be too much for her, as well, with the energy level they produce when they are together; so now Bryan is going to be working from home on Monday when I go teach in Alpine and we'll see how that goes.  I wasn't planning on teaching too much after Aubrey, and didn't for a while, but I felt strongly that I should teach again.  It's nice for me to have two part-time jobs like that so I don't get burned out from doing one.  I like to mix things up. 

I've had all my pictures from last year on a harddrive and my Mac computer died and now I'm on a PC, so I haven't been able to access them to update my blog.  I then decided to use Instagram as more of my 'blog', but I don't think I like it as much; so I will eventually catch up the last year of what's been going on because I feel like it's good to have the blog for family history. 

This ended up being more of an update than about homeschool, but I'm glad I've caught up on where we are in a few areas of our life. 
"Memory is a child walking along a seashore. You never can tell what small pebble it will pick up and store away among its treasured things." ~Pierce Harris
 
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