Monday, August 14, 2017

Another First Day of School

     Interestingly, it seems I named this blog incorrectly.  It was named "Day by Day," when it should be, "Year by Year."  I have good intentions, naturally, but life happens and school happens.  I have decided to plan on my plans being ruined.  My kids are healthy and strong and well-educated.  I have nothing to complain about!
I got my workspace cleaned off and ready to go. 
Add coffee and a cool drink and I'm on it!
     Today marks another first day of school for Life Song Academy.  This time, I have a high schooler and a middle schooler!  That sounds so crazy to me!  I want to slow the progress somewhat, but I don't want to reverse time.  I love watching my children mature and grow in so many ways.  We have relocated and have a wonderful school room.  We have space for recreation and we're near a few towns so we can get supplies we need.  However, Amazon.com is my friend.
     With all the changes and "maturity" that we are experiencing, I should have expected that there would be no hiccups for our first day.  WRONG!  First of all, my hubby recommended I just get up with him so I could get the kids up on time.  My daughter came in at 2 AM saying she hadn't fallen asleep yet.  We prayed and I sent her back to bed with a few suggestions to remedy why she couldn't sleep.  Then hubby's alarm went off earlier than I thought I had agreed to.  Well, I kissed him goodbye and fell back asleep thinking my 7 AM alarm would wake me in time to get things done.  Yeah, I must have ninja skills in my sleep because I don't remember shutting off my 7AM alarm.  I awoke at 7:30 and did my morning Bible reading and slowly got around to waking my kids up at 7:50.  Not a good habit to keep.  So it was after 9 AM that the chores were finally completed and breakfast eaten and we were able to begin the day.
Schedule
The optimal week schedule.
     I made this handy dandy optimal week schedule and I think maybe I'm maturing a little as well.  When we start school, I really want things to go as planned ... at least for the first day.  I gave instructions and prompted for things to get done with very little yelling and frustration.  I spent a month this summer doing a devotional about taming the tongue and this time it helped.  We decided that it is due time that the children wake themselves up.  When they're out of the house, mommy isn't going to hug them awake any more and urge them out of bed until they're on the verge of being late and the, "hurry it up!" yelling commences.
     So another discipline that I've never implemented is self-motivation and record-keeping.  I have typed up lesson plans by subject and then put them on a planner sheet and then typed them into my record-keeping app and then adjusted according to the type of week we have.  That's a lot of work to keep rewriting things.  I listened to a webinar by Kim Sorgius from Not Consumed and it really put me into a new mindset.  If we were a younger homeschool family, I would have bought most of her material.  Through trial and error, I have already created similar templates that work for our family.  My students now have blank planning sheets with their subjects listed down the left column and blank squares for each weekday where the kids fill in what they did each day instead of me writing  and rewriting it for them.  Seriously, if the child doesn't understand that Unit 3, lesson 4 comes after Unit 3, lesson 3, then I've done a terrible job thus far considering their ages.  My weekly schedule is also patterned after Kim's.
    Here are my 2 students on their first day of 9th and first day of 7th grade!  Aren't they cute!
First day of high school and first day of 7th grade
Cell Phones
     In our family we decided that a rite of passage into high school includes the gift of a cell phone, as long it is used responsibly.  Not that we don't trust our kids, but temptation is really strong, so we opted for iPhones and have parental control limiting the features our kids can access.  Our younger child may borrow the phone that is considered the home phone since we don't have a land line, but we've locked up the parts that make it a smart phone, except the "find my friend" feature where we can track where the phone is from anywhere.  All that said, today I also learned early on why many schools of every type have a cell phone collection at the beginning of the day.  When your high school student has their phone out of pocket and has been on the first page of a lesson for over 20 minutes, it is pretty evident they are not really reading it.  Enough said.

     Here's to a great school year!  Hopefully you'll hear from me in less than a year this time!



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