Remaining Flexible When Plans Change
While we were preparing for a small slumber party today, I didn't want to just ignore school altogether. We decided to hit the books first and then worry about the party. The boys settled right into school after breakfast.
While there is always a plan in place our days rarely go according to plan. I've learned that we have to be flexible.
When Ian and I were finished I sat down with Evan in the living room and he read Cat Traps together. It was a pretty easy book for him to read and it was rather comical so we were laughing a lot. He told me he was going to read the book again at bedtime and put it near the stairs.
We then settled back down to read through some of the sight word lists. I told him we'll be reading through them every few weeks so I can see his progress. He's already picked up quite a few in just the last few weeks.
Alec wanted to read his Warriors book and he curled up on the couch reading to himself for at least a half- hour.
I asked Evan to finish one last worksheet using his Bingo dot markers and sight words. He had fun coloring in the words when he rolled the dice and since he still struggles with 4 of the 6 sight words on the page it was challenging enough for him and good to practice.
Alec wanted a coloring page for math and requested "one of the multiplication sheets where you have to carry over" so I found a two digit by one digit page and he completed the whole thing on his own... unfortunately, much like Ian did last time, Alec carried the wrong number over each time and had to erase the whole page and start again. Needless to say he was quite frustrated.
Ian completed two more pages about perimeter in his measurement book and Evan worked on an addition sheet using the bingo dot markers.
Evan mostly played at writing with a quill and wrote out his name, some doodles, and the start of a sentence "The gum." I never did find out anything about the gum but I was happy he was writing and spelling some simple words.
Ian wrote one sentence and then commented that it must have been really hard to write in ink with quills all the time.
The boys quickly realized that the quill dried out quite often before they even finished one word.
They also noticed that if you put to much ink in one area it smeared.
Alec wanted to write up a potion and ended up only writing the ingredients in the ink before switching to pencil for all the instructions. He explained that it would have taken all day otherwise. He ended up filling up an entire page so I was happy either way.
Today was her 90th birthday and we thought it would be nice to celebrate with her. We had a great time and a fabulous lunch but I wasn't thinking about how long it takes to eat lunch and try to run errands with a 90 year old and three kids.
By the time we arrived back home at 3:30 I was stressed that we were having kids over in a hour and we still needed to clean, make the frosting, and frost the cupcakes. Luckily, the boys all pitched in and cleaned the entire downstairs while I made the frosting. We got the cupcakes frosted and settled in to enjoy our night.
Remaining flexible allowed us all to alter the writing activity to keep it fun.
Remaining flexible allowed have a wonderful memory of lunch with my grandmother.
Remaining flexible allowed us to enjoy our day to the fullest.
(If you liked this post I'd love for you to pin it!)
I should not have been surprised when plans changed; especially since I'm the one that changed them!
While there is always a plan in place our days rarely go according to plan. I've learned that we have to be flexible.
- Being flexible allows us to change the mood of the day.
- Being flexible allows us to stoop lessons that are not working.
- Being flexible allows us to alter lessons to better suit our needs.
- Being flexible opens us up to new learning opportunities.
- Being flexible helps us to be happier and content.
We planned to cover reading, writing, and math only. Then we were hoping to run a few errands, clean the house, and finish frosting the cupcakes.
For reading:
Ian and I sat down together in my room reading the next two chapters in the Hunger Games book. After he read his three pages I asked him if understood what was happening and he summarized everything nicely.When Ian and I were finished I sat down with Evan in the living room and he read Cat Traps together. It was a pretty easy book for him to read and it was rather comical so we were laughing a lot. He told me he was going to read the book again at bedtime and put it near the stairs.
We then settled back down to read through some of the sight word lists. I told him we'll be reading through them every few weeks so I can see his progress. He's already picked up quite a few in just the last few weeks.
Alec wanted to read his Warriors book and he curled up on the couch reading to himself for at least a half- hour.
I asked Evan to finish one last worksheet using his Bingo dot markers and sight words. He had fun coloring in the words when he rolled the dice and since he still struggles with 4 of the 6 sight words on the page it was challenging enough for him and good to practice.
 |
| He just loves his Bingo markers |
Math:
Alec wanted a coloring page for math and requested "one of the multiplication sheets where you have to carry over" so I found a two digit by one digit page and he completed the whole thing on his own... unfortunately, much like Ian did last time, Alec carried the wrong number over each time and had to erase the whole page and start again. Needless to say he was quite frustrated. Ian completed two more pages about perimeter in his measurement book and Evan worked on an addition sheet using the bingo dot markers.
Writing:
Writing was supposed to be fun today. In honor of our Harry Potter unit I suggested they try writing with ink and quills. My kids are big feather collectors and they each found a large turkey feather in their rooms. We then used liquid watercolors as our ink and I gave them each some paper.Evan mostly played at writing with a quill and wrote out his name, some doodles, and the start of a sentence "The gum." I never did find out anything about the gum but I was happy he was writing and spelling some simple words.
Ian wrote one sentence and then commented that it must have been really hard to write in ink with quills all the time.
The boys quickly realized that the quill dried out quite often before they even finished one word.
They also noticed that if you put to much ink in one area it smeared.
Alec wanted to write up a potion and ended up only writing the ingredients in the ink before switching to pencil for all the instructions. He explained that it would have taken all day otherwise. He ended up filling up an entire page so I was happy either way.
Our school day went OK but not great and we wanted to do something fun.
We decided to skip the cleaning and take my grandmother out for lunch.
Today was her 90th birthday and we thought it would be nice to celebrate with her. We had a great time and a fabulous lunch but I wasn't thinking about how long it takes to eat lunch and try to run errands with a 90 year old and three kids.
By the time we arrived back home at 3:30 I was stressed that we were having kids over in a hour and we still needed to clean, make the frosting, and frost the cupcakes. Luckily, the boys all pitched in and cleaned the entire downstairs while I made the frosting. We got the cupcakes frosted and settled in to enjoy our night.
Remaining flexible allowed us all to alter the writing activity to keep it fun.
Remaining flexible allowed have a wonderful memory of lunch with my grandmother.
Remaining flexible allowed us to enjoy our day to the fullest.
(If you liked this post I'd love for you to pin it!)
Being flexible when plans change is something I struggled with when I first started homeschooling. It is important for everyone involved. I am still working on it :). I love this post!
ReplyDeleteMe too; still! It's so hard to just shift gears and not think of everything else you had planned.
DeleteFlexibility is crucial not only in homeschool but in life. The more flexible we can be the happier we may find ourselves. Thanks for the reminder. #ALittleBirdToldMe
ReplyDeleteThat is so true! It definitely helps in life too and since I've had to start applying that to homeschooling I am much better about accepting changes in real life. It's helped me stress less over those!
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