this is a great path

Nov 13, 2012

I love homeschooling. Love, love, love it. Not only do I know, absolutely know, it is path God wants us to walk as a family, I actually enjoy it.

Every day is NOT stellar. Every day is not full of cheerful children and an enthusiastic mama. But many are.

Today was one of them.

This morning Annesley and I were playing Addition Memory with the two cards needing to add up to five. First we laid out all the cards. Then she started her turn and turned over a zero. “I need a five! Hmmm, where is that five?” she shouted out with glee. Luckily she picked a five on that very first draw. Then with her eyebrows raised and a look of mischief in her eyes, she picked her next card. “Hmmm, a two. What do I need, what do I need? Oh, yes, a THREE!” Her three didn’t turn up that time and I finally got to go. Each turn of the cards by either one of us brought more eyebrow raises. After she made a few more matches, I told her how smart she is, to which she responded “My brain is sooo good at remembering where things are!” Then, near the end of the game when she made lots and lots of matches, she said “I am SO intelligent.” The whole time her eyebrows were bouncing around and she was pleased as punch with her brain.

Later we practiced violin together. She is a brand new beginner. We are working on bow holds, basic rhythms, foot positions, and putting the bow on the E string. She kept praising herself the whole time. “Look at my bow hold. My fingers have figured it out. I can do it! I can do it! I can play taka-taka-stop-stop!”

This little one has so much joy in learning.

Fisher wasn’t quite as enthusiastic as his sister. He wants to go outside, live in a tree and catch bugs and fish. But, after just a few minutes of working with me, his smile stretched across his face. We were playing a math game out of his Miquon book and making bullseyes with our math problems. He raced around the page figuring out the problems as fast as he could and giggling the whole time about how speedy his math mind is. He has his mind segregated out into different sections…his lego mind, his reading mind (which he is convinced doesn’t work too well), his math mind, his bug finding mind, his fishing mind, his speaking out loud mind. He believes most of his minds work pretty well and I am determined to help him know all of his minds are amazing.

Learning together as a family is hard work AND it is fun. It takes dedication and vision and a great big sense of humor. It is such a wonderful adventure to be on. I’m so grateful God led me here.