Our first week of homeschooling!

Wow. I can hardly believe how much fun I'm having, and how great Emma and Simon are doing. I was really worried that I'd have trouble getting them to accomplish things without a negative attitude. Not that either of them are particularly negative by any means, but the "aww, do I have to?" stuff I'd get, or putting it off, instead of the just sucking it up and doing it, which they'd do for a teacher.

We jumped into the first week with very eager attitudes and vigor! We (I) decided to take a 'unit studies' approach at first, to determine how organized (or not) we could be. Unit studies just seemed like the easiest way to figure things out, for me. So this week's topic was the human body (intentionally a ridiculously broad topic). I should mention that, a few weeks ago, I had them make a list of topics they'd like to focus on, as well as a list of things they want to learn about that might not be deep enough for a whole week (at grade school level). Simon's list of the latter consisted of: how bikes are made, how mocha machines are made, and how video games are made/written. Do you think he has much of an interest in his father? :)

So all week we've been doing various lessons/activites pertaining to various body parts/systems. We also checked out some Bill Nye videos (and tons of books) from the library, and they watched a few of those. We did a taste bud experiment, and a circulatory system experiment (learned to take their own pulses, and did resting heart rate, moderate exercise heart rate, and heavy exercise heart rate, and analyzed our findings). We did an experiment in the dark to see how much light affected how wide our pupils got, and how quickly they changed. They also had to write a report on any body part/system, and have me proofread it, and then re-copy it in their best handwriting. They both did an awesome job. Can you tell I'm so happy with our decision to homeschool? I know every week won't be this amazing, but I have to gush while I've got the steam. :)

We wrapped up this morning with a spelling test, and are going to take a field trip to the Omaha Children's Museum this afternoon, as they have an exhibit on how the body works. The spelling test was interesting to me, because they picked their own words, based on books they were reading on Monday, and the words were all difficult, especially for a 7 and 8 year old. They each made a list of 10-15 words and we scaled it down to a combined list of 16 (6 from each and 4 from me) and practiced them each day. On Wednesday we looked up definitions and made up sentences to go with them, and I quizzed them periodically throughout the week. Emma got 100% on the test today and Simon got 9/16. I thought he did a great job trying, and most of the words he missed were inverted letters or leaving one out, so really, not any worse than the average adult. :) Emma just has that ingrained desire and need to conquer (she totally gets that from Oliver), and Simon is like "eh, I did as good as I thought I should", which may or may not be from me. :)

Our list:
focus
biology
virus
available
immunity
energy
bacteria
fetus
tongue
process
progress
disease
infectious
development
substances
behavior

So, for those of you who have been asking, things are going great. And they're only getting better. (Sorry, couldn't resist!) I think, selfishly, one of my favorite parts about it is that I'm learning things again. I have to constantly look things up that I don't remember or I'm not sure about, and it feels really good to be gaining that knowledge back.

So anyway - happy weekend everyone! :)