Grade 4, Week 8, Day 1 ~ Relaxed

(My apologies to anyone who was looking for this post earlier. I was so relaxed I posted it to the wrong blog, LOL!)

Relaxed is a wonderful word. It is fantastic to approach the world in a relaxed manner, avoiding stress as much as possible, and it is the healthiest state for our bodies. Stress = cortisol = health issues. Our new block format is returning a feeling of relaxation to me and to our home learning.

This week we are wrapping up some math work in preparation for a week off. Each fall we vacation at the beach; I often refer to it as our fall field study. This year we will not be taking any academic work with us and will instead focus on relaxing, exploring, and connecting.

I already feel so much calmer sticking with one subject for our main lesson block; it feels like a huge out-breath. I don't have to be prepared to teach language arts tomorrow, as we will continue with Roman numerals and division with remainders. Today we added and subtracted Roman Numerals. I need to work on being better prepared for the blocks ~ I'm not exactly sure what we will be working on tomorrow. This is what happens when I jump in with both feet but I am sure I will get the kinks worked out.

I find that a block format gives us more flexibility with our days; if we don't quite finish everything planned for one day it is easily shifted to the next, and if we are grooving on a topic we can move ahead. If someone is feeling unwell it is easier to take a sick day as we aren't behind on the entire week's learning for that subject.

The block format puts the relaxed back into relaxed homeschooler. The focus is on having fun and learning in a relaxed manner rather than completing items on a list. I am able to see the learning as a whole rather than as fragmented bits; up until now I found myself wondering where each weekly lesson was going to go, but I was always scrambling and didn't have time to read ahead several weeks to see how it would fit together.

Workboxes today: journaling, math practice (addition and subtraction with regrouping), reading, language arts practice (parts of speech), and the math main lesson. We also took Big Dog to the dog park and the boys played Wii Fit. In the evening Papa read A History of US and we played Star Wars Trivial Pursuit and Uno.