I Didn't Really Go Away ...

We've been schooling, I just took a break from writing about it. While I was gone we learned averaging and prime factoring. We resumed our American History lessons. We celebrated an 11th birthday and the birth of a great Civil Rights leader. Baseball camp and baseball practice started. We helped Grandpa choose a new dog. In other words, life went on as usual. I've actually been working on this blog post for a full week, LOL.

We started a new block this last week: Norse Mythology. Live Education also has you bring in some Scandinavian history. Can I just say how fascinated I am by Norse mythology? I never knew how much of it tied into my very own culture. My own roots are strongly European.

I'm still getting the hang of using Live Ed; it takes a little more planning that I had expected but I don't mind in concept, as I enjoy planning. In reality, I haven't had the time to plan the whole block so we are going day by day (with me making choices the night before) for now; I hope to finalize the rest of the block this weekend. (I did get that done).

I have a general plan for the "school" morning. We gather together and sing or recite a verse. We then spend a short time of writing; sometimes it is unguided journal writing and sometimes we write parts of the verses we are learning (writing really helps visual learners with memorization). We do some math practice, oral with movement and sometimes written. Then it is time to review our stories and concepts from the day before before moving into our main lesson.

When we started grade 1 with the Christopherus 1st Grade Syllabus I really liked the idea of afternoon lessons, also taught in blocks (sometimes a 4 week main lesson would have two 2 week afternoon lessons). I had intended to continue with that as we transition to Live Ed, but I am finding that some of the artistic projects related to the lessons are best done away from the main lesson. For instance, drawing makes sense within our main lesson time; making rune stones is better suited to an afternoon craft time.

Okay, I had better send this off into the blogosphere ...