Poor Poor Poor Poor Poor Poor Esme

Esme thinks we're working her too hard this year. We have stepped up academics a bit and are focusing pretty intensely on her Math skills. She also had to work with me to create a web of her experiences at The Big E and is now working on a rough draft of her writing assignment. Frankly, we don't feel bad for her. She has no idea about waking up early, going to school 30+ hours a week, etc.


Right now she and Ethan are finishing up The Knight at Dawn and she designed her own coat of arms. She's also enjoying her swimming and ballet lessons.

Recent Lessons.....

This weeks book of the week is by the famous Stan and Jan Berenstain! We are so excited that Esme is reading on her own! We have also started using the Early Readers sets by Candlewick in addition to the Bob Books. Esme is learning about different types of words, and has a very good handle on nouns, verbs, and adjectives.

Esme is about to start graphing in Math, and then onto some more serious addition and subtraction activities. We're almost done studying the Human Body and pretty sure that she's going to want to do an Earth Science unit next. She is very interested in all things Science!

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

Even though Dr. Seuss passed away several years ago, kids still love celebrating his birthday! Since he was born on March 2nd, next week our lessons will revolve around a tribute to him. Our book of the week will be The Cat in the Hat.

This week's lessons....

Book of the week is The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss. Esme did wonderfully on her short U words spelling test so now we're moving on so short I words. She's learning about bones and will soon move on to the muscular and circulatory systems. In church school she learned about needle felting, and we just started a 4-week Fractured Fairy Tales series at our favorite local bookshop.

It's Been a While....Updates

This year is flying by. We have sooo much going on and lots to share. After trying out a couple different things this year, we've decided that structured lesson plans are what work best for our family, and we have gone back to the more traditional schedule we used last year. We're glad we tried more of an unschooling approach, but now we know this is what works for us.

We are happy to share that Esme had her very first spelling word list and test this past week, and she got 100% correct on her test! Whooo hoooo go Esme. She is moving right along in Math and Reading too. Most of Esme's interest revolve around science, and we are considering an Earth Science unit when we finish up our Human Body unit. We are hoping that we'll be able to take a trip to the science museum soon. I am excited about the new art curriculum I discovered, called Discovering Great Artists. We've just started and Esme has learned quite a bit about Picasso. I am hoping to use this in conjunction with our Picturing America materials as well.

Esme has been staying very busy. In Girl Scouts she's been learning about how to care for pets including going on a field trip to Petco. This month we're concentrating on dance - last week the girls learned line dancing from Aunt Cathy, and next week they'll be doing folk dancing with our friend Ben. They also have a snowshoeing event coming up, unless we have a big thaw between now and early March. Esme is still loving ballet class and we are very happy with her new dance school. We'll be starting a new series for homeschoolers around fractured fairy tales starting on Tuesday. We are looking forward to seeing some other kids we haven't seen since Fall.

Thank You, Thank You, Sam-I-Am!!

Esme is so excited - she just read her first "big girl" book!! She's been progressing well with Bob Books for a while, but tonight I sat on the couch with her and gave her only a bit of coaching through Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss. We are soooooo proud that our little girl is reading! What a great homeschooling moment!!

Homeschooling this month.....

We finished up our homeschooling State Park series with a very cool trip. We visited a center that has dioramas of habitats all the way from the ocean up through the forest, following a local river. The interpreter walked the kids through each diorama and showed them little hidden secrets along the way.

Esme is playing soccer again - she is on a different team this season and the games are just starting now. I am worried that it is going to be COLD by the time we finish! She is loving ballet and has attended bring-a-friend-to-dance classes with both Kaitlyn and Sarah. I am pretty impressed how quickly she has learned to remember the different ballet positions.

She is also continuing with Daisy Girl Scouts, and we have starting preparing for our mitten drive. We wanted to offer something back to the library since they let us meet there for free, and the children's librarian suggested that we work together to do this. Last week we made posters and this week we'll make the actual tree.

Esme is continuing in the Math curriculum we chose and progressing nicely. She is also doing very well with her Bob books - I can see that we'll have to purchase the next set soon. However, she is resistant to trying to read anything but those books, so that is something we will be working on in the coming weeks.

I'm on vacation - Esme isn't!

Although she doesn't have a book of the week, Esme is working hard. She's doing her phonics lessons, learning math tables, and playing the the envelope games I've set up for her.

I went through the MA Standards, which is what we've been using as a guide this year, and am happy to say that we have hit almost all of them! I thought I'd be overwhelmed by what we have left but I was pleasantly surprised to learn the only thing we haven't touched on is measuring. We got a balance and weights this week and she'll be using them next week!

Week of April 6th

Esme has been learning a lot about plants the last couple weeks. She has her own houseplant now and is learning to check it once a day. She and Ethan have also been working in the yard a lot - getting rid of all those leaves that fell after the snow started. She and I have been reseeding our lawn and hoping that it will get a bit greener as the weather warms up.

Right now she's learning about how weather is measured, and her words of the week are go and see.

Remember this book?

This was always a favorite of mine, and now it is a favorite of Esme's. Studying weather gives us the perfect reason to make it book of the week! Even though the snow is gone and the temperatures are getting higher, we're enjoying Peter's adventures.

We're continuing our phonics lessons and words of the week are out and was.

We're thinking about having an open house later this Spring, so that we can invite our friends and family to come and see what Esme's learned, and look at all her projects.

changing it up

I've been reading so much about how other people homeschool and it's been incredibly interesting. Because of my job, it's so easy for me to fall into teaching Esme in the most traditional ways. But she's not in school and I want to make her education as flexible as possible and open to many different kinds of learning as possible. So we're switching some things up a bit.

The most successful homeschoolers I've read about let their children take the lead. We'll still do our daily lesson plans, but we're trying to move in a direction that is more child-led. I'm developing several learning centers and she'll have more opportunities to work in them, and choose what she works on. We're going to continue to focus on themes of her choice and let her have choices within the themes too.

Another change is we're going to be moving into some pretty intense phonics. For a while we've felt that Esme is right on the cusp of reading on her own. But in our lessons we've focused on a lot of literary elements and a few sights words, with only a little bit of phonics thrown in. Another homeschooler recommended a phonics curriculum to us and we're starting to use it this week. It's called The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading. All three of us are excited about Esme really reading on her own. We'll continue the literary elements parts because we love them so much, and of course they help her comprehension as well.

The last change is that all of a sudden Esme is BUSY! She is officially a Girl Scout and is attending regular meetings, we've started meeting weekly with other homeschoolers, she has Sunday School, and in a few short weeks she'll be starting soccer. We've joined a local homeschooling group that has all kinds of activities, and we're starting to take part in those too.

We are a busy, happy, learning family! It's hard to express what an incredible experience this has been for us, even in this short time!

P.S. Book of the week is ABC Weather.

Paper Plate Sea Creatures

Two of Esme's recent projects - making a paper plate sea jelly helped Esme learn their two main parts - a bell and tentacles. We made the crab after reading A House for Hermit Crab by Eric Carle. In the story the crab uses all different ocean life to decorate his home. We let Esme choose any materials available in our craft area and she really made it a mixed media project with crayons, glitter, stickers, foil tape, rick rack, etc. I was very amused she chose to decorate it with vegetable stickers!!

Fantasy, Folk Tales, and Myths

It is hard for me to believe that we are in the last week of our second unit already. We've been studying the ocean for several weeks and have covered sand, water, and tons of animals. We are devoting this week to magical ocean stories. Our book of the week is Mermaid Dreams and we're also reading The Fisherman's Wife, Atlantis, and two Russian folk takes relating to the sea. Words of the week are is and see.

Next week we'll take a few days to explore Valentine's Day and then we'll be on to our next full unit!

Hermit Crabs

Esme read A House for Hermit Crab by Eric Carle this week and then made this scrapbook page about her memories of seeing hermit crabs this summer. Scrapbooking is a great way to reinforce her lessons, teach her about different kinds of media, and encourage her creativity!

Shells, Crabs, and More

This week we're studying shells and the animals that live in them. We'll also continue looking at 3-D shapes, working on fine motor skill development, and of course do lots of reading! Our book of the week is Seashells by the Seashore and our words of the week are we and two.

Vacation is over - we're back in school!

We've recovered from our vacations and we're happily moving on with our ocean unit! We're finishing up mammals and moving on to sharks and more fish. Our book of the week is The Three Little Fish and the Big Bad Shark. We are reviewing some previous words of the week just to be sure she had all the words we've done down. This week she'll also be learning about the three-dimensional shapes, sounding out words, and sponge painting.

Learning about Mammals

Esme has been very interested in learning about ocean mammals. We concentrated on whales and dolphins, and used Counting Fish. We've been using Beanie Babies to sort mammals and other types of animals.

We're still here!!

Yes we are still here and homeschooling! Esme was quite sick so we took a little time off for recovery and celebrating Thanksgiving, but we are back and learning all kinds of new things! Esme is in her second week of learning about the Ocean. The first week we did an overview of oceans. Along with our usual language and math studies we compared ocean water to tap water, and read Atlantic, a book about oceans written from an ocean's perspective. This week we are concentrating on fish and our book of the week is Big Al. We are doing a sight word review to make sure Esme has a good grasp on the ones we've done so far. We spent a few weeks really working on fine motor skills so now we are branching out into writing again along with the focus on further developing those skills. Thanks to everyone who has and continues to support us in homeschooling, and check back for more frequent updates!

Just 2 Days....

Esme has read many Halloween books, done some cool crafts and fine motor skill activities, and even our annual outings have become field trips! We're taking the end of the week off to eat our Halloween candy prepare for our new Ocean unit, which we'll begin next week.

this week in homeschooling

This week's book of the week is A Very Brave Witch. We're using it to compare and contrast, and to learn about fiction versus non-fiction. Esme is also starting her very first addition lessons! Words of the week are you and love.