Accidental Homeschooling: Week 16
The post-holiday sugar crash is hitting us hard
To say we are at low ebb is to put a poetic spin on the fact that we — and I mean both my students AND me — are lazy.
We came back after the holiday break with a lot of screaming and an increasing amount of mouthiness from my elder boy, which is unattractive at best and infuriating at worst. On the bright side, I’m getting a lot of practice just breathing deeply and trying not to respond to either of my boys in anger.
So, yes, I think I continue to learn more from this accidental homeschooling than my boys are.
None of us were in the mood for the first few days, but we did manage to push our way through some math (fractions for the older; measuring and shapes for the first grader) and some Spanish (los estaciones! Hoy es el ocho de enero! Hace frio!) and even some reading and writing and spelling (this week we tackled the -y singular to -ies plural, which was a lesson I kind of enjoyed because it involved thinking up different words to prove the example, like pastry/pastries, and I’m a geek, I think playing with words is fun). We covered a few bases academically, so that’s good.
But the fact remains we need to work on our discipline. We start too late in the morning, I don’t make them stick with Spanish long enough, I don’t feel like fighting with them about additional “homework” or independent projects. Frankly, I think the fourth grader should be doing a little of his own work at night and on the weekends, but maybe that’s just because I know I had homework as a fourth grader.
I guess what I’m really saying is I need to work on MY discipline, because they are little boys and I am an old lady who should know by now that most of life is habit and it’s really important to try and form and maintain some basic good habits. I’m working on it.
Speaking of! Remember our sprouts project that kept failing? Look at that photo at the top! We grew some clover sprouts, there’s no mold in sight, and I think we’ll actually be able to eat some of these. In darkest, deepest enero (January).
There may be hope for us yet.
My hope for you this week is that your good habits give you strength, your bad habits not trip you up, and that you can find a spot of life in your January.
Here’s all of our accidental homeschooling adventures: Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Week 8 | Week 9 | Week 10 | Week 11 | Weeks 12 and 13 | Week 14 | Week 15
