Learning As We Go

Well now that we are in our sixth week of school, and things seem to be more "normal" (whatever that is!), I thought I'd share a little bit about our school year.  Micah doesn't start Kindergarten for another year, but we decided this year to keep him at home and test the waters of homeschooling.  We are praying through what to do next year and have not really made up our minds either way.  We decided this year not to send him to preschool for several reasons, but one being I wanted to "try out" the homeschooling thing.  So we are using a curriculum I found for preschoolers that I was actually looking at for next year if we do decide to homeschool.  The Sonlight curriculum is literature-based and this year is called "Exploring God's World".  I'm also tacking on the Kindergarten language arts and reading program because Micah was ready for it. 

It's been fun so far!  I enjoy it most days.  Every week I can honestly say I am looking forward to starting school again on Monday.  I definitely do have those days though when it just doesn't seem to work.  Sometimes I wonder if it is the best learning environment for Micah with what seems like constant interruptions from Caleb.  Sometimes I feel like I'm completely neglecting Caleb and I'm not able to "teach" him.  I realize that I'm very new to it, and I have a lot more figuring out to go before we decide if it's right for our family or not.  Some days I'm sold, and some days I'm not.  But that's all a part of our journey. 

Here's some pics of school so far...

Water Play

Practicing writing his name

Counting with beans

Just in case you haven't heard...

One thing I love about the blogging world is that you get so many fun ideas from others. I wanted to share two things with you that we at the Martin household LOVE.

One is this DVD:

If your kids are learning their letter, letter sounds, or beginning to put those sounds together to read, then this DVD is perfect! It is only about a 30 minute movie and has a catchy little song for learning the letter sounds. After watching it just a few times, Micah already picked up on half the alphabet. Yes, the TV taught my kid and I'm proud of it! Ha! Anyway, it is a great buy!

The other thing I wanted to share with you is the Highlights' Magazine High Five. It is specifically made for preschool up to early readers. Micah was given a subscription for his birthday a couple of years ago and he absolutely love it! He can do the Hidden Pictures and other puzzle-type pages on his own, and we read the short stories to him. The other cool thing is they have an audio version on the internet, so sometimes he will just sit with it in front of computer and it reads it to him! Either way, he LOVES it!

What are some ideas you have found that you love?