Sailing through the First Day of School

Because we spend three weeks ramping up to a full blown schedule, Pamela breezed through her first day of school today! Attending ChildLight USA's annual conference last June renewed my enthusiasm about applying Charlotte Mason's methods even more thoughtfully than I had before. I have changed some aspects of our homeschooling program:

• I let go of the daily hour of the association method because Pamela has made such wonderful progress in overcoming her aphasia that I think a combination of Relationship Development Intervention, Charlotte Mason language arts (oral and written narration, copywork, studied dictation, recitation), Writing Strands Level 2, and picture study will be enough to spur more gains in language.
• I split Math-U-See's Pre-Algebra into three twenty-minute tracks a day to allow more time to ground Pamela in new ideas (up to two weeks) before having to work in abstract symbols: number theory, arithmetic/algebra, and geometry. I promise to blog more later.
• I cut some classes back to two or three times a week (as Charlotte Mason did) to add a few important subjects or to have time for things that seemed to get neglected (*ahem* exercise).
• I am thinking very hard about how to apply the dynamic thinking skills listed in Chapter 2 of The RDI Book in all subjects of our curriculum and daily life. I even put on the schedule carved out time for chores and life skills to motivate Pamela (who loves crossing things off our weekly list).
• With the help of free courses online, I am guiding Pamela through how to get the most out of spreadsheets so that we launch her love of writing lists and making connections between calendars, the Chinese zodiac, places we have lived, PBS television stations, favorite movies, roman numerals, etc. into the digital age.
• I split up history into short blocks with a block of notebook time every day to continue two book of centuries from last year for Ancient History (The Story of the World, Volume 1, The Amazing Expedition Bible, and Adam and His Kin) and Roman History (Augustus Caesar's World and The Amazing Expedition Bible) and start two new ones for English History (Our Island Story) and American History (The World of Columbus and Sons).

So, how did our three-hour-and-fifteen-minute day look?

Morning

• Covered columns/letters, rows/numbers, and cells and renaming and color-coding the tabs of worksheets in Excel to make a calendar spreadsheet for 20 minutes.
• Copied part of a story that she choose in her copy journal for 5 minutes.
• Measured length and width of seven flat, rectangular objects and used a grid of square-inch blocks to figure out the area for 20 minutes--she figured out how to calculate the area halfway through the activity!
• Reviewed whole numbers versus fractions and the need for pieces to be the same size using the concrete idea of pizza, pie, and cookies for 20 minutes.
• Played the map game and recorded her movements north and south to introduce the idea of negative numbers for 20 minutes.
• Typed a narration of Chapter 11 of Watership Down for 10 minutes and read a page and a half from Chapter 12 for 15 minutes.
• Typed a narration of Cain and Abel based on a storyboard from last June for 10 minutes.
• Wrote three sentences from a story about Pandora for studied dictation with no mistakes for 10 minutes.
• Read half a page from Adam and His Kin plus Genesis 4:25-5:4 for 10 minutes and started a new storyboard about Seth's family for 5 minutes.
• Sang three verses of Blessed Assurance for 5 minutes.
• Read aloud Walter de la Mare's poem The Horseman for 10 minutes.
• Use the poem as a springboard for understanding adjectives and doing the first day of Lesson 1 in Writing Strands Level 2 for 15 minutes.

Afternoon

• Walked the Arwenator (our hyperactive dog) for 30 minutes.
• Listened to Mozart for 10 minutes while running errands.

I was especially pleased with Pamela's very succinct narration of Cain and Abel:

Adam and Eve had two babies called Cain and Abel. Cain and Abel was burning some animals. Cain Fought Abel. Abel was dead. Abel went to Heaven. Cain was homeless.

She also wrote a neat sentence for Writing Strands 2 with very little guidance from me:

This is a pink hat with moon, stars, and patches.

We will be phasing in literature, chores, science, geography, and the new history material in the next three weeks, so stay tuned!