New Job

I left my job at Teleperformance on Sept 13, for it was literally making me go nuts.  Thank goodness that on Sept 8, I got word that I was hired at America First.  So a new job was waiting for me. 
So far, I really love it here.  I feel more freedom.  The thought that I actually look forward to coming to work is a feeling that I haven't had in a very long time.  I can get paid more than $14 an hour as long as I put in the work.  Who knew that I could feel like this?
What is the best thing ever is that the kids have noticed that I have been coming home happy.  That never happened at Teleperformance.  Bree has never experienced a happy daddy coming home from work in her life.  Things are improving!

New Year's

It has been a traditon for us to spend New Year's at the Swenson's for 5 years.  This year was a little sad because things happened where we could go, but tha t didn't stop us from having some fun.  This year we played at the Scherbel's.  The kids get to sleep over, but not Shelly or me.  I have to work in the morning.  First time that I've worked New Year's Day at Teleperformance.  I will not go into how disturbed I am about that.  However, we had fun.  I cannot win a game, but I had fun nonetheless.

Sledding

Audrey's knee didn't allow her to join us today.  Besides that, we had a blast.  I was most impressed with Bree.  She went up and down the hill all by herself. Marissa and Trent made me go down.  The hill at Orchard Park is most impressive.

Easter 2013 (I know it's late, but still)

I'm using the blog for ideas for the final.  I found some Easter pictures that I don't think have been posted anywhere yet.  I just added my first picture on here and holy cow, I thought I was going to have to find a computer with Photoshop.  Luckily it worked!  :)  I'm liking this.  Anyways, if I use these pictures, I'll be able to make a background and story this up. 

Audrey and Marissa Easter 2013

These first few pictures are actually on Easter Sunday taken after Church.  They were Easter egg hunting.

Breanne Easter 2013

Trent Easter 2013

The next few pictures are celebrating Easter at Shelly's parents house in Provo.  That was one monster Easter egg hunt.

Marissa at Grandma's

Audrey at Grandma's

Breanne and Momma at Grandma's

Trent at Grandma's

I think I can work with this one for the next little while.

What ELSE is in the box?

Today we're taking a look at what's in Marissa's boxes.  Marissa is in Kindergarten but has done a lot of first grade work this year.  Marissa currently has 5 boxes.  Come fall she will have quite a few more.  As of right now, these are her boxes. 

Her first box, like Trent's, is her Calendar Notebook and media coupons along with the pens to fill out her notebook.

Marissa's second box contains her Math.  We use singapore math.  I love using it.  It works for us for many reasons.  Marissa has completed level 1A.  After she completed it I decided not to start her out on 1B quite yet and to spend some more time working on addition and subtraction facts.  She will start 1B in the fall (when she is officially a 1st grader) or when she finishes all of her addition and subtraction fact assignments this summer (which she is nearly done with and May isn't even over yet).

 Box number 3 used to hold Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons but she finished it months ago.  Currently it holds nothing because her reading assignments are on the computer doing a program called Funnix.  When she finishes up with funnix, this box will hold whatever chapter book she is currently reading.  Therefore, I just took a picture of the tag on the workbox. 

 Her next box holds her Handwriting.  After learning how to write all the letters, using the Handwriting without tears approach, I moved her into this book by Evan and Moor.  I have really liked it.  She is reviewing all of the letters right now, then she will do numbers and number words.  After that it all becomes copy work.  I can already see improvement in her handwriting.  She will probably be working in this book until the end of first grade.  If she does finish is up before then her handwriting will just be that in her other subjects.

For some reason, unbeknownst to me, she chooses to keep random objects in this drawer.

 Marissa's last box holds her Science book.  This year we used Elemental Science's Biology for the Grammar Stage.  I keep the two older girls together on Science and History and split the difference in their grade levels right now.  We have really enjoyed this curriculum.  Next year they will be doing Earth Science and Astronomy by the same company.  I'm planning on sticking with this company all the way through High School, that's how much I love it! 

Here is a close up picture of her section of workboxes.  You can see that the bottom drawer has 3 tags on it.  In general (and this will become more apparent when I show you Audrey's boxes) I put the tag for whatever is actually IN the box on the left of the drawer.  Tags on the right of the drawer are a visual reminder of subjects that need to be done but don't need a drawer.  On the bottom drawer she has science (which is actually in the drawer), a tag for history (which was a flop this year but will hopefully be better next year), and a tag for English (which we began with but thought our curriculum was so dumb that we stopped doing). 

Next year Marissa will have the following boxes:  General School supply box, Calendar Notebook box, Math, Handwriting, Science, History, and Geography. 
She will also have tags for Reading and Piano

So there's a peek into the school life of my kindergartener.  She is one bright little cookie and catches on to almost everything like lightning.  I feel very blessed to be able to homeschool her where I can allow her to excel in her academics and spend lots of time on character training to help with her temper.

End of "First Semester" Evaluations

It's the middle of November, and over here at the Stephen home it means the end of our 2011 school work.  I'm going to give a quick evaluation of each of my kids, mostly for my own benefit.
Audrey (2nd Grade)
Reading:  Audrey has improved a LOT in her reading since we started in August.  She still isn't where I'd like her to be, but we're slowly getting there.  I hope to have her successfully  reading chapter books on her own by the end of the year.
Math:  She ROCKS at math, in my opinion.  She has mastered how to add and subtract large numbers even with borrowing and carrying.  I'm VERY proud of her.  My goal is to keep going forward with her math curriculum and try to help her memorize math facts along the way so she doesn't always have to use her fingers.
Handwriting: Her handwriting deteriorated greatly over the summer so I have been having her do an alphabet book to help remind and reinforce her writing skills.  It has helped a lot.  My goal here is to get her doing copywork starting in January and help her improve on formatting and writing her OWN sentences.
Piano:  Great strides are being made here.  I think I may have underestimated her ability and gotten books that were too easy for her.  She's almost done with her second set of books, so I'll have to look and choose more carefully for her third set of books.  She needs more of a challenge than her current books are giving her.

Marissa (Kindergarten)
Reading:  Marissa is doing EXCELLENT in this department.  She is now on lesson 65 in teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons.  I like this curriculum SO much better than what we used with Audrey.  Marissa is already leaps and bounds ahead of where Audrey was half way through kindergarten.  I wish I had been using this curriculum when Audrey learned to read!
Math:  She LOVES to do math.  She doesn't always GET the math but she loves to do the workbook with me.  We have just finished up a unit on addition and subtraction but it hasn't gellled in her head yet.  I plan to work more on helping her understand addition and subtraction more when we get back to work in January.  She IS doing first grade math as opposed to Kindergarten math though, so I figure I've got plenty of time to slow down and help her master things better.
Handwriting:  Marissa is doing the same book as Audrey, but it takes her longer since she is learning how to form and write the letters.  Audrey is just getting review and reinforcement.  She is about half way through her book and doing well.  I can already tell that she has improved in her pencil control since August. 
Piano:  I DID start Marissa this year, but I don't think she's fully ready for it yet.  I've put it on the backburner for now and only give her a lesson when she asks for one.  I think it will be much easier for her if we wait until next fall to really get going.

Trent (Pre K)
ABC's:  We have been working on one letter a week and he does well during the week.  He is still not retaining the letters much right now, but I don't feel any pressure about that.  He's got plenty of time, and right now I feel like it's more about EXPOSING him to all the letters than about him KNOWING all of them.
Numbers:  Trent can recognize the numbers 1,2,and 3.  We're working on expanding that to 5 right now.  We're also working on counting.  He's improved a LOT since August.  My goal is for him to be able to count to 10 and recognize the numbers 1-10 by the end of the year.
Colors and Shapes:  He's great at colors and can recognize about 10 different colors.  Shapes still need work, but we'll get there.  He knows circle, triangle, and star really well. 
Other Skills:  He's getting really good at doing puzzles by himself.  He is learning how to do prewriting worksheets where he follows the lines.  We need to work on cutting skills as he's still pretty shaky with a pair of scissors.  Overall he's doing great for only being 3!

Bree (Bree School)
Each day for Bree school we pick an activity out of a jar to do with her to help her learn and grow.  The activities range from singing songs, learning sign language, playing games like patty cake, and helping her master motor skills like rolling over and reaching for things.  The kids LOVE this part of the day.  My goal with Bree is to train her to do "blanket time."  Blanket time is a time where she will be given ONE toy and expected to stay on her blanket and play with her toy for a certain amount of time.  This is going to take time and lots of work, but it will pay off so much in the years to come!!

Since some of you are probably wondering why I'm talking like this is the end of 2011, that's because for traditional school in our house it IS.  Next week (Thanksgiving week) is a complete holiday week for my kids with no school at all.  Starting November 28th and going to December 24th we will be having "Christmas School."  Christmas School will consist of singing 8+ carols/day, reading Christmas books, studying the story of Jesus' birth, doing a craft/activity every day, and doing a family activitiy each day.  One of the reasons I am glad I chose to homeschool is because I CAN take all of December and focus on the reason for the season!