M and K were up by 5AM this morning which would not have been so early last week. In the process of the day, K asked DH if he would take her "side?" pointing vigorously at the front door. It was a glorious fall morning, golden leaves, golden sun, burnished sky. I usually wait until the hour before lunch to go to the park, but I packed some lessons we could do outside. had B pack a snack, skipped non-esential chores and hustled the kids into shoes. Then I realized that I wasn’t dressed yet.
For M and B, chalk to review cursive letters and phonograms on the sidewalk, for M by himself, the first chapter of Everyday Number Stories, an e-book I downloaded from Homeschool Freebie of the Day. (That particular math text from 1915 is not on the website right now, but you can find it at Google Books.) The first chapter has lovely vintage illustrations, after that it gets more text book-y, but still cute. For B, we packed his next chapter of the Fallacy Detective. We had to review the Logical fallacies we’ve come across so far, because M was getting frustrated (and I couldn’t remember them either.)
We enjoyed the sunshine, K got to run around while we got some things done that I had meant to do this week anyway, and she did sleep at nap time and has gone to bed without complaint! So I felt like a cool mom who knew how to flex.
But,after nap time, with a headache from the whatever cold I’ve got, I asked B what independent work he had finished in the 2 1/2 hours he’s had sibling free, only to hear he’d done what I estimated to be only about 3/4 hours of work! (Thinking it over again, it was more like 1 1/2 hours work). I asked in a very wailing, immature way why he put so much emphasis on other teacher’s assignments, but not on mine. He thought carefully, and said, "the other assignments come with deadlines, yours don’t."
Well, you ask a question, you get an answer.
We decided to meet daily to set goals and check off accomplishments. It’s not really that it’s too much for me to do, it’s just that I don’t really want to do it! I do believe that teaching him to get organized is as important as anything else he’s learning, I’d just been hoped thatI had done that already.
However, if he still needs this scaffolding from me, he still needs this scaffolding from me. He can’t learn everything from experience if the results are this important. I just feel like I’m drowning in his assignments. He must feel that way too, he called it a nightmare.
So much for being the cool, flexible Mom from this morning.
Then B asked me if he could talk about his speech for Friday. He’d picked a topic that was unwieldy, and needed a new one. "Why not call your teacher and ask if you can change?" I asked.
B’s face lit up, then fell. He didn’t have another topic in mind. By this point, K had woken up, my soup was not on the simmer like I’d planned, and I hadn’t had any coffee after nap time. I took a deep breath, and told B we needed to ask someone infinitely wise for another topic idea, bowed my head and prayed about it.
Once K had nursed, and been changed, B took out his mp3 player and recorded our brain storming session, we set the oven timer for 5 min. I cut up an apple and some cheddar cheese for the kid’s snack. B picked the topic he liked (good thing he remembered, the conversation didnt’ record very well). Then I phoned his teacher, explained the situation, and put Ben on the line with her. I was pleased with his phone manors.
Then I got to make myself some tea, it was too late in the day for coffee.
So, this morning we did some of our school at the park instead of the kitchen table, this afternoon we realized that we once again had to re-calibrate B’s school organization (Ugh), but he also asked for help winsomely, and solved his own problem graciously. We also practiced brainstorming. So I’ll count that as organizational scaffolding.
Check off one spot on the new goal.
Some kids do crave schedules. Or so I've heard. I've never had the deadline thing used as an excuse! Usually I get "Oh, I started doing (choose your distraction) and I forgot. :o)
Peace and Laughter,
Cristina