A new season

I really don't know how six months has gone while I blinked, maybe once or twice, but it has.

It is a new season for us. And God is faithful in it all.

When I got home from work one day last week, I encountered a battlefield, but a great one. Learning was happening in the midst of plastic soldiers, rulers, dice and lots of imaginative fun. Yeah for homeschooling with the Daddy!

Journeying with a friend

For the past couple of months my best friend, who lives on the other side of the world, and I have had a weekly skype chat time. We talk about our hearts, our days, our joys and challenges with the kids, we swap and collaborate on homeschooling ideas - it is such a blessing. She is such a blessing.

It is so good to have someone to share with. And someone safe - who has known me for years and walked with me through the good, the bad and the uglies.

I am so grateful for my friend.

Reading

We've been doing something simple that has been really encouraging for me and for the boys, so I thought I'd share it here.

In our morning Bible time we have been reading through "Leading Little Ones to God" by Marilyn Schooland. In each of these short devotions there are Bible passages to read. S is our only fluent reader at this stage, so he enjoys reading aloud. But both B and N know all their letter sounds and can recognize some words, so we don't skip over them, but they follow along and when their turn comes they pronounce the first sound in the word and then I read the word. If it is a word they know they read it and keep going.

This has seemed to give all the boys great encouragement in reading - and as I see it, it's probably for multiple reasons.

1. They are actively engaging with us in family reading time.

2. They are reading something real and solid in reading the Bible.

3. They are practicing what they know and interacting with what they don't.

One of those wonder moments came when at the end of the day when V returned from work and B met him at the door exclaiming "Dad, I read a whole verse from the Bible! Almost as fast as S."

A pause

Hi all.

I probably won't be publishing much (if anything) to this blog for about 4 weeks. I have begun my final teaching practicum placement, which means I am planning lessons for high schoolers on such subjects as writing a letter to the editor, poetry analysis and Egyptian hieroglyphics.

So, the boys are having a blast with their Dad - somedays I think he gets more done than I do. What a guy!!

I'll be back. See you then.

Letter Work or Fun

Finger painting.

Handwriting.

Letter practice.

All rolled into one.

It was fun.

Honestly, though, it was a bit difficult to persuade the boys to practice their letters rather than doodle only. And, yes, we did do plenty of doodling too! :)

Adventure Fridays!

We have decided that Fridays are, at least for now, Adventure Fridays!! (hear the da-da-ta-dum music)

Last week I stood at the top of our driveway watching the boys construct castles and forts and privateer ships - and enjoying every moment of it.

True Treasures - a foray into character building

As I thought and prayed about the coming year with the boys, the issue of character kept coming to my mind. That is one of the major reasons we are homeschooling - to instill (or sow seeds of ) godly character.

Where to begin stumped me for a while, but then Colossians 3:8-9, 12-14 kept cropping up.

"Now, you must rid yourselves of all such things as these anger, rage, malice, slander and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to one another . . . Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with one another and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them together in perfect unity."

I decided to use this passage to guide our first foray into deliberate addressing of character issues. So we are beginning our days together with "True Treasures" - coming from Proverbs 22 and from Matthew 6. I introduced Colossians 3 with this activity - I wrote some notes afterwards with the boys, I've left them on the last page of this document.

We are touching on one character quality each week. I am trying to address the character quality from a variety of different angles: the Word of God, application in our lives, stories, activities - anything to try and plant a seed of understanding in their hearts.

Our first week we looked at Compassion - to "rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn" (Romans 12:15). We read stories on being Tenderhearted from "A Child's Book of Character Building" by Ron & Rebekah Coriell.

Our second week we looked at Kindness - we listened to a story and song by Steve Green from "The Adventures of Sir Bernard"; we talked about how kindness is showing God's love to others; we read from the Bible and acted out a story of Robin Hood and a poor knight as read by StoryNory.

This coming week we'll be looking at Humility. No plans yet - I want to ask the Lord for some ideas.