We Learned…

I’m stealing today’s post from my friend Krisha who often uses that phrase on her blog.  It’s just a good roundup.

There’s a few updates to our little school.  Silje reads all the time.  That may not be the biggest news flash, but our days have been especially productive lately.  We started the tradition of reading out loud after bedtime with Silje.  I’ve been wanting to do this for awhile.  However our kids have been too antsy, and I’ve been very eager to have them in bed at night.  For the last 2 weeks, though, after our family prayer time at night, the little ones get to bed, and Silje meets me down in the living room with her book ready.

It has been so much fun to share this quiet time with her.  I’m actually surprised to hear myself say that because I normally guard my after-bedtime pretty carefully.  Knut has always called me the “bedtime nazi” from the beginning.  We’ve been getting so much good reading done during this time and all without being interrupted so we can really get lost in our book.  Lately we’ve been reading Twenty-One Balloons.  We’ll probably finish it tonight.

I’m hoping that someday David asks to join our after-hours group with the condition that he’ll actually sit with us.  So far he’s been just fine going to bed knowing that Silje gets to stay up longer.

I took the advice of another homeschooling mom and quit the Saxon math level K with David and moved straight onto 1st grade.  I can’t believe the difference in him regarding this subject.  Not only is it totally his level where I don’t have to help him write like I was thinking, but he wants to sit and do math pages, (one after the other) for close to 45 minutes some days.

David is continuing to read so much better.  We’re at the point that I’m pulling books off our shelf and not the traditional readers.  He was shocked to learn he could work his way through The Cat In the Hat.

I’ve continue to veer off the spreadsheets that worked so well last year, and instead write daily in Silje’s assignment notebook.  She loves to have control over what subject she works on next and loves checking things off her list. 

The major change this week is I finally go so fed up with our television that I disabled it.  I mean, I took every chord away from it and every DVD player, and digital conversion box, and VHS player and put them in storage.  It’s not just a big thing in our playroom downstairs.  It was becoming such a huge distraction.  David and Elias would constantly interrupt school to ask if they could watch a show.

For awhile I would let them just so I could get the lesson done.  Then I let them know that it was no longer okay and they were watching too much t.v.  So they continued to ask, but louder.  They wouldn’t stop, so I would have to stop teaching and discipline them.  Disciplining started to consume my whole day and that’s not fun for anybody.

So I told the kids on Wednesday afternoon that it was going to be their last day with the t.v.  When they woke up the next morning it wouldn’t work no matter how much they tried.  We got 3 requests for t.v. across all of them.  Today we have gotten none.  (Although Knut just showed them how to play games on the computer last weekend, so that is now the new request that I’ve had to turn down twice already.)

I’ve been so nervous to take the t.v. away from us completely but I got to a point where I felt I had no choice.  It completely ruled my kids thoughts and they talked of nothing else.  I know I have done this before, but this time I completely mixed things up so if I do want to reassemble it it will take me a good hour of time to reflect as I put it back together.

The kids have been using their new-found free time to build more forts.  They’ve also run around doing some sort of spy game, and have started on some Christmas presents.  They’ve learned quickly that if they come to me saying “I’m bored” I’m quick to put them to work.  So I don’t hear it.

I will admit I was a bit overwhelmed by the kids more underfoot than usual by the time Thursday was done.  Fortunately, my friend Sheila invited me over for some Christmas sewing time at her house.  I got a whole doll dress done for Silje.

It will be an adjustment, but my heels are dug in at this point.  So take that, t.v.