Journey to Excellence

This has been an excellent week of school. There haven't been any real bells and whistles. But it was a nice, steady, enjoyable week. We had a full classroom this day. Some of my students were sleeping, though. We did have a little trouble getting moving on Monday morning. Even Dawson's cereal wasn't too happy about it. Dawson was still suffering from his rotten cold, and Eli had to move the Grumble-Meter up to orange. He pulled it together, though, and was still able to help his team earn their letter for the day. The rest of the week it never moved off green. Both kids had an excellent week of work, with great attitudes. The secret word this week was FAIR, so we went to the Septemberfest carnival for an evening of rides last night. Brynne ran for Junior Miss Septemberfest . She didn't win, but I was proud of her for stepping WAY out of her comfort zone and participating. She said she didn't care if she got the crown .... she just wanted to be ab...

In Oklahoma, I had a library card through the Tulsa City-County library system. I very rarely searched a bookshelf for a book. My routine was the get on the library website, search for the books I wanted (drawing from the 20+ libraries in the system), request the ones I definitely wanted, and wait for the little e-mail that told me that my books were waiting for me on the "Hold" shelf. There were VERY FEW times in the two years I used this system that there wasn't a book that I needed/wanted. In other words ... I was spoiled. We use books every single day of school . My philosophy is that if you want to learn about it, you read about it. Very frequently I had the maximum books checked out that you could have, according to the rules. Then we moved to a town of less than 3,000 people. There is an adorable library here that is affiliated with the county library, and you can have books delivered here from there. However, when I sat down to see how many books the library...

We are only one week into our Journey for 2012/2013, but I think we have established a pretty good routine. 6:30 a.m. ~ Dawson and I get up. He jumps in the shower and I grab my coffee, Bible, devotional, and journal and sit down in my favorite chair for some quiet time. 7:00 a.m. ~ I get dressed and get Dawson some breakfast. 7:25 a.m. ~ Dawson and I drive the 4 blocks to my parents' so that he can catch his ride to school. My mom, dad, niece Rylee, Dawson, and I all sit on their front porch and wait for Rylee's friend to come pick them up. After they are gone we talk for a couple more minutes before my dad leaves for work and I head back home. (I am finding this to be precious time.) 8:00 a.m.~ I have to get home quick and get my bike, because my mom and her friend, Brenda, are coming down the street to get me. We ride our bikes to the community park and walk three miles. Then we ride back home. 9:00 a.m. ~ I am home and Brynne is usually just waking up. I get ...

Okay. Now we are back to normal, or the "normal" we are going to have this year. We successfully completed our first real full week of school. That means all subjects have been incorporated into our week. And, it was an excellent week! Let me start with Dawson. As you know, he decided to go back to public school now that we are in a small town. I knew he was ready and was excited for him to go to the same high school from where I graduated. The first couple of days were really hard, as they are for any new student at a new school. But this week has been much better. He has made some friends, knows kids in every class, is enjoying the majority of his classes, and is really getting into his schoolwork. He is feeling very confident academically, and I couldn't be happier with how seriously he is taking his work. I am very proud of him! (He did end up with a horrid cold at the end of the week, and had to come home from school at noon. He's been in bed ever since.) ...

I am FINALLY getting some pictures taken of the kids for our Back-to-School photos. We had our nature day at the park today, so I thought it would be a good backdrop. Little did I know that our little park would have a couple of brand new areas with beautiful foliage and flowers! Eli and Brynne are my homeschooled students this year. They are both in the 3rd grade. However, I have decided to kind of do a 2nd/3rd combination for this year for both of them, and a rigorous 3rd grade for them for next year. Brynne would be a super-young 2nd grader this year, but academically she is ready for all 3rd grade work. I'd like to slow her down a bit, though, so that she doesn't graduate from high school when she is 16. Eli was a slight bit behind last year because of birth-related neurological delays. Although he is very smart, he could certainly use a transition year before we blast forward. The two of them are 19 months apart in age, but are cognitively at about the same...

Oh, what a better day we had yesterday! Mostly, I give credit to the Grumble-Meter. Here it is. It's made from a paper plate colored with markers, a black construction paper arrow, and a brad. Pretty fancy. For each "set" of work Eli and Brynne complete without Eli them grumbling enough times to get to RED (it moves up a color with each grumble I hear), they earn a letter in the Secret Word. The Secret Word is a reward. This week's reward is a GOOD one! Our neighbor gave us free circus tickets in a nearby town, so the Secret Word is CIRCUS. They have the opportunity to earn enough letters through Thursday for us to go to the circus Thursday night. We will have a set of work in the morning and a set of work in the afternoon each day. There can be two grumbles in the morning and two grumbles in the afternoon to still earn their letters. (Believe me, that's a whole lot less grumbles out of Eli than if we didn't have this system.) But we made it throug...