The kids have been enjoying their summer very much. The swim team was very good for them; they made lots of friends and got lots of exercise. They still go down to the YMCA every morning so Lorena can use the exercise equipment while the kids swim some laps, go down the water slide, and hang out with their friends. Kelly and Christian both started their comic strip authoring careers. Kelly slowed down a little on the piano (although she did not stop) while Christian kept plugging away. Right now they are working on a piece for piano and guitar they can play together the music for which their friend Sara pointed them on the internet. Kelly did some reading and Christian did some IT servicing of his computer. They both continue to blog–Kelly mostly doing social networking while Christian worked on his (high technical) how-to’s at his NerdHow blog. All that is starting to come to an end now. There is only one more week of summer before we jump back into homeschool.
Homeschool will start a week or two early this year. I say that, but it seems like we start a week or two early just about every year so that we can have time during the normal government school year to visit Mexico, go skiing, and other stuff like that. The kids are tasked to empty the homeschool bookshelf in the bonus room and load it up with all their books for the new school year. This weekend, on the way home from the Holly Springs library, we will go to Target to buy notebooks, pencils, and other supplies. We really love to do that. I have the schedules pretty well under control for both of the kids, but I am planning a couple of hours to refine them, get them printed out, go over them with the kids, and get the first couple of weeks into their notebooks.
I just got a really nice note in the form of a comment from another homeschooling father who keeps a very extensive blog called Every Good Path on homeschooling and some other stuff. Thanks, Ruthie! Percentage-wise, there are not so many of us as homeschooling seems to be mostly a mother managed thing. I will put him on our blogroll. He gave me a link to something I have been wanting to do for a long time! It is a bible reading list that is in chronological order. As soon as I finish my current pass through the bible, I think we will try to do a family read through the bible using Mark’s list.
April 14, 2004 (no. 2) – Tentative Schedule
April 15, 2004 – Closet preparation
Hi Ken, I’m glad the reading schedule will be helpful to your family. As you said, dad’s actively, daily involved in their kid’s home education are rare. Glad to find your blog and I added you to my blogroll as well.
By the way, Vision Forum just sent an email yesterday with a special offer (through August 16 – free for a donation of any amount) on a CD about the father’s role in home education. I just posted about it on my site here: http://www.everygoodpath.net/VisionaryFathersRoleInHomeEducation
I immediately took advantage of the offer and thought you and your readers may be interested as well. Blessings, Mark
Thanks Mark and thanks for the blog roll. That is a great tip I will go check it out.
http://www.oklahomahomeschool.com/forms.html
A website with lots and lots of pre-made forms and checklists….Perhaps you or some of your
readers may benefit from this site.
Ruthie
There is a wealth of information there. I do not think I would have started down my own path to develop our homeschool forms in the OpenOffice.org spreadsheet, if something like this would have been available. That is another great pointer Ruthie. Thanks!