The Week is Off to a Good Start

We began school yesterday. The boys never want the entire summer off because they get too bored. We usually take about two months off before starting again. This really allows our schedule to be flexible. We can take more time for holidays, and we have the freedom to take off if needed for unexpected events and issues.

This year our little guy is in the first grade, so we are doing a bit more than last year. Last year we focused on writing letters and numbers, beginning to learn to read and beginning to add and subtract. He did very well and learned quite a bit. His favorite thing is reading and he is really excelling at that. This year we are adding Bible and history, and I think I'll add a bit of science since he really likes animals and we can study them and some literature which will simply consist of my reading some good books to him.

Anthony is in his last year of high school and has also already begun college, so he is busy. Here at home for high school, he simply needs to complete his government study which he began last year, his health, again, something he began last year, and he wants to continue to read classic literature with me. He will also continue to participate in our homeschool co-op because there were some classes he was interested in, and he really enjoys co-op.

As far as the college goes, he is doing that online. He is participating in the College Plus program, which enables to study and CLEP out of all of the general education classes during the first year, and then to get into the heart of the studies he has chosen. He has chosen to study Humanities. He has already taken two CLEP tests: Analyzing and Interpreting Literature and College Composition. He also had taken a Psychology AP test at the end of last school year through a class he completed at co-op. He has passed all of these tests and has already earned 18 college credits! He is currently studying for the American History I CLEP test.

Nicholas is in eighth grade this year. Our little guy thinks it's great that he and Nicholas are both studying the same thing for History. I am reading books to them about the famous explorers. Nicholas will have to do some additional work like writing a report of two and another project that I have up my sleeve to show what he is learning about the explorers as we progress. He will also finish learning keyboarding. He would like to start a blog, so I told him he needs to finish learning his keyboarding skills so that he can use all of his fingers and not take forever on typing as he will have to share the computer I use most. We will also finish reading the Lord of the Rings series, which we began last year, and I have a few other books we will read together.

We have begun the year with Anthony, Nicholas and I also reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Also, this school year, the three of us are doing a writing curriculum together. It is called "The One Year Adventure Novel". It was created by the author Daniel Schwabauer for homeschoolers. The curriculum guides you to complete an adventure within one school year, and as I have always had an interest in writing, I decided to take the course along with them. We began this writing course yesterday as well and are really enjoying it and looking forward to upcoming lessons. It is fun reading each others' work.

Today was just a good day. We did school and I played with our little guy for a while, just kind of romping around and doing a lot of giggling. There was lots of laughter in our house today and our Pastor stopped by for a short visit because he had been in the area. That was fun, too, as the boys could all share with him about some of their current interests. It's always a pleasure to spend time with our Pastor or any of our church family.

Even the unbearable heat gave us a break today. We finally got some much-needed rain yesterday as well, but we could still use more. However, the weatherman is saying the heat and humidity will be returning by the end of the week. Oh, well, at least we're getting a bit of a break before it hits us again.

I hope your day was filled with laughter and blessings like mine was.