Aug. 3, 2007: First Week of PreK Report!

So we just finished up our first week of preschool with the Princess. She really enjoyed herself, as did I. Today we did science by going on a nature hike at Eaton Canyon Nature Area while the Pirate was at VBS.

We looked for colors that matched her crayon colors and then she colored a page in her nature notebook with the colors that we observed. Then we listened for different sounds and heard birds chirping, birds hopping under the bushes, the breeze blowing through the plants, and the crunching sounds of leaves being stepped on by animals. (We also heard a lot of cars and trucks zooming by and people talking loudly!)

Then we sniffed the air but couldn't identify any specific smells other than that of dirt. :) We also observed red ants scurrying rapidly to and from their "anthill" which was level with the path we were on. She didn't enjoy watching the insects so much. The Pirate would have loved it!

We also touched different surfaces - although we were careful because I knew there was poison oak and stinging nettles around and figured there would be other similar plants to beware of.

We had split up the subjects for the week as follows:
Monday - Pre-reading activities and Bible
Tuesday - Arts & crafts and theme activities (Farm)
Wednesday - Math and Bible
Thursday - no school
Friday - Science

Each day includes a page from the Devotions for Preschoolers book.

She is so happy to have her own wall for hanging up the week's activities.

The Pirate, on the other hand, is sad that VBS is over. He's been a bit bellicose lately. Yesterday, he kicked a boy during rehearsal for today's program. Today, I spotted him during the program punching wildly at a (who I assume is the same) boy. The boy was backing away but none of the teachers seemed to notice so I went up and interrupted and made the Pirate stop. :(

His teacher seemed convinced that his misbehavior was due to lack of socialization from being homeschooled. I was pretty irritated by that comment yesterday but thought I had gotten over it last night. When the topic came up again today, I firmly stated that homeschooling was not the issue. That this occasional behavior was pre-existing from when he was 2 years old. She seemed to be under the illusion that the Pirate was being kept in some solitary existence being schooled by himself with no social contact with other kids. I said not to misunderstand what homeschooling was. I said that he has lots of exposure to other children regularly via church, support groups, park days, and playdates. I also said that if he were enrolled in school, I would most likely be in frequent parent-teacher conferences addressing this behavior.

Anyway, I was a bit frustrated, as you can probably tell. As we were driving home and discussing what was going on with him, it became apparent that he was a bit stressed out from all the activity and the fact that his sister has been homeschooling all week, as well as being emotional about VBS ending. He kept begging me to homeschool him today and then elevated his pleas to threats. I told him that he would start on Monday but he got pretty hysterical about it. Well, fast forward to now, he is working on an old math workbook that he had started some time ago but never finished because we had started with Singapore Math. He's happy as a clam.

Next week, we will be working out the kinks in homeschooling two kids on different curricula. Additionally, we will start going again to regular park days that we had been missing due to the heat over the summer.