We go year round in the truest sense. We go from the first week of August until the second week of July, with a week off for Christmas, one for Easter, and a day off for holidays and birthdays that are important to us. Tim just cannot handle not having his routine, so I’m not even sure if I’m going to stop completely for those two weeks between the end of kindergarten and the beginning of 1st grade.

We finished our 3rd quarter yesterday, which is why I forgot to post on here, it was busy making sure I had paperwork in order. I printed his report card (he just gets S, S-, S+ grades) and printed out his attendance, and looked over what we are doing for the 4th quarter. We only have two more weeks of new material, and the rest is all review from the whole year, which means a really relaxed, easy last quarter. I’ll use T4L and a few other sites for the reviewing, and the rest will be worksheets and verbal review. He loves webcams, so we’ll use those again to review animals.

Our state requires 180 days for school. Right now he’s completed 151, so he only needs 29 more to go, but I have 71 scheduled. I like going over, so we can take a day off here and there as we want to and not have to worry about it. This was my test run to make sure I had everything figured out so next year, when he’s officially a homeschooled student (he’ll be six, compulsory age, in July) I’ll know exactly what I’m doing for record keeping, making sure we are covering the required attendance,etc. It’s been great, my system works, so I’m sticking to it! I’ll spend those two weeks between grades writing my curriculum for 1st grade, leaving off where we are now since he’s ahead anyway. This way I can double check curriculum standards and make sure he doesn’t have any gaps, and then just keep going.

I first came across T4L one year ago, when Tim was 4. We were only a year into knowing that he had autism, and still had some serious problems at that time. I found out about T4L from other parents on a special needs homeschooling group,and decided to try it. He liked the site, but I just couldn’t afford it, to be honest. Not that it’s expensive, but when you don’t have money, even $5 is too much. It really wasn’t helping him at that time, either. He was really struggling with letter recognition at that time, and I was trying to find anything to help, but nothing was. So, I quit, reluctantly. I LOVED the graphics, and how well everything was explained. But, it’s not exactly ‘preschool’ level, and that’s where he was then.

We started kindergarten on August 6th, but I still didn’t have the money to add another monthly bill, so I still didn’t sign up. About two months ago I tried another free trial, and he was finally ready to handle it. He’s all over the place in terms of what grade he’s working on, but it’s so helpful in explaining things to him. So, it looks like we’re staying with it now. I like knowing that I have something else to add to our every day curriculum that helps cement things I’m trying to teach him. He’s breezing through the phonics, not even needing my help, and I just love seeing that.

I never bothered to research them. The way I think and act is that I put more emphasis on what parents are actually using and liking rather than what reports say, so as long as something has been referred to me by people I trust, that’s good enough for me. I trusted my own instincts to know if this was going to be right for MY kids, and it is! The only problem I do have, is that from 3rd grade on, it’s not as animated and isn’t as interesting. For a lot of kids on the autism spectrum, this can cause them to lose interest, I’ve seen this happen with my neighbor’s son. At the very least, I wish there was some way of having the text read to him without having to download the parrot that’ll do it. It would be nice if there was a simple button that parents could click on that would read what is there. My son’s reading level is nowhere near as high as his comprehension, so this leaves me doing A LOT of reading to him, not just on T4L but with anything else we’re using. But, that’s only a minor problem compared to the many benefits they receive. There is nothing more exciting than to have your kids begging to ‘play their school games’!

It felt SO GOOD to get back into school this week! Even though Tim gave me a really hard time for giving him a break, it was obvious today he needed it. He did SO WELL today. I found a book at the 99 cent store that introduces word problems for math, and he did a page in that. I am horrible with these and always was, so I want to introduce it early to him. He got it, it was just simple pictures where they showed four cats, showed two walking away, and he had to write how many was left.

For science, I am so excited this week! We are learning about birds, and we’re going to be doing a lot of observations. We started today by just looking at the different types of birds we see, and trying to identify them online. I had him try to tell me how many different birds he heard, and whether he thought they sounded angry or happy. I had read a book to him about why birds sing, too. Tomorrow, he’s going to gather things in the yard and try to make his own bird nest, the lesson being on how awesome it is that birds can do this without any hands.  We are also learning about California, and in the process, he’s learning a little about researching online, and copying and pasting to make worksheets.

On T4L, he learned today how to count by two’s and five’s. I don’t believe I could have explained this to him in a way he would have understood it, but he really got it by using T4L. I was really impressed! The two’s were easier for him than the five’s, until I showed him the relationship between the numbers when going by fives, that the last number alternates between 5 and 0. Then, that was easier for him if he’s looking at a number line.

I’ve been thinking a lot over the past year about the concept of unschooling.

I know that unschooling means different things to different people.  To me it simply means self-directed education.

Even though I am quick to link myself to the unit study approach, I believe I’m an unschooler at heart.  I try my best to supply the resources for my children, but I give them a choice in the matter.

This is why we do not always have a unit study going.  Sometimes we’re busy learning about Stan Lee or Japanese anime’, or graphic arts. 

Time 4 Learning has beome a great tool in our unschooling toolbox.  It’s so easy to use and it’s so fun!

Once again, Natalie just amazes me.  I can’t say it enough, I wish I had T4L when Emily was just learning to read, 8 years ago.  Anyway, Natalie is reading on her own now.  This week she went through about 10 small lessons mostly in the Language Arts curriculum for 1st grade and then a few others in the Language Arts Extention for 1st grade.  In these lessons there are sections where the story is read to her, then it asks her to identify different words and finally it makes her read the story back as each word is highlighted with a click of the mouse.  She did great and really enjoyed reading the stories.  As hard as it is at night (because I’m usually very sleepy) I let her read to me or we share the story.  She also reads to her dad when he’s working in the garage.

I am proud of her progress and her dedication to keep learning and to even go on T4L after being in school all day.  She doesn’t go on everyday, usually on Wednesday because she has a half day and Friday’s because she goes to bed a little later than usual.  The other days are optional.  She also goes one if she is reviewing something in particular that she may be struggling with. We just find one of the lessons to help her through that and so far we’ve been able to find something on T4L to match what they have been doing in class.

We are over our colds, still holding on to a little sinus or allergy issues but otherwise everyone is feeling pretty good and looking forward to our family vacation over the holidays.

Everyone, have safe and healthy week.

Terie