8.00 - Snowy and I wake up and after a bit of a cuddle, we head off to satisfy our addictions - Snowy for his 30 minutes on DS - I head for the kettle and a cup of tea. Lucy, my 'lark', is already up - dressed and breakfasted and working on her 'to do' list for the day. She's already fed the guinea pigs.We have a bit of a chat about our dreams, and about what she'll be working on independently and what she needs me to 'teach'. Today it's a recorder lesson and helping her get started on a biology experiment. I check my emails and forums.
8.30 - Arwen stumbles out of bed and heads for the kettle as well. She's definitely my night owl! Snowy's timer goes off; he finishes up on his DS and I log off the computer. I get breakfast for both of us. The girls tell me about the latest installment of their comedy mash-up 'Glamelot'. It's funny. I have a brief vision of them as a stand up comedy sister act. Everyone gets on with their morning chores - except for Snowy, who has moved on to his Lego - I wash the breakfast dishes, put away washing, make my bed, get dressed. Lucy sweeps the kitchen floor and Arwen dries up and puts away. I like having the kitchen clear for Maths.
I have an inner debate about whether or not to make Snowy leave his Lego and get his own chores done - bed, dressing, teeth, watering outside. I decide that as long as he's done by 10, that works for me. I give him a reminder. I'm realising that I need to put a bit of work into habit formation with Snowy. It's one of my favourite Charlotte Mason ideas, that of 'habit'. Relying on motivation is a capricious and often tiring thing. Habit, once formed, requires much less energy.
9.20 - Lucy is ready to start maths. It's a diagnostic test on her decimals unit. We look through it together for any tricky questions and I leave her to it. The early morning rain has cleared so I put a load of washing on while Arwen reads through 'what you've done so far' of this blog post. She's hoping no-one steals their 'Glamelot' idea. Consider it copyrighted, all you comedy idea-stealers reading my blog!!! She highlights her name in green...
Snowy suddenly has a spurt of energy and gets all his jobs done in 10 minutes. Arwen is officially ready for maths. I'm officially ready for a second cuppa.
9.40 - Both girls working. Arwen and I work on prime and composite numbers in the lounge room, so Lucy has the quiet kitchen to herself. Snowy is playing Lego and waiting for the school shows to come on at 10.
10.00 - Schools shows on the ABC - Snowy watches 'Backyard Science'. I check in with Lucy to see how she's getting on. Arwen's done her 2 pages of maths and moves on to her English book. She's using 'English Now', which I think is quite boring but it's a way of getting her used to school-speak before next year.
I send a few emails about upcoming h/s events and look around online for images of leaf cells under a microscope for Lucy to use later.
10.30 - I mark Lucy's test and identify the areas she need to revise tomorrow. Must fuel Snowy up before we start working. I cut him up an apple. Gappy teeth make biting a whole apple impossible! Maths first, followed by a phonics lesson, some reading practice and some handwriting. We finish off with a page out of 'The Story of Life' about the first land creatures. Snowy narrates a few sentences back to me and I type them up as part of his ongoing narration.
Arwen is writing an article for her dance school newsletter about the jazz class they took in the city on the weekend. Lucy is writing her World War One journal - written in character as a nurse and then moves on to soaking some bean seeds and preparing a graph for her science experiment. I've forgotten to hang out the washing so I race out to do that and put on another load and come back in to listen to Arwen read her piece aloud. I correct her punctuation. Snowy takes a break.
11.40 - Lucy starts recorder. We're working on 6/8 time and 'C' - I listen to her play and give her some feedback. She keeps practicing while Arwen chooses a LOTR project to do. She decides on an art project - writing out some characters' names in Elvish. I find the Elvish translator I've bookmarked for her previously. She and Snowy squabble a little in the meantime.
I've got a little window of time before lunch to do some more work with Snowy. We read a couple of pages from 'A Child's Introduction to the World' and talk about tectonic plates and how they move.
Lucy has finished recorder and starts reading Act 4 of King Lear using Spark Notes 'No Fear Shakespeare.' I hang out more washing and warm up some left-over pizza for lunch. By 12.30, everyone's eating. There's some grumbling over the fact that Snowy gets to do his tectonic plates experiment with a Mars Bar whilst the girls had to do it with a Vegemite sandwich!
12.45 - Lucy still has to finish reading King Lear. Then she's got some knitting to do and an Amelia Earhart biography to start. She's also got some of 'Story of India' to watch if she feels like it.
I'm going to clean up after lunch, make a cup of tea and then read Snowy a chapter from 'The Borrowers' and do a little bit of yoga with him as well. The girls and I are between read-alouds - we got bored with 'DragonKeeper' and so the girls finished reading it themselves over the weekend. More squabbling between Arwen and Snowy over how loudly he is bouncing the pilates ball. Arwen has some dance homework/practice to do before we go out.
I have to write a shopping list as well. I'm taking Arwen out in the next suburb over at 3.00 and will get some groceries afterwards. Snowy plans on spending the rest of his 'screen time' while I'm gone.
( This is the part of the day when I long for chocolate. And the bit where my efficiency dips. I could be filling out Arwen's high school application but instead I'm checking out my forums/emails again. )
Motivated by Chris suggesting that he do the grocery shopping while I'm out with Arwen, I write the list. Motivated by that, I start filling out Arwen's application form and realise that it isn't going to take very long after all. Then I start filling in the menu plan for the week. Yoga goes by the wayside as Snowy is deep in a Lego game. I have a quick read of the paper instead. All is quiet...
No comments:
Post a Comment