Home-Schooling Working Parenting

Week One Home School

We have survived our first week with Mommy and Daddy as teachers. No one has been suspended or expelled yet, but there have been several breaks taken and calming corner (bedroom time out) moments leveraged. There have been many "BBC Dad" moments with one or both appearing (invited and not) in my Zoom VC  meetings. Fortunately, there are also other children, pets, spouses and all manner of interruptions in those same meetings.

Day One

We embarked on home learning with a strong start, but quickly hit a roadblock. The Seesaw app and Schoology, the tools our teachers are using to communicate, both went down at some point in the morning, stopping lessons in their tracks. Schooling went into the evening, due to the (lack of) cooperation of M & L, but all was completed. I worked at my desk with the boys at a table behind me so I could help when they needed assistance. Which was ALL. THE. TIME.

Also, don't have anything beyond Monday for L's preschool work. It was supposed to come that evening, but difficult to plan. Also, today we were supposed to "paint germs with liquid watercolors". I don't know about you, but I have never once purchased liquid watercolors for my kids. They get the crayola pack of 10 colors that you have to wet a paintbrush to color with. We received no supplies for L's work, so we are on our own there. I am definitely going to run out of computer paper soon...

Quiet time reading 30 min a day

Day Two

M has realized that L has very little "assigned" to him for home school, which is "NOT FAIR." Try explaining to your 7-year old that the reason his brother doesn't have as much work is that he is in Preschool and they mostly play. And then try to do this when said brother is playing LEGOs downstairs or zooming around the house acting like Jigglypuff.

And I have learned the most challenging part of M's work is going to be writing journal. Today, we were supposed to write "a story about Spring," but M could not think of anything. I was certain that they had more help than just a statement, so had to email to get the tips. We tried a Word Bank, asking questions, and every trick I could think of (which is not many). We were finally able to complete the writing by dinner and it turned out great!

Building the "Tallest Building in the World" (Look at that balancing!)

Day Three

Polygons and symmetry

By Day Three, it was apparent that work was not efficient when my time was divided between the boys and my computer. Something needed to change fast. There were tears that they couldn't do it or understand it. There were demands to do certain lessons later. I had to reach out to Mrs P to see how she kicked off the creative writing, as there were flat out refusals to do this due to "not knowing what to write!" I am so thankful that I work for a company that is incredibly flexible and understanding! Going forward, I will be taking two hours in the morning to do lessons and N will take an hour in the afternoon.

Physical Education has been easier. The trampoline, M's ability to bike on his own, the slack line, and pretty nice weather made it easy to get outside. M is also really getting into playing baseball with N pitching and me fielding in the street. Do NOT hit our windows! The activities sent over have also been pretty fun and both boys can do them.

Day Five

First off, I made Cinnamon Rolls that I found a delicious recipe for. From scratch. I don't really make much from scratch. Not even the cakes that I decorate! Thurs night, I had the boys help me make the dough and then we set it to second rise in the morning. M declared they were way better than school lunch cinnamon rolls. I'm not sure how high that rating is, as I think the bar might be low.

Technically a day off, there were still some things we could do. Spelling test, math test, listening to Charlotte's Web from earlier in the week that we missed. Art class, which was probably the highlight of the day, started with drawing Bruni from Frozen 2. They spent over an hour watching videos and drawing from the Art for Kids Hub on YouTube. Sadly, they did mostly video game characters, but they were quiet the entire time. Thank the Lord!

To end the day, we had a happy hour with our friends and Family Skit. So fun to see our friends and play some House Party games. Each family did a short skit. We decided to show "A Day in the Life of the Pogorely Family". Hoping to add a copy of it here in the future.

Check out the skit HERE!

Side note, I'm still earning quarters from lights on. Since we are home all day now, I can only imagine what our electric and water bill will be like. Is anyone else running the dishwasher two times a day?!?