SETTLIN' IN

"And John Smith sojourned many days in the land of Powhatan and his tribes."  Genesis 21:34 revised

I sure had a crazy idea of homeschooling when I first looked into it.  I thought homeschooling was a mom and her kids sitting at a table re-enacting school at home.  I thought it was not only insane, but boring.  My friend, Shannon even ratted me out at Catey's homeschool graduation this past June by telling everyone how I said all homeschoolers were crazy.  And that was less than a year before I started to homeschool!

Catey went to Kindergarten and first grade at the public school near our house.  That was so long ago that I can't imagine life if it had carried on in that educational path.  It was like putting her in a box and poking holes in it and showing her pictures of the real world.  THAT was boring and insane.

We started school last week, as you may know if you read the post.  It was hard for me, as I have never started school before Labor Day in 11 years of homeschooling.  Another prerogative of homeschooling.  Last week was just getting back into the swing of school. But, this week, I was reminded why I love, love, love educating my kids at home.  Intentional, serious, FUN!

My older girls are GONE.  Yep.  On a major field trip to Utah to help teach a mini communications conference. How many schools start the year off with an overnighter where the STUDENTS do the teaching?  I never got to do that.  The second week of high school was always the "real" start of school.  Homework, projects and late night studying.  For a grade.  My girls aren't doing this for a grade....they are doing it for their life!

Meanwhile, my younger kids are learning American History this year!  WOOHOOOOO!  I am so, so, so excited! I LOVE history (a great gift from my mother) and am currently trying to figure out how to fit it all in!  We aren't meeting for co-op until October, but our family is having a lot of fun starting at the beginning of America's great past.  Well, okay, not the beginning.  My older girls, with eyes rolling, will tell you that to start at the beginning for American history, I must start at the fall of Rome.  So, I have compromised for the sake of my young charges and started with the English Reformation.  At this point, my co-op partners are very glad NOT to be learning with me until we reach the Massachusetts Bay Colony in October.

Say what they will.....my kids are having a blast!

Gecko is doing math, phonics, history and Bible with us.  Carli is doing math, history, Bible, science and writing.  I am reading to them both.....and Sam when he listens.  Lots of fun books about Roanoke, Jamestown, John Smith, and Pocahontas.  That is all fine and well, but I like FUN!  School is not HOMEschool to me unless we are having a blast!  Anyone can do school at home, it takes a REAL nutcase to break the mold and do something else!

So, here was today's assignment.  After the boring stuff (reading, writing, math), I gave the boys a choice of being one of Powhatan's Indian braves, or being one of John Smith's explorers/interpreters.  Guess what the boys chose.....

They played outside for three hours as explorers!  Listening to them hunt, track and fight, I could tell that they learned a lot from our studies.  Who needs a test when you can hear your little soldiers tracking  game and bartering with Indians along the James River?

I did learn that I need to go over some more Godly Character training with Gecko, though.  Through our study on the early settlers, we are focusing on Courage and Inquisitiveness.  Today, when I asked Gecko what every explorer needed, he did not answer "bravery" or "curiosity".  He didn't even answer "guns".  He said, "Mom, all explorers have to have.....

CURLY MUSTACHES!"

Well, okay, then.