Fina's Homeschooling Blog: Leading up to November 12

We had a lovely afternoon on Monday, listening to our free read on a picnic blanket in the park. I think it got to 12 degrees, but it was so sunny and not at all windy. Just incredible!

We got a chance to play with our friends too, with wood chips left over from the outdoor exercise equipment that was just installed in our park.

Over just a few days, Fina listened to the entire Little House in the Big Woods book, from her free read list. And I didn't have to read it myself.

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I feel like I have had a revelation. I want to slow our schooling down a bit. I feel like we are rushing with our readings, just to complete the week, and that is not what I want to do. I'm going to restructure my thinking. I hadn't intended on starting formal schooling so early. It was Fina's idea to start when all her friends were starting. I really want to buy Laying Down the Rails and do some of that with her. I do feel like habit training is lacking. And I also want to focus more on the feast subjects. Certainly the point of homeschooling isn't to do things just to get them done! What a liberating revelation!!! School isn't even mandatory in Manitoba until the September of the year the child turns 7. That gives me 10 more months! I am thinking math and cursive regularly, but the rest to be spread over many more than 4 days per week. Probably 6 or 7 or even 8 days. Whatever it takes to leave more time for finger knitting, hymns, artist study, foreign language, composer study, folksongs, Lego, play time at home! We try to spend lots of time outside and Fina sometimes feels like she doesn't get to play much at home, because she is doing school work when we are in and then spending time outside of the home. Imagine me, rushing her around. Not what I want to do, for sure. I'm going to give her more time to play, by spreading our readings out much farther.

I did read Better Late Than Early by the Moore's a few years ago (loaned to me by one of my early homeschooling benefactresses, DH), and, in some ways, the title says it all. I think I have done that with Fina, by not pushing her to write, or to do math, or to sit for extended periods of time, giving her freedom to wander and giving her space for imaginative play. I haven't taught her to read even now at 6 years old. But I think I can continue the principal into the early schooling years, by taking it slow. Savouring the feast. Not rushing through "weeks." I think I can make it work!

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Yesterday was Remembrance Day here in Canada, and we took part in the ceremony in our town. We had many discussions throughout the day about war and peace and sacrifice. A lot of learning, speaking, and thinking.

Today is Thursday November 12, and we just had to hollow out and carve the giant pumpkin we picked just before Halloween! We did lots of Lego and Fina also made a haunted house area for her pumpkin. We read some books, coloured, and recited some poetry.