Why we'd been looking into homeschool before COVID-19

Our eldest, EG - age 8, is behind in reading. Sure, she's on an ISP with the district school despite attending a parochial school. Yes, she gets extra help and sees the reading resource teacher 4 days a week (also known as every day the teacher is on site). The school is doing pretty much about all they can. While we appreciate it, EG is still behind and, given how both she and her teacher describe her behavior in class, falling further behind.

So, with this sudden homeschool requirement (and please note that as of this writing we've been out of school for 1.5 weeks and had exactly 1 e-learning day), I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to find out what EG's true reading level is and help her advance.

​With that in mind, let me tell you about the online and offline things we are doing for homeschool.

Reading:

First, I assessed EG's reading level using ReadingEggs.com. They have a 30 day trial going on -- we actually started ours before schools closed in our state. The assessment came back with a reading level of 6 years old -- kindergarten.

EG is 8 and in second grade. She describes herself as not understanding the written directions and waiting for the kids around her to help her figure out what to do (because the teacher is often busy too).

Since I know EG also has a tendency to blow-off tests, her reading level might be higher. Either way, I decided to go with the lower level. My objective: get EG feeling confident in reading.

I think both her reading and her confidence in reading have already improved. It might not be by a grade level -- I'm sure she's still behind -- but she has improved.

Math:

EG is actually at grade level in math and a bit bored. The school is using Eureka Math for teaching. EG is one of those who has a certain amount of addition and subtraction memorized. She also has little interest in learning yet another way to do something she already knows how to do just because. Math is actually fairly easy for her to pick up on and I'm not pushing it too much.

What EG's math looks like now:

• 1 Eureka Sprint sheet (I kept all of them -- she routinely only does like 8 problems out of the 44, so there's a good bit for her to complete)
• OR
• a page out of Saxon Math 2 workbook
• I will also substitute a worksheet from Math Salamanders for fun

​Later this week she will start using Khan Academy for math (I'm figuring out where to start her so she doesn't get bored)

All those other subjects...

I'll be honest, my mental energy isn't high enough to do a whole lot more. I've never been a professional teacher. The reading and math take up the better part of 2 hours for us. So, for now, other subjects are getting shoved aside. That said...

We are watching Home Safari at the Cincinnati Zoo daily as our science lesson. We also watched the live births of a hippo and a giraffe.

For Physical Education and to get our wiggles out, we've been watching GoNoodles, Cosmic Kids Yoga -- which the kids ask for the most, and Coach Wood.

For the Pre-schooler:

​For math we practice counting to twenty in English and Spanish. I'd like to add shape and color identification into the mix in the coming days. It's all about getting things set out beforehand!

That's it for us -- for now!

Please drop me a comment or email and let me know about how you've structured your sudden homeschool days. Thanks. Enjoy this time as best you can. It's weird and great and hard and fun all at once.

Everyone realizes that there is only one week left in September. Right?
Tamara hangs her head and moans, "Where did the days go?!?!?"

I was under the weather the entire week and still have a cough to show for it. My first antibiotics attempt was a train wreck. I think if a medicine lists insomnia as a side effect, I should just opt for a different one. Four nights without sleep.... Doing much better on the new meds....

Given I was sick (I mean sick to the point that my husband had to get the kids), what did me do....not a whole heck of a lot.... Here's the very short list:

• Sea foam play time
• Science in the garden -- this is really find the caterpillars on our milkweed plants
• Finished edits for The Tea Party which goes live this coming Wednesday
• Clicked the button to release the print version of The Tea Party (because Amazon says it needs up to 72 hours...)
• Kids had more play dates than typical for a school week
• Girls went to a friend's birthday party and had a great time (Tamara slept)
• Still managed a meal every night because everyone needs to eat, even a sick Mommy

Sure, it looks like a long list, but trust me when I say that I did mostly laundry and dinner without much else. Some weeks, that's the best you can do.

That's it for this weekly round-up. Catch y'all next week. Cross your fingers, pray, or send healthy vibes my way. Thank you.

This is coming out a little late due to illness -- one freakishly weird pounding headache. Probably the summer flu. Icky. Either way, I'm keeping it brief because we did fewer things last week!

Things we did this past week:

• 2 failed science experiments
• Made banana bread with TM
• An ornament for Halloween
• Finished the formatting and set The Tea Party up on all retail sites
• Completed first drafts for books 3 and 4 in the Emma & Ava series
• Released Little Witch Girl in paperback

That's the best of this last week. See you next week, hopefully healthy and with more to share.