Testing Today

Today is the first big tests that Tyler’s taking from the Calvert curriculum. Calvert has testing after 20 lessons (so testing after 20, 40, 60, 80, etc lessons.) We have finished 20 lessons so far.

He just finished his math test. He got 38 out of 40 (or 95% for those who want to know.) The 2 he missed were word problems that he was supposed to write a number sentence for. So if the problem said “Jack had 3 cars and he found 2 more. How many did he have all together?”, Tyler was supposed to write 3 + 2 = 5 cars. Instead he just wrote “5 cars” which is just the answer. So I know that he knows how to add, but he got them wrong for not following directions. I’m a stickler for this because he has a tendency to not follow the directions stated and make up his own. Sometimes that is OK, but he also needs to learn that there are times when he has to follow directions that others have dictated because that’s what happens in real life.

He’s taking his reading test now, so after he finishes that one I will come back and update. He also has a writing test, which is a spelling test, and a science test. So I’m giving him little breaks between the subjects to shift gears.

Reading test did not go so well. He got 13 out of 26 (or 50%.) He just doesn’t get vowel sounds. He never has. I’ve tried numerous approaches to teaching it and he just hasn’t grasp it. He is more of a whole word person. So most of the questions had a word and then he had to match it with another word that had the same vowel sound.

Writing (or spelling) was 11 out of 11 (100%.) He likes spelling and always does really well on them. I know, doesn’t make sense since he can’t sound things out very well, but for some reason he always gets his spelling words right.

Science went well. He got 10 out of 10 (or 100%.) He’s been learning about plant parts and habitats, which is nothing new to him so it is mostly review for him.

Overall I’m happy with how he did. So I say we had a successful testing day. Now we get to have a break and do some playing.

Tuesday

Well, we caught up yesterday. A whole 2 1/2 days worth of school yesterday! It was a struggle, but so worth it since today was review day for the tests tomorrow. It is the first big tests and he seems prepared so we will see how it goes. He’s been reading a lot more lately. However, it is mostly to himself (well, as much to himself as he can get at 6.) It is mostly quietly reading out loud or if he thinks we are listening then he mumbles. He did read to us last night out of his Ranger Rick magazine and then he read the riddles from school again. He total admits that he doesn’t understand them, but he still laughs so much that he finds it hard to read them. The one he liked the best was “Why did the duck cross the road?” “Because the chicken was on vacation.” His second favorite was “Where did the sheep go to get their hair cut?” “To the baa-baa shop.” It has been interesting to see his humor evolve. Things he finds funny today, he wouldn’t have even a few weeks ago.

We are slowly getting ready for the big move. I put some furniture up on the Colorado Support Group site so that I don’t have to move it. And it will be gone on Sun. I’m excited!!! That means some cleaning and rearranging this week, but it will so be worth not having to worry about the furniture at the last minute.

Tyler has been doing pretty good with this move. Maybe it is because he’s excited about Grams & Grandpa Randy and all the fun things he’s going to get to do. He’s signed up for Little League. He is old enough to play baseball now. We’ve also talked about projects he will be able to help with like cleaning out the sandbox. He so wanted to help with Shamu (this really huge fish that my mom has in her pond outside, but brings in during the winter.) Unfortunately, Shamu didn’t make the transition inside very well this winter. So there will have to be a replacement for Shamu. I think Shamu lived about 5 years which is great for a cheap goldfish that lives outside part of the year. He has to survive lots of things including raccoons outside.

Hershey isn’t doing so well with everything. I had thought we were leaving the chewing stage. But since I’ve brought out boxes, he will chew while we are gone. His favorite thing is books. I think he might have a case of separation anxiety, which is understandable because he was a pound pup and we don’t know what happened before us. I’ve tried talking to him, but it doesn’t seem to be working so far. Of course, things like the fire alarms going off yesterday and the day before only increase his anxiety. I’ve made sure he has plenty of toys to chew on and that I spend quality time with him every day, but we’ll just have to see how things go.

Feeling better & the weather

I’m finally feeling better. We didn’t do much on Mon or Tues since it was such hard work for me to hold my head up. So then Wed and yesterday we played catch up. Wed we did 2 days worth of school work. Yesterday we did a day and a half. So we have to do another day and a half today to finish out the week.

We’ve started working on connecting the letters together for handwriting. He has been taking his time and writing very nicely so I thought it was worth it. However, now I have to explain that some of the letters change their shape when you connect them. Hasn’t been as big of a deal as I thought it was going to be, but it has been a little struggle.

We ran our errands last night in prep for the 6th storm in 6 weeks. They are saying 1-3 inches where I live. I’m tired of snow at this point. It was just getting warm enough the last few days that there was a bunch of melting and the ice islands covering the sidewalks could be scraped away. Next week is supposed to be cold so there won’t be much melting.

Sickness & Weather

Well, we’ve been sick here. We got this cold thing that starts out as a sore throat, which you immediately think “the heats been running so much, it’s dry, no wonder I have a sore throat.” Then a couple days later you get hit with this massive sinus headache, plugged ears and you’re sore all over. Then it preceeds to itchy, runny, watery, can’t keep your eyes open, sneezing all the time, tickle in your throat, stuffy nose, and you are still sore all over with a sinus headache. This is where I am. Now Trent got it before me (well Tyler got it first, but he was over it in about 3 days), so next comes the coughing and sore chest from the coughing. This is where he is.

He talked with our neighbors across the hall who were sick before us. He was informed that they went to the doctor (not something that is happening in this house), give antibiotics (which is why we are not going to a doctor), and told it is just a bad cold that lasts about 3 weeks. 3 WEEKS!!! I’ve got things to do. This sitting around all day is getting annoying. Not having the breath capacity to walk the dog verey far is getting annoying (probably for him as well.)

Which leads me to my weather discussion. We have had 5 storms in 5 weeks. This last one dropped about 3-4 inches here where we live. Totals varied throughout the Denver area. Down by Trent’s work it was closer to 8 inches. So last night I watched the news – they are wonderful sometimes because they do this 10 minutes without interruption thing where they give the highlights and a little weather. That’s all I want to see becausee I don’t really care about the whole newscast. Anyways, the weather person was going on and on about how we have a week without another storm and/or snow in the forecast. I was a little excited. Maybe things would melt and we could see the ground again and be able to drive on the roads without sticking to the 6 inch deep ruts because the streets haven’t been plowed and maybe we wouldn’t be slipping on the ice under the snow whenever we went outside. I should have known it was too good to be true. I checked out weather.com this morning (because I trust it more than any local person) and it is predicting snow for us on Sat. Should have known it was too good to be true.

National Western Stock Show

On Tuesday, we went to the National Western Stock Show for a field trip with the support group here. You can view info about it here: Click here If you want to see the pictures that I took, then Click here

Trent took the day off and came with us. We started in the Event Center where they had horse/rider (I never know which) judging going on. I love watching the horses.

Next we went to the petting zoo. We had to wait a little for them to finish cleaning the area and getting the animals their breakfasts. But Tyler enjoyed petting the animals. The baby goats are so soft that you just want to hug them (or take them home with you.)

Then we were off to see “Behind the scenes with a rodeo clown”. I took pictures of it. The clown showed them how he got ready, some of his animals, his barrel and talked with them about staying in school (there were school groups there) and not doing drugs.

Then we went to the Hall of Education where they had a bunch of educational things set up for the kids and where the rabbits and guinea pigs were. Tyler just wanted to breeze through there. He wasn’t impressed by the cow that makes milk since he already knows how it works.

So we broke from the group and walked around on our own. We took in some heifer judging and walked around some of the booths. It is like a fair and convention all in one. And we went over to the colusiem to see what was happening over there. There was a rodeo at 2pm (which you had to buy tickets for and we didn’t have) but we got to see them doing some of the set-up for it.

Back to the other building for some lunch while we watched some more heifers being judged. We were going to see the stock yards until we realized they were all outside and it was cold. So instead we headed back over to the Events Center watch some more of the horses – they are more interesting than the cows.

Trent decided he wanted to see the John Deere display so back we went. After that display we were walking around and got offered free tickets to the rodeo. So we took them and hustled to the rodeo. They were really good seats and Tyler couldn’t sit still for the life of him. He got really interested in the roping. Roping of any kind. We got to see lots of special things like the stage coachs in the pictures or precision riders that rode in the dark (a lot of trust in yourself, your horse and your fellow riders to pull that off.)

We left early since it was 4pm and we had been there since 9am. On the way out, we bought Tyler a rope. So now he’s roping his stuffed animals. We told him no roping the cats or the dog. He had a stool that he put one of his backpacks on – this is his horse with a saddle. Then his stuff animals get tossed around the living room and he has to ride over, rope them and take them to where they are supposed to be. Quality entertainment!!

Tyler is also planning his own rodeos for future dates so I guess I’m going to have to get tickets to those.

Handwriting

If any of you would have told me that Tyler would improve his handwriting abilities and interest because I would be teaching him to write script, I would have laughed at you. Now the joke is on me.

We have been doing script as part of the Calvert curriculum. I view script as a hybrid between printing and cursive. The letters are curvy but they are not hooked together.

Tyler is so excited about this. He has been taking his time, focusing on what he’s doing, etc. He’s a changed handwriting person. Printing was an effort and he never wanted to take him time with the letters, no matter how much I requested “being able to read it” as a good goal to have.

Now with script, he is writing a lot of things and practicing it in non-school time. WOW!!! I’m excited about this development.

However, now his interest in reading books (and his school work) has taken a nose dive. Hmmm, any ideas on how to change that?? Maybe I should start in with a foreign language and then it would make reading interesting again.

Schedule

Some friends have been discussing their schedules (or lack of schedules) that they are using. So I thought I would post our schedule here to share. Now this is Tyler’s schedule because obviously I get up earlier and stay up later so I can get things done. This schedule is also not set in stone. If we have a field trip then things get moved around.

7-8am – wake up, get dressed and eat breakfast (he usually gets this done quickly so then he gets to play some before school)
8am-12pm – school time
8-8:15 – Journal
8:15-8:45 – Math
8:45-9:45 – Reading
9:45-10 – Break
10-10:30 – Writing
10:30-11 – Other subjects
11-11:30 – Other subjects
11:30-12 – Wrap up
12-12:30pm – Lunch
12:30-2pm – Quiet time
2-4pm – Open
4-5:30pm – Homework (if necessary) or more play time
5:30-6:30pm – Dinner
6:30-8:30pm – Wind down before bed
8:30pm – Bedtime

So far this has been working pretty good for us. It gives a good routine to the day. During school time, if he is taking too long on a certain subject then when time runs out, it becomes homework. This then gives him a break from it and he’s ready to do it again when he comes back to it.

Snow, snow & more snow

I haven’t really blogged about the snow we’ve been having yet, so here goes. For those of you who haven’t been following we have had 3 snow storms in 3 weeks with another on the way this coming Thurs & Fri (making it 4 snows in 4 weeks – a month of snow.)

Side note – yes, I heard about the avalanche. No, it’s not that closee to us. But for those that know my past, you may remember I lived in Winter Park right after college. The avalanche was up near Berthoud Pass (on the way to Winter Park from Denver) and I have driven that stretch of road many times. Luckily no one was seriously injured.

Back to our snow here in Denver. I was watching the news Fri night after our 3rd storm had passed and they showed some interesting statistics about the snow that I want to share with you. These are snow totals since the start of the season.

Denver – 47.2 inches
Billings (think Yellowstone) – 20.1 inches
Minneapolis (for all you MN residents) – 4.5 inches
Chicago (for all you IN residents) – 6.5 inches
New York – NONE
Texas – .4 inches (yes, Texas has had more snow than New York)

Now this next storm coming through is scheduled to be one of the biggest yet. It is supposed to start on Thurs and go through Mon with temps in the teens and 20s. Considering it is supposed to get up to 50 on Wed, teens & 20s is going to be COLD. They aren’t saying how much snow we are expected to get out of this next storm yet.

But we still have snow on the ground from all the other storms, the sidewalks are basically slush during the mid-day and ice the rest of the time and there are streets that have yet to be plowed. This is just nuts!!!

Everyone who has grown up here says that “this is the way it used to be when I was growing up.” But the kicker is that March & April are usually the heaviest snow months on record for this area. I can’t imagine them being heavier than this.

Besides, I’m secretly (well, maybe not so secretly) hoping that we will get all this snow now and then we will have none at the end of March when we are loading up and driving cross country.

I’ll let you know how this next storm goes. Personally, I’m getting tired of being so confined, but I don’t want to be out on the roads with all those other drivers. Trying to come up with new things to keep us entertained. I guess it is one thiing to decide to stay home, but then when you are forced to stay home it just makes things difficult.

1st week is done

We survived our first week back to school. There have been some interesting things learned and some interesting insights gained. The first is how much he regressed when he wasn’t doing it on a regular basis – like handwriting (all of a sudden he is writing letter backwards) or in reading (where he’s guessing on the words instead of sounding them out.) The second is how much he picked up in some areas without doing it on a regular basis – like math (we use it all the time in practical stuff I guess) or science (probably because I’ve still had him in classes at the nature center and the zoo.)

It reinforces the idea that we can’t take extended breaks from school. It’s just like riding a bike for him – him may know how to do it but getting back on can be highly shaky.

I am liking the schedule that we have in place. We only spend a certain amount of time on a topic and if it isn’t done then it’s homework later. It gives him a break from the topic at hand and moves him to something else if he’s struggling. That break is usually enough to get him past the struggles because he’s rested that part of his brain and when he goes back he flies through the homework.

I have also been enjoying our quiet time after lunch. We do school, take a little break mid-morning, finish up school, have lunch and then I get an hour as quiet time. He has to do something quietly in his room and I do something quiet in my room AND he is not allowed to talk to me for that hour. I have use it to write, make resolutions, set up plans, and meditate. That little mental health break for me has been nice. It helps give me the energy for dealing with him for the rest of the day.

Next week there should be no interruptions to our daily schedule. It gets interrupted if there are things like field trips. But hopefully that gives a full week in the schedule to really settle in.

Computer Skills

I can’t believe the stuff that Tyler is learning. Yesterday he has his first computer lesson.

Let me back up. The subjects he is learning with Calvert are Art, Computer Skills, Math, Phonics, Picture Study, Poetry, Reading, Science, and Writing. I have added a journal topic to write about to start each day. I’ve also added an additional science. We sometimes include Top Secret Adventures and ideas out of a Creative Teacher book that I have. I’m going to be adding more projects after we get into the swing of things with the curriculum.

Back to the computer lesson from yesterday. These computer lessons are scattered through the lessons and tie into things that are being learned. Anyways, he learned about visual mapping using software. I don’t even know how to do that. I understand the basis of it. You have a main idea and then link like ideas to it. But I have never used any software to do it. I’m sure I could figure it out if I were given it to play with, but I just can’t believe that he’s learning these things at the age of 6.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad he’s learning it, but I was hoping for an older age before he was learning things I didn’t know about. I am going to have to stay on my toes to make sure I can stay ahead of him. He’s just like a sponge.

He was so excited about his school stuff that when he talked to Grams & Grandpa Randy about it yesterday on the phone, he ended up talking to them for over an hour. Now granted that was all about school, but his excitement spilled over into other areas of the conversation.

No computer lessons today, but today is the first day of poetry. He’s practicing his script letters right now. I see script as a hybrid between printing and cursive. Now, for the record, I want it noted that back when I was in 1st or 2nd grade, a friend and I decided that we wanted to write cursive (which wasn’t taught until 3rd grade.) So we wrote one of our papers with all of the letters having tails or being curly. We, of course, got in trouble and got reported to our parents. Now I’m teaching this same concept to my son – letters with tails but just not all connected like with cursive. Yes, I do see the humor in this. I’ve decided that I was just ahead of my time, yet again.