Our Daily Life

I homeschool my two daughters, ages four and eight. At first, it was a challenge to keep both kids happy at the same time. Here's how a typical day goes, now that we've got the hang of it. 
In the morning, I get out my 3rd grader's school books and materials for the day. I make her a list of everything I want her to do, including tasks that require my presence. Also, I usually set up one or two little activities for my preschooler to do independently in the same room, but away from my 3rd grader. Both kids get to work while I assist or do house chores or other things. When my preschooler gets bored with her activities I let her just have free play time; no TV, but anything else goes. 

Ideally, my 3rd grader has finished all school work by lunch time. After lunch is an hour of quiet time where the girls lay in their bed and may read or take a nap. This is my time to do whatever I need to do; nap, clean, play Candy Crush, etc.
After quiet time, I sit down on the floor with my preschooler and spend some time with her singing, teaching, reading, and playing games. This usually lasts about 20-30 minutes. My older girl is free to join in or do her own thing as long as it's not TV or electronics. This is a fun time of day for her. She can research things that interest her, do art projects, read, and tinker. After our floor time I usually give my preschooler a couple of pages to work on for school and that's it! We try to take a walk every day. That is a great learning time. We go to the library once per week and always come home with 40-50 books. That is what we do in our free time during the days; read, read, read!

Good Shows for 8 Year Olds

There are a few shows on Netflix and other places that my 8 year old has really enjoyed. Ones that I think inspired her in a good way, where as other shows that are targeted at her age group have been down right disturbing.

     

This one took us out of our living room and into the wild! We realized how comfortable our daily lives are, and how much humans can endure. These shows inspired her to get out her flashlights and compasses and look at nature as a sustaining resource for human life. I did have to watch with her and cover her eyes for some parts which showed some bloody animals that were hunted.

19 Kids and Counting is entertaining and gives us some perspective from another family that home schools and holds some of the same values we do. I like that she sees all of the kids pitching in and helping each other with daily life.

The Cosby Show is a household standard. Sometimes her jaw drops when she sees how Cliff parents his children and I just smile and say to myself, "Thank you, Bill.". Also provides a lot of laughs. This is not on Netfix, but we watch it on YouTube.

Another home school family that inspires us to get into the kitchen and cook up something yummy (hopefully with a little less cheese and butter :)). My girl loves to cook and watch others do it too! This one we watch on Amazon.

Do you have any favorites?

Preschool Activities

Here are some fun learning activities I've done with my preschooler.

Making letters with salt.

Sorting crayons into color groups.

 Singing Old MacDonald.

And Counting with flashcards.

Measuring

Earlier this month my third grader was working on measurements in Math.  We decided to make pumpkin muffins!

Today for third grade language we worked on spelling words, writing a journal entry, and using context to find the meaning of words. For math we are studying polygons, quadrilaterals, rectangles, squares, and parallelograms. Whew!
I sat with my preschooler and read "The Three Little Pigs" and talked about that for a bit. Then we learned "Hey Diddle Diddle" and what rhyming is all about. We finished up by setting up a writing station at the table with lined and plain paper, crayons, pencil, and markers. She was free to write whatever she liked. She drew a picture of both of her grandmas and a bunch of hearts for her mama!