Thurs. March 19

I just realized that I have been home-schooling Connor for exactly two months. Wow! Time does fly. It is almost time to write my quarterly report to the Superintendent. Yes, home-schoolers have to submit reports four times a year. I know that it is to make certain that parents are really teaching their children, but it does seem rather "big-brother" like to me. Luckily, I enjoy blogging each day about our objectives and lessons, and I can use these ramblings as a basis for my report. Mass this morning was at 8am in Mt. Morris. We have been rotating churches almost daily, and it has added to our Lenten experience. We learned recently from Father Ed that in Rome it was the custom during Lent to attend a different church each day of Lent. We didn't realize we were on to something. The Mass today was about the Feast of St. Joseph. The reading was the story of when Jesus (at age 12) got lost during a Pilgrimage and how his parents searched for him for three days. When they found him, Jesus was sitting in the temple asking questions and participating in the adults' dialogue. It reminded me of Connor. He is fascinated with religion and takes every opportunity to question the traditions and practices of all faiths, including ours. I know church is not part of our school curriculum, but it has expanded our learning exponentially. After church Connor finished his Math Journal number one. He will begin the second Math journal next week. Writing a summary of The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle came next. Connor already wrote an essay for me about the story, but now he has to write a summary of a novel for his writing teacher at Impact. At first I thought it was redundant, but it gave me an opportunity to teach him the difference between writing a thesis driven essay compared to writing a summary. Summaries simply retell the story, whereas the essay he wrote for me makes an argument. Guitar practice and Chinese were next, and then unit 6 in the vocabulary book. At 3p, we were off to horseback riding lessons. At 4:30p Connor went outside to play. He was begging to go out all day, and I kept him inside to finish his work. As the weather gets nicer, I may have to do more school work in the evening and give Connor a recess outside during the day. It's good exercise and he does learn a lot through play too. I am just so focused on my own agenda sometimes that I forget to let him guide the learning too. I need to work on that. I don't want him to hate being home-schooled, but I want him to value his education no matter where it takes place.