Wednesday, August 13, 2014

Leaning a lot

We are really enjoying our time learning and doing many things together this summer. The schedule went well last week. We made little animals for our nature table (a dog, a bunny, a mouse and later a bird to take care of the eggs in the nest), we also made beeswax eggs.  We had our first tea party with home made chocolate muffins which Mateo helped make, you can see him wearing his chef outfit! On Friday we went to the pool and on Saturday we went to our land where he also practiced swimming in a nice puddle left on our new construction site. What a great way to have fun and dirty!



Nature table with some things made on our crafts days


Tea Party. Samuel was the guest 


Helping in the kitchen 


Swimming in clean water



Swimming in a mud puddle

I have not mentioned it before but after Mateo turned 5 years old, he began to read in Spanish. He now goes around reading all he can in books and street signs. Today, I notice that he also can read few words in English! I really don't push him to read because I want to wait until he is 6.5 or 7 to start formal schooling with language arts and math; however, we never tell him not to do something that is unfolding naturally. It is amazing how much he is learning outside school! 



Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Trying out our schedule!

We have come up with a schedule for our homeschooling activities which will formally begin in September, however, during the month of August we will be trying out the schedule and making some changes as needed.

On Monday we will do watercolor painting in the morning and gardening in the afternoon. 
On Tuesday we will go for a hike and come home to rest in the afternoon and watch something. 
On Wednesday we will draw with crayons, or work with beeswax or do crafts, in the afternoon free play in the sand box. 
On Thursday we will bake bread, cake or muffins, soup or anything else we would like to try.  And in the afternoon we will have a tea party.
On Fridays we will join the homeschooling group doing different activities including going swimming once a month. 
On Saturdays we will clean the house and on Sundays we will try to visit a new place or park.
We also plan to go to our land once a month for 4-5 days. We will see how this goes...

Basically kindergarten in the Waldorf schools resemble a home life, the academics are not yet introduced this year, so we will try to follow this simple schedule. Of course Mateo spends a lot of time playing with his cousins, Samu and "the bebe", who live next door. Pat and I will also continue to read and tell stories and I will be singing new songs as often as possible!