Since we homeschool almost year-round, we don’t have a true “last day of school.” In May, we wrapped up our 36 weeks of curriculum and our year-end assessment testing. The boys might not have a technical last of school, but they did have a true “last day” for their grade levels. 4th and 6th grade are officially finished! It’s a good feeling!
We enjoyed a short break over Memorial Day weekend and then started summer school this week. For summer school, we jumped into our 5th and 7th grade curriculum. Yay for new books! Summer school is a fun change of pace. We do “batch” subjects instead of all the subjects in one school day. The flow looks two weeks of science and then we switch to two weeks of history. After that, it’s two weeks of language arts. We end summer with two weeks of math. This allows us to get ahead and gives us flexibility for breaks during the regular school year. We take August off, so we do get a “summer break” and that allows us to have a “first day of school” when we go back to our regular schedule in September. It’s all semantics, but I try to make sure we have similar milestones to their peers in public school. Plus, I love the photo opportunities!
We selected Cooking 1 as an elective for the coming school year. I thought we’d start it in the fall. Owen got ahold of the book when it arrived and has spent hours pouring over it. He begged me to start over the summer and I agreed. We started our next family adventure together this last weekend: cooking!!! I haven’t passed on many cooking skills to the boys, because I have very few myself. I’m hoping to learn alongside my boys during this class. Jeremy is our family chef and by doing the class on the weekends, he is able to assist us and offer his expertise. Week one went really well! The boys made scrambled eggs and French toast for the first time. The end results were edible (not just edible, but also tasty)! Praise the Lord! The bonus of this class is the boys have promised to try everything they create. With picky eaters, this is a huge win for us. We’re hoping to broaden their flavor palates as well as their cooking skills through this course.
Being in summer mode means more time to hang with friends and enjoy the great outdoors. Jeremy and the boys got the backyard pool up and ready to go this weekend. It’s too cold to swim yet, but it will be ready when the time comes. We’ve enjoyed having friends over to run amok in our backyard. We’re in the middle of our spring soccer season. We have another state park hike on the calendar with friends as well as outdoorsy travel plans booked throughout the summer. I love the transition to our summer schedule. These are some of my favorite months! A little bit of school and a lot of adventure is a good combination!
Amy Scott's Thoughts 