Homeschool Update

Today, I started our school day by hugging Motor Mouth like a baby. I held him and rocked him and kissed him. Then I asked if his teacher in Tulsa ever held him like that. He laughed and said 'No!'  A little more rocking, holding, kissing and I asked if his teacher in Chicago (1 day/wk) ever held him like that. He got a great big laugh out of that, too!

Motor Mouth is doing great in school. He is just so smart. I plan to have him complete kindergarten math, language arts and phonics by April. At that point, he will start working on grade 1 work. To ensure this happens, I created a spreadsheet to determine what percentage of coursework needs to be completed each month to achieve the goals.

That said, Motor Mouth has been frustrating me with school. He feels like he should know everything before he even learns it! And, I don't think he likes the fact his 'mother' is teaching him new things.

Also, he doesn't want to sit for the time it takes to do his work. He is good for 10 minutes or so and then he wants to be done and to go play. My son can do 2-3 math lessons OR 3-4 language arts lessons in 1 hour. When the suggested time for EACH lesson is 45 - 60 minutes, you can see he zips through this stuff. 

I'm really working on being patient with him on this.  It is important to get him ready for a traditional school next year. I am always saying, "Sit up!", "Sit down like a normal human being!" "Stop. Sit up and focus." "Focus." "Get zen." 

I am grateful to Motor Mouth's karate instructor for telling the kids to get 'zen'. I wasn't so sure about that term at first, so I looked it up. 

 

ZEN

meditation and mindfulness

Meditation

turning attention to a single point of reference

Mindfulness

concentrated awareness of one's thoughts, actions or motivations. 

Perfect. And, he has great respect for his sensei, which is bonus. Now, when I need to pull out the big guns, I tell Motor Mouth to 'get zen'.  

It works!!