Choreganizer

I saw this chore system on a blog I read and it got such good reviews by the mom that I thought I would try it. I googled it and with shipping it cost less than $20.00, so I thought if it doesn't work, it wasn't something I'd feel too tied to. I must say, I am not disappointed. We have only been using it a little over a week, but it is just what I was looking for, for this stage of life. It's simple (for me and the boys), motivating, colorful, and fun!

The choreganizer comes as a book with everything you need inside of it, waiting to be punched out. It comes with 6 chore displays. Obviously we only need two right now, but for those of you who aren't planning to have 6 kids, the book said that you may want to consider putting 2 per child in the house. For example, you may want to put the "make your bed", "get dressed" chores in their room, and household chores in a more central location. Here are the boys charts from the other day. I added brads (the gold part) to mine and hole punched the cards to make them a little easier to take them on and off. The way that it works is that you choose up to 5 chore cards for your child and hang them up so that the child can check their chores in the morning. What I love is that the cards have pictures so that even little ones can understand them. There is writing on the back to describe them in more detail. As your child completes their chore they put it in the pocket at the bottom of the chart. At then end of the day we look at their chore chart and see if all of their chores were completed. Some chores aren't taken down until the end of the day. For instance, on this day, Knox was "mommy's helper" for the day and Drew was "the baby helper" for the day. Even though the boys have that specific chore, they understand that they may still be asked to be involved in their brothers chore. When we see that their chores are complete for the day they earn a "mommy or daddy" dollar. Sometimes I hang the cards back up, and sometimes they help me. What they are working towards is an opportunity to shop at the Chore Store. We have chosen that night to be Sunday's so that we know daddy is here and we can make it family time.

Knox's Chart

Mommy's helper

Self grooming

Make bed

Clean Room

Help put away laundry

Drew's Chart

Baby helper

Clean Room

Make bed

Self grooming

Complete school assignments

Here is a picture of the money.

Here is a picture of other chore cards to choose from. They also include blank cards so that you can create your own unique chores.

I thought about doing a treasure box, but then decided to set up the included sign and spread all of the choices on the table. I want to have a variety of fun things to choose from, but I didn't put out everything I have. I want to make sure I have something different to add each time. Even if it's just one thing. I used clip art on the computer to make coupons for certain items. Like for $3.00 they could get a coupon to go out for ice cream. They have to keep the coupon and turn it in when they want to redeem it.

Here are the boys with their money. They were so excited that each morning before I even got up they had made their beds, brushed their teeth (which I ended without us around, what a mess!) gotten dressed for the day, and picked up toys. They have been really good about checking their charts.

Here is Knox after buying bubbles. They each chose to save some money for next time. They are saving up to see the Lion King which comes out in a few weeks.

So far, so good!

2011-2012 Curriculum

We have finished 2 weeks of school and things have been going really well. I love having a routine and knowing each day what we will be doing. I'm sure over time there will be changes to how we "school" at home, but here is how we have started off our year.

We do school Monday through Thursday, so that we can leave Fridays open for field trips, fun with friends, errands, or just a lazy pajama day. The boys wake up in the mornings and begin to complete their chore chart (which I'll blog about later), and then have time to play, relax and eat breakfast before we begin school. School starts when Davis lays down for his morning nap. :) I'm not sure what we'll do when he gives up that nap, but as of now it's a great time to do our work.

Choosing what curriculum to use took some time for me. I attended the statewide homeschool convention this year and last. I spent lots of time on the computer looking at curriculum web sites and reading other homeshooling blogs. I would also ask other homeschool moms what they were using for curriculum. Homeschooling has such a variety of options on how you want to teach your children. That's part of what I love so much, but it can also feel overwhelming. I went to the convention this year with a game plan, thinking I knew what I was going to order, and while I was there got so confused tha I almost completely changed my mind. In the end I realized that I had to go with what I had a peace about, and it was what I had originally chosen. Whether we always stick with the same curriculum, I don't know, but that's another great thing, we don't have to. We can see what is working for us. Since this is my first year, I wanted a very "teacher" friendly curriculum. One where most of the planning is done for you. I did not want to spend every night spending hours planning out tomorrow's lessons. What I do like about our curriculum is that it is easy to add on to if you want to go more in depth on any subject.

The main curriculum we chose is called Sonlight. It comes with a 4 or 5 day schedule for the week, and it very easy to follow. It also provides space in the teacher's guide to fill in other subject you want to add on. I purchased Sonlight K Core. Core basically consists of history and read alouds. Anyone who knows me, knows that I LOVE to read. That was another huge reason I chose Sonlight. I wanted a curriculum that I would enjoy along with the boys. The first book we read was The Boxcar Children. We finished it a week early, because every time I got to the end of the chapter the boys would say "can you please read more?" I usually did, because I was enjoying it as much as them.

Here is a picture of what Sonlight calls "box day". It's the day when your curriculum arrives and you have fun getting to open it and spread it out, and look through it all. This was earlier in the summer.

Here is a complete list of our curriculum:

Sonlight K Core (history)

Sonlight language arts

Explode the Code 1, 2, and 3 (LA)

Handwriting Without Tears

Singapore Math

I'm looking forward to starting week 3 tomorrow!

ABC's and 123's

Today was our first day of school. It's funny that I had no idea when the first day of school would be since we're homeschooling and it's up to me to decide the date, so last week I decided that today was the day. I wanted it to be special for the boys and have a few fun things planned. I found this web-site that had these free sign printables, and I thought they would be the perfect thing to hold up for their first day of school picture. If anyone wants the web-site message me and I'll send you the link. I printed them out, glued them to card stock, cut them out, and taped them to a pencil. There are a lot of pictures of them because I really like them! :)

Here's Knox's 1st Day of school picture

Here is Drew's 1st day of school picture

Here's a picture closer up of the signs. They are clipped on to a hanging wire I bought from Pottery Barn to display their artwork and map (that we use with our curriculum).

Drew in front of our white board that still needs to be installed.

Knox


Brothers (and signs again!)

They're standing in front of a half wall I painted with magnetic paint and chalkboard paint. The magnetic paint only holds very light magnets, but so far the chalkboard has been a big hit with the boys and not as messy as I thought it would be.


I got them a few school presents to open this morning.


Waiting patiently. Drew said it felt like Christmas.





Knox just opened a new push down eraser and was super excited!

They each received a new Gator shirt since football season is right around the corner. It seemed like a perfect "school is starting" gift.

The boys are always playing Gators vs. Seminoles and fighting over who has to be the Seminole. Usually they both end up being Gators. :)

Here are their gifts. erasers (which is by far the favorite), new crayons, math bingo (outof the $1 bin at Target), and their shirts.

Andy and I each wrote a note to the boys on the back of their signs and Andy read them to Knox and Drew before leaving for work.

Drew and the principal :)

Knox and the principal :)

Knox and his teacher

Drew and his teacher

Davis and his... mommy :) Andy said he needed to have the abacus, so we knew this was his school picture.

Drew waiting to get started while I was putting Davis down for a nap.

After we started Knox decided that it was all too exhausting and he needed a break.

Then he needed a snack. :)

Hard at work. You can see the masking tape in the background. That is where we are having a built-in put in to organize our room. I put masking tape on the walls because right before our carpenter was about to begin, I thought the desks we had planned were too small so I redid the plan. This time I wanted to see it visually so I taped off the entire wall. It should be ready for installation in a few weeks. I can't wait! I was hoping our room would be finished before starting school, but it's still a work in progress.

Knox was working hard, too. I picked up these great preschool books for him at the convention. They are by Rod and Staff.

After we finished the boys needed some goofing off time.

Even Davis made a face when he woke up from his nap.

Happy boy....

I told the boys that they could pick a special celebration dinner for tonight. On the Menu:

macaroni and cheese

hot dogs

celery

carrots

brownies with marshmellows, chocolate chips and pecans

We had a wonderful first day, and I am so excited to see what this year will hold for us.

Sweet Home Ocala

Last month one of my best friends from high school, Heather, was coming to Ocala to visit her family. She and her husband, Phil, brought their 3 little boys all the way from Colorado (very brave), so I figured the least I could do was drive the 3 hours from Tallahassee to go and visit. I am so glad that I did. We had a wonderful time! This was my first time driving any sort of distance with the boys alone, and it really wasn't bad. On the way to Ocala we only had to make one stop, and on the way home I left at night, and Knox and Davis slept, while Drew watched a movie. I know it sounds silly, but anytime I do something like this I feel like I'm all grown up!

The first day that Heather and I met up we went to a park and let the boys play. I had so much fun catching up with Heather. Her sister, and my sister-in-law also met us there. It was a nice park, and there was a football field next to it. The field was being watered and I let my boys run through the sprinklers, which is totally out of my character to do. I'm usually thinking about how I don't have a towel, or change of clothes with me, but Andy has been encouraging me to let our boys be boys, so I guess that's what I was doing? The boys loved it (as well as Heather's middle son). Then I felt bad that I didn't have a towel or change of clothes for him. :) We met at another park the next day and had a great time again! I'm so glad that we all got to see each other!

Here we are with our babies! This is Heather's husband and oldest son talking with Drew.

Drew's listening to what they are saying. :)

Here are the middle boys. (I know some people are really offended at the term "middle" child, but I can't think of a better way to say it.)

Heather and I got to go out one night just the two of us. We had such a great time talking, that we lost track of time and before we knew it, it was really late. I think we could have kept going if we both weren't so tired. It's so nice when you have those friends in life where you can pick up where you left off.

While we were in Ocala we also got to meet my new nephew, Camdyn for the first time. He is soooo cute! This is a picture of Kate, my sister-in-law, and our babies! Davis and Camdyn are only 4 months apart, so I'm sure they'll be great buddies.

We also wanted to visit Mimi at the school where she works. She works in the discipline department and she introduced us to as many of her co-workers as she could find! She loves her boys! Her principal was an assistant principal at my high school. We saw him on our last visit, but he was out of his office on this visit. I think it's always neat to see people years later. As a former teacher I love getting to see my old students and hear about what's going on in their lives.

Here's Mimi and Papa with their 4 grandsons.

Cousins!

Davis and Camdyn meeting for the first time!

While we were in Ocala Mimi swam with the boys every afternoon, and Papa had them help him in his garden. The boys loved every second of their time there, and of course the first question when we left was, "when can we go back?"