Thursday, March 26, 2009

One more reason I love homeschooling

I love Thursdays. It's the day where we don't have to be anywhere and can go with the flow at home. Today was a perfect example of that. After breakfast, we played a few math games, read, learned about the history of Shodo (Japanese calligraphy) and tried it out using a Shodo set while listening to Yo Yo Ma play Japanese Melodies over the kitchen speakers. My son said it was one of his favorite homeschooling experiences to date. Fantastic! Always love to hear that.




My youngest usually joins in on what we are doing in his own way or plays near us. Today I cozied up with him and read while my eldest son explored online at National Geographic for kids. All was flowing beautifully in our household...but as they say, this too shall pass...

My eldest son went up to his room to put something away and discovered that earlier his younger brother had completely dumped out his large US quarters collection map board. Not only had they been dumped, but many were missing. My 3 year old fessed up and promptly returned with his blue IKEA piggy bank & a butter knife in hand.

Then my two sons went to task at putting the map back together. They discovered they were only three states away from a complete map, so I brought out the loose change jug for them to dig through.

In the meantime, my eldest son found coins from France, Jamaica and Canada, which prompted us to look on our world map to see just where these places are. He taught his little brother the names of the different coins and together they discovered one more State quarter, Arizona...now they only need Oklahoma and New Mexico.



This is one of the many reasons I love learning at home...mishaps can turn into meaning and there is the time to slow down, work together and enjoy the moment.

3 comments:

  1. That is so cool. My daughter like to use my Chinese calligraphy stuff. Maybe I will have it out tomorrow. I also just heard some homeschool ladies talk about the coins and that they have all them and seeing you doing it too, I think I will try that too. What a wonderful homeschool day.:)

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is just awesome! I'm laughing about the piggy bank, at least he was saving them..... The last photo of the boys together teaching and learining is absolutely priceless! I love the Japanese calligraphy!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks for sharing such a sweet story. I really enjoyed reading about the piggy bank, coins and the map. Learning can be such fun! :)

    ReplyDelete