First Day of School

Today was our first day of school for the 2011-2012 school year!

Mondays are very hard for me. I get off work at 6am and have to be back at 6pm. Usually we attend a Co-Op on Monday to get our educational hours in. This works great for me because I can count the hours, they are learning, and it is a social time for us all. It is not starting until Sept. 12, so we needed to do a little something at home today.

 We basically spent a little time going over our subjects for the year and giving Nico his new books to keep in his desk. Luca learned where his toys, crayons, paints, etc are kept. Here is the boys "First Day of School" picture.

 Luca got to ring the bell this morning for the start of our day. It is planned to be a short one, because mom is tired and has less patience on these days.

 Luca's first unit is on farms. Today we read a farm book and he drew the background of a farm setting. As the week goes on he'll cut out and draw pictures to add to his farm scene. We'll be reading lots of books about farms and playing some fun games. Nico will get to help out and participate in the games. He enjoys it because it is a break from his work.

 We took the summer off this year and over the last month spent no time at all even reviewing math. Today's lesson was suppose to be a quick 20 minute math drill over multiplication,,,,it ended up being an hour with us going to the MathUSee website and doing online drills. I love the online drills because it is quick correction. Much nicer than filling out a whole worksheet only to find out later you missed half of them. More math drills tomorrow! Hera, our cat, loves Nico. She loves laying on his paperwork when he has papers out. She is quite a treat to try to do school work with. I look at it as good thereapy.

 Nico took a break from flash cards and helped Luca draw his farm scene. Nico is a great drawer and added an awesome tractor and plow to the scene.

This little treasure box is from our wedding. I knew when I bought it for the wedding it would end up in the school house. I am going to fill it with reward coupons and little dollar prizes such as hot wheels. If they have extra good weeks they will get a prize. The coupons are such things as skip a subject the day of your choosing, a trip to DQ, bowling or a movie (after school hours), a park day, a half day, play a board game for math instead of a worksheet, etc. I am trying to make it fun and encouraging for the boys. They boys have to do their work without complaining and whining each day with a minimum of 3 days out of the month being bad days. We all know we have bad days. This goes for mom too!!!! So, if I feel a bad day coming on for myself, I usually shorten our day before the boys even know it, then I can make it by too.