Yay, it's Friday! We like Fridays around here, not only because we can wrap up our school week, but because it also means something fun for SweetPea. Today it's art class where they'll be doing a monochromatic watercolor of a sailboat on the water (blacks and grays). Monica teaches out of her home and I'm quite impressed with the results of her instruction to this group of teens--and my dad's an artist by profession so I tend to have higher-than-normal expectations! Her students are having a chance to show their work this month at a local library, so I'll try to get some pics.
And it's Family Night, so that means fun food--maybe tacos--and a movie or games. Tomorrow is more fun; we're headed to an international snow sculpture festival at a ski town, something I've wanted to do for years. These things are huge and amazing! I'll post some pictures of that, too.
A couple of mini-breakthroughs this week brought some nice help to our school. One was figuring out some specific help for SweetPea with her Algebra program, Teaching Textbooks. Thankfully, the program provides a complete work-through of every single problem, so with some careful review and some help from dad, I think she's on higher ground.
Another improvement for me was to decide that I should create my own weekly instructor guide. We use Sonlight, which provides a wonderful schedule and which has always worked for us. But I've ended up using so much White-Out to customize it this year, I finally broke down and made my own look-alike template and put everything and only what we needed on it. I can color-code tests or out-and-about events, etc. It's wonderful! And of all the silly things...not having those boxes I didn't plan to check off (optional stuff Sonlight puts in), my guilt level has plummeted. :-) All you box-checkers out there will know what I mean. Why didn't I do this before??? I actually think there's been this suggestion posed to the Sonlight people, the option of an online/customizable template, but I don't know where they're at with it. In any case, what a time-saver.
Time for breakfast and off to art!
It's so good to hear you are having a good week. I had a bad case of "box checking" when I started Sonlight. I, too, made my own similar schedule. And, I thank you once again for your insight into high school. I am finding there are so many resources and I really am not all alone in this! I need to see if Sonlight has anything about transcripts. I saw they had a book on high school for safe. I may get that.
ReplyDeleteI can't wait to see pictures of your dd's painting. I miss drawing...I need to get back to that someday soon. Ohhh and I can't wait to see the ice sculpture too. *grin*
ReplyDeleteHappy your dd is figuring out Algebra. Pray that continues to go well.
And there is nothing better than finding a way to make life easier. Glad you found it finally for your scheduling. *grin*
Blessings and ((HUGS))
In Him<><
-Mary
PS: It was a treat to finally get to see you. Hello my SSiC.
So good to hear that your week has gone well. It's always nice having a schedule that works, isn't it? And I completely understand about the check boxes. :)
ReplyDeleteJoAnn