School Days, School Days, Dear Old Golden Rule Days

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That song has been running through my head since last week when I enrolled the two littlest for homeschool. This is our last full week of summer. Next Wednesday Joshua starts back to high school, and the following Monday, Noah, Peach, and I start our first week at home. Geoffrey brings up the rear when Ohio States starts at the end of September.

I'm having a little bit of hard time reconciling myself with starting already. I don't feel 100 percent yet (having a hard time sitting). And, since Noah dragged his feet in math (he likes to do a pretest before each math test, which added 28 days to our year in math) we just wrapped math up last week (at least he will be less likely to have forgotten it). But, today the UPS man brought our books and I'm beginning to get in the mood.

We haven't decided where we are schooling this year. We have a school room in the basement,



but, last year we schooled all year at the kitchen table. I have a hard time being in the basement all day. I miss the sunlight and I miss seeing what's going on outside. Even on dreary fall and winter days, I like to be able to see the trees and sky. If we are going to school in the kitchen this year, I need to get a bookshelf for the kitchen. I have one small space by the kitchen table that is big enough -- last year it's where we put our plastic bins. I hated living out of those bins, though -- it was kind of like living out of a suitcase. So, if we are schooling in the kitchen I need to go to the Amish furniture store and get a sturdy shelf. But, we have the entire basement to spread out in, and I hate to waste anything. And being in the basement means being close to the laundry room. The laundry is much easier to do when I don't have to "leave school" to switch loads.

Such decisions. Any opinions here?

What's left to do before we start:
1. Clean the basement -- the kids moved some gaming stuff down there over the summer and everything needs a good scrubbing.
2. Have the workbooks spiral bound. If you don't do this and have a few extra bucks, it's really worth it. I take mine to Office Max where they cut the glue binding off and then punch them and bind them with a durable plastic spiral binding. It makes the books much easier to work in when they open flat. I think I paid less than $2 a book last year to have it done, and if you have books that are the same size you can save on the cutting fee by have them all cut at the same time. Plus, if you have an Office Max educator's card, the money spent goes toward your rewards. Some people shy away from spiral binding the books because the covers are more fragile. There are only a few books (usually English and vocabulary) that I have trouble with each year. If the cover falls off halfway through the year, I take it back to Office Max, they laminate and rebind it for about a buck.
3. Cover the new paper back reusable books. I just placed my order for these. They keep the paperbacks clean and the covers undamaged, so they can be used over and over -- a real plus if you have more than one child using the books. They are a little pricey, but because there are quite a few covers in each package, you can split an order with another homeschooler. I don't use them for consumables.
4. Make my lesson plans (copy from Seton's lesson plans those activities that we'll do).
5. Write study guides for history and science, and type up vocabulary words and definitions.
6. Buy some school supplies: five subject notebooks for Joshua; a notebook for Latin II for Joshua; a durable lunchbox for Joshua (just did that while I was looking -- cross that one off); some graph paper notebooks for math; some paper; more blue and red pens and pencils.

Adding (just for me to remember):
7. Send letter of intent to school district. I'm a little late on this one -- must be done ASAP.


And those are just the things that I can think of at this moment. I guess I have enough to keep me busy for two weeks.