Light bulb Moments

Oh my goodness! I knew it had been a while since my last post- but 2 months? That's bad! Most of it has been pretty frustrating, but I'm hoping (praying) for better days ahead. Mainly because of some 'light bulb moments' that I've had recently.

The biggest 2 have come within the past week. First, I've been flying by the seat of my pants for the past several months. This makes our day haphazard since I don't know from one minute to the next what we're going to be doing. I was constantly stopping to try and figure out what we were going to be doing next and then get it ready- mean while the kids just had enough time to get into a whole bunch of trouble. No wondering school sucked! I've been pretty frustrated about it as well and would often just 'let the kids play' because it was easier than trying to corral them back to start the next activity.

So, for the past couple of days I've been going back to actually preparing for the next day- what we're going to do and how to get it done. I've still got to work out logistics of getting 3 kids taught different things, but I'm feeling like there is purpose/direction now- which is making me feel organized and in control. Always a good thing when you're a teacher! ;-)

On the heels of that, tonight, I realized that I don't have to teach every single subject to each child every day- and failure to do that does not equal weakness/failure on my part as their teacher. Wow, if that isn't liberating! I was preparing their 'to do lists' for tomorrow and realized that my oldest had had double the work of the other 2 kids combined today! Not exactly fair!

I think that Math/LA are 2 subjects that need daily work- simply because there is so much to learn that it requires a short amount every day for it to really sink in. However, Socials & Science can probably be covered with 1-2 lessons each per week (i.e. alternating them instead of trying to get both done every day as well as everything else).

We've also gone back to group reading sessions. This way we are all able to spend time together and can discuss the material being read- not only to help deepen their understanding of the material but to have quality together time which keeps the younger preschooler & toddler in check so that there are fewer disruptions.

Another thing is going to bed earlier so I can get us all up earlier to begin working on better work habits- i.e. getting chores done before school starts, doing our work diligently/quickly and then the rest of the day is free.

So on that note, I need to get going.

Hopefully it won't be another 2 months before I post again!