A lot of good things this year...

Homeschooling is always a challenge, but as I look to this year I can see that we have the opportunity to do a lot of cool things. It's just me and my high schooler, which equates to me being a tugboat managing a huge ship in the harbor helping him dock and go to sea again. I kinda love it, but then it's a but of a love/hate deal at times; sometimes the rough seas are not very cooperative... I am so glad to have my confidence in the Lord. He is the true overseer of it all, even teaching me things through it.

Math is a biggie this year and for the first time, my son is doing math with a real math instructor. This is very cool for him and me. We have done some textbooks, a few computer programs, and even a video math class over the years, but this is different. It's a textbook with an instructor on-line who delegates assignments and introduces lessons. Also it's a "class" made up of students in different time zones. It's been only two classes, but already I like the dimension it adds to our homeschooling day and life.

Writing is in the scope of things as well. This year my son will be writing his own book. This is being done as a video course. I am thinking that maybe I will get in on it too and have some fun learning and writing myself.

We are still reading through the Bible. This is really good. I love it and am glad to be back into the swing of doing it regularly. We never planned to stop, but it really takes up such a big chunk of time to sit and read aloud and so it fell by the wayside. Seems summer just draws you away from books if you let it, and we did, so we stopped reading daily for a while. Also he wants to go more to youth group, and of course, church is a very much a part of our community life. It is a great learning time too as our pastor teaches a lot about history (and life in general) not to mention God's word, so I pretty much think it's a huge part of the learning that goes on in our lives, for both of us.

Spelling would be good. I always say we will do spelling but it seems so tedious. I have always heard that readers become good spellers, so I hope he does a lot of reading.... and that some spelling will come in so he can improve in this area. I just have to make it happen... (tug tug tug)

Another of our great learning adventures this year will be a a sort of philosophy class tied into the film industry. We will be looking at movies comparatively and reading the book, The Universe Next Door, a worldview catalog. We are doing this as a discussion group, "a class." I am very excited about this venture too.

Then of course there is our favorite sport of all... fencing, and all that entails being part of a fantastic fencing club.

and this really is only the beginning.... their is internet stuff like graphic art pages and webpages and facebook and blogspot and technical stuff for the theater and personal gizmos and gadgets, TYPING for sure.

It is bound to be a busy year... and it's here!