Legos in the workboxes

Lego and Family Fun have these great little sets of building instructions (they are free downloads). I've added them to Agent H's workboxes a few times with great results.

Agent H Stitching

Agent H has been watching me stitch LE Babe's baby blanket and got up the nerve to ask "Mom, can boys stitch?" You bet! I gave him some muslin, a hoop, a threaded needle and he went to work stitching his initials. It made a nice workbox filler.

That Quiz

I just found a nifty website that has quick online quizes (they seem to be mostly mathematical) for your children to see how well they grasp a subject. I tried out the telling time and shapes one. Quick, easy and you get your results right away. I can see this being an activity on the schedule strip. Here it is: That Quiz.

Day 1 Workboxes, how it really went

So my official 1st day of school post is done. Now I can post the "behind the scenes" details. :)

Agent H:
It took FOREVER to get Agent H in the groove of his first workbox. He was distracted by what I was doing with Ebug (we were deep in discussion about cows since they are our weekly theme), restless in his chair, and had 50 questions.

However, once he saw that Ebug was flying through his workboxes and had already reached the "snack" spot on his schedule strip he was motivated.

That said, once we finished the first workbox (which were coloring pages "All About Me" to be made into a book) and he put it in the "done" pile, I think the light bulb went off and he realized how this system works. He raced through his next workboxes.

It was lots of fun for me to hand him the timer and say "go ride your bike out front for 10 minutes". This is a fairly new priviledge for him to go out front by himself so he loved this! When he came in, he went directly to his desk and picked out the next bin without even being told. He says that this was his favorite thing on his schedule strip.

Ebug:

He and I started our school day. We went to his little table and talked, read, colored, and pretended to be cows. Then I had three bins set up for him which he proceeded to finish in about 30 seconds. I think I had to refill his bins twice. I'll be picking him up some more bins to fill. Ebug's favorite part of the day? Working on cows with me. Sigh, music to my heart.

A huge help was that my mother's helper (a very nice girl from our homeschool co-op who comes to help out once a week) came today and was able to help me balance the workload between the boys. Thankfully, LE Babe slept through it all.

First day of school '09-'10

We've started our new school year! This week is a review week for Agent H and the beginning of Ebug's preschool program. I decided we'd use Sue Patrick's Workbox system for our schooling method. There have been some great reviews on what it is so I'll just direct you to them for more information. Click these titles to view their posts: 1+1+1=1, Joyful Mother of Six Children.

In the morning the boys complete their chore charts then I hand them their ID cards so they can go "clock-in" to school and grab their schedule strips.














Agent H's (1st grade, age 6) Curriculum: HOD's Beyond Little Hands for his Glory, Hooked on Phonics, Handwriting Without Tears, and Singapore Math.

This is Ebug's work area. With him (Preschool, age 3) we are using Letter of the Week and Totally Tot's ABC lessons based on Chicka Chicka Boom.

I did some rearranging and made this reading/audio story listening area.

I love that this system inspires the kids to be in charge of completing their schedule. They see what "good stuff" is coming up so they are inspired to move through work they may not enjoy as much. I also like that I am able to do extra activities that I normally wouldn't have planned or thought we had time to do (cool educational games, magic science, file folder games, etc). Time will tell how this system works for us but there appear to be hords of homeschooling families out there in the blog-o-sphere loving it.