James graduates kindergarten

So, I graduated my first homeschooled kid from kindergarten! I know it's not rocket science but teaching a kid to read and write is no easy task :) Thankfully James is a pretty smart kid and we had a fairly easy year. He wasn't crazy about having to sit down each day and do a little school work but once we got going he was good to go!

My buddy! Words can not express how much I love and adore this handsome boy!!

Excited to be a graduate!

 One graduate down, four to go! John-Mark is ready to wear the cap and gown next year :)

 Agape Kindergarten class of 2013

 Such a great group of kids. We are so blessed to a part of such a special cover school with so many awesome families. I pray my children continue to grow strong friendships within this group. One of the first things I worried about when I felt the Lord leading us to homeschool was "who will my kids be friends with!?!" Oh how the Lord been so faithful and brought so many wonderful homeschooling families into our lives.

 





  During the graduation ceremony the kids recited Psalm 100, sang the continents song and a sweet song called "Guide me in your Truth"

 James and three others sang the Presidents Song

We (meaning I) made a tri-fold board with highlights of his year and some of his work. I made his name sign out of Lego's and he LOVED it :)
Since he was my first kindergartner he was kind of my guinea pig. Also, since he became a big brother for the 4th time in late September the first part of the year was hit and miss but in the end we met all the goals I had set for him to accomplish by the end of kindergarten. Basically we focused on the three R's - reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Highlights from this year:
We used Math-U-See Primer for our math curriculum this year. James mastered shapes, place value, adding single digits and 10's and 100's, skip counting 2's, 5's, and 10's, solving for an unknown, telling time and some basic subtraction.
We used a curriculum called Spell to Write and Read. James learned how to spell, write, and read 240 words this year. He is reading simple readers and can now understand most words I spell to Jeremy when I'm trying to be sneaky!! (Definite down fall to all this learning:) He also memorized all 70 single and double phonograms as well as many of the 28 spelling rules (ex. - 5 reasons we use silent e; when the sound of c and g changes etc).
For handwriting we used pages I printed from several websites. We started the year mastering the writing of numbers and manuscript abc's and at the end of the year we moved to cursive. He has blown me away at how easily he has picked up cursive. He writes cursive much  better than J or I!
We also did Bible through our weekly Community Bible Study and reading our Egermeir's Bible this year.
James went to our local science center once a month and got to do lots of fun science experiments from learning about magnets, measuring, chemistry and more.
You had and "All About Me' paper you had to complete for your graduation. Two of my favorite questions were -
What does God want me to do - Tell people about Jesus
What do you want to be when you grow up - Baseball player (what a surprise:)

 

So thankful for our friends and family that joined us to celebrate James' graduation. Mom-Mom and Papa Steve came down from Huntsville

Papa and Nonni



(Our sweet friends Mrs. Nikki and Zach joined us as well but I totally forgot to grab a picture)

 

I haven't really posted much on the blog about our homeschooling journey. I'm sure I'll be posting more about it in the future since we're about to REALLY be getting in to it with more of the kids getting school age. In a nut shell, several years ago Jeremy and I both started thinking about homeschooling. Not having any friends that homeschooled or knowing any one who had been homeschooled we started praying and researching. Honestly, I NEVER thought I would be a homeschool mom. I think I am a terrible teacher! But God... It's truly amazing how He has worked in me over the past several years to show me what it really means and doesn't mean to homeschool. At first I was thinking of how I needed a laminator and bulletin board :) but God so clearly spoke to me that homeschooling isn't me bringing what I know as "school" in to my home. There are so many different ways for a child to learn and one of the great things about homeschooling is that I can work with each one of my children and find what works best for them. Freedom!! I am sooo thankful that Jeremy has always been on board (really before I even was ready) and excited about homeschooling our kids. I have met several parents where one is really drawn to homeschooling and the other totally isn't. To be honest there are several days that I feel totally inadequate for this job and if wasn't for Jeremy encouraging me and reminding me why we're doing this I would have quit! At this point we feel very strongly that this is what is best for OUR family and we plan to homeschool ALL.THE.WAY - but, you never know what God has in store so we'll keep going down this road until he leads us another way.

 

Dear James -

I am so thankful for you! You make me laugh everyday. This journey of homeschooling that we have begun with you is teaching me as much if not more than it is teaching you. I am so grateful that I GET to be your teacher. Every day hasn't been easy and we've both had our days of frustration and tears for sure but I think we did ok :) There are definitely days that I wonder if I am doing what is best for you and if you wouldn't be better off with some nice young school teacher doing fun crafts with you everyday but the Lord keeps giving me a peace about having you home with me. I can't describe how proud we both are when we work on something and you finally get it!!! That is probably my favorite part. Getting to walk with you every step of the way and watch that brain of yours working hard to figure it out and literally see it click in your eyes and see you be so proud of yourself.

I am beginning to think I may need to get a seminary degree to be able to field all your questions about God. You are definitely a thinker and come up with some great questions that I don't always have an answer for but I pray our conversations are planting seeds in your heart and you are learning what it means to have a relationship with Jesus and all you have and are in Him. As of late you have become very interested in Satan - where he is, why the angel warriors can't kill him, how he works around you etc. I'm rarely prepared for the questions you come up with but try to do my best to use them as opportunities to point you to Jesus and your need for him.

I am so proud of you and the little man you are becoming. I love your joy for life and how much you love all those around you. You are truly such a sweet boy and amazing big brother. You have grown up so much over the last year - it's almost too much for me.  I pray you continue to grow in your understanding of Jesus and your love for him and all those around you. I know God has great plans for you and is going to use you in a mighty way to impact the kingdom for Him. You are the best!!!

Love,

Mommy :)