It's time to publicly make my biggest education goal for the year: to read 2,013 books to my children. Repeats count, so if I read a favorite many times I'm good. Still, I am going for variety- I would love to have a nice list of 1,000 or more when the year is over. This is a personal goal for me, so I'm not taking attendance for my children to make sure I read that many books to each of my children. My older son needs longer books. I need to read about 5.52 books a day to reach my goal.
I mentioned this goal on BrillKids and a lot of variations for this goal were suggested. You could read 2,013 minutes. Some read 1,500 last year, but they all had to be different books. You could read 20 minutes every day. You could make a goal to max out your library card once a week or once a month. My challenge is to find a goal that will stretch you and go for it.
That's my reading challenge. So far we are on target. I look forward to posting our progress at the end of every month.
Overall, I have found that I am very hesitant to make concrete goals this year. I want to do so many things and I know I won't be able to do all of them, and I'm struggling to decide what would be my best priority. If I fail to plan, I plan to fail, that sort of thing. I need to prioritize. A couple of years ago I realized that I was spreading myself too thin trying to do everything and nothing was getting done, so I dropped everything and focused on teaching my oldest to read. It was wonderful to drop everything else and focus on one vital skill- one that would open doors to others. Now that I've figured out how to teach reading, I've decided to focus on music and math. We got Soft Mozart for Christmas and I want to make sure that I make it work, that we continue to use Little Musician, and that I be consistent with my own products. After the Moshe Kai thread I realized how important math is, so I'm hoping to get my foot in that door too. Specifically I want to help my 5-year-old memorize his basic math facts so we can move on to Saxon 5/4 next year. (Robert Levy said that what a child needs for a prerequisite for that book is to memorize their multiplication, and feel comfortable with two-digit addition and subtraction. Division is covered in the Saxon book.)
But writing is important too, right? (Naturally it is). And it's a perfect time for a second language (Spanish), and there's chess (I found a great program I'll be reviewing soon). I want to teach speed reading. We just bought an awesome geography book we need to dig into. There are scriptures to memorize. Oh, and computer skills like learning to type. Oh, and I want to continue to do all of the other things that have worked for us. My 7-month-old would really benefit from Baby Signing Time. That sort of thing.
My husband pointed out that our kids just scribble when they go to our church's nursery when other kids are actually coloring in the lines. He said with all of my grand goals, I need to not neglect the basics. They need to be able to color. I want to do more activities like the stuff on http://playathomemom3.blogspot.com/. We also haven't done most of the experiments in "The Big Bag of Science" we bought more than a year ago.
So my only measurable goal is to read 2013 books. I probably should set more concrete goals for my kids but I'm not ready to commit yet as I haven't figured out what my priorities are. Mostly I just want to continue to make progress.
Frankly my new years resolutions are more of the "go to bed earlier, wake up earlier", "Keep on top of the dishes" type. That and spending less time on my computer! I'm just a little addicted to facebook, my e-mail inbox, online forums, and that sort of thing. If I spent half as much time teaching my kids as I do reading about how to do it, I would accomplish a lot more in our homeschooling.
Sigh. And it would be nice to have an empty sink now and again.
Happy New Year! Good luck with all of your goals!
I mentioned this goal on BrillKids and a lot of variations for this goal were suggested. You could read 2,013 minutes. Some read 1,500 last year, but they all had to be different books. You could read 20 minutes every day. You could make a goal to max out your library card once a week or once a month. My challenge is to find a goal that will stretch you and go for it.
That's my reading challenge. So far we are on target. I look forward to posting our progress at the end of every month.
Overall, I have found that I am very hesitant to make concrete goals this year. I want to do so many things and I know I won't be able to do all of them, and I'm struggling to decide what would be my best priority. If I fail to plan, I plan to fail, that sort of thing. I need to prioritize. A couple of years ago I realized that I was spreading myself too thin trying to do everything and nothing was getting done, so I dropped everything and focused on teaching my oldest to read. It was wonderful to drop everything else and focus on one vital skill- one that would open doors to others. Now that I've figured out how to teach reading, I've decided to focus on music and math. We got Soft Mozart for Christmas and I want to make sure that I make it work, that we continue to use Little Musician, and that I be consistent with my own products. After the Moshe Kai thread I realized how important math is, so I'm hoping to get my foot in that door too. Specifically I want to help my 5-year-old memorize his basic math facts so we can move on to Saxon 5/4 next year. (Robert Levy said that what a child needs for a prerequisite for that book is to memorize their multiplication, and feel comfortable with two-digit addition and subtraction. Division is covered in the Saxon book.)
But writing is important too, right? (Naturally it is). And it's a perfect time for a second language (Spanish), and there's chess (I found a great program I'll be reviewing soon). I want to teach speed reading. We just bought an awesome geography book we need to dig into. There are scriptures to memorize. Oh, and computer skills like learning to type. Oh, and I want to continue to do all of the other things that have worked for us. My 7-month-old would really benefit from Baby Signing Time. That sort of thing.
My husband pointed out that our kids just scribble when they go to our church's nursery when other kids are actually coloring in the lines. He said with all of my grand goals, I need to not neglect the basics. They need to be able to color. I want to do more activities like the stuff on http://playathomemom3.blogspot.com/. We also haven't done most of the experiments in "The Big Bag of Science" we bought more than a year ago.
So my only measurable goal is to read 2013 books. I probably should set more concrete goals for my kids but I'm not ready to commit yet as I haven't figured out what my priorities are. Mostly I just want to continue to make progress.
Frankly my new years resolutions are more of the "go to bed earlier, wake up earlier", "Keep on top of the dishes" type. That and spending less time on my computer! I'm just a little addicted to facebook, my e-mail inbox, online forums, and that sort of thing. If I spent half as much time teaching my kids as I do reading about how to do it, I would accomplish a lot more in our homeschooling.
Sigh. And it would be nice to have an empty sink now and again.
Happy New Year! Good luck with all of your goals!
1 comment:
Really love this! I feel you on spreading myself too thinly, and consistently keeping on top of the basics is a challenging resolution in itself for me (ah for a shiny sink). But I guess slow progress is better than none, and giving that we're early educators there's time to build on a good foundation. Thanks for sharing!
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