ready...

(Some images from last week, and some thoughts from this week....)

The final countdown has begun. We start our school year on Tuesday. Tonight I came home as early as I could from my 10-day-work-a-thon to put the finishing touches on our Adventure Circle. I have our first curriculum story lined up, and our first four week block roughed out. I've filled in the gaps in our weekly rhythms and firmed up our daily rhythms. I think I'm as ready for Tuesday as I can be at this point. Which does not mean that I won't have a total panic attack tomorrow night....

This is a first grade year for us. Academically, J is a bit beyond the material being covered. However, comprehension wise, it is exactly where he needs to be, and bringing him stories to support what he already knows (or at least thinks he knows!) about math, reading and science, is only going to further deepen his understanding. Socially, he is very much a starting-first-grader, so the Enki Education First Grade curriculum is an extremely good fit for him. And a bonus is that a lot of the Enki First Grade activities lend themselves very well to supporting the RDI (Relationship Development Intervention) work that we and our Speech Therapist are doing with him -- it's very heavy in "Guided Participation" (one of the key principles in RDI).

Zoo Boy is not really ready for some of the First Grade stuff, but I know that the stories are going to appeal to him, and I also know that it would be a mistake to try to exclude him from the work we're doing with J. So we've decided to take a "lite" approach to the materials with him -- basically, he'll have access to all that we are doing, but will be able to pick and choose what he'd like to participate in. We are keeping our Circle simple and on a Kindergarten level so that it meets him where he is developmentally. And our art and craft activities will also be at a K level, which is where both boys are in regards to those sorts of things.

I've been giving a lot of thought as to exactly what to do to commemorate our first day. The boys will be "officially" receiving some first grade supplies -- they will each get their own set of block and stick crayons, as well as a cloth "case" to hold them in, and a set of "good books" to do their school work in. They will also each get a corduroy "counting bag" in which we will collect items to count (rocks, acorns, etc). We will probably have some sort of special dinner to mark this big day, at which we'll present them with these supplies. I'm not sure we need to do much more than that. They are excited about getting started, and so am I.

I think we're ready...