We finally started back to school this week, after taking a six-week break following Chickadee’s birth. We started back in much the same way as we ended off before she was born…with just the basics. Religion, math, grammar, history, read-alouds, and reading are all that we accomplished this week. Latin, science, and electives are still on the back burner as we figure out the new normal that is our school now. The good news is, Turkey, Bunny, and Ladybug don’t seem to have forgotten too much following their vacation, so we didn’t have to review a whole lot, and we were even able to dive into some new math concepts this week.

I’m not going to lie–trying to do school with a newborn is harder than I thought, and not for a reason I anticipated. Yes, Chickadee fusses some, but that’s usually easily taken care of. And I have to feed her during school, but I’m a good multi-tasker, and doing that while explaining a math concept or reading aloud is no big deal. The real problem is keeping my students’ attention off their baby sister and on their work! Every noise she makes or smile she gives out is reason, (in their minds), to stop what they’re doing and fawn over her. And I understand that, because I want to fawn, myself. But we need to work on staying focused, if only because life itself is full of distractions, and you can’t always stop what you’re doing every time something shiny comes along…this a great time for a life lesson!

So, that was our week. We did some more state sheets and learned about Samuel Morse in “Adventures in My Father’s World,” We also worked on a new spelling list and practiced putting apostrophes where they belong in contractions. The biggest thing we did this week, though, was working on subtracting and multiplying fractions, which was deemed by Turkey as “fun.” And anytime they think that something valuable they’ve learned is also fun to do, I consider it a successful week!