Bismillah
Asalaamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuhu,
So, we are on the doorstep of our second week of 'official' homeschooling. We made it through the first week, alhamdulillah!
We started with a fixed hourly schedule, painstakingly created to ensure that we were covering the curriculum we are using, as well as leaving space for the necessary settling in after a hectic time away, Qur'an practice, and time to just... be.
I don't think we followed it to the letter even once this week.
And I'm not stressing about it. At all.
I think having daily Qur'an and Arabic with a tutor from 10 to 12 is working well and the Boy is enthusiastic and dedicated, masha Allah. He can see the progress he is making and that makes him want to try harder. May Allah grant him tawfeeq.
Aside from Qur'an hifdh, his main passions at the moment are mastering cursive (which he is now practicing all the time!) and French (he is self-teaching via an app called Duolingo - www.duolingo.com - the same one I am using to learn Spanish). His other passion is football so a lot of time was spent outside, playing with the children who now have their winter break from school. He is also reviewing times tables. His reading is sporadic at the moment so we are building up to a regular reading time. I have decided to go back to reading aloud to the all the children, the older ones and the younger ones (thank you to all the wonderful parents and educators who reminded me of this special way to bond, share values and adventures and explore language!).
The Girl had a very sleepy week. Shame, she is still recovering from all the travel upheaval. Spelling, reading and writing were her lot this week. Introduced the 4 Madams of maths: Little Miss Adding, Little Miss Sadaqah (subtraction), Little Miss Barakah (multiplication) and Little Miss Zakat (division). Hey, Oak Meadow said to make it into a story! So, I hope it makes as much sense to her as it does to me - while introducing Islamic concepts at the same time :) And lots of playing with her little sister, drawing and colouring.
The Islamic buzzword this week was Tawheed ar-Rububiyyah for all three of them. I am still figuring out my wished-for multi-layered approach to teaching my children their deen, encouraging them to know and love their Lord and their Prophet and learning the ways of the believer. I hope to transcend the lecture format and also go beyond the workbook, question and answer method, bi'idhnillah, because Islam is not a school subject, only to be taught and studied and tested; it is a way of life to be LIVED.
Any suggestions welcome!
We celebrated a fairly calm and productive week by being even more social than usual from Wednesday afternoon onwards (you know those homeschoolers have to have their 'socialisation'!): dinner with friends on Tuesday, homeschool playdate and dinner on Wednesday (our Learning Roots floor puzzles were a big hit!), sleepover on Thursday with an epic football group project, Jumu'ah, lunch at a sister's and guests for dinner on Friday. Manic!!
Alhamdulillah, we had a calm day today to round off the weekend. Just a walk to the shops to stock up on stationary supplies, bread and milk, and foraging for seed pods (and getting wet through in the process) and leaves to paint and print with. Then some stories, cutting, sticking, emailing family, cooking and the usual hijinks.
We have OUTINGS planned for this week, alhamdulillah! Will let you know how we go, insha Allah...
May Allah bless all our efforts, ameen!
Na'ima
Links
www.oakmeadow.com
www.learningroots.com
www.duolingo.com
Books read this week
The Silver Swan by Michael Morpurgo - My daughter and I cry when reading this book every time. Beautiful language, gorgeous illustrations and poignant story. I read it to her for a bedtime story, she narrated it back to me the next morning and we did some copywork from pages she chose. And we talked about the sounds of the words, alliteration, repetition, etc, because she has a real ear for language, masha Allah.
Chapter 1 of Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder - read aloud to the boys that were staying over at my house this weekend
Ex Voto by Geraldine McCaughrean in 'War - Stories of Conflict' This seems to have sparked an interest in the Boy in the Crusades and Salahuddin and, since his great citadel is here in Cairo, I am looking at exploring this further with him as part of his History studies. Where's my Book of Centuries when I need it???
The Secret Garden - Ladybird abridged version. The Boy read this one on his own.
Selections from the Oak Meadow story book for Grade 1
Not great but not too bad, eh? Alhamdulillah...
Asalaamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuhu,
So, we are on the doorstep of our second week of 'official' homeschooling. We made it through the first week, alhamdulillah!
We started with a fixed hourly schedule, painstakingly created to ensure that we were covering the curriculum we are using, as well as leaving space for the necessary settling in after a hectic time away, Qur'an practice, and time to just... be.
I don't think we followed it to the letter even once this week.
And I'm not stressing about it. At all.
I think having daily Qur'an and Arabic with a tutor from 10 to 12 is working well and the Boy is enthusiastic and dedicated, masha Allah. He can see the progress he is making and that makes him want to try harder. May Allah grant him tawfeeq.
Aside from Qur'an hifdh, his main passions at the moment are mastering cursive (which he is now practicing all the time!) and French (he is self-teaching via an app called Duolingo - www.duolingo.com - the same one I am using to learn Spanish). His other passion is football so a lot of time was spent outside, playing with the children who now have their winter break from school. He is also reviewing times tables. His reading is sporadic at the moment so we are building up to a regular reading time. I have decided to go back to reading aloud to the all the children, the older ones and the younger ones (thank you to all the wonderful parents and educators who reminded me of this special way to bond, share values and adventures and explore language!).
The Girl had a very sleepy week. Shame, she is still recovering from all the travel upheaval. Spelling, reading and writing were her lot this week. Introduced the 4 Madams of maths: Little Miss Adding, Little Miss Sadaqah (subtraction), Little Miss Barakah (multiplication) and Little Miss Zakat (division). Hey, Oak Meadow said to make it into a story! So, I hope it makes as much sense to her as it does to me - while introducing Islamic concepts at the same time :) And lots of playing with her little sister, drawing and colouring.
The Islamic buzzword this week was Tawheed ar-Rububiyyah for all three of them. I am still figuring out my wished-for multi-layered approach to teaching my children their deen, encouraging them to know and love their Lord and their Prophet and learning the ways of the believer. I hope to transcend the lecture format and also go beyond the workbook, question and answer method, bi'idhnillah, because Islam is not a school subject, only to be taught and studied and tested; it is a way of life to be LIVED.
Any suggestions welcome!
We celebrated a fairly calm and productive week by being even more social than usual from Wednesday afternoon onwards (you know those homeschoolers have to have their 'socialisation'!): dinner with friends on Tuesday, homeschool playdate and dinner on Wednesday (our Learning Roots floor puzzles were a big hit!), sleepover on Thursday with an epic football group project, Jumu'ah, lunch at a sister's and guests for dinner on Friday. Manic!!
Alhamdulillah, we had a calm day today to round off the weekend. Just a walk to the shops to stock up on stationary supplies, bread and milk, and foraging for seed pods (and getting wet through in the process) and leaves to paint and print with. Then some stories, cutting, sticking, emailing family, cooking and the usual hijinks.
We have OUTINGS planned for this week, alhamdulillah! Will let you know how we go, insha Allah...
May Allah bless all our efforts, ameen!
Na'ima
Links
www.oakmeadow.com
www.learningroots.com
www.duolingo.com
Books read this week
The Silver Swan by Michael Morpurgo - My daughter and I cry when reading this book every time. Beautiful language, gorgeous illustrations and poignant story. I read it to her for a bedtime story, she narrated it back to me the next morning and we did some copywork from pages she chose. And we talked about the sounds of the words, alliteration, repetition, etc, because she has a real ear for language, masha Allah.
Chapter 1 of Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder - read aloud to the boys that were staying over at my house this weekend
Ex Voto by Geraldine McCaughrean in 'War - Stories of Conflict' This seems to have sparked an interest in the Boy in the Crusades and Salahuddin and, since his great citadel is here in Cairo, I am looking at exploring this further with him as part of his History studies. Where's my Book of Centuries when I need it???
The Secret Garden - Ladybird abridged version. The Boy read this one on his own.
Selections from the Oak Meadow story book for Grade 1
Not great but not too bad, eh? Alhamdulillah...
Not great??! Sis, may Allah bless your efforts. This is stuff some of us can only dream of. Masha Alllah.
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