Successful Day

We had lots of learning fun today. We read as usual. We are trying out Fairy Realm Book 10: The Rainbow Wand by Emily Rodda. I didn't realize that it was a series, but the book seems to stand on it's own. We haven't run into in any confusing materials, yet, that relate to previous books. The children seem to be enjoying it well enough. There's no shouting "Read more! Read more!" But there's no moaning when I pick it up.

Then Casey and I played a math game online. The object is to reveal a picture by answering addition problems. Aria and I played a game, too. In this game, you defeat an alien space ship by answering math problems.

I think my favorite part of both of these games is that the kids and I sat in the chair together. I held Casey and then held Aria while they played. I encouraged and helped them through both of the games. I've been thinking that I wanted to spend more individual time with each of them and I think I may have hit upon something important for us.

I have, in the past, spent more physical time with Casey while he's learning. I've held him in my lap or sat behind him in the chair. I've sent Aria off to blog or play a game. I think that was a mistake. It disconnects me from her learning and allows her to hurry through things just to get them done. I feel that having me there may help to support and comfort them when something is confusing or difficult. Being there, also, shows that I am interested in what they are creating and learning. It says I'm interested in them.

Casey and I worked on another digraph and then he wanted to play with a couple of 'games' on Starfall.com. I like that he chose to play these things. He knew we could have been done after practicing the 'ch' sound, but he then went on to 'ar' and 'ow'. I didn't for an instant mind that we didn't do the worksheet I planned. It's so much better to go where the interest leads then to end a foray into learning prematurely.

Lastly, we did something they both really liked. We created a story with sound effects. Aria typed a fairly lengthy and, slightly, disturbing story. :) I saw her making corrections here and there. Although, her writing was far from perfect, the fact that she was taking notice of any of the grammatical errors is a huge step for her.

I transcribed Casey's story for him and we then took turns reading our stories and pressing the buttons for the sound effects. This is definitely something we will do again. We all thought it was great fun and I think this would be wonderful for those kids who don't like writing. This makes it much more fun. I think I may write one that's funny and see what the kids think.