Study Island and Day Two

There is a neat little assessment tool which we became familiar (and a little obsessed) with today. It is called Study Island. We all enjoyed it, and the children's scores were as follows:

R

Pretest, reading:
Score: 100%

Phoenemic awareness, word recognition, and fluency (word sounds):
Goal: 68%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

Acquisition of vocabulary; context clues:
Goal: 67%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

Pretest, math:
Score: 100%

Number, number sense, and operations:
a. Place value
Goal: 70%
Score: 90.9% (Ad) Advanced

b. Compare and order whole numbers
Goal: 70%
Score: 90.9%

c. Odd and even numbers
Goal: 70%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

d. Money
Goal: 70%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

G

Math: Numbers, operations, and quantitative reasoning

a. Counting objects up to 20
Goal: 70%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

b. Comparing Numbers
Goal: 70%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

c. Ordering
Goal: 70%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

d. Dividing in Half
Goal: 70%
Score: 100% (Ad) Advanced

This was actually a bit of fun that helped us all unwind a bit from what started as a somewhat stressful day. The OLS (online school) was suffering from some technical problems, and we (as well as many other K12 families) were suffering right along with it. I found myself thanking my lucky stars that I printed out my lesson plans for the day bright and early this morning before the birds even started chirping. I will make it a general plan from now on to print all lesson plans the night before, just to be extra safe.

Though I was admittedly stressed out, since I tend to prefer things super organized and highly predictable and because I could not access all of the information and was forced to miss out on a really cool connection opportunity with one of our virtual academy teachers, we managed to keep busy and even have fun with our offline studies until the technical issues were ironed out. Even on a stressful day, I still love this experience and felt us finding a bit of a groove today as we worked. I would even go so far as to say the technical issues were a bit of a blessing in disguise because it showed me we work well under pressure and the flexibility of the curriculum is a major benefit for many reasons.


I am witnessing myself some of the things that R's teacher told me last year about her strengths (most places) and the areas where she needs a bit of encouragement (focusing on the details instead of skimming, and counting money). It is a different perspective. It's one thing to hear it and know it, and another entirely to witness it and work with it. And, pleasantly, I am surprised how well R and I work as a team. My concerns are quickly fading, our collective enjoyment of the experience is already growing, and I am feeling truly blessed and incredibly fortunate to have the opportunity to witness and be a part of my children's learning experience. Honestly, it almost feels too good to be true.

Today, we enjoyed Math and Language Arts, as we will every day. My only problem there is getting Little G to pace himself. We really need to move ahead for his sake, because he had three days worth of lessons completed in the five minutes - no kidding that it took me to set R up with her words list and book for her Language Arts lesson. I mean, he was done, and everything was correct. I think he could complete that entire math book in a day's time and not miss a beat. Fortunately, he cuts things very slowly, so I set him to work on making a shapes puppet. To quench his mathematical thirst for knowledge, we studied only Math in Study Island. He loved it. Eventually, his 5 year-old attention span won, daddy came home, and the two of them enjoyed a game of chess together.

Did I mention how much I love this? Because I do.

My precious R did a self portrait today as part of her Art curriculum, and I have to tell you I am still in awe of it. She is an artist. She comes by it honestly; her grandma Josephine and cousin Josie are also very creative and talented artists.

We didn't get to music today, but since we put in extra time on most of our other subjects, the plan is to have a lot of fun tomorrow with that.

Today I made a call to the transportation department to let them know that my children will not be attending the local elementary school and thus not taking the bus, so we should not have a repeat of the bus stopping and beeping like it did this morning. I will not miss that, though I do have to admit that I enjoyed watching it drive away with absolutely zero anxiety about the fact that we were not curbside, dressed, backpacked, and ready to leave for 8 hours. I relished making breakfast in our own time, doing school in pajamas again (because we can!), and inviting Sticky and a few bears to join us for our lessons. The big yellow bus, once so anticipated with innocent smiles and hopes and dreams, lost much of its appeal by the end of Kindergarten for my sweet R. I hated that. But the smiles are returning now instead of fading, and there is nothing in this world that could ever mean as much to me as knowing my children (and husband) are happy.