Tuesday

"Should we turn off the TV?"

"After Elmo's world."

So begins our morning.

Should I be trying to stop all TV in the morning?

We set out a schedule this morning, including: my phone calls, gardening and playing with bugs, cleaning up toys, swimming, 2 homework sessions, cooking supper, visiting a camera store, cuddling, and my paper work. By just after noon, we have finished about half our tasks and have eaten lunch. It might be strange to see my work included on the schedule but Julia seems to like that I have tasks to accomplish. I get to cross off my work and she hers.

It was so hot today. Hotter than usual -- or at least hotter than we've experienced in Wisconsin in June. Julia and I cranked up the air in the car and did our errands. She was great while I asked questions in a camera shop. I am looking for a new camera and right now I am really bogged down trying to figure out what I want in the camera and what is just extravagance, at least for me. I have not seen exactly what I want yet but there is so much out there. I do wish that I could really just put what I want into some search engine and the right camera would just appear. Instead, I am taking recommendations and checking out reiews. Very slow going.

Julia and I did home work twice today, both for about 40 minutes. Julia had to be pursuaded each time we worked and she did waste a bit of time each time. I would like to get up to 45 minutes twice a day of focused work but I am taking it slow. The first work was our usual drill -- letter sounds, rhyming words, and our work books for words and numbers. I decided to make the second work time different. I hope to do science work as the summer wears on. Today, we worked on First, Second, Third, and Last -- words that Julia doesn't really understand. We used Julia's name first -- writing out her whole name, explaining why she has each of her 4 names, labeling the names with First, Second, etc., and figuring out how many letters are in her names. Then, I took four of her plastic insects and put them in a row and I asked her which was First, Second, etc., asking in different ways to get some question and answer work in there. Finally, we read Green Eggs and Ham. Julia finished page 20 tonight and only needed help on a few words. Although I am still working hard on phonics, I think that Julia is learning these words whole.