As a new homeschool mom, I sometimes worry if Adrianna is really learning or not. For our History/Social Studies classes, the work consists mainly of books that I read aloud to her. The history book also has great pictures. While I do try to supplement these with things I find online (coloring sheets, interactive learning websites) and I try to point out the countries on the map we have, there really isn’t a lot of actual “work”, such as worksheets, at the Kindergarten level to help me gauge if Adrianna is retaining any of it or not. It doesn’t help that she is often antsy (as five year olds tend to be) and doesn’t always appear to be paying close attention. (I think she gets some of that from her father.) 🙂
But then Adrianna will recite some fact that we had read about days or weeks before and astonish me. It is so reaffirming and exciting for me. For instance, today we were at Michael’s and we saw some decorations for Saint Patrick’s Day. When I mentioned Saint Patrick’s Day, Adrianna piped up, “Hey, we learned about him in school!” Why, yes we did!
She then proceeded to ask me, “Why did they steal him when he was a boy?” (Referring to Patrick being taken as a boy of 16 from Britain to Ireland to be a slave.)
I was amazed that she remembered that piece of the story, since it was back in October that we’d read the short story about him. That made my day.